MonkeMischief

The first of the concentration camps are already complete.

The first of the domestic ones. There's still plenty of blacksites all over the world, most notably Salvador, lately.

I seriously can't fathom how anybody can still say "He's probably bluffing again. It's just a joke."

Last I checked the Taliban is still going.

You're absolutely right.

Even better, thanks to U.S involvement, they've got a whole country in their clutches now!

🇺🇸✌️MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!✌️🦅

There's times when violent intervention is unavoidable, and cartels are decidedly not a force for good in this world, but it's seriously sad how we've conditioned the civilian populace into casually thinking "Maybe if we just killed them all that would fix problems!"

"Just one more invasion bro. Just one more, just one more drone strike bro. It'll fix everything this time! Trust me bro. One more Contra op! Just bump my defense stonks a little bit bro! Just little bump! C'moooon!"

Way to go. I like this take.

It's become very clear that there is no moral goal behind the "war on drugs." It just becomes a never-ending escalation of cat and mouse, and civilians are caught up in the middle.

The factions of fear and despair based profit that made everybody miserable enough to give the cartels a market, now are simply mad they're not getting (enough) revenue from that market.

Conveniently as well, entire industries (many well-meaning) have sprung up around combatting the ravages of addiction, and "because drugs" is a convenient cop-out for pretty much every societal issue, and an expedient paper-thin justification for crackdowns, fear-mongering, and draconian punishments.

Unlike the rest of us, the powers that be have little to gain from "solving" drugs.

Instead of reducing the systemic precursors to crime, they would rather instead cut off everybody's arms and merely rent them back to you only while you're clocked in at work.

open ended occupations are far more profitable.

Ah, one of our major exports: "Occupation as a Service."

Art of the deal!!!!

He must think this whole conflict is over real estate and golf courses.

In a just world, Trump would be a cautionary riches to rags story.

"To shreds , you say?"

Great picks, thanks!

I've had an eye on those before. I really enjoyed playing SWAT 4 with my friend, so maybe Ready or Not eventually as well.

I know there's still good tactical games making a comeback, but I'll always kinda mourn the loss of Rainbow Six turning into "Ubisoft presents Fortnite."

League was one of those global phenomenons that felt so fun to be a part of and try to get good at... Sometimes .

But we'd often just bot-stomp because we'd usually get rekt in matchmaking.

Once they declared their kernel-level spyware, that was the real kicker that helped us quit for good. Ha

It's amazing how much those games improved with sequels, but the first one on the OG X-Box was still an incredible experience, especially for the time!

Still a worthy experience I'd say! I could listen to the voice work of that game all day.

I even really liked the much more action-oriented Conviction. Never played Double-Agent though. Still have Blacklist on my list.

I miss when the "Tom Clancy's" monicker was representative of plausible tactical experiences. Sadly I don't think we'll ever see intense thinker-games with Splinter Cell, Ghost Recon, or Rainbow Six again. :(

Ha, I met my now-wife on WoW so long ago :D.

I guess I consider myself lucky I never really got addicted to that point, as in, I never even maxed a single character. (I had a bunch of them in various race/class/faction/server combos though...later found out I had ADHD lmao)

I mostly treated WoW like a chatroom with a game attached hahaha.

I totally understand the draw though, like, I LOVE MMOs as a concept but I hate how difficult it is to make an ethical one that doesn't waste players' precious time, or incentivize addiction. I feel like there's an answer buried in how some MUDs operate(d), somehow... before casino psychology was introduced.

Reconciling the desire to pop into a "meta-verse" (screw you, facebook, that's our word.) to socialize and cooperate with others, against our finite time constraints on various scales, is a difficult challenge.

I could ramble on and on, but linear level systems definitely exacerbate this. I never played as much as my always-online friends so we'd all start characters and suddenly by next week they're all level 30 and I'm still like 13 and I'm like "K nvm."

But it's a very human thing to enjoy a sense of progression. Hm...

I'm glad you were able to break free though! We're similar in our gaming lives. Instead of one monolithic game, we pass the controller on single player games or play co-op stuff, and get a wide variety of experiences. :)

Someone call up the fine people of France and ask for lessons on how it's done!

(Heck, we North American folk should, too...)