Creaphis
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I feel privileged that I'm able to fully appreciate this work of art. You really do have to be obsessed with Doom to be able to catch all the subtleties of how things slowly (and then quickly) break down. My dozens of completionist Ep 1 playthroughs have paid off.
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I have mixed feelings on practicing socialization online, just because my own addiction to Runescape got in the way of learning to connect with people in the real world (which is what I really needed at the end of the day). But it's also hugely valuable to have safe spaces to socialize in, even if those spaces are online. It's a hell of a lot better than nothing. I agree with trying online roleplaying groups like WoOp suggested. The nice thing about gaming groups is that you'll be spending time with the same people every week-ish, so you'll get to know them over time - their personalities, what's going on in their lives, what they're struggling with, etc. However, there isn't any pressure to talk about anything personal. You can, but you don't have to. If you're comfortable meeting people in-person I'd suggest Googling "<your city here> board game club." If you like gaming, that would be another way to meet people who tend to be mature and accepting of people who are neurodivergent. Again, you can mention personal stuff when you want to, but you don't have to! Don't worry about fitting in - the only people who aren't welcome back to board game club are the people who are aggressively petty when they're losing. Don't be an asshole and you'll be fine. If you don't own any board games that's totally okay. Plenty of people in the group will have their own massive game collections and they'll just be thrilled that you're there to help them justify all they money they've spent on them. I don't recommend card game clubs as much. Magic the Gathering and Yugioh are expensive hobbies and you're more likely to run into people who are younger and more competitive in an unfriendly way. In general though, any community group (like gaming groups, organizations that recruit volunteers, choirs, recreational sports leagues, the right church if that's your flavour) has that same perk - you can talk about personal stuff but you don't have to. I really can't overstate how valuable this is when you're getting used to putting yourself out there. It takes away most of the pressure of socialization and you still get the benefits. You don't have to impress anybody with your charming personality. Everyone there is just happy that you're there, getting involved in something that they care about. They'll like you by default. Personal conversations will happen occasionally in a naturalistic way and you'll feel closer to everyone there as time goes by. If you want anecdotal evidence of the magic of community groups, I'm an awkward fucking mess at parties but I met my wife by singing in a choir every week. I agree with most of what rita remton suggested too, but I need to add something to it. You shouldn't go into social settings with the attitude of "I need to learn to express myself better." Go in with the attitude of "I'm good enough as is, but spending time here today will help me feel more comfortable around people." If you go into social settings feeling like "I have to know a lot of stuff and I have to say interesting things but I shouldn't dominate the conversation and I have to remember to ask questions but not challenging questions and I have to try to connect on an emotional level but I shouldn't show negative emotions or weirdly positive emotions" then you probably won't accomplish what you're hoping to accomplish. Obsessively self-monitoring will make you feel more anxious about socialization and more disconnected from the people around you. You won't want to socialize at all if it's just a massive anxiety-inducing chore and then you won't get the practice you want. Self-monitoring also gets in the way of just being your authentic self, and your authentic self is good enough. Yeah, I don't envy your situation of trying to find free therapy in the US. You can try googling "<your city here> free therapy counseling psychology diagnosis" or something like that, and see what comes up. Some non-profits offer free therapy (with a long wait list). Some universities offer free psychological diagnostic services as practice for their psych students (again, with a long wait list). One last thing! If you're feeling overwhelmed in your life because you're not sure what direction to take, like whether to work or not, and this means that you end up not doing much of anything, just pick one single goal to work on for the next month or two, and just work on a single baby step towards that goal. You don't have to work on everything all at the same time and you don't have to accomplish miracles in a month. Do one single thing and feel proud of yourself for doing it. If you want my suggestions, try to find either one free psychological resource or one interesting community group in your city in the next 30 days.
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This post is an awesome start. Well done! You're definitely not the only person here who's felt this way. People gravitate to niche hobbies like retro games when they're looking for a place where they can feel competent and in control. A lot of us probably came here for similar reasons. I definitely grew up not understanding myself well, and when I thought I understood myself it was still just the depression talking. My friends were like your male family members. Good guys, but not used to saying or listening to deeper and more personal things. I think what helped me was getting involved in more social settings where being radically open and radically accepting was the norm instead of weird. (Disability support work at first, social work school later.) Or maybe I got lucky and met some weirdly open people. When you know people who are very open about their inner lives and very accepting of yours, it helps you practice that kind of communication yourself. And it also helps you learn that you're good enough as you are, because other people accept you, including your own personal communication style. Depending on where you live and what you do, you might actually have more access to therapy than you realize. Schools, employee benefits and insurance plans usually have some programs that could be helpful. Otherwise, I do recommend getting involved in some kind of social service volunteering - it's a good ice breaker with people who are likely to be naturally caring and who will like you from the get-go because they're happy you're there to help. Also, it was a huge help for my mental health when I started distracting myself from my own problems by focusing on somebody else's. However, I apologize if this is an unrealistic suggestion; I realize most people right now are barely keeping up with their lives so saying "just volunteer more" might not be helpful.
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Fair enough. Changing anybody's mind on any subject is a nigh-insurmountable challenge, and right now we're talking about a group of people that is especially closed off against new information and prone to forming their attitudes from feelings instead of facts. So yeah, practically speaking, we have a better chance of outnumbering and outliving these people. That said, even if it's useless to say "you're wrong," we can still avoid casually accepting prejudice from people and make it clear that being outwardly bigoted comes at the cost of losing connections. We can also try to find the last nuggets of empathy in their stunted hearts and make an emotion-based appeal: You should be ashamed. I don't think Carmack personally did anything horrible and I'm not arguing that we should try to wipe him from the face of the internet (if that was even possible). I'm disappointed that he's signal-boosting shitty people and therefore showing them that it's okay to be shitty. Shitty people are gonna be shitty no matter what, but we shouldn't be okay with that, and apparently Carmack is. If it seems like I'm holding Carmack to a higher standard than everyone else involved in this BasedCon that's just because 4 hours ago I only knew good things about him and this was an unwelcome change. Everything happening in Florida right now is beyond horrifying.
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I'm not sure if I'm joking with that title or not. I actually am really disappointed that he's headlining a sci-fi convention that's specifically for people who are "tired of woke propaganda." I guess he really is just famous for his technical acumen and I shouldn't have expected him to have emotional intelligence on top of that. https://www.basedcon.com/ Here's his tweet trying to justify his involvement as non-political. In reality, condoning and signal boosting shitty people is a political act even if you don't want it to be. And straight white cis men really are responsible to tell other straight white cis men that selfish bigotry is not okay. Bigots don't care when people outside of their in-group tell them to fuck off. That just fuels them. They need to hear it from their in-group. Ignoring that responsibility is a moral failing. Thoughts?
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I just wandered back to take a look at the 2020 Cacowards and I played this first. Awesome work Antares! I played on UV and really enjoyed the fight choreography and gorgeous abstract visuals. The weapon and enemy changes are satisfying. The "Do you like revenants?" meta moments made me laugh and the bonus ending map is incredible. I did have to give up on MAP31 when my poor laptop slowed to 1 FPS (and I don't think I would have been able to hack it anyway). My only critique of that map is I would have liked it if the restocking points for the final fight were easier to navigate to. The central pillars in the middle of each group of four lowering platforms with megaspheres and cell packs could be more visually distinct somehow, so the player can still home in on them when they're blinded by the horde of enemies in their face. Usually my spatial awareness is pretty good in this game but that fight totally overwhelmed me - though I guess that's kinda the point.
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Damn, what happened to blogs?
I was going to write some heartfelt screed about where I've gone in life since I posted here last but this really doesn't feel like the place- Show previous comments 11 more
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Yeah, I was surprised to see I've been stripped of my title. I definitely still deserve it.
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I've been putting off buying a new desktop PC for years, and now I've finally decided I'd rather have a laptop anyway, which should get me out of my basement and into my kitchen.
I'm thinking 15.6" screen, big enough to see and small enough to carry. 1366x768 max resolution is fine. Aside from that it just needs to be reasonably good at playing things and doing stuff by modern standards. A friend is already telling me to get the Lenovo IdeaPad Y510p on sale for $850 on this page. If anyone wants to show me some better performance:price ratios or warn me about important things I haven't thought about then that's what this thread is fuckin' for.- Show previous comments 10 more
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I ended up buying the laptop I linked in the OP.
hex11 said:I bought a used Thinkpad with 15" widescreen and don't like carrying it around much. Should have got a smaller machine... bigger than a netbook, but smaller than this.
I did choose a 15" over a 17" to cut down on some excess bulk.
ArmouredBlood said:You'd think laptops are great for going around town and having something to do while waiting for class/lunch break/appointments/etc, but after my college years commuting, I don't really see a difference between what I'd be doing on my laptop and I see others doing with a smartphone (I do not own one), besides doom mapping and adding 3+lbs to my backpack. If you really want to play a game, you'd be at home, in your computer area/living room, not setting up near to someone doing something completely irritating.
I'm not sure I'll worry about dragging this thing to classes when I go back to school - there's just something special about taking notes on paper like our primitive ancestors did - but I'd sooner take notes and write essays on a laptop than on a smartphone. I'll never use this thing just to kill a few minutes at a time, and I'd never use a smartphone for that either, because there's nothing I can do in five minutes that doesn't leave me feeling drained. Worthwhile activities take longer. I see myself setting this thing up where I have the space and time to read, write or watch something all the way through, and next to a friend's computer when he wants to play something. The freedom of mobility will be a relief even if I don't end up taking advantage of it all that often.
Technician said:I use a Mac. I'm not one of you programing/mod nerds; I use my computer like one drives a civic.
Same here, but if I got a Civic after paying for a Mercedes Benz I think I'd be disappointed, wouldn't you? The only way I know of to get a Mac for a fair price is from your friendly neighbourhood black market. -
I'm technologically inept and I find Macs and iThings in general utterly confusing.
For example, I got an iphone 3gs last year. I wanted to put a custom ringtone on it.
With my previous mobile phone from 2000, all I had to do is connect it to my computer with an USB cable, and drag and drop the music file I wanted to use.
With the iphone, apparently I need to install specific software (itunes) that will always run in the background and use resources unless I do complicated (for me) computer trickery to get it to stop. Opening that particular piece of software greets me with a bunch of random categories plastered everywhere about stuff I don't want/need, complete with unintuitive names. When I finally find out I'm supposed to click on the name of my device or somesuch, there's no simple "transfer files" option. Instead, I have to go through some kind of "synchronise" option; which of course I can't get to work, no matter how hard I pray for the immortal soul of Steve Jobs.
How is this easier or accessible?!
Rhetorical question. I know there's people who find "RT @SuperCoolKid34 LOOOOOOOL~~~ #YOLO #JustinBieber" to be easier to read than "heh, that's funny" or even a simple lol. And there's also the whole reading from bottom to top prevalent in every popular site ever. Obviously, everyone else is weird and I'm the only sane person alive. -
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As in, we figured out that the relationship wasn't going anywhere. She's the one who started the conversation but it was more or less mutual.
Commence sympathizing.- Show previous comments 15 more
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Phobus said:Has this been a particularly lengthy (6 months or more, say) relationship?
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Shit was so cash.
- Show previous comments 5 more
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Creaphis said:
In this case, she's actually the one who wanted to show me her Yugiohs.
I figured this, which is why I worded my post the way I did.
Creaphis said:I guess I'm guilty of wanting to show her off, but if you replace "cool" in the above sentence with "bizarrely nerdy" it will more accurately reflect my sentiments.
In circles such as this, the two are interchangeable.
edit: looks like eternalslumberparty beat me to it -
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As in, I finally went on one.
Yeah I'm a real Casanova.
Commence backslapping. -
Mine were no exception, for today I turn:
-Chronologically 23
-Cognitively 17
-Emotionally 12 -
Since I've been using the Blogs forum to reassure myself that my life really isn't as shitty as some others out there, I'll do you guys the same favour and tell you what went wrong with my day, so you can be happy that at least it wasn't you.
Today, I was scheduled to see my grandma in her hospital bed (a fairly important gesture, even though it's not much fun) and to go to one of my favourite Christmas family gatherings. Well, that all changed when I woke up by soiling myself. I went to the toilet right away and just about passed out from the trip. My hands actually started vibrating like I had Parkinson's, maybe from lack of blood or unstable body temperature.
I've spent twelve extremely uncomfortable, extremely boring hours tossing and turning in my bed. It's 8 pm now, and I've only been able to force myself out of bed to go to the bathroom and to take care of my cat, which is my responsibility of course because I've been alone all day. I'm not sure I'm actually feeling any better now but I had to get out of bed because the isolation in my dark room was driving me crazy.
I've eaten nothing all day but a glass of apple juice and two crackers, and even that made me nauseous beyond belief. I actually had to induce vomiting for the first time in my life because my stomach just felt so awful.
I know the flu's pretty mundane, but it's the best I can come up with. I'll tell you about some real disasters when they happen.
