Syntax

12 minutes ago, Digital said:

This has been my problem with media so far on any topic regarding anything to do with the current state of politics.

This is what has my concern even more than Trump at this point. Media outlets shamelessly releasing articles that directly contradict each other, so one of them is lying but both are pointing the finger at the other and screaming fake news. Nothing is about the facts anymore, and no one seems to be thinking logically anymore. It's all buzz words and anything to pander to their party and it's just worsening the political/idealogical divide. It REALLY concerns me whenever I hear about politically driven violence and the free speech vs. antifa clashes in Berkeley because to be honest I don't see another way for this divide to resolve. Either one side folds peacefully or it'll be civil war and in either situation we lose idealogical diversity in a really profound way. 

2 minutes ago, dracula said:

Seems like the kickstarter was successful but the game got derailed when payments were forwarded for coding, which was never done.

Not that I knew all the staff who were working for Evocality but if memory serves me correctly one of the frustrations was staff claiming they never got paid for the work they did so there were questions everywhere about what happened to the money that was raised. 

I think it's because we're getting old.  

I don't have as much time to spend playing video games as I did when I was in highschool or even college. So those achievements are less shiny because of the sheer amount of time it can take to platinum a game. And I happen to like the rubbish trophies! But taco bell gave me a free PS4 so I might be biased... 

To be honest, as much as the media and left has pushed and called for impeachment, there really hasn't been evidence that he's done anything wrong/illegal. I don't like Trump but I want him to succeed because he's my president.

There hasn't been any evidence linking Trump's campaign to Russia, and there are new claims that the DNC wikileaks situation came from a disgruntled Bernie supporter and not from a Russian hacker. Assange has asserted from the beginning that the Russians weren't behind the leak, and take what you will but he is one of the very few people who actually knows the identity of the leaker. 

As far as the Comey firing, again I think it's a little overblown. Comey did a LOT of things wrong over the last year and both parties have called for him to be fired multiple times. Despite apparently telling Trump he was no longer under investigation with regards to Russia he would not publicly say so. I can see where that would piss Trump off enough to fire him because for as long as the Russia investigation continues Trump looks bad and guilty even if he isn't. I think Trump went about it very stupidly but that just speaks to him being unpracticed politically.

No one is really presenting these situations in their actuality, and everything I've seen is LOADED with bias one way or the other to push an agenda and taint impressions and conclusions.

The culture of being offended is really silly in my opinion. I'm a big believer in free speech and that means I don't have agree with what you say but I support your right to say it. So I might not like jerks but they have the right to be a jerk, and it's not your duty to change the behavior of someone who offends you. 

Unfortunately there is absolutely no way to avoid not offending everyone all the time. Even slightly related but totally irrelevant things (like a personal belief of an owner) can get people offended enough to do serious harm to a business. I don't see anything wrong about that Marapets costume or using pieces of real cultures to mix into your games. I personally would not be overly concerned with offending the user base of your game. If you're game is also a business that adds a little complexity but I think as long as you have a good understanding of your base you're fine. 

Yayy. love seeing our ranks grow! 

9 hours ago, Boltgreywing said:

@Anoua: One of the problems I have with ids is they are very hard to know who has what id since I id's can get pretty large.  I am guessing the same would hold true for blogs, and private messages that it is better to use id's in those cases.

Just because you use the ID's doesn't mean you need to display them. If you have for example a pet-search that is by name, you can display the ID alongside the name to show they are different pets, or display other information such as the owner, species or age to differentiate. You don't REPLACE names with ID's, they serve a different purpose. Any data entity should have unique ID's associated with it, unless you're using a multi-field ID but those can be a pain. 

19 hours ago, Boltgreywing said:

@Syntax: Sometimes there are cases where I can't use ids at all and need to use names instead.

Can you give an example? To be honest if you're in a situation where you can't use ID's in your database you're probably doing something wrong... 

17 hours ago, Sparren said:

Also, on a similar note to what @Anoua was saying I think there needs to be some 'fair excuse' for such a tax. A lot of games have a small trading post tax which is rather unintrusive because it is in exchange for a service (essentially it is purchasing the right to list a trade/auction). A flat annual tax not tied into some gameplay feature or event could ruffle some feathers in my opinion though (or in the very least trigger some very clever but undesirable tax evasion attempts among your playerbase). It will seem like you're just taking their money for no reason. It's generally better to set up your sinks in a way that feels fair and voluntary like allowing players to spend money on some kind of upgrade (like lair expansions in Flight Rising), adding expensive cosmetic items for them to purchase and collect, or exacting a fee for certain common game activities (like the trading post fee I mentioned).

@Boltgreywing Pushing this a little further, taxes in the real world are for a purpose, supporting the governmental bodies. In a game this usually isn't necessary which is why tax systems don't usually get implemented(that and people generally hate taxes). If your taxes aren't supporting any other system financially, they are literally pointless. If you're using taxation as just an economic sink, stop. Instead, where users would normally earn 100, just reduce it to 85. In the tax scenario, your users will have felt like they earned 100, and feel negatively about only have 85 whereas in an income reduction scenario your users will be happier because they felt like they earned 85 and it's all theirs.

Gorgeous work, although you can't request people just email you. It's in the guidelines for the board. 

I don't think the addition of the discord chat will mean people will go there instead of here. I'm on here way more, and occasionally pop over into the chat to see what's happening. 

15 hours ago, Boltgreywing said:

I do like names to be unique but something like Petri12348854875777477574 is weird. Perhaps it be best to remove numbers otherwise people get lazy. The problem with non unique names is if you are searching for something like Dragon then you might get the first dragon that is found and this can be a problem if your petsite uses names as its difference. Dragon and DRAGON is the same name and this can cause problems.

The only way around this would be to use ids but to search for an id gets kind of boring really fast.

In your database you should probably always store unique ID's anyway. 

17 minutes ago, jakdacrowe said:

I... Haven't been keeping up with news at all.
But I am worried for my friend's parents who are living there as ambassadors.

As far as I know, it's kinda iffy and frankly downright scary as they can see the fucking ships in the ocean from their house, but they have a bag prepped and ready to go in-case their country's government hears anything stupid from the US.

North Korea has always been threatening but the threat always seemed 'farther down the road' so to speak. Trump wants to look like a stronger world leader than his predecessor though so I'm not sure what's going to happen but I agree it does look scary. 

On 4/25/2017 at 4:26 PM, Nate said:

On a side note:
Looking back though, as a Child I always saw Tom as the bad guy..
As an adult though watching them back, OMG, Jerry is the instigator in pretty much all the episodes. Tom FTW.

I always saw Tom & Jerry as sort of a representation of my sister and I. She'd push my buttons, we'd fight and then get into all sorts of trouble, etc. Even looking back it reminds me of two siblings fighting lol. 

On 4/25/2017 at 7:19 PM, runeowl said:

I think this honestly comes down to Nostalgia and personal preference. "Good" and "Bad" shows are completely objective, and could cover a wide range of potential talking points - art style, narrative, message, etc. It sounds like you're taking a strong stance of "Old Cartoons (or at least the ones you watched) are more moral / wholesome than Today's Cartoons", and I'm not sure if that's possible to argue on such a wide scale because of a gradually shifting culture and societal norms, not to mention the incredible variety of content show-to-show. 

In summary, "the good old days" of cartoons might seem like a fine point of comparison at first, but I don't think it can hold its weight. 

There is a difference between personal preference and what I think is being talked about though. Despite changing culture and societal norms, I still expect childrens cartoons to maintain a certain amount of innocence that they do not seem to be fulfilling. It's the fact that these shows (Steven Universe I'm looking at you) are packed full of sexual innuendos and allusions to what I would consider to be very adult topics. I have no problems with creativity, fantasy or weird and don't get me wrong, I am a HUGE fan of Futurama and I enjoy adult cartoons.  It's the things they say in addition to targeting the show for children that really bothers me. I don't care if societal norms are changing, little kids do not to be exposed to sex and all kinds of swear words with one letter changed to make them 'ok'. I don't think all newer cartoons are that bad, I sat down and enjoyed Kulapari(I think? frogs on netflix) and I've always liked MLP, and some other ones. 

I'm not saying there weren't sexual innuendos or that kind of thing in old cartoons too but it just wasn't as blatant.

On 4/25/2017 at 8:53 PM, jakdacrowe said:

If I'm not wrong, having possession of drugs, especially a significant amount, could lead to a death sentence?

Well that would be why no one does drugs!! 

I've never been to Asia, but I just wanted to throw in something about the political landscape. There are a lot of rumors flying in recent months about North Korea and how I think they basically hold South Korea hostage. I'm not super familiar with the situation but I know U.S. soldiers in that vicinity and it makes me really nervous for them. 

Well normally those tax brackets would be reversed. I'm not really sure what you're going for here though. 

Pennsylvania  I live on the fine line between high speed internet and rural living. 

Sorry, yes I was being overly simple about it. I've heard way more on this topic then I ever wanted to because only 10-20% of software engineers are female and everyone's convinced there's some conspiracy and I was congratulated for overcoming a world of male dominance and road blocks designed to push me towards a kitchen instead of a computer.  I've taken to just being annoyed every time it's brought up. 

Legally speaking men and women are considered equal, if anything women tend to get more rights/benefits when you bring kids and healthcare into the mix. Being in the computer science field, being an avid video-gamer, DnD player, I've always tended to run in circles that were for whatever reason mostly male. This hasn't ever bothered me, and throughout my entire life I've never been systematically targeted because I happen to be a different gender. If anything, running in those circles I've had a lot more problems with other girls than with any of the guys because suddenly there's a girl at what was assumed to be a guys night based on the activity. 

31 minutes ago, Digital said:

In many areas woman have to choose children or career. Is this fair?

Fair to the woman or the children? It used to be that for the most part families could do well enough on a single salary, women didn't need to work. Now that women work, it seems uncommon to see single-income households and while I'm sure many women love what they do (as do I) I wonder how many would prefer to drop to part time or stay home with children completely but can't because their household needs both of the incomes to pay the bills. 

I'm not sure what changed, if what's considered a middle-income lifestyle has become more expensive or if salaries just haven't kept up over the years but there's been a definite shift from women can work if they want, to now women are expected to work and bring home a salary and at least in the universities the idea of a stay-at-home mom is looked down upon like they're not living up to their full potential.

As far as choosing career or children, even I struggle with that decision because I think it's desirable to have a parent dedicated to the kids but I do love what I do. I don't think I would continue working full time after having kids, although I'd probably find it hard to not work at all. I am deeply grateful to my mother for walking away from the workforce to raise and homeschool my sister and I and I attribute a lot of success in my life to my mother's dedication to us. I most certainly don't want to shame anyone with kids who works but I do sometimes wish it was more like the 60's when women working was more of an option and less necessary. 

25 minutes ago, Digital said:

To a males viewpoint, you have women who enter the workforce and are often seen as having the ultimate power over male coworkers through the use of sexual harassment (here in the US, most companies will fire anyone who has claims against them without actually investigating the situation.)

This is awful. I've been in hostile work environments, but putting a sexual harassment claim on anyone should be a big deal because you're messing with someone's life and livelihood and with what's considered sexual harassment these days it's seems like you can land in hot water for just looking at someone wrong. 

Clubs and reactions would be awesome!  I call dibs on starting a modding club  

On 4/20/2017 at 5:16 PM, Digital said:

If it is an age old problem, but materials (although forms change, games, manga, video, books, etc) exist, and these materials in whatever form do appear commonly in correlation with those who appear to have behavior problems, doesn't that imply at least statistically a potential causation?

Not at all. Correlation never by itself implies causation, especially when you have SO many factors. One of the big things about correlation is the understanding that while there might be a relationship there isn't a definition to it. There's no real way to determine if the video games are the root cause of the violence, or if it's the struggle with violence that draws someone to the violent games.

I'm always disappointed when I hear in the news that some violent person was an avid COD player, insinuating blame on the video game. I've been and avid COD player as have millions of people who have never been or had violent tendencies. This automatically blows a huge hole in the hypothesis, so it has to be reworked. With the correct circumstance, video games can cause violence. That begs the question, what are those circumstances, and can you ever prove without a doubt that repeating those circumstances in addition to video games always leads to a violent end? Well that brings up a whole other debate on free will, determination and individual responsibility. It also seems to pull the responsibility for the violent action away from the perpetrator and onto a media they happened to consume. 

On 4/20/2017 at 5:16 PM, Digital said:

However, I do myself believe that video games in today's world do as a direct means profit from the direct display of violence with no regard to the effects on their players mental state. All in the name of entertainment huh?

If you want to be critical about violence in one source of media, you have to look at the others too. Movies, TV, Internet, books, all of it. In the same way if you were to restrict the video game industry's use of violence then you would have to restrict all of the others. 

I think there's kind of a big point being missed here though. Even IF all of these violent media sources do cause some kind of negative effect on children, is it that media's fault for existing or is it the guardians fault for not restricting the access to a child? If someone legitimately came up to me and said that GTA caused their child's behavior problems I would have no problem asking why the heck they let their child play GTA? We have to be careful to not remove the responsibility of the parents or faults in ideology by blaming media and entertainment. 
 

Ah okay. I'll be honest I think you might be hard pressed to find someone to help you out with this here. Maybe find a forum specific to Dune? 

Simple: Because men and women are different.

But as far as inequalities go, the inequalities I've seen and experienced are not the ones that they harp about on TV and in the media. 

I don't buy that there's still a wage gap, and I've seen how disadvantaged some young boys and young men are nowadays and it breaks my heart. 

I don't mind spending money on apps that I actually enjoy. I don't usually buy games, but if I find a game I really like (Fallout Shelter, Pokemon Go) I don't mind buying a few things to make the game more enjoyable and support the developers. Most recently fallout shelter, I just couldn't get past a particular point but I really liked the game so I broke down and purchased a starter pack, some pets and lunchboxes and I've been happily playing it every since.  But I also really like Bethesda, so they can have my money. lol

When did you try it? I know as time went on it got harder to start it completely from scratch because they kept changing things around. 

@Regnant I have recently fallen in love with Starset. <3 

The only concert I've ever been to was for Casting Crowns, it was a birthday gift from a friend of mine in college. So my boyfriend and I went, and the ladies behind us in line offered us tickets to the meet and greet because their other two friends weren't going to make in time.  I totally wasn't expecting to meet the band too, but it was pretty cool.