Fits right in with the GOP's desire to bring back child labor.

It's a space clutter looter

Played 8 hours last night so this is a very early impression. I love clutter looters and didn't expect much else from Bethesda's Fallout/Scrolls main studio. The Bethesda crafted areas are excellent if you are looking for what I call a Fallout / Elder Scrolls clutter looter. Lots of stuff to loot, the FPS combat is much better than Fallout 4 or 76. Don't expect a space sim like SC or NMS this is a Bethesda Fallout/Scrolls style game with a bunch of additional systems on top of it.

First person combat

I've played both SC and NMS. While exploring a station in Starfield I thought to myself... this is what SC should have been for their foot exploration. The derelict stations in NMS are rather static environments and never cared for them much. What surprised me about the Starfield AI is they will "flee" or "flank" by running past you at times. I've lost track of enemies at times because of this and have had to go hunting for them.

Ship travel

There is fast travel. If you are looking for a space flight sim this is not for you. I don't have an issue with fast travel as I get no thrills from traveling in space 1:1. There is simulation and there is stupid... SC leans a bit too heavy into the latter. Don't expect 1:1 space travel in Starfield, it isn't made for that.

Ship combat

Again this is not a space flight sim. Most recently coming off Everspace 2 I do miss the strafing controls and pedal usage, but that game is star fighter like combat. Starfield does have a ship editor and seems to be more about load out than fighter style combat. Think a bit more like Expanse style combat. I don't have much time in this area of the game so I can't say a whole lot more about it.

Initial impression

I love Bethesda clutter looters and this one is in space. Going to eat up the Bethesda crafted clutter looter areas. The 1,000 worlds will likely function as a massive canvas for future mods.

Wagner Group chief says his mercenaries will halt their march on Moscow

https://www.npr.org/2023/06/24/1184166949/wagner-group-moscow-halting-march-russia

Bethesda did a good job. I have played SC and SB2 and while I like how they do space travel, the rest of their game sucks by comparison. Bethesda really knocked it out of the park.

This. Just exploring the first POI after leaving the tutorial I thought to myself, "This is how SC, NMS, and ED should have done their ground FPS exploration and combat." The FPS gameplay is much better than Fallout 4/76, Bethesda improved that aspect a good amount. And with any Fallout/Scoll game, I love the clutter loot. I'm now 42 hours into the game, lots of new Bethesda style detailed POIs to discover and explore. People complaining about empty moons/planets are ignoring the hand crafted content and focusing on the unpainted mod canvas... or to give them a bit of a pass they have never played ED, NMS, or SC as those have lots of empty moons as well.

https://www.npr.org/2023/06/24/1184166949/wagner-group-moscow-halting-march-russia

Lots of opportunities for improvement!

Here are some numbers. I’m at 42 hours played. Resolution 2k, settings are on High. Ryzen 5800x and a Radeon RX 6800xt. The last session of ~5 hours had an average FPS of 108, Starfield is more optimized than BG:3 and Remnant 2.. at least for AMD. I had to lower a lot of Remnant 2 settings and it still averages around 55.

“And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth. And for two and a half thousand years, the [CNET article] passed out of all knowledge.” - LotR Tolkien

Going to dump my initial impression. Note my bias, I love clutter looters and this is a Bethesda clutter looter in space with a bunch of additional systems resting on top of that genre.

It’s a space clutter looter

Played 8 hours last night so this is a very early impression. I love clutter looters and didn’t expect much else from Bethesda’s Fallout/Scrolls main studio. The Bethesda crafted areas are excellent if you are looking for what I call a Fallout / Elder Scrolls clutter looter. Lots of stuff to loot, the FPS combat is much better than Fallout 4 or 76. Don’t expect a space sim like SC or NMS this is a Bethesda Fallout/Scrolls style game with a bunch of additional systems on top of it.

First person combat

I’ve played both SC and NMS. While exploring a station in Starfield I thought to myself… this is what SC should have been for their foot exploration. The derelict stations in NMS are rather static environments and never cared for them much. What surprised me about the Starfield AI is they will “flee” or “flank” by running past you at times. I’ve lost track of enemies at times because of this and have had to go hunting for them. If I had to compare a more recent rpg shooter I'd say the combat is sort of close to Remnant 2 but where Remnant 2 combat is more deliberate and paced, Starfield fire fights are more erratic and frantic. I did find myself enjoying hunting down the AI that will run off and setup elsewhere.

Ship travel

There is fast travel. If you are looking for a space flight sim this is not for you. I don’t have an issue with fast travel as I get no thrills from traveling in space 1:1. There is simulation and there is stupid… SC leans a bit too heavy into the latter. Don’t expect 1:1 space travel in Starfield, it isn’t made for that.

Ship combat

Again this is not a space flight sim. Most recently coming off Everspace 2 I do miss the strafing controls and pedal usage, but that game is star fighter like combat. Starfield does have a ship editor and seems to be more about load out than fighter style combat. Think a bit more like Expanse style combat. I don’t have much time in this area of the game so I can’t say a whole lot more about it.

Additional systems

I haven't played enough to have an impression on the other systems but they are there: ship building, research, resource gathering, surveying, and base/output construction.

Initial impression

I love Bethesda clutter looters and this one is in space. The first few locations are fantastic in their detail, interactivity, and clutter; I going to eat up the Bethesda crafted clutter looter areas. The 1,000 worlds will likely function as a massive canvas for future mods.

"250 articles a week..." So they are just transitioning to creating spam? Never read any of those sites but focusing on output just sounds like spam. #filtered #squelch

Paper.wf is using Write Freely. You can see Paper.wf in their instance list here: https://writefreely.org/instances

Thief Deus ex (you can choose stealth in this game but it isn’t specifically a stealth game imo) Dishonored (superb)

Was surprised to not find these games in the main list. Thief and Deus Ex (I play it stealthy as much as possible) have been my go to stealth games. And no matter how you try to play Skyrim it always ends with stealth archer. 😅

Zoom meeting. Manager's husband trying to crawl behind her out of the camera's view. He didn't quite make it obviously. The manager was reading something so she didn't notice everyone trying not to bust up laughing. Never thought I'd see one of those "zoom events" in the wild, but there it was.

StarUI: https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/773

Achievement Enabler: https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/252 (this does require an external dll, use at your own risk)

I was mainly after a mod that would show how much of an item I have in my inventory when buying. This mod does that and more. The achievement mod just keeps achievement enabled with mods installed.

Been working remote since 2016, no issues, stuff gets done (GIS, software development, data management, client support). I know may others have been working remotely for much longer.

Because someone mentioned gaining weight... if you do work remotely it can become easy to roll out of bed and into the chair, make sure to take time to exercise (even a brisk walk). I try to get a walk in before breakfast each morning, then follow up with more intense sessions during the day to break up all the sitting or a longer session in the evening.

Ah, thanks. I should have given the API a look. I'll see if I can write something that will do what I need.

Ok, this looks slick. First thing that came to mind was the IM client, which I used for a long time. I'm looking to consolidate a bunch of information (docs, knowledge base DBs, bookmarks) in this beast.

It's stealth all the way down.

Replied to wrong level, moving to parent comment.

The US military has projected that basic infrastructure in the USA will be collapsing throughout much of the country in less than twenty years. It’s hard to see how ebikes will be practical under those conditions.

The Modern War Institute articles are not official US positions as stated in their own disclaimer. Here is the disclaimer straight from the link:

The articles and other content which appear on the Modern War Institute website are unofficial expressions of opinion. The views expressed are those of the authors, and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.

The Modern War Institute does not screen articles to fit a particular editorial agenda, nor endorse or advocate material that is published. Rather, the Modern War Institute provides a forum for professionals to share opinions and cultivate ideas.

That noted, yes US infrastructure is aging and will need more funding. It is not like the US infrastructure will just suddenly become feral ghoul territory in 20 years, funds (likely not enough) will be used to replace/update/maintain infrastructure. Will US cities become feral? I'd bet an exceedingly safe wager is no, not at all. That podcast references 3 other articles dealing with cities mostly in war torn areas of the world, not US cities.

It’s hard to see how ebikes will be practical under those conditions.

If the worst outcome occurs and some cities turn into Fallout style wastelands... bikes will work MUCH better than large vehicles that require more maintained roads, service stations, and generally more infrastructure/logistics than a bike or ebike would ever require.

This seems like a difficult topic, at least for me.

Disclosure: I been using Starlink since Dec 2020.

I tend to look a bit forward in time, often too soon. Thinking about the future I have to ask the question, "will earth continue to build space structures, constellations, or even ring structures (I know, far far future)?" I figure in time those developments will happen at some level or another. The next question I wonder about is "when", if humanity builds out into space should we do it now or later?

These developments will surely be a problem for viewing the stars from Earth. More space based telescopes could eventually replace the more professional work but views from Earth itself are likely to always be impacted by space development. It could be that Starship, the craft that will put even more Starlink satellites in orbit, may also open up many more opportunities for space based scopes at much lower costs and/or sizes than previously possible.

My guess is long term development in space will create more space based viewing platforms and there will be increased accessibility to those platforms, but all this space development will impact Earth based observations at least short term. Longer term it is a bit more murky what might happen with Earth based observation. It could be that the sky becomes so busy that astronomy as we know it will be forced to change (it may have already by then) or the technology will change to where constellation systems may no longer be needed or more effort may go into reducing their impact.

No doubt I like to look out at the stars in wonder but another part of me wants to see humanity act on that wonder, step out and explore what is out there. The stages between viewing with wonder and exploring is likely to pretty messy, at least looking at how humanity has approached most things.

Lab cotton could, hopefully, be efficiently grown

While there are not many details this is hopefully a great step toward more efficient cotton production. There are a number of possible reductions from this method (hard to know without full details though), that being lower usage of land, water, pesticides, herbicides, and shipping.

Longer term what I find exciting is the some of these lab grown systems may work well "closed loop" which mean they might work off planet at some capacity or another. That is a much longer term vision though and we have a long way to go before we master that aspect.

Naturally.

Laser brother fist bump

Developers have been trying to put themselves out of their own jobs since the beginning. Automating/scripting things, creating tools, IDEs, etc.

As a developer I always thought this was sort of the point. If the mostly automated system doesn't require less maintenance, make life easier for the user(s), or require fewer humans, I'm doing something wrong. Always feels a little bit like undermining your position, but when things do break you are also the person most likely to know the fix and fix it quickly.

Just in time for the republicans to blame Biden for the economic down turn late this year, early next year, after payments restart for 43 million.

I had the exact same issue with the Microsoft Sculpt, it would disconnect much too often. There is a setting in Windows that sort of helped it but not fully. I also missed the standard cursor keys placement (home/end/pg) and the number pad as I will often punch in some numbers or even hit the enter key over there just to mix it up a bit.

The Logitech is a full width/key keyboard so cursor manipulation muscle memory is great, that was something I was still getting used to on the Sculpt. The Logitech does not disconnect as much as the Sculpt and there are no repeat key presses, it does however still disconnect at times and it is most obvious when trying to copy or paste. Overall the Logitech is the board I like best since the natural 4000.

If there was pie in the sky I'd like a full key, ergonomic split, wired, and hot swap keys so I can just fix any key that has an issue in the future. I searched high and low for that combination and haven't found one that checks all the boxes. There are split mechanical keyboards but they are always missing a feature like: not hot swap, short the cursor keys, have shuffled the cursor keys, or dropped the number pad. There is one mechanical keyboard that comes extremely close but the keys are not hot swap.

Core Keeper has a Terraria / Zelda: Link to the Past vibe if you are looking for something like that.

I listen to NPR but their impact statement is weak sauce... I'm sorry it sounds like 6 figure speak.

Impact: Roughly 1 in 8 Americans will have to restart loan payments as soon as September.

Nothing to see here folks, just move along. No, the impact is people choosing between food and meds, the mental burden of loans on their neck (after being told by every fiber of the US that education = more income), further inability to purchase housing, choosing between rent and living in a car.

But irongamer student loans didn't cause all that! No, they are just another shovel load of dirt on the grave of the American dream. Many of these individuals are increasing their education so they can afford food AND meds, or afford to own a home let alone rent these days. Many other individuals are increasing their education to move humanity forward in technology, humanities, and sciences.

But irongamer they took the loans on themselves! Sure, with the pressure of just about every fiber of the US saying get an education to make a difference or make more money. Worse yet are those that are attempting to help the country by continuing their education, only to have the system (honestly mostly republicans) spit on them during an event like a pandemic.

The timing is perfect for republicans to play their economic down turn card when repayments start late this year. Watch for that card late this year or early next year after 43 million repayments start.

So, folks get back to making payments to your yacht lord. Think of the poor fellow with 4 houses and the inability to exist in all of them at once! Weep for the individual that can already put food on the table and afford the meds to treat their ills.

It is just a loan restart... nothing to see here.

Did you play Lords of the Fallen 2014? I did play that one and it felt much easier than the Dark souls at the time. It made me wonder if this new Lords of the Fallen 2023 would also feel, or be, easier than the current gen of souls like titles.

While I do not use tenting or physically split keyboards, I have been using ergonomic split keyboards for ~16 years. Not sure if that exactly fits the category you are looking at.

The specific keyboards have been the Microsoft natural ergonomic keyboard 4000, Microsoft Sculpt, and Logitech ERGO K860. I've been gaming on the PC since the early 90s and have been in IT and software development for ~26 years.

I have had no issues with carpal tunnel or RSI. While I obviously cannot say it was 100% due to the split keyboard design I believe it has likely helped to keep those issues at bay. Once you are used to a split keyboard design you can feel the pitch and stress on your wrists when using a standard keyboard. I have also always used the riser that rises the wrist end of the keyboard so you fingers are sort of "falling" down toward the keys.

I used that Microsoft 4000 keyboard for years, cleaned out the membrane on it 2 or 3 times before I had to replace the entire keyboard. Then was left hunting for something to replace it; I tried a lot of keyboards. In the end I've settled on the Logitech K860.