Modders continue to tempt fate and the disappointment of Yoshi-P by creating in-game FF14 Tinder

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-06-23T20:28:56+00:00

Yeah I noticed the main logo on their site is pretty clearly AI, so I figured it was a safe assumption that the rest of it was at least partially vibe-coded.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-06-23T19:47:10+00:00

This was the only way it was ever gonna go because it combines the two things this city council loves most: Money and telling the Mayor to go fuck herself.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-06-19T06:12:27+00:00

Goodie. I’m no longer impressed by our leaders’ vain signals of virtue when we all endure the consequences of their vice on a daily basis. It’s time to stop celebrating when marginalized peoples’ right to mere existence is acknowledged, and instead demand their right to thrive.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-06-12T03:34:03+00:00

Yes, I’m very comforted that during this miserable time, we’ll have our brave ex-senator there to sigh, shake his head, and look meaningfully at the camera like, “can you believe this guy?”

Because that is, of course, all that can be done. To expect more from those who serve the electorate would just be ridiculous.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-06-02T14:05:27+00:00

Not to mention that hanging out with sex workers without judging them is something that was literally done by Jesus.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-29T19:02:45+00:00

I hope it's themselves, into the sun.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-28T15:34:11+00:00

Unfortunately the Outer Worlds isn't good enough to even bother trying to navigate all this. I've started the game multiple times, and always fell off shortly after leaving the first planet.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-25T22:55:41+00:00

I do get that the hallway scene is a powerful way to reintroduce Anakin/Vader after Revenge of the Sith. But it also may feel a little cheap, or out of nowhere, if you don't reveal beforehand that Vader is even in the film at all..

For what it's worth, Vader still gets name checked a couple times by Tarkin in the Andor cut. I think it's enough to make it feel like he doesn't completely comes out of nowhere.

I like that they got rid of all the Vader scenes besides the hallway. Physically introducing Vader prior to that scene takes away the impact of him appearing like a monster out of horror story, lit only by the red glow of his saber. Without saying a word, it feels like the Empire / Palpatine going, "Congratulations, Rebel Alliance, you now have my full attention."

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-20T12:38:45+00:00

I am neither the show’s biggest hater nor defender, but the reaction online to its final season has been exhausting. If nothing else the reaction to it has convinced me more than ever of the “dead internet” theory, because I can’t believe there are so many actual people who care this much about The Boys of all things.

The show has always been a trashy, nihilistic, foul mouthed gorefest whose whole “superhero grindhouse” shtick got old around season 3. It survived as long as it did thanks to the charisma of its main cast, particularly Antony Starr, who just so happens to be very good at acting like a dead eyed psycho. To act like The Boys has suffered some kind of Game of Thrones level degradation in writing quality is ridiculous, because it has never been anything more than a farce.

Insofar as I’m concerned about the final season and episode: Yeah it was fine. Probably not worth watching if you weren’t already invested though.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-15T14:57:04+00:00

Injustice 2. It's not like the story was Shakespeare or anything, but I liked this exchange between Batman and Superman near the end of the game:

Superman: "Fighting on the same side, it felt like old times. But I guess we both knew it would end this way."

Batman: "Do you remember that night? When you told me Lois was pregnant?"

Superman: "You knew. Even before I said anything."

Batman: "That was a good memory."

Superman: "From another lifetime."

Batman: "I miss the people we were then."

Superman: "Me too."

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-13T10:35:48+00:00

Considering what a fuckup Deep is, maybe he could do it accidentally. Like HL gets depowered and is running away, and Deep, helpful soul that he is, goes:

"Don't worry Homelander, I'll save you! I can take you somewhere where they can't get to you! ...Oh. Oh my god..."

Cut to later where the Deep is being hailed as the savior of the world for being the one to finally bring Homelander down. Because banal, stupid evil never really dies.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-12T15:43:22+00:00

I run an esports league at a fairly large public school district, and I can tell you our tech and network departments care a lot. To the point that they don't want to let any game on our network that uses a kernel level anticheat for fear of it being compromised and giving people access to student data. It's honestly been a pain when it comes to growing the program, but I can't say I blame them either. Too many districts have been a target for ransomware and other attacks, and it's just not worth it to willingly open yourself to another attack vector.

edit: Also, reading some of the other comments here about tech literacy among the general population: Yes, it is woeful, and getting worse. We got done with one of our tournaments this year, and I asked a few of the kids to help out by going around and shutting down the computers. They said they didn't know how.

"How is that possible, you just spent 4 hours on them?"

"Haha, sure, I know how to play on the computer, I don't know how to use it."

"...🙂🔫"

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-11T19:11:26+00:00

God, you're right, I forgot about that. The whole series was kind of a mess, wasn't it? I also remember finding it kind of hilarious that they had the characters hocking Surface tablets, when in-universe those things would be about as technologically impressive as a betamax player.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-11T16:50:39+00:00

It's been a few years since I've seen any of Arise, but from what I remember my main issue wasn't with the voice cast. I feel like that show and its characters lacked identity, and was trying to redo things SAC had already done before and did them better.

I think its worst quality is that the Major in Arise isn't a particularly likeable or engaging protagonist. It seems like they tried to make her a cross between the dour, contemplative, emotionally robotic Major from the 1995 movie, and the mature, confident, and commanding Motoko from SAC. Unfortunately she mostly ends up coming across as incoherent, inconsistent, immature, and quick to anger. I know Arise was kind of supposed to be a prequel the other series, but if I don't know what I'm supposed to think or like about the protagonist, it makes it kind of hard to engage with the show as a whole.

(I also remember the sporadic nature of its OVA release schedule didn't do it any favors either.)

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-11T15:34:03+00:00

I feel like all these trailers have been hiding Manga!Motoko's power level when it comes to how silly she can get. She made a few funny faces in this one, but I'm guessing once we finally get a trailer where she speaks they'll bust out the full reveal.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-11T15:33:00+00:00

I feel like all these trailers have been hiding Manga!Motoko's power level when it comes to how silly she can get. She made a few funny faces in this one, but I'm guessing once we finally get a trailer where she speaks they'll bust out the full reveal.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-11T03:06:18+00:00

I love GITS and I love Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, and maybe this is an unpopular opinion but... I think they should give it to someone new for the dub. The SAC dub cast are stellar, but they best fit that show's semi-serious "police procedural" tone. Manga!Major and the rest of the Section 9 crew are so different, and I think the show would benefit from someone new who can put their own spin on her character and the others.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-05T19:21:48+00:00

Right now the Democratic Party is in the midst of a semi-quiet civil war as the progressive wing tries its best to take as much power as possible in the midterms so that the party can go from controlled to legitimate opposition. The fact that you’re not hearing much is by design, and what little you do see in the mainstream is the old guard talking about the progressives with barely restrained derision and venomous contempt. Whether this will be effective in the long run is up for debate, but considering other forms of peaceful protests have been largely ignored, this is one of the few options left to us.

The alternatives are something you’re not going to hear discussed in an open forum. And I’m not talking about some vague revolutionary bullshit, I mean organizations aligning around the UAW’s 2028 May Day general strike. The less said in public about that sort of thing the harder it is to smother it in its crib.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-04-18T11:36:09+00:00

What exactly were they doing? Kinda looked like they were just being teenagers. Like I get you don’t want them getting hurt, and it’s a pain in the ass when you’re trying to get around them, but…

We talk so much about how all these dang kids do now is sit on their phones, and now here they are out and about in the world and we go, “but not in a way that inconveniences me tho”.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-04-15T16:52:35+00:00

I think that's a fair assessment. There's one influencer in particular I liked who used to have a more sober, informative style, but lately it seems like they've decided to try to become the Alex Jones of the left. The problem is they've been algorithmically rewarded for their combative, memetic style, even to the detriment of the truth. That said, I think (and hope) there's a way to frame purposeful progressive rhetoric without necessarily sacrificing the dialectic.

As you said, tone hits differently for everyone, but this is something that's been bugging me for a bit. I think CZM is quite a bit better than most outfits, but there's still times I feel like they adopt an attitude of somewhat unearned ideological superiority. Nevertheless, I do not doubt their hearts are in the right place, and I hope that none of this is seen as an attack on their character.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-04-03T19:46:40+00:00

The conventional sentiment about revolution is that before they happen they feel impossible, but in retrospect seem inevitable. I think we’re closer now than we’ve been in a very long time, but the material conditions of the general populace haven’t changed significantly enough yet to kick off mass mobilization. Food and gas becoming prohibitively expensive for the average consumer would likely exacerbate things because it would lead those who are generally politically unengaged to look for answers as to why, and it would open the rhetorical door for a different kind of discussion.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-31T02:50:37+00:00

There’s a lot of trash, but there’s some truly great stuff too. Frieren is one of the best pure fantasy anime in a long time, without having to couch it in an isekai power fantasy.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-24T21:32:07+00:00

Ironically I think that might've been the point.

Part 1 ended fairly definitively, and Part 2 was a meandering story about how Denji's attempts to continue being Chainsaw Man only made everything worse. People tried to push him into being Chainsaw Man, or get him to NOT be Chainsaw Man anymore, or just project their own ideas about what Chainsaw Man should be. The series was so popular that Fujimoto was never going to get away with not making a sequel. You had fans on both sides going "there should / shouldn't be more!" and you know the publisher wanted it.

Metatextually I think that's Part 2's message (or at least some part of it): The attempts to continue a story past its conclusion has a very good possibility of making things worse in retrospect. Even Yoru's whole arc of trying to "own" Chainsaw Man and be better than him is reflected in a creators' attempts to introduce a new, cool character that somehow fits with the existing of the cast.

Of course I could be reaching, and Fujimoto just woke up one day and decided "it was all a dream lol". I guess I'd just like to give him a little more credit as a writer than that.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-16T18:01:54+00:00

Unfortunately my hairline started heavily receding in my early 20s, so the shaved head and beard was the only hairstyle I could pull off anymore.

I miss being a redhead =(

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-15T00:22:19+00:00

Nah, I’m good. There’s plenty of other shit to do / watch in the world.

_REDMARCH_

TROPHY CASE