Peanut

Is already standard for companies to further ‘optimize’ by creating problems that they can charge extra to solve.

I mean, advertising to begin with is just a way for people with existing capital to make themselves more salient regardless of their product quality.

But if you don’t even need a product and can charge people for the right not to have every experience made worse, or more annoying or time consuming, the whole point of the market has lost the plot at the expense of the people.

Like paying rent on features that have traditionally just been available after purchasing a thing, like vehicle seat heating.

Only going to get worse unless we change out of a system built entirely around individualized extraction and competition.

The story is impenetrable

actually thought the story was much more clear than in any of the souls games.

largely boils down to a bunch of cosmic forces trying to do their own thing or gain their own gains. we understand everything from the abandonment of metyr and her fingers, to the classic nobility/mythology relationship between the gods, lords, and extended family.

we know that gods can have two bodies, and that they can act against each-other. we see how the finger’s influence has affected all of this, and how ranni the witch is actually in a state of escaping that whole situation by killing the important half of her older brother, and less-important half of herself in order to escape the two fingers.

there’s way too much to even summarize succinctly, but i always find it baffling when people say the story is more vague than their other titles. lots of meat, and it all makes sense in the larger world they built, even if some questions are still left open.

also everything around radahn. what a tragic badass.

really love how scadu DLC resolved the family conflicts around ‘kindly’ miqella creating a sycophantic bubble that justifies his usurpation of other people’s autonomy, etc. actions of mohg and malenia making a lot more sense when you realize that, just like everyone else, are just tools for the cause.

the cause being fucking his really cool older brother who doesn’t seem interested.

i don’t remember a whole lot in the souls-verses resolving anywhere near as clearly as a lot of the stuff in elden ring.

also i think it’s much less “you’re supposed to suffer,” due to the RPG grow-as-you-explore vibe they went for, and many people complain about how you can make the game too easy, but i think it’s a good balance that makes sense with the world you’re exploring and how you explore it. except for the scadu DLC. the scadu DLC wants you to suffer.

The issue is the ever encroaching line of “I need this for basic survival” while people who are extracting the means for survival can’t seem to understand why ignoring the problem doesn’t solve their anxiety or continuing societal failures ensuring more and more people fall below the line of basic autonomy and survival.

Like “why do the Gays need to make so much noise” meets society forbidding gay marriage and classifying that entire way of being a an “illness” to justify past and future abuses

I this case, those who don’t want to suffer a prolonged and more dangerous pandemic because a few people are still pushing the Andrew wakefield hyper debunked MMR autism narrative, or any other social issue that makes finding peace extra difficult because you or your love ones are directly suffering or dying from these problems.

It’s like, offering someone some mindfulness advice after your dad poisoned their dog. Doesn’t help as much as you’d think.

And an advertisement. I’ve been convinced that any time I see label front and center it’s just the morally gray arm of the already morally bankrupt concept of rich people being able to use excess money to make sure that their products are always more salient than other smaller or local suppliers, ensuring sales regardless of quality.

I think both a lot more of that, and intentionally divisive instigating content than people realize.

Almost like extreme excess of wealth and celebration of greeds will inevitably fuel itself by extracting autonomy, truth, and value out of every other space for interaction we want to care about.

Making yourself openly visible to the public turned into an unnecessary contest of being the MOST visible, which somehow takes more of societies energy overall than services for public good. Funny that.