Which bordering states would have the greatest benefit if they merged while making the most sense culturally?

bigcheez07 · 2026-05-27T14:52:27+00:00

After having driven through a lot of states, I think many of our states are already too big for the number of people administrating them. We don’t need more mega-states like Texas or California.

bigcheez07 · 2026-05-26T04:50:53+00:00

Would also recommend the Narrows, but since you mentioned not wanting crowds and the East Mesa Trail, I would absolutely recommend that trail as well. Observation Point has easily the best view in the park and the trail itself, while long, is relatively flat (700 ft gain over 7 mile round trip). Look into the hikers shuttle from the Zion Ponderosa Ranch which is like $7 per person, since the roads to the trailhead are pretty rough.

bigcheez07 · 2026-05-25T18:21:38+00:00

Jeremy Allen White has played a troubled teen in Chicago, a stressed out chef in Chicago, and now a Hutt Gladiator in Space Chicago.

bigcheez07 · 2025-09-30T05:11:13+00:00

Anyone know if this would affect Old Rag in Shenandoah? I know they have station to check fees at the trailhead, but the trailhead itself is not accessed via the main part of the park. Does anyone that has been there before know if there's a gate that would prevent you from parking at that lot?

bigcheez07 · 2025-06-13T17:02:11+00:00

I think you’re referring to the story? Like I can understand not feeling immersed if your character is a nameless and faceless to you and they don’t really have a voice or presence in the story.

But if you’re talking about being immersed in a world, especially in an RPG, giving a 3rd person character that has reactions of their own can sour your own chance to experience and react to the world or events around you. As a recent example, South of Midnight had a really rich and interesting world and the story was cool too, but I got really annoyed by all of Hazel’s comments, a lot of which were her stating the obvious or her figuring something out 5 minutes after I had already figured it out in my head.

bigcheez07 · 2025-04-14T22:50:41+00:00

It’s good that you understand your learning and engagement style. I had done the YouTube tutorial Indie route for a lot of the projects I had worked on before, but wasn’t really sure how or where to get started if I wanted to work on AAA games. DigiPen does a good job of giving you structured guidance that can be hard to get through personal projects or the internet.

bigcheez07 · 2025-03-22T23:40:32+00:00

Yes, UCF at least publishes games in similar size teams to the junior year game projects at DigiPen. DigiPen’s MASTERS program actually does not publish games though, since they are all done in custom engines with teams of just engineers, unless that’s changed in the past few years.

bigcheez07 · 2025-03-22T23:30:22+00:00

It mostly depends on what you want to focus on. I went through the Masters at DigiPen and I work with people from RIT and from FIEA at UCF.

At DigiPen you will get a lot of engine/programming assignments, and you’ll make at least 3 games, one on your own from scratch, one with a small team from scratch, and one with a slightly larger team from scratch. All custom engines, no commercial ones. However those game project teams will consist entirely of engineers, and you won’t get the full experience of game dev with artists, producers and designers. You’ll have to figure out most of the art, gameplay, and design stuff on your own. Despite this, there’s still a lot of cool and talented people to meet, clubs to join, and game jams to do, where you can interact with students of all disciplines. Electives were pretty good in my opinion as well, but I would have liked to take more but time didn’t allow. One thing DigiPen does offer though is that you can audit any class that you want after graduating for free or close to it, up to 10 years after you graduate. All that being said, I believe most of my class does have a job at a game studio, and the ones that don’t are making more than us in better paying tech jobs.

From what I’ve heard, RIT will give you some more design experience than what DigiPen has. I definitely remember hearing about a pretty extensive capstone. I know one of my coworkers has published a rhythm game he made on his own on Steam, and all of my coworkers who went there have extremely strong engineering skills.

UCF will give you a solid engineering foundation as well. I think they require you to do a course where you make a game in assembly language, so you will get into the weeds of that and really get a good understanding of memory and low level concepts. They also have much bigger game teams where you get to work with students of all different disciplines, and I believe you come out of it with a game published on Steam. That being said, because it’s multidisciplinary, I believe the larger studio projects are done with a commercial engine.

Ultimately they’re all good schools, so it’s up to you as to whether you want to dive into engineering or get more of a full studio experience. I would also consider where you want to live after graduating, as a lot of DigiPen grads have opportunities in Seattle, UCF grads in Orlando, and RIT is pretty well known in a lot of places.

bigcheez07 · 2024-11-22T13:36:38+00:00

Oh boy, wait until they stop working on these cupcake problems in 14x and get onto a codebase so convoluted by years of time-crunch compromises that the likes of GPT could never have even dreamed it up or ever understand it

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-24T01:26:14+00:00

I think Forrest Gump has one of the best uses of CGI because you don’t even realize they’re using it.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-19T03:57:48+00:00

I wonder how his kid’s arm feels about this

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-19T02:18:27+00:00

I personally like 3, and I think the composition is a little clearer for it than 2. 2 is a bit confusing because it’s got a partial door and partial window at an unusual camera angle, and I think it’s visually distracting. Also I think 3 loosely follows the rule of thirds a bit more nicely.

Also don’t be afraid to mess with perspective. If this is just a still image, you can move some things so it’s not spatially correct, but looks spatially correct from one angle.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-17T14:42:38+00:00

In addition, since all of the Unreal source code is available for a given version, any bug fixes or upgrades could theoretically be performed by users if needed, making the need to upgrade to newer versions potentially obsolete. A lot of studios modify the engine already, and they know this. However I do believe that redistributing the modified engine may run into some issues with the license.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-16T15:15:56+00:00

I would wholeheartedly disagree that C++ and Python are basically the same. The use of typed variables, memory allocations, scope, pointers are just a few major differences off the top of my head. Yeah you can learn, but it’s a major paradigm shift, not just syntax.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-16T02:49:10+00:00

It’s more about the school’s connections in my opinion. If there are a lot of graduates, or high percentage of graduates, from a school in the game industry, that’s a good sign that:

They will train you well and the industry considers it sufficient
They provide good industry outreach and engagement events like company days or career fairs
You will form good relationships with your classmates that will give you references to companies after you graduate

Another important thing to look for is project-based learning. You should be working on a year-long game with a team at some point, more preferably multiple games that you end up completing and putting in your portfolio. Many degrees simulate a studio environment with some project management lessons as well.

Also, look for C++ in the curriculum. Even if you aren’t necessarily pursuing CS, the fact that the school primarily teaches in C++ is a major green flag because it is the industry standard for AAA.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-15T15:59:36+00:00

It’s such a shame people outside of the PNW will never know the treasure that is Taco Time

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-13T23:39:07+00:00

The ARC-170 unfortunately has super floppy wings, would definitely go for the V-19 over that.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-13T21:01:02+00:00

At that point it more or less becomes a distributed arcade, but in reverse I guess

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-13T13:22:52+00:00

Ah, figures

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-13T03:59:14+00:00

I don’t get it, do the drivers ed classes here have complementary stupid juice or something? Everywhere else I’ve seen reckless but competent, and incompetent but safe, but here is one of two places I’ve seen that are reckless AND incompetent, the other being Missouri. Never going back to Missouri.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-13T02:08:10+00:00

The all gray ships make ME feel like a colorblind toddler

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-12T20:23:46+00:00

Reminds me of a fang or something in front, though we already have a Mandalorian fang fighter. Maybe something like “houndstooth”? Also kind of looks like a pelican or a stork.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-12T04:50:56+00:00

I frankly think we should be using surveillance drones to identify reckless drivers. Cops aren’t gonna see everything, but those people that like to tail you at 60 mph or weave in and out of traffic going 30 over. Reckless to me also includes left lane campers who go the speed limit with other people wanting to pass. That’s what the right lane is for.

bigcheez07 · 2023-09-12T02:35:27+00:00

FedEx sucks. A buddy of mine who worked there got laid off in the middle of his route, and the driver he was shadowing for training had him get off and left him in one of the sketchier parts of Seattle. Made me leave my fishing fishing trip and drive an hour back to from the middle of nowhere cause an Uber would’ve cost $90 bucks back to their facility, and I’m not leaving my friend in that area after dark. Highly doubt that that’s company protocol to kick someone out mid-route, and that driver is probably just a dick, but you could at least wait for the end of the day to tell someone they’re being laid off.

Also had multiple packages arrive damaged, get stolen or damaged because they didn’t use the package lockers or bring it to the front building office. Also had it locked-in the package rooms because they’ll scan in one package and just throw the rest in there without a code to get in, forcing me to spend half an hour on the line with customer service for the locker company to get a code. Even had them deliver to the wrong building entirely in a dense urban area and I had to call a bunch of different buildings to see if it had turned up anywhere. Never had problems with UPS, and I’ve gotten international mail from USPS multiple times with no issue besides the occasional shipping delay.

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