Lurker > adjl

Humble just released a "learn Godot" bundle. Not about to let this opportunity slip them by, I guess.

Yellow posted...

I don't understand, this new model doesn't even make Unity that much money, it's just terrible PR

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F58ZeiCXQAAMijv?format=png&name=medium

The only reason they'd choose this over 5% after $1m is if they're actually hoping to fraudulently take the fee after a user re-installs it 10+ times? Or is this just directly targeting Genshin Impact?

A very significant number of games never make more than a million dollars, and Unity is used for a substantial proportion of those due to its ease of use and the abundance of assets available to flip (or put legitimate effort into using). I'm guessing they're looking to capitalize on those (never mind the ways they already capitalize on those, such as the up-front license fee). Kind of a quantity over quality thing.

BlackScythe0 posted...

Surprised I haven't seen anything about leaks explaining why this decision was made. I've seen people suggest it's because unity can't compete with unreal... but that doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me because I felt like they had separate niches.

The problem is that corporations don't want to have separate niches. They want to have all the niches so they can make all the money.

DeltaBladeX posted...

https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/16hnibp/unity_silently_removed_their_github_repo_to_track/

They trusted there would be no changes because their old TOS said there wouldn't be. -_-

Yeah, there's pretty much no chance the retroactive thing will hold up if existing uses of the engine did so under a ToS that explicitly said "your project will only be held to the ToS as it stands at the time that you produced it." That's a blatant breach of the licensing agreement. There's also pretty much no chance anyone's going to start developing with Unity after this, and a substantial chance that current Unity projects will be either moved to a new engine or abandoned, outside of a handful of cases where the developer can take the hit. This is almost certainly a matter of grabbing a golden parachute and dumping the company.

Yeah, I don't think the Switch's announcement was really comparable. The Switch still has momentum. I'm not sure the WiiU ever did.

Though, historically, new Nintendo consoles have tended to be revealed at E3, then released in November of the following year. They weren't afraid of affecting holiday sales of current systems in those cases, but then again this has been the longest Nintendo generation ever and I couldn't tell you how long it's been since one of their systems was still going as strong as the Switch is in its (potentially) final year. That kind of makes it hard to draw on precedent to make predictions. Fortunately, we don't need to make predictions. We'll have answers tomorrow.

faramir77 posted...

I'd be surprised if they revealed the next console given that I bet they're aiming for a fall 2024 or spring 2025 release at the earliest.

I saw one article about the Direct saying that they don't think it's likely until after this holiday season, which I think makes sense. Announce a successor now (especially a backwards compatible one), and you're going to get people who were considering buying a Switch for Christmas holding out for the new system instead, as well as possibly missing out on some game sales. Announcing it early next year for a holiday 2024 release would likely be the best approach.

SinisterSlay posted...

It does happen a lot because we'll be on a hike, then stop at a grocery store. So we have hiking equipment, usually not bags.

So... you've got a backpack and could fit 2-3 folded-up bags in there pretty easily? Sounds like that might be a good thing to get in the habit of doing, especially if you plan to stop for groceries.

For that matter, where are you hiking that you don't need to drive to get there but also walk past a grocery store on your way home? That seems like a rather unusual set of circumstances, given how many grocery stores aren't exactly in pleasantly walkable areas (and those that are are in a more urban setting than "hiking" suggests).

Sufferedphoneix posted...

What's more wasteful. Not using the grocery bag at all cause of this and buying and using some other plastic or use what's give to you for free that would otherwise just go in the trash

In terms of plastic waste? They're identical at best, and it's probable that even if you make a habit of reusing plastic grocery bags you're still going to be throwing some out un-reused (by simple virtue of the fact that you use them to bring stuff into the house, but then you consume some of what you brought in and the volume of waste that leaves the house is less). The only difference is that you end up paying for the occasional package of suitable plastic garbage bags instead of getting it for free, and that cost is pretty negligible (though the fact that you've paid for them incentivizes you to use fewer, such as not bothering to line a garbage can that never sees anything that's actually messy enough to warrant a liner, which reduces waste).

SinisterSlay posted...

Think I'm making it up?
Here's a picture of my car trunk. It's empty, just those fucking bags you have to take everywhere
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/3/2/6/AAXuwuAAE1pm.jpg

1. Those Compliments bags are exactly the ones I've been using for several years without issue, so I'm not sure what you're doing that they "are wrecked after a few uses"
2. At least three of the bags I see are insulated cooler bags, which can't be replaced by plastic bags and therefore don't factor into the comparison
3. It'd take about 3 minutes to fold those up properly so they took up a quarter of the space
4. That still doesn't answer why you think they take up extra gas. Strictly speaking, yes, it is extra weight, but on the scale of a 1300 kg car with 3-400 pounds of people in it, an extra 10 pounds of bags (if that) isn't exactly impactful
5. If you know for a fact that you won't need that many bags for a regular trip, storing them in your trunk at all times doesn't make much sense

DeltaBladeX posted...

https://twitter.com/megacrit/status/1702077576209207611

I'm inclined to guess that removing their ToS from Github is less a matter of recognizing that it's a violation of trust and more a matter of trying to cut down on the number of devs that realize Unity has no legal grounds for retroactive charges like this.

The Direct is tomorrow (the 14th). Tokyo Game Show is the 21st-24th, or next week.

SinisterSlay posted...

Yeah my overall plastic waste increase substantially when they banned plastic because now I can't reduce the plastic bags as trash bin liners, so I have to buy more bags.

That sounds like you're producing, at worst, exactly the same amount of plastic waste.

SinisterSlay posted...

they don't even last that long. Most are wrecked after a few uses.

I've seen some terrible ones that don't last, but most I've used are still going strong after years of regular use, and those are just generic grocery store ones. Not sure what you're buying if they're falling apart that quickly.

SinisterSlay posted...

It also means you can't easily walk to a grocery store anymore, you have to know ahead of time and bring bags with you.

That can be an issue, but at least in my experience, it's pretty rare for me to spontaneously walk to the grocery store. If I'm getting groceries without a car without planning to before I leave my house, it's because the store is on my way home from something, and in the vast majority of cases "something" usually means I've got either a backpack or a saddle bag with me. I don't typically keep reusable bags in those because I don't typically find that I need them, but if it were a common issue, I'd just stick 2-3 in there and haul them out as needed. Said backpack/saddle bag can also hold a decent amount themselves, and in practice, I find spontaneous trips for groceries tend to only involve a couple items anyway, so a bag might not even be necessary.

If you frequently find yourself impulsively walking to get a significant number of groceries from somewhere other than your home, while also not making a habit of carrying some kind of bag with you while you're out, I can see it being a noteworthy problem. But even then, it's not that hard to get in the habit of adding a folded-up bag to the wallet-keys-phone that normally make up your everyday carry, and I would expect that to be sufficient in the vast majority of cases.

I think it's next week.

Oh, it absolutely is. But it's pretty rare for particularly wealthy corporations and executives to actually see consequences for insider trading, especially in a case like this where anyone who understands the medium at all knows why it's a bad idea, but the technologically-illiterate justice system might not see it the same way.

Nichtcrawler-X posted...

They are opening the doors for accusations of false inflated install numbers and making it so outside forces can actually artificially inflate those numbers, is just asking to have your reputation destroyed.

Given that the CEO has been selling off a bunch of his shares lately, I think a destroyed reputation might be exactly what they're going for.

I'm mostly just hoping for an update on Fantasy Life i. There isn't much "2023" left to still not have a release date, so I'm expecting a delay.

Nichtcrawler-X posted...

This is just such an easy to exploit concept, that I cannot imagine anyone at Unity would not foresee it...

I fully expect quite a few people at Unity foresaw the issues. The executive team, however, either doesn't include those people or doesn't care (in the particular example you presented, they aren't the ones being hurt, so they have little incentive to see it as a problem).

Shrek posted...

especially when the replacement is just the same thing but marginally smaller.

The bags I use are less than a tenth the size of a grocery bag, and if I wanted to spend a bit more, I could get biodegradable ones that eliminate the plastic waste entirely. It's a pretty substantial reduction in total plastic bag waste even for the people that normally reuse most or all of their plastic shopping bags. It gets even larger when you consider that most people don't do that and instead just throw out most or all of their plastic bags.

Shrek posted...

all these plastic bag bans do is enable stores to make even more profit off of you while reducing their own margins, and i'm sick of this s***.

In the last five years, I've spent maybe $10 on reusable grocery bags (not counting the Costco cooler bag, which was much more expensive but also serves a purpose regular grocery bags never could and therefore doesn't belong in this comparison). I had one tear, and the grocery store replaced it for free. In the grand scheme of corporations price gouging customers, this is nothing. You've spent more time trying to defend free plastic bags than it would take to earn the difference in cost at minimum wage, and given that it does actually reduce the amount of plastic bag waste on a larger scale, that makes very little sense.

sveksii posted...

Personally it feels like they're targeting F2P with this.

Installs would include F2P games with microtransactions, where as purchases I imagine wouldn't unless you made some sort of sub-clause to rope them in. Not to mention the majority of F2P player base doesn't ever do any purchases, so using installs could produce a significantly larger revenue stream.

Even then, updating the terms of use to claim residuals from all revenue instead of just the initial sale would likely make them more money than a per-install fee. Games are F2P for a reason: they stand to make more money from a small number of whales spending a large amount of money on a recurring basis than from all players paying a small entry fee. I would expect that to extend to residuals as well, if they're a percentage of revenue.

Shrek posted...

but spending it on something that's presumably free already is rather silly

When it's a trivial amount of money and it gives me a size that's actually appropriate for the job instead of generating a bunch of unnecessary plastic waste? Not really. Especially so where I can't get plastic grocery bags for free and this is coming from a perspective of "I really don't need to care about this" instead of coming up with a strategy for dealing with cat poop.

Shrek posted...

with my way, i get the bags for free
with your way, you pay for them.

we are doing the same thing, except one of us is paying money to do it

Perhaps my privilege is showing, but I'm okay with spending $2 every 2-3 months for bags.

I'm sure it's possible, but retroactively applying a fee like this that wasn't in the initial license agreement definitely won't pass legal muster.

shadowsword87 posted...

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/unity-software-incs-president-ceo-050515124.html

Hmmmmmm

And now he waits a week, buys back every share he sold for a fraction of the price, then walks back this idea for a PR boost that drives up their value. Classic.

Judgmenl posted...

I would be absolutely stunned if Takahashi creates anything adjacent to Xenosaga that's not a Xenoblade tie in like he's done with KOS-MOS In the past. I could never get into the Xenoblade series but I love Xenogears/saga.

Well, there's a scene in Future Redeemed (3's DLC) where a radio with the Vector logo on it does a bunch of background lore dumping and they name drop Dmitri Yuriev, presented in a context that was depicting a time before the trilogy began. And then the post-credit scene (broad ending spoilers for the whole Xenoblade trilogy and Xenosaga 3) is believed to be an alternate perspective of Xenosaga 3's post-credit scene, showing a blue dot floating through space next to the Earth on which all of Xenoblade (X aside) has taken place just after it emerged from a pocket dimension. The theory most people have grabbed onto is that the blue dot is KOS-MOS in Xenosaga 3's post-credit scene, very strongly suggesting that all of Xenoblade has taken place on Lost Jerusalem (and also explained how/why it was lost). It's all just speculation at this point, but the theory seems very plausible, especially paired with giving copyright credit to Bamco. Takahashi's cooking something.

That... sounds like an excellent way to ensure nobody uses Unity ever again.

fishy071 posted...

Then I am not strong, so I won't live long. I'll soon be wiped out by natural selection.

Uhh, what?

Judgmenl posted...

Why would you trade away a classic that will never be reprinted

I wouldn't be so sure about that. Xenoblade 3's DLC dropped a couple of sizable Xenosaga references, including crediting Bamco for the copyright for the material. The consensus among the community is that Takahashi was probably hinting that something Xenosaga-related is coming, whether it's just a port/remake or that Xenoblade 4 will be more integrated with Saga (which would probably also warrant a port so more than 300,000 people worldwide can legally get caught up on the story).

LinkPizza posted...

Id definitely lose them on the doorknob. I have a cat and a dog who both need to constantly mess with everything. They are the reason I cant find some of them now. Or why some are torn.

I'm sure you could figure out something that would leave them in an accessible, easily-remembered location that also kept them safe from meddling quadrupeds. It's not that hard to develop the habit of keeping bags around. You just have to actually put a modicum of effort into doing so instead of just sticking to the status quo of making unnecessary garbage.

LinkPizza posted...

I do have some of the reusable bags from the store. But I almost never have them. They are usually in the house wherever I put them after removing groceries. And I sometimes forget them when heading to the store. Plus, many trips are spontaneous, or when Im on the way from somewhere else

That's really easy to fix. Keep them in your car when you aren't using them. After you empty them, hang them on your doorknob so you remember to bring them out to the car the next time you head out. If you're driving to most places where you might need a bag anyway, there's really no reason not to have a reusable one with you.

Shrek posted...

why would i spend like $50 on a box of cat s*** bags when i could just use a free Walmart bag though

I spend $2 for a box of 100 fold top sandwich baggies. Lasts 2-3 months with two cats. Sure, it's more expensive than "free," but not by enough to genuinely worry about.

Meat, and it's not even close. That's just the nature of trophic levels: 1000 calories of meat takes ~10,000 calories of plants (assuming we're talking about eating herbivores, since the math gets even worse for carnivores) to produce. If arable land is limited enough that there's a chance it won't be able to feed everyone, using that land to grow livestock feed instead of food that can be directly eaten is a terrible idea.

Solid_Sonic posted...

Biting your lip and swallowing down the urge not to talk back to someone being critical of you is stressful (at least for me it is, maybe people with more mature coping mechanisms have it easier).

"Work on that" means developing those more mature coping mechanisms. The issues you're describing aren't particularly uncommon. There are plenty of therapy options out there to help you resolve them, so if they're adversely affecting your life, you should probably look into that.

darkknight109 posted...

you were *supposed* to help your friends with the gamepad, but my buddies and I had far more fun trying to screw each other over, as it gave the game some real challenge and was hilarious to boot

This is why I don't get the people that are unhappy that Wonder is only going to offer the full co-op experience for local play and not online. Co-op in platformers isn't a matter of genuinely co-operating, outside of the occasional "here, have a spare life" thing that Wonder's online features does include. It's a matter of making the game harder by actively trying to screw each other over in the most infuriating ways possible. That's something that's really only fun to do if you can punch each other as needed, which you can't with faceless strangers.

darkknight109 posted...

the controller was reduced to, as adjl put it, mostly just freeing up HUD space and/or providing easy menu access (which was sometimes cool, but kind of a waste of potential in my eyes)

It's not as glamourous as something like local asymmetrical multiplayer that would otherwise be all but impossible, but as a quality of life feature it shouldn't be understated. WWHD took WW from, in my eyes, being toward the bottom of the 3D Zelda pack and made it a serious contender for the best of them, and that's pretty much because the exploration around which the entire game is designed went from being a tedious chore to being actually fun. The speed sail and truncated Triforce hunt had a lot to do with that, but the gamepad map was also a huge component, given that it's necessary to consult the map so often to make course adjustments while sailing. Being able to do that on the fly was amazing. Xenoblade X similarly benefited in much of the same ways, given how strongly that game emphasized exploration and how intricate the terrain was (meaning having more than a minimap was very helpful).

It may not have been the most exciting, but it was very welcome.

darkknight109 posted...

It says something about the (lack of) innovation in developer ranks that all of the games that I thought made the best use of the Wii's motion controls and the Wii U's gamepad (Wii Sports, Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games, and WarioWare: Smooth Moves for the former; Nintendo Land and NSMBU for the latter) all came out in the first year of their respective consoles' lives and were all either developed directly by Nintendo or had their heavy involvement.

To be fair, it's not like third parties didn't also put out dozens of motion control minigame compilations for the Wii. By and large, they weren't as polished as Nintendo's, but they were definitely there. The market for motion control minigame compilations is only so large, though, and ultimately the wiimote was a bit too limited to really take it beyond that (at least until WMP came along, but by that point third parties had mostly abandoned the idea of taking the Wii seriously enough to take full advantage of that).

It may also have been better with later models, since mine was a near-launch one.

Shrek posted...

my guy that shit worked like a block away

It really didn't, unless we're talking really small blocks with absolutely no interference. Anything further than the next room over was a crapshoot. It worked really well within that range, but the range was absolutely a limiting factor.

Judgmenl posted...

There's really no reason to go outside and isn't going to be one for the foreseeable future sadly.

Fresh air? Sunlight? Giving your eyes a chance focus on something more than fifteen feet away so your iris doesn't atrophy?

I can't say I've encountered those, but I'd guess it's just chasing a trend more than anything really substantial.

__starsnostars posted...

Like... who thought it was a good idea to focus on having a controller with a tiny screen within a decade after the entire world just converted to large wide-screen high definition televisions.

But it didn't focus on that. Streaming to that screen instead of using the actual TV was a feature, but when games actually focused on the gamepad it was to use it as a secondary display to free up HUD space. In that regard, it worked perfectly, even if relatively few games took full advantage of it (notable examples being WWHD and Xenoblade X, exploration-heavy games that were made so much more pleasant to play by not having to pause to see a full map).

__starsnostars posted...

And do you know what Nintendo typically had going for it that their competitors didn't really emphasize at the time. Couch co-op and playing with friends in person. Do you know what doesn't make sense, designing a system around a controller that only one person can use.

Quite the contrary: Very few games actually did it (I can really only think of Nintendoland, which was unironically a blast), but the gamepad enabled local asymmetrical multiplayer that no other console before or since has done. Only one person could use the gamepad at a time, but that's precisely what made it so great, because it meant that player could have a different view from everyone else in the room. In terms of local multiplayer, the only other way that's really possible is to hook up a bunch of PCs to LAN, which is significantly less practical than simply booting up a console.

And, of course, all of the games that didn't offer asymmetrical multiplayer offered exactly the same local multiplayer experience you'd get from any other system. Nothing was lost there, except that the gamepad was a bit unwieldy to use if you didn't have any use for the screen. I'm not sure why you're framing it as though Nintendo screwed over people who wanted local multiplayer.

Shrek posted...

it had built in remote play that worked flawlessly with imperceptible latency, something that bigger companies can't even achieve to this day.

While impressive, the fact that you pretty much had to be in the same room (or at least have a clear line of sight to the system and still not be more than ~15 feet away) kind of limited its utility. It was marketed as a way for people who live with others to not have to stop playing if somebody else was using the TV, and that was about the extent of it.

__starsnostars posted...

The wii u was a disaster of a system and it soured me on Nintendo that I haven't even bothered with the Switch.

It was pretty much entirely a marketing disaster, rather than there being anything really wrong with the system. It sold poorly, and every other problem (tiny library, short lifespan) just cascaded from that. I wouldn't say that should sour you in the Switch beyond being a little leery of buying one until you had an opportunity to see how well it was selling and what kind of library it would end up with (which, by now, you have).

GanonsSpirit posted...

I like the Switch hardware better, but the Wii U firmware blows it out of the water. Nintendo took so many steps back with that one.

That, I can wholeheartedly agree with. Especially the eShop, which runs like an arthritic sloth and has fewer basic quality of life design features than even the Epic store (to say nothing of the shovelware problem that pretty much guarantees nobody's ever going to find a game unless they're specifically looking for it).

Now is it worse to have a console that you want to work not work, or a console that you want not to work to work?

Darth_CiD posted...

Don't, i've seen flat earthers make this exact argument in earnest and it's like come on man, Newtons laws of physics are taught to 11 year olds in school.

Never mind the fallacy inherent in believing that a helicopter can ever simply hover in place instead of having to adjust to compensate for wind and turbulence.

I understand why it was a flop, but I did really like mine, and the tiny handful of decent games it had were really quite good, and the rare game that did make full use of the gamepad did so amazingly well and in a way that no other system (except maybe the (3)DS) could emulate. The Switch definitely handles off-TV play better, though, and is overall a better system in pretty much every regard except the asynchronous multiplayer and QoL features that a second screen could provide, and the eShop UI.

GranTurismo posted...

who created the simulation to begin with, though?

No idea. When I say I believe it's possible, I just mean that I believe it's not impossible. It's nothing more fleshed out than that, and a shred of evidence to the contrary would be enough to change my mind.

I believe it's possible, but that's about the extent of it. There's zero evidence to support believing it more definitely than that, but there's also zero evidence disproving it, so I can't rule it out.

Muscles posted...

That's not a condition I'm putting on anyone,

Phrased like that, it is. That's just what words mean. If that's not what you mean, try using different words.

I get that you're not trying to be malicious. I think most people would get that. There's still room to improve the way you're framing the point you're trying to make so it comes across as less of a criticism of their failure to like themselves as they are, which is something you should try to do if you want to be understanding and supportive.

Muscles posted...

I'm just saying you should at least try to like yourself as you are before you do anything

And in doing so, you create a condition that anyone who wants to change themselves has to meet before you approve of them changing. How hard do they have to try? What do they have to try? What do you think of them if they don't try hard enough?

It's a subtle difference in how you frame it, but it's one you need to be aware of because it completely changes how accepted you make people feel. Be concerned for people's well-being, certainly, but don't frame it as "you should try to like yourself as you are first." I can guarantee that anyone seriously considering invasive cosmetic surgery has already tried liking themselves as they are. It hasn't worked, which is why they're seriously considering invasive cosmetic surgery.

Muscles posted...

So yeah, I think it's perfectly fine to say the way you were born is the way you were meant to be but with some exceptions.

Not really. Starting from the basic premise of "accept people for who they are unless that hurts other people" means not gatekeeping cases in which you're okay with people wanting to change the natural state of their bodies. Your perspective is one of "they have to earn my acceptance and support by falling into a category that I've been convinced deserves special treatment," which is not a perspective that somebody who wants to be a tolerant and accepting person should hold.

Muscles posted...

but there's a reason that the first step in transitioning is talking to a professional

I don't disagree. Pretty much any surgery should be preceded by consultations with appropriate professionals to rule out less invasive alternatives for solving the problem. But, again, there's an important difference between expressing supportive concern that somebody might not have properly considered their decision, and a blanket statement of "however you turned out is how you should be and you're wrong to want to change that." The former accepts that they have a problem they want to solve, and is trying to provide alternatives that might be safer, which is accepting and supportive. The latter starts from the premise that they are wrong to want to change themselves and need to justify the decision to you, which is neither accepting nor supportive.

BlackScythe0 posted...

I don't know how exactly what was obviously a low effort troll post went this direction

Because it's an interesting discussion with differing viewpoints. Low-effort troll posts can sometimes lead to meaningful debate, even if the low-effort troll doesn't end up being a part of it.

BlackScythe0 posted...

this is probably the first time in my life I've ever seen cosmetic surgery be defended this way.

My first reaction was "that's stupid, just accept the height you ended up with instead of resorting to invasive surgery to change it," but then I considered that I'd never say the same thing about gender (since that would make me a transphobic dinglemuffin) and realized that any line I might draw between the two would be completely arbitrary and exist solely for the purpose of letting me ignore my cognitive dissonance. So I changed my mind.

BlackScythe0 posted...

While there are definitely a variety of legitimate cosmetic surgeries (like dealing with excess skin after weight loss) I view the "non-legitimate" ones as predatory.

They can be. Much more so than gender-affirming care, there are absolutely cosmetic procedures out there that exist primarily for the sake of preying on people's insecurities and not to genuinely help. Across the board, I think more people considering cosmetic surgeries should consult a therapist before making that decision to see if they can find a way to feel more comfortable with themselves before taking the plunge on invasive medical interventions (as is typical for dealing with gender dysphoria). Be that as it may, however, virtually all cosmetic procedures can have some therapeutic value, whether we're talking radical skeletal modifications or simply getting your ears pierced. Gatekeeping that is neither helpful nor logically defensible.

BlackScythe0 posted...

Wishing you were taller is not the same as a persons gender identity and I consider it to be transphobia that people are attempting to make this argument.

It's not as big of a deal, I would agree, but they're definitely logically analogous. If you can come up with some way in which they aren't (noting that "height doesn't matter as much as gender" falls into the former category and is also completely subjective), I'm happy to entertain it, but I can't come up with a justifiable way to draw that line. As such, I'm not going to draw it.

Muscles posted...

People should be ok with themselves before transitioning,

If they were okay with themselves, they wouldn't need to transition. Not being okay with yourself is what it means to be dysphoric (at least as regards a personal trait, since the term does more generally refer to any pervasive sense of unease, but we'll stick with the colloquial use).

Zareth posted...

Because the treatment is potentially dangerous? HRT is very different than breaking your fucking bones.

Do you think gender-affirming care doesn't also involve radical, invasive surgeries with considerable risks? For that matter, HRT also carries quite a few dangerous side effects, including a substantially elevated risk of various cancers.

Yeah, there's risk, but such is the nature of any medical treatment. Whether or not the potential therapeutic benefit is worth the risk is a decision that needs to be made between the patient and their doctor (including a therapist, in cases where dysphoria/dysmorphia is involved). Unless you've got concerns that the doctor has inadequately informed the patient of the risk and/or is pushing the treatment against the patient's best interests (which can be valid, particularly with lucrative cosmetic procedures), that's really the beginning and end of it.

And, again, this is a question of "your genes dictate how you're meant to be" being treated as a valid criticism. Expressing concerns about safety is very different from trying to insist that somebody is inherently wrong for wanting to change.

BlackScythe0 posted...

How the fuck does that border on transphobia?

"The way you were born is the way you're meant to be" is textbook transphobia, when applied to gender. Why should it be any less objectionable when applied to other form of dysmorphia?

Mine is wearing out and I should probably replace it (it keeps double-clicking instead of single-clicking and sometimes has trouble dragging), but mouse shopping is a pain. I routinely swap between lefty mouse for everyday use and righty mouse for games, so I need something ambidextrous, but I also want a few extra buttons (mostly back and forward buttons for browsers, but they have other applications), and mice with extra buttons tend to be handed. It's made even worse by the fact that I don't like buying mice without being able to feel them to see if they're a good fit, so I'm limited to the pretty small number of options on display at local stores.

I'd thought this particular model (Razer Diamondback) was out of production, but just doing a search now I seem to be able to find a couple listings, so I might just order one of those. Otherwise, I'll have to start hunting.

Friday makes the week before feel shorter, Monday makes the weekend feel longer. Both have their merits, and my preference mostly boils down to how the week before is going.

wwinterj25 posted...

Seems a lot to go through for very little results. Have at it though.

This is about my take on it. Hope you feel it's worth it.

keyblader1985 posted...

Furby or nothing

And so began the Great Animatronic War of 2039.