Drone Warfare gives me the blues

George Monbiot on drone warfare. John Robb has more on this topic. While the moral implications are surely scary, and the emergence of semi-autonomous drones is horrifying, it's not only the non-accountability but also the cheapness of the system that gives me pause. A drone as smart as a rat, able to make its own decisions whether to kill a target is bad enough. Lower the cost of a strike at about 1000 dollars, and that should put Seal Team Six out of business. Link this concept with total surveillance - now that is truly depressing.

One could counter that the low cost democratizes the system, but what will you do with your one little drone when the competition puts a few thousand of them into the sky? It's like voting with your wallet: You might just not be rich enough to win a war of attrition. And while everyone was hoping for a nice robocaust, it's just another wizard-level police state.

Please use the web for this, but not for that

So what is this ACTA business? It is said to be worse than SOPA, and proffering that legislation led to (maybe) the first visible strike on the internet. Now there seems to be an European version on the way, and it seems like it has proceeded quite far, in a rather sneaky way, like one of those halfling fucks lurking on the slope of your house volcano. I think we need another strike, and lots of phone calls to our representatives' offices. And letters. And creepy signboard vigils with vaguely related but really scary bible verses. Like the one about the two hundred foreskins. Other scary religions are, of course, welcome to join the fray.

Anyway: I think we are raging against the dying of the light. One day, a similar or worse legislation will be rammed through the relevant law-giving body, something like "all behavior on the net is illegal, prepare to be sued to oblivion and gitmotized if you do anything that displeases or hurts the feelings someone with more litigious oomph, or if we feel that our ROI isn't high enough. We will fuck you up. Yes, you could be face a lawsuit for posting a photo that looks like a photo that some has taken before, but from a different angle. Shut your mouth and pay up." But fret not. While articles like that cracked oldie above might no longer be possible, the net will still be there: It is useful after all, and you should use it for this, but not for that.

The evolution of narco tanks proceeds

As noted in the New York Times via BoingBoing. Note the arrangement of spotlights around the chassis, the closing embrasures and the armored glass for the driver and observer.

A Golden Age of Gaming

Robert Brockway thinks it's a great time to be playing computer games. I concur, mostly, but I find it strange that he returns again and again to his ten-year old self. Most kids are easy to impress (next time someone brings their brats over just tell them about the twelve-fingered man living under their beds if you want to check this statement) and I stopped listening to the views of people who can be fitted into an empty dishwasher. Still, he has many good points and it was about time somebody said it - we may not have our rocket backpacks, and neo-feudalism is just around the corner, but the gaming in this timeline is great.

Does talking about guns count?

The Bechdel Test. Go and read up on it. Then ask yourself the question: What about RPGs?

Watching this, I feel my vertebrae crumple

via coilhouse

Skyrim - again

I hope for the sake of my well-being that these are the closing comments on Skyrim - at least for the time being. Two days ago I finally ended the main quest, and while the game graciously allows you to go on playing with your character, I feel spent and see this as a good point to to put Skyrim on the back burner. Still, I want to correct my earlier assumptions, and while Skyrim still is a very strong game, and definitely worthy to be admitted into my personal Valhalla of gaming, a full play-through still showed some points which appear as weaknesses.

Non-optional upgrades

I feel that Skyrim - contrasted with, e.g., Fallout New Vegas - has only limited replay value (which is a good thing in a very tangible way, with just having wasted half a month on the game). A replay of an RPG is often motivated by trying out a different character type, and the best RPGs allow very different approaches to plot and gameplay. I don't see that possibility in Skyrim: While the whole setting screams for a barbarian character - a Conan, if you will - who abhors the unnatural magecraft, and this would be a nice choice for a replay, I would always end up playing a character with at least moderate magical abilities, as the gameplay forces you to use magics to deal with your opponents - especially the dragons. As your figure becomes better at what he does, and as only a handful of tactics seem to work, the pool of possible characters seems rather limited, even if you have some ten fantasy races to chose from. But a fighter-mage is a fighter-mage, whatever his ear size. And your character will get good at lockpicking, seems no way around it. At the moment I don't plan a replay (again, this is a thinly veiled blessing) because I already know how my character would develop.

A nagging sense of familiarity

Atmosphere is Skyrim's strong suit - even after dozens of hours the environment appears beautiful, and you are regularly surprised with epic views and vistas. This atmosphere (and the fact that Skyrim does not fall into the theme park trap - or structures its theme park in such a subtile way that it never becomes an issue) was my main motivation for going out an exploring. And while exploring, you find the dungeons - their symbols pop up on your compass, conveniently divided into nord barrows, nord crypts, dwemer ruins, armed camps, unspecified caves and so on.

Once inside, the feeling of being in a strictly linear haunted house ride becomes stronger with each dungeon you pass. After a dozen or so you find yourself looking for the sliding wall section close to the entrance where your treasure-laden ass will be deposited after dealing with the boss fight, and that's not a sign of full immersion. I'd rather have complex cave systems where you could get completely lost while your supplies and assets dwindle, but other players told me they where very happy with this haunted house dungeon design - getting lost is not for everyone, and it's nice to know that you don't have to walk back all those crypts, some of us have work to do etc. And the visual appeal and distinctiveness of the dungeons makes up for the linear design.

So there you have it: two minor niggles, one of which is purely subjective, while the other allows me to leave the house again. I see no need to correct my earlier rating.

5 of 5 cute little rabbits soul-trapped and fireballed