On April 04 2015 01:37 ThomasjServo wrote: Cool, I only heard good things even in the beta/alpha, and I think it was on sale which was why I wanted to check it out, but I did want to wait until it was finally out, out to commit. Plus when your real name is Joe Smith, there isn't much point in committing to the point of having my name added to the game.
I usually adhere to TotalBiscuits view in that (pre)ordering unfinished games isn't a good model from the end users perspective, and have shunned all other early buy games. But, yeah, lol, this had rave reviews and the sale too..
I generally agree, with one exception: If what you are getting RIGHT NOW is worth your money, then go for it, no matter whether it is called an alpha, beta, or whatever. Do not buy things on promises for the future, buy them in the state they are in right now, and take any further improvements as freebies.
Of course, this would require you to inform yourself about the product as to what is actually there right now, not what "They are going to add in the future", as that might or might not happen.
Prison Architect for example is very much worth your money right now.
how much does Archaeology/ knowledge of world history change over time? would a world history book from 1985 still be pretty accurate now? (and by world history I mean starting at pre-civilization)
On April 04 2015 07:27 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote: how much does Archaeology/ knowledge of world history change over time? would a world history book from 1985 still be pretty accurate now? (and by world history I mean starting at pre-civilization)
Depends on one's perspective. If you were in the field it's obviously pretty huge. For average people I'd say it's still kind of a big deal. The history of North America has certainly changed quite a bit since 1985.
Again I learned something. Up to this day, pidgin was this + Show Spoiler +
to me. It actually sounds cool. Reminds me of jamaicans speaking german, not so keen on texan though. Any suggestion which american accent I also should look up?
On April 05 2015 04:35 waffelz wrote: Again I learned something. Up to this day, pidgin was this + Show Spoiler +
to me. It actually sounds cool. Reminds me of jamaicans speaking german, not so keen on texan though. Any suggestion which american accent I also should look up?
Difficult thing to get an accurate gauge on I am from Minnesota for example, and because of the movie Fargo (a town in North Dakota) and a generally Swedish/Norweigian with a bit of German group of settlers a lot of people think we sound like a hyperbolic Canadian accent. Despite that most of the state, and the broader midwest speaks a fairly accent-less version of American English.
One subtle thing I've noticed about East Coast accents beyond Jersey, Boston, or New York accents is they don't say h's with the a hard pronunciation humor becomes yumor almost, they just drop it off completely. Far and away my favorite accent is a high southern accent. One thing that isn't generally ascribed to the South of the US mainly because of impressions and how the accent comes across is being well spoken. The accent I am thinking of, and I can't find a searchable name for it has very enunciated H's so a while isn't just while it is a, "w-hile."
The best part of English from the South of the US, is that it is very paced and deliberate. with an emphasis on word choice. One example I have from my own life is a well educated woman who was asked about her first impressions of her now husband and she described him after a slight pause as, "a swarthy gentleman."
There is something to appreciate about just about every bit of any language, most opinions tend to just come up from what is considered low vs. high class, which would be why Northern accents in the UK catch flak for being so far out of the norm.
On April 04 2015 01:37 ThomasjServo wrote: Cool, I only heard good things even in the beta/alpha, and I think it was on sale which was why I wanted to check it out, but I did want to wait until it was finally out, out to commit. Plus when your real name is Joe Smith, there isn't much point in committing to the point of having my name added to the game.
I usually adhere to TotalBiscuits view in that (pre)ordering unfinished games isn't a good model from the end users perspective, and have shunned all other early buy games. But, yeah, lol, this had rave reviews and the sale too..
I'll hold off until I see it again, Civ 5 has consumed my life enough as it is. I should try a cultural victory instead of killing everyone.
One of the directors was recently interviewed on MSNBC, thought you might like a quick look.
On April 04 2015 01:37 ThomasjServo wrote: Cool, I only heard good things even in the beta/alpha, and I think it was on sale which was why I wanted to check it out, but I did want to wait until it was finally out, out to commit. Plus when your real name is Joe Smith, there isn't much point in committing to the point of having my name added to the game.
I usually adhere to TotalBiscuits view in that (pre)ordering unfinished games isn't a good model from the end users perspective, and have shunned all other early buy games. But, yeah, lol, this had rave reviews and the sale too..
I'll hold off until I see it again, Civ 5 has consumed my life enough as it is. I should try a cultural victory instead of killing everyone.
One of the directors was recently interviewed on MSNBC, thought you might like a quick look.
Those types of news pieces always irk me, starts off like it is going the GTA route about how a sim game is teaching your child to be the warden of a prison like in Oz, and then devolves to her clearly not knowing anything about the business model as well. I mean I think the interesting bit isn't the prison game so much as "early access" development or crowd sourced betas/alphas basically. All press is good press I suppose.
How long until someone cites their success in a city management sim game as a reason they should be elected to some local office and actually wins (presuming it hasn't already)?
On April 08 2015 06:43 GreenHorizons wrote: How long until someone cites their success in a city management sim game as a reason they should be elected to some local office and actually wins (presuming it hasn't already)?
My grandfather is a dedicated motherfucker. Likes to get things done. Tried retiring once. Got bored. Called my Dad. Said, hey I'm bored what should I do. My Dad says, the kids play video games, like Sim City. Grandfather buys the game. Likes it. Calls up his city and says, hey, need anyone to build roads? They say, sure.
Anyway, the punchline is he ended up managing roads for a city of more than half a million people.
It would depend on how accurate the modeling was in the game in question as well. I've known city planners, and none of that stuff happens in a vacuum.
'Male competition' is an aspect of courtship behavior in the majority of animal species. Females usually have to choose the best male among competing males for reproduction (See Sexual selection).
Do you think that 'male competition' is an innate human behavior or can culture override this behavior? In our modern world where gender equality has been established, do men still compete against each other for women?
On April 12 2015 01:37 excitedBear wrote: Here is my question:
'Male competition' is an aspect of courtship behavior in the majority of animal species. Females usually have to choose the best male among competing males for reproduction (See Sexual selection).
Do you think that 'male competition' is an innate human behavior or can culture override this behavior? In our modern world where gender equality has been established, do men still compete against each other for women?
Yes and No. As long as there are more than one man and woman, there will usually be instances of multiple people of one sex who are "courting" a member of the opposite sex. In this sense, there is competition between potential suitors. This is where is kind of stops though. I do believe culture can sort of override this, since there is very little direct competition as you would see in the animal kingdom. In many species, males display traits that females want in order to be chosen, and males fight against each other to prove superiority and such. For humans, there's mostly just individuals displaying traits which the opposite sex likes.
On April 12 2015 01:37 excitedBear wrote: Here is my question:
'Male competition' is an aspect of courtship behavior in the majority of animal species. Females usually have to choose the best male among competing males for reproduction (See Sexual selection).
Do you think that 'male competition' is an innate human behavior or can culture override this behavior? In our modern world where gender equality has been established, do men still compete against each other for women?
The answer is no. When people flirt/court a girl, it is not with the goal of outdoing the competition but of presenting themselves to the other and hoping there is a bond. Male competition makes the assumption that the impetus for what animals and people are doing is to outdo other males instead of the simple act of two individuals making individual decisions whose actions can be studied statistically.
It is the attempt to remove personal choice from a statistical sample for no other reason than to place importance in males. Its very backwards and archaic thinking.
Well women do still value social status higher than attractiveness when choosing a partner (see e.g. Ha et al. 2012) As long as this form of sexual selection is in place, males still need to compete for social status.
If you say that there is no male competition nowadays, that would mean that it opposes female preferences.
On April 12 2015 02:14 excitedBear wrote: Well women do still value social status higher than attractiveness when choosing a partner (see e.g. Ha et al. 2012) As long as this form of sexual selection is in place, males still need to compete for social status.
If you say that there is no male competition nowadays, that would mean that it opposes female preferences.
Its very male to use broad statistics to define individual women's choices and personal anecdote to define individual male choices.
Social status is a competition of class, not sex. No one is competing to be richer than another male, but to be richer than another human. The same is true for other social constructs. "I want the fastest car, not just a car faster than a male in my immediate peer group" etc...
The same is true for women. When the social constructs of society tells women to like men with jobs over homeless people--that's not "Male Competition" but a self categorization of class. Much like women would rather own a house than live in the slums. Its a higher social status, which is something all sexes want, not just women.
On April 12 2015 01:37 excitedBear wrote: Here is my question:
'Male competition' is an aspect of courtship behavior in the majority of animal species. Females usually have to choose the best male among competing males for reproduction (See Sexual selection).
Do you think that 'male competition' is an innate human behavior or can culture override this behavior? In our modern world where gender equality has been established, do men still compete against each other for women?
Yeah the real flaw with the PUA thinking (which is more or less the question you're actually asking) is that human mating isn't in the form of a direct competition. In a tiny tribe/pack roaming around with unified values, then yeah, you might see humans reliably line up in order of whatever the desirable traits were.
But in real life, think of all the heterosexual people you know in relationships. If you put each relationship on a scatterplot with men's attractiveness on X and women's on Y, there'd be some general correlation, but a weak one at best. And I think you could juggle your criteria for attractiveness quite a lot and still end up with these results.
Some portion of this is how indirect the competition is. But more of it is because different people look for different things in one another. Some men really like super-skinny girls. Others are into boobs and curves. Most of us are somewhere in the middle. I dig smart chicks; a lot of guys like girls who will fawn on them and not intimidate them intellectually. And beyond all of this, there are really more important things like compatible interests, personality traits, or lifestyle habits.
Saying that humans have overcome all biology and can operate on purely cultural terms is just as ridiculous as saying that all humans still operate like apes. The truth is probably somewhere in between, in that some behaviors were imprinted after 1000s of years of evolution and cannot be completely overridden by 'culture' and therefore still come to the surface. This may not be apparent on an individual level, but may present itself on the level of the population.
Differences in male and female sexual preferences are real as the study above shows. Females value status while males value attractiveness when choosing mates (also see Human Mating Strategies). The question is how in our culture the display of innate behaviors like male competition is affected/modified.
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/lyuVmmR.png)
