I couldn’t figure out the spoiler tags or I’d have left it up. I played it out on my DS so I got the full experience. If I remember correctly even if there wasn’t dialogue you’d still get a short cutscene of the gang eating ice cream after a long day of fighting stuff, which (for a middle schooler at least) really built up a connection by the end of the game.

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No, independent would mean you could cease that source of income and maintain your lifestyle. If you save 50% of your first paycheck and then quit I doubt that would be the case.

Being able to set that much aside would definitely make one wealthy (or live a very austere lifestyle) and fast track them toward independence, but it’s not an automatic qualifier.

Maybe some mental mixup with Snowpiercer, which does take place on a train surrounded by snow?

Yes, instead of building individual houses and mines for a few hundred people, you build districts for thousands of people. Instead of heat levels per district, there are five “bad things” that have levels, food, sickness, cold, squalor, and crime. If you don’t produce enough of something like heat from coal/oil the cold level will start to rise to different levels depending on the percentage of the need met (if you make 1/4 the heat demanded, it gets really high). Each level affects other problems, so high levels of cold leads to higher sickness, high levels of sickness reduce the number of available workers, which makes it harder to keep housing districts running, which you need to keep enough shelter or else cold levels rise more.

There are also multiple ways to solve the issues this causes. If you can’t find or exploit a new source of heat yet, you could build hospitals in housing districts to counteract the increase in sickness and keep that level low, preventing sickness, or you could pass a law like family apprenticeship that increases the percentage of your population that can be used as workers (kids helping their parents) so you can afford more people being sick. You could also shut down some material or food production to save heat demand or workers, but then you need to have big enough stockpiles to survive the deficit, or you might be dealing with hunger from food shortages (which increases sickness by the way) or crime from material goods shortages.

And the worse things get, the blacker the edges of the screen get as tensions rise, trust falls, and your own hope outside the game wavers, which get’s really intense. But that only makes it all the sweeter when that one district, building, or law you needed finishes and you see that beautiful word while hovering over the problem killing you; “diminishing.”

I think I went on a bit of a tangent there, but I have really been enjoying my time with the game so far. The one issue I have is the game chugs right now. On an RTX 2080S I have the resolution down to 1080p and framerates still hover around 40. Maybe it’s my CPU, but by the end of my last game building one mega metropolis even the music was skipping repeatedly as the game tried to keep up. I do really hope they make it run better going forward.

It’s a “survival city builder,” so it’s easier to lose than most. It has some serious style and in the first game has some tough decisions between doing what’s humane or doing what benefits you mechanically. As an example, for dealing with the dead you can create a cemetery where the dead can be remembered, reducing the malus to the hope of your people when someone dies. Alternatively you can create a snow pit out in the cold to preserve the bodies for organ harvesting, healing the sick faster and preventing some deaths but reducing hope overall.

I’m biased because I’ve played the first game for over 200 hours, but if it’s on sale definitely give it a try if you think the art looks cool or like city builders. It’s best played in winter when it’s already cold outside. I first played it during the polar vortex a few years back and it was awesome feeling the cold creep into my room as I tried to keep the cold from taking my people.

I’ve also played two playthroughs of Frostpunk 2 the last week and it feels like a larger scale escalation of the first game. If you play the first game enough you learn build orders and what to research first which can become rigid, the sequel feels a lot more fluid in deciding what to build toward next. A law or building has a smaller impact overall but there are enough of them that it feels like building a house of cards that you hope can weather the literal storms that hit you.

You know, that would make it a lot easier, but he’s not a loser, or at least he wasn’t for the longest time. He’s done well for himself career-wise, even if it’s not exciting. He has a wife that cares about him and who he cares about. He’s the type of charismatic guy who meets someone and gets to know them, whether they’re a customer at work or the guy that helps him at the cell phone store. I have learned a lot about how to treat and respect the people I meet from him.

He’s just really bad at taking care of himself. He’s been treating his body like it’s 20 for the past 30 years and it’s catching up to him. While he’s good at making and keeping acquaintances he’s failed to keep many close friends to confide in. When Covid hit he started drinking to the point he was hospitalized and in the years since I don’t think he has ever learned to forgive or love himself, and as long as that’s the case there is nothing anyone else can truly do for him. Which really sucks. The only hope I have is that he lives closer to family now which will make it easier to offer opportunities for him to be loved and maybe realize he can be better toward himself. But until that happens yeah he is a bit of a loser right now. I just tell him I don’t care if he is.

I agreed to fly across the country to drive my dad’s car back home while he drove the uhaul with his stuff. The day I fly out, he calls and tells me he’s been drinking again, the movers canceled on him, and he’s a loser.

I get there and he’s puking up blood as he detoxes, hasn’t eaten in days, and I’m stuck with one driver and two cars. I had to ask my uncle to fly out to help instead of spending time with his son who was on military leave while my stepmother called around to find movers last minute, all while my dad complains about the pain he’s in and how he can’t sleep while taking constant naps and he’s such a loser.

Halfway back he has a seizure in the car I’m driving and I have to help him get the bile and blood he’s choking on out of his throat while operating a vehicle at 80mph to the next exit. Afterward his memory is frazzled and it takes a couple hours for him to remember where he is and what we’re doing.

We get home, I tell him I’m never helping him move again, his response is “but we listened to your music 90% of the way here!” This was three weeks ago.

Wow, I’ve never seen someone try to link bidet use to intelligence before. It’s almost impressive.

I think what they’re implying is that it would not be feasible to seize or remove properties already owned by corporations, and by the time reforms are actually attempted they will own a significant portion of properties, making it extremely difficult to get those already-owned houses in the hands of first time buyers.

If you’ve had poems published without really understanding poetry itself, you may naturally have an intuitive grasp on poetry. I think it would be interesting if you continued writing and reflect on what you write, how you write it, and how you feel while writing it. Maybe write a poem expressing your feelings on poetry!

Then again, studying could give you better means and terminology to express your internal understanding. Either way, I wish you well!

There are several good total conversions for Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion. Star Trek Armada 3 is the most complete overhaul I’ve played for it. I’m a big fan of Halo spaceships and the Sins of the Prophets mod is the closest thing I’ve seen capture the asynchronous battle between UNSC and Covenant ships. There are others for Star Wars and Stargate that I hear are good, but I have not tried them.

How did you decide on $1,000,000? That seems very low.

While I agree that there needs to be some big growth in portable batteries like those in EVs, there are options for cities. Since they wouldn’t need to move, heavier and denser batteries become feasible. I’ve heard good things about molten salt batteries.

If I want to gain more qualifications but never actually spend time working on them, if I want a better resume but never even look up a phone number to call, do you think a therapist could help me get moving on those things I want to do?

What I was trying to say is that if you already have a job above your qualifications, which my understanding is you do, you can use your experience in that job as a qualification for future jobs. Maybe I did a poor job of saying that.

Yes, in the hypothetical scenario where you are applying for positions but not hearing back and it has become frustrating, my theoretical therapist might suggest you get in touch with someone specialized in helping with that, and then if you continue to not do so while stressing over the state of your resume their job would be to help you take that step.

Evidently that’s not your problem, which I could not be aware of, being a stranger on the internet before your explanation of your situation. Sorry my example did not perfectly address your situation.

I don’t know how a therapist would react to your circumstances of being able to make more money but still not making enough because that is rather foreign to me, but I can tell you one thing. If you are holding down a job above your credentials, you are no longer holding down a job above your credentials, you are now holding down a job at your current level of credentials and I would recommend updating your papers to reflect that.

No, the steps would probably be more along the lines of refreshing your resume, maybe setting up an appointment to have it professionally reviewed, getting a habit of applying for jobs going, stuff that materially contributes to having more money. A therapist might tell you that overthrowing the rich is a little too vague a plan to actually act on.

I specifically said higher-paying instead of a “better” job because it’s not necessarily going to be a more fun or world-improving position. But if money is what you need and the job you apply for has a higher pay rate than the one you have now it will likely lead to you having more money, regardless of the greater economic climate.

No, a therapist will not give you money. What they could do is identify why you don’t have the money you need, then help you plan and execute the steps to accomplish your goal. If your goal is more money, I’d guess they would ask you if you are looking for a higher-paying job, then discuss what steps you can take to improve that process, with a focus on mental hurdles you may not even realize you’re putting in your way.