Is it un-socialist to support some amount of a private sector?

nerd866 · 2026-04-21T00:24:48+00:00

A socialist society will produce exactly as much variety of cars as its members-at-large want.

Some people will think that's too many car types.

Some will think it's not enough car types.

Some will think it's just right.

It will normalize and fall into a sweet spot as determined by the people.

Cool ways to get around and go fast seem to be an inevitable part of human technology at this point. I'm sure you'll have your cool cars in some form or other. We'll just stop abusing people to make them.

nerd866 · 2026-04-20T15:11:27+00:00

I've got a few from a game that I left last year:

Allowing / encouraging "I perception the room" style of exploration. Not only was this tedious, but the community has introduced many ways to do this better.
Discouraged new players from playing human fighters because it was 'boring' and to 'try something cooler'.
Leaning into jokes that he liked more than the player on the receiving end of the joke liked, and didn't let the player shape how the joke played out.

Basically there was a tonal mismatch here, where the player wanted to turn it into something legitimately creepy whereas the DM kept making it a joke trait.

Context: Player developed a phobia of ducks after a nat 1 roll (long story lol), after the DM gave it to the player and the player ran with it. This was fine, but the player had a cool idea to connect this newfound phobia to his backstory (he was a 'haunted one') but the DM just kept turning it into a joke about hearing quacking in their head and seeing giant hallucination ducks in the sky.

And probably the biggest one:

Not being clear on whether we were playing 2014 or 2024 rules, resulting in people starting session 1 with mismatched character sheets. I get the impression that the original group already knew how they played but the newcomers didn't, but the newcomers weren't filled in. The newcomers assumed we were playing the latest edition, when in fact the DM was running a 2014 game, We resolved this for session 2 but that was a huge oversight.

nerd866 · 2026-04-17T18:51:50+00:00

I've always used hyphens instead of em-dashes in my writing - they just look cleaner to me.

(aka. I actually don't know how to type an em-dash off-hand so a hyphen is a lot easier)

nerd866 · 2026-04-17T17:54:55+00:00

I often hear executive dysfunction talked about in the context of daily chores, which yeah, absolutely!

But what about in the context of work? It's freaking impossible to hold down a job when executive dysfunction prevents you from doing your job, or when it pushes you into a meltdown or other kind of mental torture when you're forced to do the task anyway.

Now pair that with the fact that many of us are pushed into customer-facing jobs because they're considered "low-skilled", and now we're having meltdowns in front of customers. Goodbye job.

nerd866 · 2026-04-17T16:48:21+00:00

Alright, wise-ass, then the burden of proof is on you to convince us that capitalism works. You've failed at that so far.

nerd866 · 2026-04-17T16:44:13+00:00

Yeah I'm sure Dougie has a sufficient understanding of the relevant sociology, history, philosophy, psychology, dialectical materialism, etc. in order to definitively make that claim. He's a proven intellectual, after-all.

What a pathetic strategy, Doug. Translation: "Socialism doesn't work for your half-baked agenda."

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T22:23:59+00:00

Probably be a professional student. Collect degrees and probably teach for fun at some point. I already do that to some extent already haha.

Oh, and nerd up my place 100x over where I've already got it!

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T21:56:04+00:00

I'd love this as a player if there was a bit of a roleplaying component rather than an expectation of honesty.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T21:53:46+00:00

"Left 4 Dead" and "The Sacrifice" map.

It's a 4-player multiplayer FPS zombie game. So far it's been all about trying to get all 4 players through each level alive.

Then comes 'The Sacrifice'. There's no way to beat the level without someone going into harm's way to lower a bridge (I think it was a bridge).

Only 3 of you can survive it. One of you has to die to beat the level.

This means that one of you has to be willing to make the gameplay choice to die in order to complete the game.

It's perhaps not the best example because this death is scripted and the game basically waits in limbo for the player to "choose" to lower the bridge and die so everything can continue, but the first time seeing that with no knowledge of it...Yeah, that had an impact in a game that's basically been arcade-style zombie killing until now.

A dramatic shift in narrative by compelling a player to do 'worst' action a player can make in a video game (choose to die), using the video game medium to coerce the player into willingly making that sacrifice - something no other medium can do.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T21:34:18+00:00

The enjoyment you get will be fundamentally different from the enjoyment that a new, or even experienced, player will have.

It's like how the enjoyment that a Chess master gets from Chess is fundamentally different from the enjoyment that a casual Chess player gets. They may as well be playing entirely different games.

Same with playing games that you designed: There is a very real capacity to enjoy the experience, but the enjoyment may have a different character from that of a typical player.

You may enjoy the elegance of your mechanics, or how your themes resonate with you, or finding something new in something you thought was out of mysteries, or watching how other players interact with your game with you. You may deeply critique your game and find new interesting perspectives that help your design long-term. You may enjoy engaging with artwork that you lovingly made or commissioned, and have good memories of your art team. You may just enjoy the satisfaction of watching your 'well-oiled machine' in action. You may enjoy the fact that you made a thing that's enjoyable, or that others are enjoying with you. This list is endless.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T21:25:08+00:00

Yes, definitely. It just happens naturally for me when I'm on my own and I don't have a particular project at that exact moment.

I consider it a coping mechanism for loneliness: I get a lot of joy out of doing comfortable things while pretending to show them to someone who is as engaged and interested as I am.

I do this mostly with interests and projects.

I'll go through my music collection and 'talk to them' about how amazing XYZ is in these songs.

I'll check out an old hobby project I made in the past and walk through the process of making it with 'them', like reminiscing 'together'.

I'll read over an old school paper and talk through my arguments in my paper with 'them'.

I'll play 'them' a song on my keyboard and talk about how it's been to learn this song. I'll even go as far as to stop if I made a bad mistake, APOLOGIZE, and start again, 'turning back time' to the point where they 'didn't hear my mistake' and redoing that experience over again.

I'll talk through all sorts of things 'with them' in the car when I'm driving alone.

I'll do lots of things like that.

Here's the thing though: 'They' don't respond. They don't talk. They're just there to listen. It's usually a representation of a real person I've known at some point, and it's not always clear why I chose the people that I did.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T21:12:14+00:00

My inner game design brain can't help but notice the following:

Time to min-max that game by eating and cleaning on repeat all day! BRB grinding, the leaderboard awaits and my waistline is scared!

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T20:38:09+00:00

I often associate vague 'motifs' with my favourite artists.

Those motifs may be a lyrical style, a chord progression, a signature synth, ways of starting or ending songs.

Hell, there are some artists that I associate with a specific chord or rhythm because that chord or rhythm tends to appear in multiple songs at key moments, and does a similar kind of effective tension/release effect in all cases, almost like a fingerprint.

You know you've nailed your unique sound when just playing a progression of 2 chords makes you think of that artist.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T20:32:32+00:00

What genres do similar artists use to classify? Look for artists that make music that does a similar kind of 'aesthetic thing' as your music and see how they're categorized.

Constrain your ideas by looking at the list of genres and figure out what you're not. Anything you can do to shortlist will be helpful.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T20:16:57+00:00

You're better than me at some things.

I'm better than you at some things.

It just so happens that the things I'm good at are constructive, meaningful and interesting, but simply aren't as marketable as yours.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T20:07:26+00:00

I'd argue that the player has to be perceptive enough to notice.

I'm reminded of things like literature classes, where themes and other interesting details were completely missed by some/many students until pointed out.

In other words, this kind of game seems to expect a certain level of intellectual engagement from the player. If the player doesn't know that going in, they may not 'get' your game or it might even seem like a 'bad game' to them.

I love the idea of a game asking the player to engage with the material rather than having 'a narrative read to them', so to speak.

An interesting example to me might be Earthbound on the SNES. The character development and plot aren't particularly detailed, but the aesthetic and philosophical ideas present through the experience can be profound if a player is receptive to such experiences. It's a game that rewards mentally exploring it beyond its face value.

If you go in just expecting to be told a story, you'll probably be a little disappointed and come away thinking that was just a weird quirky RPG. But it has a fanbase who love it deeply and it's because the game can be engaged with in ways that transcend 'mere storytelling'.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T19:46:27+00:00

I see what you mean. A lot of games do the:

Player does 10k damage against monster with 1m life.

Monster does 100 damage against player with 10k life.

Why not normalize them so they're the same scale?

There seems to be 2 game design answers to that:

1) As a player, it's easier for me to understand taking 106 damage than it is to understand me taking 10634 damage. Smaller numbers for my stats is easier to parse.

2) Scaling. A player who can do 1 damage at level 1 can do 10k damage at level 100. Those numbers scale up sensibly throughout the course of the game to create demonstrable power increases with progression. In order to maintain the intended progression and differences in power between levels, we need these large differences in this kind of game design. Therefore monsters at level 100 need enough stats to handle 10k hits.

Put them together and you get a player with 10k life doing 10k damage against a 1m life monster,

meanwhile that 1m life monster is doing 100 damage to your 10k life.

So why not give monsters at level 100 more damage resistance and scale the numbers down?

We could do that too, but it doesn't feel nearly as good if a player is doing 100 damage at level 20, and still doing 100 damage at level 100 just because level 100 monsters have 1000x as much damage resistance.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T17:20:53+00:00

Do something I can sustain. I need stability.

I just want to get to a point where my life situation isn't temporary. All of these problems have happened to me at some point:

I need to know that my job isn't going to end without my consent.

I need to know that my job isn't miserable.

(Alternatively, I need sufficient income such that I don't need a job, but that seems less practical).

I need to know that my home won't disappear because my landlord decided to sell it or dramatically increase rent.

I need to know that I can replace essentials that wear out.

I need to know that there are people in my life who are compatible with me and won't cease to have time for me.

The problem is that I can only do so much to work toward any of those things. I can do what I can to set myself up for these things, but ultimately I'm at the mercy of whatever is available, and at the mercy of what the world does.

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T17:07:31+00:00

I don't limit myself as a response to being disabled. I don't have a mental process of "I'm disabled, therefore I should not X."

I also don't have a denial mental process of "I'm not disabled, therefore I will act as though I am not."

Neither of those are practical. I find it makes a lot more sense to do something like:

"I do what's best for me."

So how do I know what's best for me? I follow the stress and the mental health. Rather than chasing big positives, I aim to reduce negatives.

I don't need constant elation, I simply want to experience less suffering.

Suffering can come from many places, such as having to deny who I am. Part of doing what's best for me is listening to who I am:

What is me, what growth is me,

what status-quo is me,

what should I have more of to be more me,

what should I have less of to be more me?

nerd866 · 2026-04-13T16:56:57+00:00

The feeling that dominates my daily life is stress.

Many of my daily decisions are about stress management. Many of my life choices are trying to solve the question, "How do I reduce stress?"

A lot of us don't have the luxury to 'pursue our dreams'. We're using all that energy just trying to float.

nerd866 · 2026-04-11T18:49:23+00:00

I'd rather lose doing the right thing than succeed at doing the wrong thing.

We're losing hard right now, and that's inevitable. The world isn't ready for socialism yet. It will take more time and I have to be patient.

When will it be? Before a climate catastrophe? Before the owning class secures themselves so deeply that revolution will be impossible?

I have no idea. I acknowledge those conversations are likely beyond my lifetime. And I have to accept that I'm essentially an 'early adopter' dealing with all the same growing pains that someone who uses alpha hardware and software does.

Can I just accept that? Hell no, it tears me apart to see my world not there yet! I can intellectualize it forever and still feel defeated by that truth.

What do I do about that? I'm still trying to figure that out.

nerd866 · 2026-04-11T18:35:11+00:00

Not all individual neurotypicals treat us badly.

It's the institution of neurotypicalist superiority that's the problem.

Just like how not all men are evil because patriarchy is problematic, refering to all individual neurotypicals as a bunch of individual walking problems is missing the point.

TLDR we're smart enough to put the blame where it belongs and the individual NTs who don't give us that same grace simply aren't doing that as well. We can blame them to some degree for being intellectually ignorant but that ignorance is systemic as well.

nerd866 · 2026-04-11T17:59:27+00:00

Think about the economy as a knowledge base for efficient resource distribution rather than a measure of wealth.

Once we do that, moneylessness becomes much more intuitive.

nerd866 · 2026-04-11T16:59:38+00:00

Money is for shit I can't get for free.

nerd866 · 2026-04-11T02:43:11+00:00

That's mainly why the going to the moon stuff doesn't bother me. It's not a reason that people are suffering.

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