The incentives in capitalism are what sets it up for the business owner and makes them the original out of touch weirdo believing contradictions and setting the incentives for the rest. I firmly believe that a person’s whole worldview is largely shaped by their incentives. Most people don’t do evil things that they think are evil. They mold their ethics, morality, philosophy, and even interpret their religion to make following their incentives virtuous.

Andrew Carnegie at 33:

I propose to take an income no greater than $50,000 per annum! Beyond this I need ever earn, make no effort to increase my fortune, but spend the surplus each year for benevolent purposes!..I will resign business at thirty-five, but during these ensuing two years I wish to spend the afternoons in receiving instruction and in reading systematically!

He later became one of the most ruthless robber barons of the gilded age. Bad behavior is done by individuals that should be held accountable. But accountability can’t outperform incentives. The incentives must change for a systemic change in behavior to occur. You could fire all C-suite and promote the best and after a while, you would be back to the same behavior.

I sometimes do this. If cars aren’t stopping to let me cross. Just confidently walk in front of them. Be ready to jump back if they call your bluff but I’ve never had to.

I used vapes to quit cigarettes and became more addicted to vaping than smoking. I could puff pretty much anywhere anytime. Nicotine pouches actually helped quit vaping though.

Businesses also make those people. Once they align your incentives toward making the company the most profit, you will gradually become an out-of-touch weirdo that fetishizes productivity and thinks empathy is weakness.

I think the meaning of roguelike has evolved beyond being a game like rogue. After all, a dungeon crawler that’s not procedurally generated and doesn’t have permadeath would be more like Rogue but it wouldn’t be considered a roguelike. I wish the genre of “procedural run-based game with permadeath” had a better name. It reminds me of how shooters in the 90s were called Doom-clones. Platform fighters went through the same phase with “smash clones” for a while. I think the resurgence of roguelikes happened so far after Rogue that players didn’t have the feeling of disrespect of their game from the term. Anybody who likes a platform fighter wouldn’t want their game reduced to a “smash clone”. Same goes for shooters and Doom. But Rogue was far enough out of the public consciousness that “roguelike” didn’t feel like a comparison.

What other term could we use? “Random run game”? I’ve heard “roguelite” to refer to procedural games with progression between runs rather than starting from 0 every time. I also think this distinction isn’t very meaningful since I can’t imagine many people looking for that style of gameplay loop would be super concerned about the progression system.

Ehh. I don’t see much value in the distinction. The meaning of roguelike has evolved.

The bubble popping will take out a huge chunk of the economy with it. We might not be able to afford more drives even if they come down in price.