I don’t really see what’s objectionable about asserting that Jesus was a prophet—according to modern usage of the word—while acknowledging that he may not have met some religions’ narrow definitions of the term. I can be as pedantic and prescriptive as any 40-something internet user about topics I consider myself well-versed in, but

Words we use have meaning even if you don’t like them.

is some really misplaced ‘old man yells at cloud’ energy.

Ok, so maybe (depending on the mythology one subscribes to) he wasn’t a Prophet. Nevertheless, it seems inarguable that he was a prophet. Dude was mad prophetic.

I don’t see how you’ve made your point here. Jesus being a prophet isn’t mutually exclusive with his being the son of god, or so it would seem to a layperson like myself. If he can be the father, the son, and the holy ghost, it stands to reason he can be a prophet. Lots of hats, I believe he wore.

I hated Myst as a kid. Not just because I disliked the gameplay, but because its inexplicable popularity heralded a shift in the adventure game market. Instead of more Sierra or LucasArts-type games, there were, for years, scads of shitty, boring Myst-likes.

Sounds like you’re just lucky!

I tried to get into Fallout 4 for the second or third time recently, and have just given up, and uninstalled it. It’s the simplified dialogue that ultimately robs it of any meaning for me. Nobody has anything very interesting to say, and the player just has a few one-word prompts to respond with. I don’t suppose that’s any different in Fallout: London? I imagine they’d have had to go to unreasonable lengths to change it.

This is from Waterworld, right? Troublingly relatable.

The single-player NWN used 3rd edition. I played a lot of NWN2, which was based on 3.5.

Samesies. I think it didn’t help that I played the sequel first. It’s just really damned dated. Some older games age really well, but NWN did not.

Yeah, I don’t worry too much about my GD builds being “end-game viable”, I just like finding combinations that are fun to play, and there are enough unique item sets and abilities to keep me entertained for a while. I’ll check out Last Epoch—looks like it might be up my alley!

Have you by any chance played Grim Dawn? I really enjoy the mechanics and aesthetics of it, and I’m wondering how PoE2 compares. I don’t think I’ll ever be in the market for Diablo 4; the P2W cash-grab of Diablo Immortal really soured me on the franchise.

Only tangentially related, but when I was a kid I’d write stream-of-consciousness type stuff in a “code” consisting of the first letter of every word. Whenever I run across one of my old notebooks, I spend some time trying to decipher it, generally without much luck. Sometimes it’ll spark a bit of remembrance, like dipping madeleines in tea.

I think it’s the difference between punching down and punching up. Boomers in general have far more money and power than the people using the term. So complaining that it’s ageist, and comparing it to a homophobic slur will get you about as much traction as white people being offended by cracker, and comparing it to slurs used against African Americans.

Yeah, I tried Black Flag a while back—because I’d heard good things—but just couldn’t be bothered with all the busy work. I did really enjoy Mafia 3, The Witcher 3, RDR2; I’m not anti-side quest by any means. I think I need a more compelling story, and that’s never been AC’s strong point (based on ~3 AC games I’ve picked up and quickly dropped over the years).

I mean, what else are you gonna wind a piece of string around?

This is something I do, so I’ll take a crack at it—though, bear in mind, it might be total bullshit.

It’s a defense mechanism. Many popular things are—in my estimation—objectively terrible. Every time something utterly devoid of merit (and often actively detrimental to the public good) is generally agreed to be a popular sensation, the connection I feel to my fellow human beings takes a hit.

I want to believe in people—in society. But I’m clearly a judgmental sob. So maybe by avoiding the popular things, I’m trying not to further my own alienation.

I mean, not to put too fine a point on it, but what the fuck is normal? Nobody’s really normal. Even the so-called neurotypical are riddled with undiagnosed disorders. Normalcy is just a social fiction. Don’t let it limit your options.

I think that you’re probably right. I also think I may be projecting a bit, and conflating my country’s apathetic embrace of fascism with my own executive dysfunction. Seems all of a piece. Anyhow, thanks for the words.

The thing is, it can be really hard to accurately assess why you feel an aversion to things, and whether or not that aversion is misplaced. I can come up with scads of seemingly reasonable objections to, for example, going to the gym. That doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t benefit from it.

Overcoming an innate aversion that you’ve convinced yourself is a part of who you are can be life-changing.

The big caveat there is that knowing things doesn’t change the world. Scads of people are acutely aware of the problems facing society—maybe more than at any time in history. Vanishingly few feel empowered to do anything about it.

I’m not pro-ignorance by any means; education is the silver bullet. But we urgently need to find better ways of translating our spectacular surfeit of knowledge into individually actionable mechanisms of social change.