Do it on the clock, during a work day. Make sure you plan for nothing to get done that day. Make it optional: go to the field trip (expenses paid), or take a free day of PTO. Either way they get paid and, because you planned for it in the development schedule, don’t have to worry about potentially having to play catch up because of the day off later. That way it gives them the choice to go do something fun on the company’s dime or stay at home and recharge. Another thing to note: don’t limit yourself to game-related stuff like video game museums.

Go to an aquarium.

Go to a zoo.

Go to a national park if there’s one nearby.

Go to a natural science museum.

The artistic side of game dev takes inspiration from a wide variety of sources, not just other forms of media. Tbh, the most boring field trip I can think of would be to go to a movie theater or video game museum. I want to see something new and take inspiration from that.

Weighted Wildlife. They specify how much each one weighs on their site. I have an opossum from them and I love her. She’s one of my favorite plushies (don’t tell the others I said that though). They’ve also got some 5lbs dragons in the works.

Creep Cat Toy Company also makes some weighted plushies like the raccoon and opossum, and the weighted ones come with a zipper in the belly so you can, remove, or move the weighted bean bags around.

Uhh… Someone was literally raped on set, in front of an audience, and no one got arrested? Are you fucking serious?

The ones I had were pretty shitty, lol. Like, I had some good ones like Zoombinis or Freddi Fish, but most of them were stuff like “Milly’s Math House”.

Windows 98

Windows XP

Dialup

The Old Internet aka when 90% of it was html and shockwave flash

Weird childhood obsessions; some were good, some were bad, some became things that defined me as an adult.

A lot of the edutainment games I played as a child. I actually went back and installed them to see what they were like through the eyes of an adult. There were a few that were still fun, but as you might be able to guess, most were pretty shitty.

That said, there have been a few things that ended up being 100% worth revisiting. CRT monitors, for an example, are unironically still kinda awesome. I just wouldn’t replace my main monitors with one.

Community is absolutely still a real thing. In my experience, however, you have to be willing to step outside of the mainstream and you have to be willing to touch grass every now and then. Socializing IRL is completely different than socializing online, which is different than socializing in VR, or in voice chat, or so on.

That said, there absolutely is a case to be made for idea that “community” being slowly ground into dust, possibly intentionally so. The death of open gathering places, the rise of online-only interaction and so forth, erodes at the kind of socialization you need in order to build a community. My tinfoil hat theory is that it’s easier to sow division in the unruly masses and keep them at each other’s throats when everyone is alone, so the rich and powerful have an incentive to kill the concept of community so that it’s harder to rise up against them.

At this point, I believe the places where you’re most likely to find a strong sense of community will be within marginalized groups; people who’ve traditionally been downtrodden tend to band together for protection, relationships and support.

This is my experience as well. Anecdotally, at least. Lately I’ve been slowly putting together a community of friends, and my anxiety and depression have been dropping like crazy. Between that and the self-esteem boost I’ve been getting from finally starting hrt, I’m actually starting to feel competent enough to tackle things like getting a job, moving out (I’m gonna go looking at rental properties with a friend tomorrow), going grocery shopping, things like that.

God, I’ve always wanted to be able to just do something so plain as going grocery shopping for myself.

I can also tell that the anxiety causes a lot of issues with my motivation from the fact that my wonderful mom always throws worst-case scenarios at me whenever I try to become more independent. She’s been throwing the entire warehouse at me lately because I’ve been talking about how I’m moving out with a friend. My excitement has been turning to dread despite my friend’s reassurance that they’ll catch me if I fall; and as a result my motivation and ability to get out of bed has been plummeting.

But… Yeah. Anecdotally, it’s not laziness, it’s being anxious, overwhelmed, overstimmed, depressed, feeling lonely (I mean, what’s the point in doing anything if no one cares?) and so forth.

The world around them is collapsing. Tate promises to have the solution. For whatever reason, his solution makes sense to them. So they follow him.

The number one thing I’ve been missing are Spotify jams. Spotify also has a wider selection of music, but tbh it’s rare for Spotify to have something that Qobuz doesn’t. Spotify also has lyrics, playlist folders, and audiobooks; though tbh I haven’t checked to see if Qobuz has the latter.

I love Qobuz. Also for those of you trying to boycott US goods, it’s a French company. I just wish it had the same adoption and features as Spotify.

…are you literally wanting plain colored t-shirts? I mean, those exist, but… They have other shirts that don’t say “Hyena Agenda” on them.

You know you don’t have to be a furry to buy furry stuff, ye? It’s not like anyone’s checking for a “furcard” or anything.

Besides: for those of y’all boycotting US goods, Nomad Complex is Canadian. It actually sucks for those of us in the US because afaik, Nomad Complex has stated that they’re not attending US furcons anymore. They’ve apparently had issues with immigration and customs prior to Trump, and they’ve decided (and for good reason) not to enter the US for the foreseeable future.

No, but it’s one of many. c:

This is why I love furry stuff. Nomad Complex, Hyena Agenda and Weasel Gear are great. I mean, I guess Nomad Complex and Hyena Agenda could technically be kinda considered branded since Nomad Complex puts their logo on the front of their hoodies and Hyena Agenda has some shirts that incorporate their logo into the design, but the designs are generally really good.

Edit: okay fine, it’s one of the reasons why I love furry stuff.

Some kind of ancient forest spirit emerges from the woods, consumes my soul and leaves my body in a coma before fading back into the trees without a trace.

Who the fuck are you talking to that is saying, “oh, well, both sides, you know?” The only people I know who are still saying that are people who are wealthy enough to not feel the immediate effects of Trump, or are conservative, white, christian assclowns who voted for Trump. Why are you talking to those kinds of people for an honest read on the US? Those people are part of the reason we’re here now.

Yeah, uh, last I checked American territories don’t have the ability to vote in federal elections. Someone from Puerto Rico can’t vote for the US president despite being governed by the US. It’s one of many bullshit systems designed to keep the GOP-Democrat right-wing ratchet going.

Contrary to that Europe doesn’t have one cohesive identity, your example of Orban is multiple country borders removed from me personally.

Orban would probably be best compared to a state governor. Just a reminder that Texas is literally larger than the largest EU country with some space leftover for a city-state or two.

The idea that the US has a cohesive identity is just… unbelievably ignorant. I’m actually amazed that you believe that considering that no one in their right mind would say the same thing about places like Africa, Europe, or South America.

I didn’t have a choice to be born here, and, had I had the option, I wouldn’t have defaced a Native American monument in the first place. This is on top of the fact that the US is currently trying to find ways of disowning/executing me (trans).

Quite honestly, maybe I shouldn’t be offended by being lumped in with other Americans, because maybe I’m not actually being included in these kinds of sweeping statements. However, it rubs me the wrong way when people imply that Americans as a whole are responsible for the things our government has and is doing.

Again, I didn’t ask to be born in the US. I don’t like that I’m “American”. No one asked me, please don’t lump people like me in with the others.

Well yes! You stupid leftists don’t have the right to live a comfortable life, free from criticism and accountability like us right-wingers. We’re the ones who are right, it’s right there in the name, “right-wing”. As such, anyone that might cause us discomfort, such as breaking ties or criticizing the ones who we support, is espousing a disgusting, ignorant, liberal ideology.

(I hope it’s obvious that I’m being sarcastic)

I don’t actually use these much, but I love using them whenever I get a chance:

CRT monitors

iPod Classic

OG GameBoy

DSi XL

I actually had rockbox on the iPod but had to take it off because I’m more concerned with how it feels to use than the actual functionality; and rockbox kinda fucked it up.

Edit: I kinda unironically wish dial-up would come back, but as a novelty that ends up blowing up into an actual, community-driven internet. A) gives me fuzzy feelings for when I was a kid at my grandparents house before they ate the MAGA brainrot, and B) might force people to learn how to optimize their shitty websites or get left behind on the corpo-web.