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Doctor Zero posted:Yeah I really don’t get that tweet. Is it trying to say that not wanting to gender swap or have a tail is bad? That just wanting to have a better version of what you already have is bad? IDGI speaking of bad hashtags, the Altered Carbon ad tweet had #Cyberpunk2077 in, which is a bit cheeky.
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Feb 3, 2020 19:03
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its saying that, despite all the choices you could possibly think of, the white cis computer janitor chooses to be marginally better at code
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Feb 3, 2020 19:03
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There's a strain in science fiction in general and cyperpunk in particular that tends to view body modification as a form of spiritual corruption. It's how you get poo poo like Essence in Shadowrun.
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Feb 3, 2020 19:06
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Ah, metal vs meat. Okay.
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Feb 3, 2020 19:12
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Astroboy mods or get the hell out
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Feb 3, 2020 19:24
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It's also about how certain people's vision for how to make people "better" is to just make us better at capitalism. See - the guy who invented Soylent because getting all your nutrients in a soy-based milkshake eliminates "useless" time sinks like buying ingredients, cooking, and feeling good, and lets you get back to work faster (or never stop to begin with). (I think the guy also did some terrible experiment where he killed his entire gut microbiome, so that along with his diet now being only liquid, he never had to poo poo, either. That may have been someone else.) EDIT: Found it; it was that guy, but he stopped pooping to save water, not necessarily time. And only for a few weeks (I think). CellBlock fucked around with this message at 19:38 on Feb 3, 2020 |
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Feb 3, 2020 19:35
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battle angel alita did the postcyberpunkapocalypse transhumanism in fun ways. Some spoilers I guess but nothing super major: you've got the group of transhumanists who chose to build a pseudo dyson sphere out of jupiter who put their minds into near-featureless cybernetic boxes, you've got the transhumanists who put their brains into small ugly biological bodies that are basically heads with arms and legs, and genetically engineered a plethora of meat mods to graft onto their ugly headcases to make, to you or I, horrifying gestalt meat titans. Then there's the traditional non-modded or only-cyborgs groups on mars, etc. and then you've got the alita android clone who slightly modified their body to be a bit more masculine because they decided to be a guy and that was it.
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Feb 3, 2020 19:45
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I have been going back and forth with backing that Dark Tower game because it looks amazing....I just feel like I'll probably never play it.
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Feb 3, 2020 19:55
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ColonelJohnMatrix posted:I have been going back and forth with backing that Dark Tower game because it looks amazing....I just feel like I'll probably never play it.
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Feb 3, 2020 20:02
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FMguru posted:I think you really need a playgroup that's similarly all-in on the early-80s nostalgia, otherwise it gets played once, people say "that...uh was certainly a thing", and it gets put away never to hit the table again. I look forward to checking it out at the board game free play from a con, having a lot of fun, and never playing it again. Did the same with Fireball Island.
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Feb 3, 2020 20:06
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Jumped in on the It's a Wonderful World reprint and expansion after hearing much praise for the base game on various BG podcasters. I've gotta say, it's a game where looking at the box sort of does a disservice to what the actual content within holds. I'm excited to see it arrive later this year.
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Feb 3, 2020 20:08
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FMguru posted:I think you really need a playgroup that's similarly all-in on the early-80s nostalgia, otherwise it gets played once, people say "that...uh was certainly a thing", and it gets put away never to hit the table again. It's going to be a good game, it's not just a gimmick. And they're really leaning on the idea that each Big Bad and each Ally changes up the game in significant ways (one of the updates was how the Lingering Rot bad guy puts poo poo all over the board that drains the heroes, while another is an assassin that marks a hero for death and then sends out all his killer lackeys after them)
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Feb 3, 2020 20:33
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90s Cringe Rock posted:He's British, it's just kind of what happens on TERF Island.
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Feb 3, 2020 20:35
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Haystack posted:There's a strain in science fiction in general and cyperpunk in particular that tends to view body modification as a form of spiritual corruption. It's how you get poo poo like Essence in Shadowrun. This is exactly why i like what i've seen of eclipse phase, it wholeheartedly embraces the possibilities and weirdness that transhumanism allows. For what it's worth, i think transhumanist possibilities are almost inevitable as technology advances so it's important that we don't let the tech-bros monopolise discourse and thought about them. Altered Carbon: Is the overall author a shitheel or the rpg author specifically? Also i was genuinely horrified when it was revealed that in Altered Carbon the protagonists faction wants to enforce maximum lifespans for everyone despite humanity having the tools to conquer death. Immediately put them in "kill them all, it's self defence" territory for me despite them having a very valid point about inequality spiralling out of control Battle Angel: The way i remember it the alita clone got a new body that happened to me male-featured but they do not "get" or care about gender at all.
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Feb 3, 2020 21:18
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It's the overall author, Morgan, who's a poo poo.
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Feb 3, 2020 21:22
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Good to know, thanks. I think i'm done with that franchise then.
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Feb 3, 2020 21:25
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You want good cyberpunk that handles trans well (IMO*) try George Alex Effinger When Gravity Fails. Half the cast is a sex change and except for the conservative Muslims nobody seems to care much. If he ends up having been some kind of creep, please don’t tell me because I adore his books. Thanks. *I’m a CIS male so I could be wrong. Seems to be tho. End derail E: I guess if I mentioned that I finally caved and got Dark Tower it wouldn’t be a derail. I hope it’s not janky 80s trash but even if it is it should be good for a bit. Hell I still like janky 80s games
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Feb 3, 2020 21:59
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Doctor Zero posted:E: I guess if I mentioned that I finally caved and got Dark Tower it wouldn’t be a derail. I hope it’s not janky 80s trash but even if it is it should be good for a bit. Hell I still like janky 80s games If/when Restoration Games does and Omega Virus Kickstarter I'm absolutely on-board. I still have my old copy from my childhood and last I checked it still worked!
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Feb 3, 2020 22:01
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Actually on topic: I decided to back Oath after reading up on it a bunch, i love backstabbing and shifting loyalties. I hope i can get regular enough games going that the semi-legacy aspect feels cohesive and meaningful. For upcoming kickstarters i'm super hyped about Excavation Earth after playing the prototype at Spiel last year. It's about alien archaeologists digging through the ruins of earth for precious artefacts like license plates and washing machines while at the same time trying to drum up interest on the markets back home to actually sell them. Last word was that the kickstarter should be launching in march or april.
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Feb 3, 2020 22:15
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Doctor Zero posted:You want good cyberpunk that handles trans well (IMO*) try George Alex Effinger When Gravity Fails. Half the cast is a sex change and except for the conservative Muslims nobody seems to care much. When Gravity Fails is also a huge success in the noir-protagonist-fucks-it-all-up genre. Marid is a loving loser and watching him try to manipulate his way through a shitstorm while on like ten different types of drugs is spectacular.
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Feb 4, 2020 00:35
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Bistromatic posted:
For what it's worth, that's a (stupid) change that the showrunners made and not the original text. It sucks that Morgan (who IMO is a brilliant writer) is a much less brilliant person. Even if there wasn't that, though...I'm not sure what an RPG licensing that setting brings to the table that we don't already have in other games.
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Feb 4, 2020 00:47
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Yeah and that's a really weird turn for Morgan because the series he's most famous for has a fairly trans-friendly concept and is full of radical marxist futurism. Eh, some trans analysis have called his take on it the most gender essentially version possible, considering I'm told that they literally put a character in a menstruating sleeve as torture among other things.  As I have little enough time for the things I want to do, I don't particularly want to go looking to confirm that take.  quote:its saying that, despite all the choices you could possibly think of, the white cis computer janitor chooses to be marginally better at code  I'm had markedly mixed feelings about that copypasta for a while. Honestly, I think the 'cat ears and poo poo' only serves to sugarcoat the reality of what it would be, namely dehumanizing and markedly unhealthy performance implants and soylent all day. And there's plenty of ways for a socialist/anarchist future to reach that state, through either state eugenics programs or Annares-eque austere hyper-conformism, just to name a few.
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Feb 4, 2020 00:50
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Transhumanism is an easy cover for eugenics-minded hyperutilitarian regressives to find cover for their "essentialist" beliefs that a person can be quantifiably better than another. See also:
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Feb 4, 2020 01:06
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I think there is a good, historically supported argument for it being that from get go, and the ones that aren't are the minority, by possibly a significant margin. Or at best, are a slim majority.
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Feb 4, 2020 01:15
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I'd classify the Culture series as extremely transhumanist and there, everyone's like "hey I decided to switch to female because I wanted a baby, prob go back later" or "I decided it might be fun to be a dude for a few decades" or "yeah I'm a dude but I am also pregnant now" and nobody bats an eye. (Well, the people who do are all religious assholes)
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Feb 4, 2020 01:27
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It has its own issues with paternalistic authoritarianism, and while BravestOfTheLamps often shed more heat then light, their review was fairly on the money in my opinion. I should like to hear what some native person or some such thinks of the civilizing mission of the Minds.
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Feb 4, 2020 01:38
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StratGoatCom posted:It has its own issues with paternalistic authoritarianism, and while BravestOfTheLamps often shed more heat then light, their review was fairly on the money in my opinion.
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Feb 4, 2020 01:41
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I meant an actual IRL Amerind or Aboriginal Australian, not in-text.
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Feb 4, 2020 02:02
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StratGoatCom posted:I think there is a good, historically supported argument for it being that from get go, and the ones that aren't are the minority, by possibly a significant margin. Or at best, are a slim majority. My position on identification with it was always from a perspective of escaping being a lovely first-draft of a functional organism to being a person whose body just worked and didn't require patching up to get me through life. To be honest, I still kind of wish someone could just scoop my brain out and put it in a body that worked properly all the time instead of having vague anxiety about if I'm going to end up disabled again.
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Feb 4, 2020 02:28
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The Culture is all about a utopian anarchocommunist-with-robot-god-servants society with neoconservative foreign policy, and how that’s hosed up. The entirety of Excession is about some Minds trying to engineer the Space Iraq War against the worst rear end in a top hat aliens in space, and they are definitely not the good guys. The Culture is a thought experiment on the prime directive: if you really are a utopian hyper tech society, is it moral not to try to spread your utopia? Can it ever be moral to do so? The books don’t just say ‘yes Culture colonialism good.’ (Also afaik Quellists in Morgan’s books wanted proletarian ownership of the means of production, not to execute everyone at a set limit. I wonder why that didn’t get to television!) E: Morgan being a TERF sucks immensely, but it’s also the case that his books were always kinda thoughtlessly sexist and gender essentialist. Lots of women getting fridged. Joe Slowboat fucked around with this message at 02:53 on Feb 4, 2020 |
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Feb 4, 2020 02:50
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StratGoatCom posted:It has its own issues with paternalistic authoritarianism, and while BravestOfTheLamps often shed more heat then light, their review was fairly on the money in my opinion. (2) The books are often a criticism on the negative sides of the Culture. Use of Weapons is a novel-length dissection of the morality of spreading utopia through violence. Excession is about how loving terrifying, amoral, and alien the Minds are.
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Feb 4, 2020 03:10
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Joe Slowboat posted:The Culture is all about a utopian anarchocommunist-with-robot-god-servants society with neoconservative foreign policy, and how that’s hosed up. The entirety of Excession is about some Minds trying to engineer the Space Iraq War against the worst rear end in a top hat aliens in space, and they are definitely not the good guys. I know all that, but I would eagerly enjoy seeing what a native person would say about that book.
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Feb 4, 2020 03:18
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Regardless of its other flaws, Altered Carbon (the show) is a really disappointing endeavor just because the setup is a genuinely good cyberpunk detective story. But then they mostly wrap it up suddenly halfway through so that the rest of the show can be a weird space opera action adventure, with a bunch of time given over to flashbacks starring a lady who is acting very badly (I don't know if this is because of the direction or if she just can't act). But they make sure to return to the untouchable oligarch at the very end to smugly tear him down, undercutting both endings, each major storyline's themes and making a whole mess of the show's storytelling aesthetics. I'm not big into lore-heavy game adaptations, but if Morgan hadn't showed his rear end I would have given a game based just on the first half of the show a couple of chances. Shame about all the rest of it.
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Feb 4, 2020 03:20
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StratGoatCom posted:I know all that, but I would eagerly enjoy seeing what a native person would say about that book. Fair enough!
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Feb 4, 2020 03:29
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Yeah and that's a really weird turn for Morgan because the series he's most famous for has a fairly trans-friendly concept and is full of radical marxist futurism. There's really very little about radical Marxist futurism that would make someone not be a transphobe. Most people don't choose their ideologies after meticulously determining their correctness in the first place, so being 'correct' about Marxist futurism doesn't imply a better ability at choosing the 'more correct" ways to think about gender stuff. Mostly it comes down to having a sense of belonging in a community leading to exposure to the ideas popular in the community. Catgirl communism is in vogue in SA Tradgames-adjacent spaces - but if you came into, say, Marxism, through, say, the old guard of radical activists from the 70s and 80s, chances are you're going to get exposed to a lot of ideas and opinions about gender and sexuality that solidified in the 70s and 80s. (And with Marxism specifically there's long traditions of portraying gender and sexuality stuff as at best a distraction from the more important class issues and at worst as decadent bourgeoisie deviance that threatens to corrupt the pure spirit of the worker.) I've read some Morgan, and while I can't say I picked up on all that much Marxist stuff, I did pick up on his feminist views, and they don't come off as having been terribly influenced by anything this side of Croatia's independence...
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Feb 4, 2020 04:21
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Bistromatic posted:Battle Angel: The way i remember it the alita clone got a new body that happened to me male-featured but they do not "get" or care about gender at all.
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Feb 4, 2020 04:26
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malkav11 posted:For what it's worth, that's a (stupid) change that the showrunners made and not the original text. It sucks that Morgan (who IMO is a brilliant writer) is a much less brilliant person. Even if there wasn't that, though...I'm not sure what an RPG licensing that setting brings to the table that we don't already have in other games. The books have a badly problematic attitude to women, and I'm not at all surprised to learn how transphobic Morgan is, but I enjoyed them enough to be crushingly disappointed in the show. The first two or three episodes were so great but then it takes such a nosedive. Among other things, changing the Hendrix to some lame goth poo poo sucked and was terrible.
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Feb 4, 2020 04:33
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Terrible Opinions posted:kinda:They had always been a bit more male presenting that the other clone-siblings and the new body was made at their request. So I assume there was at least an active desire to be more masculine. Good excuse for me to re-read the whole thing 
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Feb 4, 2020 08:28
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transhumanism has been a thin aesthetic gloss for eugenics and "the Rapture but for nerds" Singularity types (the Venn diagram of which is basically a fuzzy circle anyways) since at least the 90s, and they take it a lot more seriously than the handful of people who use the word "transhumanism" to mean "looking forward to better prosthetics"
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Feb 4, 2020 09:59
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Terrible Opinions posted:kinda:They had always been a bit more male presenting that the other clone-siblings and the new body was made at their request. So I assume there was at least an active desire to be more masculine. yeah, Sechs is a trans man and the comic isn't even a little bit ambiguous about it e: like we're talking about a character who uses male pronouns, deliberately seeks out a masculine body as soon as he gets the chance, and has this to say about his new body: 
Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 10:13 on Feb 4, 2020 |
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Feb 4, 2020 10:02
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