I stumbled on the OST for the unreleased Jazz Jackrabbit 3 recently, and I keep playing this track every now and again, it's such a banger. This whole subgenre from Epic Games' early efforts (and stuff those composers did for other companies) is really cool, I with there more games beyond the Unreals and Deus Ex with that style. This track from Unreal 2 is another great one

The cut Downtown theme from Vampire: the Masquerade - Bloodlines, it's just such a vibe

Fertile Rondo from Bayonetta 3 is also just , great 5th Element vibes

Brain Freeze from Yuri's Revenge, I miss the "just stick some old movie/TV quotes in" era of electronic music

This track from Descent (this particular recording off a Roland SC-55, I'm pretty sure I originally found it on youtube but it seems like that upload may have been taken down, and a lot of the other ones I could find don't sound as good)

The whole Neotokyo soundtrack really, just an absolute masterpiece composed for a free mod for some reason. Some standouts: Beacon, Imbrium, Tachi, I just absolutely love the combination of more electronic sounds with strings and piano in a lot of these.

On the more ambient side of things, STALKER has some great ones, Call of Pripyat especially, like the Pripyat theme

it's difficult to merge that deep simulation system with the capability to do narrative traditional game design

Definitely, games that try this do need to abandon traditional narratives to some extent, which is a big ask for a typical publisher - and unfortunately, the complexity of such systems also puts them out of the reach of indie games which can otherwise afford to be more experimental (although Rain World is supposed to have some pretty amazing AI simulation too) - these kind of projects really have to be AA games, big enough to manage the complexity, but small enough to be allowed to actually do it instead of flattening everything in pursuit of more market share. And the AA side of the industry has unfortunately massively declined.

Space Rangers' main narrative isn't really much more than "liberate all star systems and defeat the big boss commanding the enemy" - there's a bit of detail about the war itself, but it's mostly revealed in big text boxes, which is moreso lore than narrative I guess. However, it's still got plenty of stories, thanks to the baffling(ly amazing) decision to just stick like a 100 mini-text-adventure games in as side quests. Get caught by the cops for your piratical crimes and sent to jail? Oh boy, we've got a whole text adventure of you having to manage your relations with the prisoners and the guards, choosing who to snitch on, getting into, uh, trained cockroach races (?), ratting out the horrible prison conditions to journalists, and much more! There's also presidential elections, cooking competitions, just a whole ton of random stuff, I have no idea what they were thinking but it turned out pretty great.

Grand strategy games like Crusader Kings also utilize such dynamic systems to great effect while forsaking typical narrative, but they're their own niche (and while Paradox does make cool stuff, they do also nickel-and-dime people for like 100 different DLCs per game...)

There's a neat Russian game series, Space Rangers, which also hit some of those vibes for me.

STALKER early in its development had some marketing blurb about "the AI being able to beat the game without the player", which is pretty dubious (it may have been sort of technically true at a very early stage when the game didn't really have much of a story or missions, but it's definitely not true for the finished product, which does have a more conventional narrative running through the game that you as the player are the driving force of), but in Space Rangers 2 this actually can nearly happen in the lower difficulty modes - you're not playing as some chosen hero, you're just a volunteer soldier in a big war, a war which goes on without you - star systems are captured and lost, the military organizes expeditions, technology advances over the course of the game with new weapons and ship models becoming available, and eventually, the AI can indeed whittle the enemy down to pretty much one or two final star systems. It was pretty nifty.

I really wish this whole "simulating deep systems that allow gameplay situations (and maybe even whole stories) to naturally emerge" approach (seen in these games, immersive sims, and I guess to some extent grand strategy games) was more popular, but it is pretty difficult and risky. It's part of what makes Bethesda's trajectory even more disappointing - at the time of Oblivion, they were actually exploring some of the same ideas of detailed AI routine simulation as STALKER (just tailored more towards "citizen" NPCs, ones who have homes and jobs and families, and thus routines revolving around that, while STALKER's guys are more nomadic wanderers getting into hijinks)... but the Radiant AI system didn't end up going anywhere, it was very jank but instead of trying to further develop it they've been progressively cutting it down more and more, and apparently in Starfield there's not much of it left.

gotta shill for Patlabor 2 (the whole franchise is great, although I haven't gotten around to watching the whole TV series yet, but the 2nd movie is the most explicitly political)

Patlabor 2: The "Just War/Unjust Peace" Scene (1993) (or with subs here)

We're a rich country, and what is our wealth built on? The bloody corpses in all these wars... they're the foundation of our peace.

Other countries, comfortably far away, pay the price for our prosperous peace. We've learned very well how to ignore their suffering.

https://xcancel.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1858019192370507904

Wow, looks like Xi was extremely straightforward during his meeting with Biden, probably the most he's ever officially been in a meeting with a US president.

According to the Chinese readout (https://www.guancha.cn/internation/2024_11_17_755645.shtml) here's what he told Biden were the 7 "lessons of the past 4 years that need to be remembered":

1. "There must be correct strategic understanding. The 'Thucydides Trap' is not historical destiny, a 'new Cold War' cannot and should not be fought, containment of China is unwise, undesirable, and will not succeed."

2. "Words must be trustworthy and actions must be fruitful. A person cannot stand without credibility. China always follows through on its words, but if the U.S. side always says one thing and does another, it is very detrimental to America's image and damages mutual trust."

3. "Treat each other as equals. In exchanges between two major countries like China and the United States, neither side can reshape the other according to their own wishes, nor can they suppress the other based on so-called 'position of strength,' let alone deprive the other of legitimate development rights to maintain their own leading position."

4. "Red lines and bottom lines cannot be challenged. As two major countries, China and the United States inevitably have some contradictions and differences, but they cannot harm each other's core interests, let alone engage in conflict and confrontation. The One China principle and the three China-US joint communiqués are the political foundation of bilateral relations and must be strictly observed. Taiwan issue, democracy and human rights, development path, and development rights are China's four red lines, which cannot be challenged. These are the most important guardrails and safety nets for China-US relations."

5. "There should be more dialogue and cooperation. Under current circumstances, the common interests between China and the United States have not decreased but increased. Whether in areas of economy and trade, agriculture, drug control, law enforcement, public health, or in facing global challenges such as climate change and artificial intelligence, as well as international hotspot issues, China-US cooperation is needed. Both sides should extend the list of cooperation, make the cooperation cake bigger, and achieve win-win cooperation."

6. "Respond to people's expectations. The development of China-US relations should always focus on the wellbeing of both peoples and gather the strength of both peoples. Both sides should build bridges for personnel exchanges and cultural communication, and also remove interference and obstacles, not artificially create a 'chilling effect.'"

7. "Demonstrate great power responsibility. China and the United States should always consider the future and destiny of humanity, take responsibility for world peace, provide public goods for the world, and play a positive role in world unity, including engaging in positive interaction, avoiding mutual consumption, and not coercing other countries to take sides."

Funnily, all this is summarized in the official US readout (https://china.usembassy-china.org.cn/readout-of-president-joe-bidens-meeting-with-president-xi-jinping-of-the-peoples-republic-of-china-3/) with this short sentence: "The two leaders reviewed the bilateral relationship over the past four years". Talk about an understatement 😅. The language compared to the readout of the last Xi-Biden meeting in San Francisco one year ago is noticeably more forthright, especially on the U.S.'s lack of trustworthiness ("if the U.S. side always says one thing and does another..."). Looks like he's getting very frustrated with U.S. duplicity... The 4 red lines he enumerates are also new (not new individually as they've each been mentioned before, but packaging them together as "four red lines" and explicitly labeling them as such in a president-level diplomatic readout is new)

...

With the red lines on "Democracy and human rights" and "Development path/system", it looks like China is effectively telling the U.S. it will not humor them anymore in discussions about its internal system and so-called "human rights", and that it will consider any U.S. initiative aimed at interfering with China's internal affairs or otherwise shape China as hostile actions on the same level as Taiwan. This is also clear with Xi telling Biden that "neither side can reshape the other according to their own wishes".

On development rights Xi states that "the Chinese people's right to development cannot be deprived or ignored" and criticizes how "while all countries have national security needs, the concept shouldn't be overgeneralized or used as an excuse for malicious restrictions and suppression". He also said that "great power competition should not be the theme of the era; unity and cooperation are needed to overcome difficulties together. 'Decoupling and breaking chains" is not the solution; mutually beneficial cooperation is the path to common development. 'Small yards with high fences' is not befitting of great powers."

In other words, he's telling Biden that he believes the U.S. is attempting to curtail China's development in the guise of national security, but that this is "an excuse for malicious restrictions and suppression" and a red line as China has a fundamental right to develop as any other country. This is all, of course, also signaling to the upcoming Trump administration. The fact these are "red lines" means they're non-negotiable regardless of who leads the US: he's telling Trump too that attempts to "reshape" China or restrict its development will be viewed as hostile actions. And the emphasis on US "saying one thing and doing another" also puts the future administration on notice that China will judge the US by its actions rather than its diplomatic statements.

Conclusion: by framing these positions as "lessons learned" from the past four years, Xi is effectively closing the book on one approach to US-China relations - which he's obviously very critical about - and very clearly signaling to Trump a change is badly needed, particularly around the "4 red lines" and matching words with actions. The language is very confident, telling the U.S. they need to "treat each other as equals" and that they have no "position of strength" anymore. The US readout on this, as usual for the Biden administration, is very illustrative of exactly what Xi is complaining about: a complete disregard for China's stance on these issues and a refusal to engage with them, or even mention them at all. Not sure that "America first" Trump and the team of China hawks he put together will be much better...

Also, do the Ukrainians even have any ATACMS left at this point?

https://newsukraine.rbc.ua/news/ukrainian-army-used-nearly-all-atacms-missiles-1726014379.html

An anonymous US official told CNN that the US has supplied Ukraine with several hundred ATACMS missile systems and that Ukraine has used most of them. The official noted that the US has a limited stockpile of missile systems that can be provided to Ukraine without compromising its military readiness.

I wasn't able to find another source in a cursory search, but have they even been doing any ATACMS strikes lately?

And even if they had the missiles, how many vehicles do they actually have left that could launch them, and what's the chance of those vehicles getting close to the frontline (where they would need to be in order to actually meaningfully strike into Russian territory, the "long-range" here is very relative, these aren't ICBMs) without getting taken out by the Russians (a whole bunch of artillery systems were lost in the Kursk offensive precisely because they had to be moved closer to the front in order to perform their strikes)

This whole thing seems symbolic, just the US going "feel free to use these weapons you don't even have jack "

https://xcancel.com/JesseJenkins/status/1840773225070158215

critical support to the US in reducing carbon emissions by de-electrifying itself

gommunism no food? capitalism no power!

https://xcancel.com/ArmchairW/status/1839453350854853047

There's actually a critical lesson to draw from this and other Ukrainian fiascos, of which the Bakhmut saga and the Zaporozhie Hundred Days come to mind: Ukraine will have ended up losing this war in large part because it consistently tried to fight beyond its means.

The Ukrainians started this war with an enormous army, well in excess of what the Russians could and actually did commit to the fight in 2022. That huge force (the "First Army") was badly mauled in early 2022, but it was rejuvenated later that year by a combination of ruthless mobilization and massive aid from NATO. This convinced the Russian Stavka to transition to the defensive and consolidate their position in Ukraine, withdrawing troops from more exposed positions in east Kharkov and right-bank Kherson. Any serious assessment of the situation at that point would have been that the Russians had consolidated into a basically impregnable position that the AFU was incapable of breaching (lest we forget in the wake of Russia's totally unhindered withdrawal from the area, their attempts at reducing the Kherson bridgehead by force in mid-2022 were bloody disasters), and the correct course of action was to start digging in and negotiate a peace treaty in the meantime.

The Ukrainian leadership instead threw a disturbingly large portion of the "Second Army" into Prigozhin's meatgrinder in Bakhmut and then ordered not one but two large-scale counteroffensives into Zaporozhie and the Bakhmut flanks using the post-Bakhmut remains of the "Second Army" and their NATO-supplied "Third Army." Those failed with enormous losses, opening the way for Russia to transition back to the offensive in late 2023 and begin systematically rolling Ukraine out of the Donbass. The correct course of action at this point was, again, to find a tenable defensive line and start digging. Zelensky instead ordered a "Hail Mary" offensive in Kursk with the remnants of the "Third Army" and significant elements from a lightly-equipped "Fourth Army," hoping Russian border defenses were weak despite their having ample warning of Ukrainian designs on the border region (courtesy of several earlier, smaller raids) and plenty of time to prepare. It proceeded to fail with enormous losses - Ukrainian forces breached the border, began to exploit, and ran square into a Russian haymaker counter-punch that stopped them in their tracks. The Ukrainians then reinforced failure, sending massive reinforcements into a death pit in an attempt to keep a sliver of Russian soil under their flag as a middle finger to Putin.

And while this was happening the front in the Donbass started to collapse with Russian troops making large advances and seizing key terrain, in no small part because the AFU's resources had been systematically redirected to a tertiary operation far to the north. We've seen, again and again and again, that when the Ukrainians got resources and generated forces, rather than admitting they are the weaker power here and working to strengthen their positions and conciliate, they instead squandered them on hugely ambitious and equally doomed offensives. In 2023 these offensives were aimed at restoring their pre-2014 borders when Donetsk may as well have been on the Moon for them, while in 2024 their ambitions transitioned to the outright insanity of conquering southwest Russia despite the fact they'd been on the military back foot for the last year. These are the moves of a power setting objectives beyond its means to achieve, and they will probably end up dooming Ukraine as a sovereign state going forward.

a little bit of analysis about Kursk

The only thing I'd want to add to Mikael's excellent analysis here is that the Russians are actually fighting a much more conventional area defense than we've seen in the very static fighting in the Donbass. They're not trying to stop Ukrainian drives at the screen line like we saw in the Hundred Days, they're instead diverting them into engagement areas between their front line of screening troops and the main defensive line 5-10km to the rear and destroying them there. Ergo why we've seen Ukrainian units just go on these long runs in the last couple days - way past where the front line should be - and then get wiped out in what look like complex ambushes. That's... actually just how you do a very normal area defense.

Why have the Russians changed tactics? Two reasons. First, in Kursk they - paradoxically - have space to fight. The Donbass is a cramped theater where real estate is at an absolute premium. They're either backing up into the sea, key lines of communication, or critical urban areas there. There's actual operational space in rural Kursk. Second and relatedly, the "forward" defense we're used to seeing in the Donbass will not inflict crippling casualties on an attacker quickly for the simple reason that attacks often fail in the "cone of fire" in no man's land or even behind the attacker's front line, allowing defeated units to easily withdraw. In a conventional defense the attacker is defeated in a kill zone behind the screen line and it is far easier to annihilate an attacking force. Ergo why we're now seeing huge AFU equipment losses, with entire Ukrainian companies burning out behind the ostensible Russian "front."

Having found themselves in battle with the AFU's strategic reserves, the Russians now very much intend to use the Battle of Sudzha-Korenevo to destroy as much of those reserves as possible. Even if that means scaring some war mappers on the internet.

an uneasy feeling but nothing specific to complain about

vibes-based performance evaluation

twitter thread

I just got back from Ukraine, where I was visiting some friends. Everything we have heard about what’s happening in Ukraine is a lie. The reality is darker, bleaker, and unequivocally hopeless. There is no such thing as Ukraine "winning" this war.

• By their estimates, they have lost over one million of their sons, fathers and husbands; an entire generation is gone.

Nazis and destroying the demographics of their own people, name a better duo

• Even in the Southwest, where the anti-Russian sentiment is long-standing, citizens are reluctant or straight-up scared to publicly criticize Zelensky; they will go to jail.
• In every village and town, the streets, shops, and restaurants are mostly absent of men.
• The few men who remain are terrified of leaving their homes for fear of being kidnapped into conscription. Some have resorted to begging friends to break their legs to avoid service.
• Army search parties take place early in the morning, when men leave their homes to go to work. They ambush and kidnap them off the streets and within 3-4 hours they get listed in the army and taken away straight to the front lines with minimal or no training at all; it is "a death sentence."
• It's getting worse every day. Where I was staying, a dentist had just been taken by security forces on his way to work, leaving behind two small children. Every day, 3-5 dead bodies keep arriving from the front lines.
• Mothers and wives fight tooth and nail with the armed forces, beg and plead not to have their men taken away. They try bribing, which sometimes works, but most of the time they are met with physical violence and death threats.
• The territory celebrated as having been "won back" from Russia has been reduced to rubble and is uninhabitable. Regardless, there is no one left to live there and displaced families will likely never return.
• They see the way the war has been reported, at home and abroad. It's a "joke" and "propaganda." They say: “Look around: is this winning?”.
• Worse, some have been hoaxed into believing that once Ukrainians forces are exhausted, American soldiers will come in to replace them and “win the war”.

There is no ambiguity in these people. The war was for nothing - a travesty. The outcome always was, and is, clear. The people are hopeless, utterly destroyed, and living in an unending nightmare. They are pleading for an end, any end - most likely the same "peace" that could have been achieved two years ago. In their minds, they have already lost, for their sons, fathers and husbands are gone, and their country has been destroyed. There is no "victory" that can change that.

Except the peace offer then (see under the The Objectives and Strategy of Russia section) was incredibly favorable for Ukraine (and naive on Russia's part), basically just security guarantees and no NATO membership, without any territorial changes. That ain't happening anymore.

Make no mistake, they are angry with Putin. But they are also angry with Zelensky and the West. They have lost everything, worst of all, hope and faith, and cannot comprehend why Zelenky wishes to continue the current trajectory, the one of human devastation. I didn't witness the war; but what I saw was absolutely heart-breaking. Shame on the people, regardless of their intentions, who have supported this war. And shame on the media for continuing to lie about it.

also lmao at the fucking community note

um actually the US says that only a few Ukrainians have died (based on propaganda fed to them by the Ukrainians)

I was reading the latest Simplicius post, and holy shit:

The world can see the US terror regime has no clothes. It looks increasingly weak, particularly given the announcement that Raytheon Lloyd helmed the strikes from—I kid you not—his hospital bed. Yes, he pulled the trigger on a laptop while soiling his bedpan: https://www.businessinsider.com/defense-secretary-lloyd-austin-ordered-strike-on-houthis-from-hospital-2024-1

followed up by this great line:

A decrepit regime led by a senile president and debilitated secretary of state, launching illegal massacres from their nursing homes and hospital beds against the poorest nation on earth—virtually on the same day as their own bloc ally faced genocide and crimes against humanity charges at The Hague.