The original link is barely readable. I recommend the pdf version for anybody seeing this.

Taliban: Don’t worry, we’ll make sure our women’s rights are maintained

Never realised they were from the US. And such a geographically limited area to boot

deleted by creator

Why would any non-japanese gamers fear this? As for the Japanese ones, sounds like it’s on them to stop being bad eggs?

Oh. Anyway…

Fucking self righteous fruitcakes (the finance companies, not Steam)

Honestly not sure what to think about this trend. Good for them that they’re happy I guess, even if I think they’re being deluded.

That’s the first and biggest step in it being lost to history.

Probably because before that it was at ‘it works on MY machine sometimes’ levels of quality.

It to the best of us

Are the demons the DRM?

Did you mean DRM free?

Best I can say is this is a small step up from the Pinkertons debacle

Unless you’re arguing that the criteria are too strict, which it doesn’t sound like you are, the system is obviously doing its job in this case at least.

Doesn’t that make it even worse for the game, that they couldn’t even pass a ‘joke’ rating system?

The most sophisticated liberal arguments interpret fertility decline as a symptom of more serious underlying problems—economic precarity and an “incomplete” gender revolution. Men and women alike struggle to provide for their families, but the participation of fathers at home has not caught up to the participation of mothers at work. A more generous welfare state, and a more equitable culture, should therefore produce more children. This does not seem to be the case. Finland famously provides all new parents with “baby boxes” full of useful, high-quality products, and Sweden has normalized extended parental leave, especially for fathers, and flexible work hours. The Nordic countries are wonderful places to be parents, but their fertility rates are lower than our own. These trends are not reducible to budgetary concerns. Child care is virtually free in Vienna and extremely expensive in Zurich, but the Austrians and the Swiss have the same fertility rate.

So? It does not change the fact that to be a parent requires you to sacrifice and carry greater expenses than if you were child free. The sacrifice and expense may be smaller in the Nordics, but the equation remains fundamentally the same. Nor is it very practical to raise a family on a single income. I have yet to see anybody actually address this issue instead of simply brushing it off.

The world’s most lavishly pro-natalist governments spend a fortune on incentives and services, and have increased the fertility rate by approximately a fifth of a baby per woman. Some observers believe that subsidies could succeed, but they would have to be on the order of three hundred thousand dollars per child.

Sounds like a reasonable price, and a small fraction of the lifetime productivity of a person.

Don’t know anything about the game, but from the article it sounds like it was a commercial flop? Which would make it understandable that a lot of the dev team got laid off. This would be a different situation from those companies who had successes and then proceeded to lay off their dev teams anyway.

Still reading the article, but my mind keeps trying to figure out if the title is an intentional typo or not.

That was a wild read. Incredible to think this stuff is still happening today.