The Lemmy Club

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The worst corp I can think of is Nestlé, these pieces of shit have done a lot of environmental damage and have been known to engage or complicit in slavery.

Erasing Nestlé is like erasing the infectious boil on a human body.

What foul company would you erase for good and why?

Life ain't about stuff.

But here's the thing—stuff can be pretty foundational to a life experience. It’s not about materialism; it’s about meaning. The objects we surround ourselves with—music, movies, photography, books, video games—they reflect who we are. You walk into my house, see what I’ve collected, and you don’t just see things. You see me.

Let me tell you about one of my "stuff".

In 2015, things were getting very difficult for me. I had just dealt with a family death. My job was becoming more and more dicey. And things were about to get a whole lot worse. But before things got worse, my birthday arrived. And my wife got me something for my birthday. She wanted to get me a gaming PC. What she specifically got me was an HP Stream laptop.

It was blue. It had an 11-inch screen. It was definitely not a powerhouse. It ran on... some basic Intel chip, probably a Celeron. It had two gigabytes of RAM. 64 gigabytes of storage. And what's more, the display maxed out at 720p.

You may be thinking, "That's not a gaming PC." And certainly, it's not what most people imagine a gaming PC to be. But I'm telling you right now: this was a gaming PC. Because I gamed on it. And had a hell of a time. An amazing time.

Because the advantage of this laptop wasn't just that it was cheap—though yeah, it was. It was light. It was small. The keyboard was tactile. It could take a beating. And the battery life was just amazing. I think the thing ran for about 12 hours without needing a charge. I could take that thing to a coffee shop, game for an hour or two, leave, hang out on a park bench, do some more gaming, then take the bus home, and while on the bus—do even more gaming.

The thing felt a lot like a Steam Deck before the Steam Deck existed. Now obviously it wasn't, because form factors being what they are, a laptop is less playable on the go than a Steam Deck. But as far as laptops go, this was as convenient as they come. Though I acknowledge that triple-A gaming was simply not an option.

But what was an option—and a great one—were indie titles. And indies were exploding. Not only were they exploding, they were cheap. They were super cheap. And some of them were even free. No strings attached. Steam keys were being given away. And a few days after I got that HP Stream laptop, I discovered—on a website I forget—which particular indie game was being given away for free.

That game was called Enemy Mind.

I knew nothing about this game when it came out. I got it because it was free. And I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. If something is free, I’m taking it. What I didn’t know was that this particular game—Enemy Mind—was going to be one of the greatest horizontal shoot-'em-ups I had ever played.

I’m not saying this lightly. I’ve played a lot of great shoot-'em-ups. It’s one of my favourite genres, actually. I must have spent hundreds of dollars, if not thousands, in arcades playing shoot-'em-ups. And what’s more, when I was a DOS and Genesis gamer, that’s the genre I often played. I could not get enough of shoot-'em-ups.

But this game, Enemy Mind, had one of the most compelling game mechanics I had ever encountered. Because the thing with shoot-'em-ups is: you're almost always going to die, right? Like, okay, if you're super skilled and you practice a lot, maybe you can be untouched and maybe you can finish the game. Personally, I've never finished a shoot-'em-up on one quarter. I've tried. But it ain't happening. These games are designed for you to die.

But Enemy Mind took that whole premise and turned it on its head. Because in this game, you're not playing a ship. You're a being of pure psychic energy, okay? And what you do is—you take over ships. You take over enemy ships. When you see an enemy ship coming at you, you shoot it. Fine. But what you can also do is transfer your psychic energy to another ship. So if it looks like you're doomed, if it looks like you are on the precipice of death, as a Hail Mary, you can shoot another ship with your psychic energy and take it over.

Which gives you survivability. And you can just keep going. And going. And going.

You will die in Enemy Mind. But almost always it’s your fault, because it’s on you to transfer that psychic energy before your ship dies—and therefore you die.

The mechanics of this—the mechanics of psychic energy transfer as a device for survivability—I have never seen that before in a shoot-'em-up. And I’ve never seen it since. And it’s a rare thing in any game genre. Although I do remember a game in the early 2000s called Geist, which was a Nintendo game that kind of had the same idea. But that was a first-person shooter—not a horizontal shoot-'em-up. So very different.

But what made Enemy Mind so compelling wasn’t just the game mechanic. It was the story. At first you’re being pursued by a bunch of pesky humans trying to do you in—because you’re a threat, and they need to neutralize you. While you’re just trying to survive.

But then, as the game goes on, you encounter a war between humans and aliens. And you realize there’s a greater war happening. The humans are battling the aliens. And now, you can also take control of the aliens. So it becomes this kind of three-part tug-of-war—a Mexican standoff, if you will—between humans, aliens, and you, the psychic being.

And in terms of story? That’s just absolutely amazing. The story is a compelling reason in and of itself to play this game.

Now, seeing how this was very much an indie game of the 2010s—it was released in 2014—it has a very neo-retro feel about it. Actually, by conventional standards, we’d just call this a retro game. Because what retro means is: something new that feels old.

See, people call NES or Genesis games "retro." But that’s not right. Those games weren't trying to look old—they were trying to look futuristic. They’re vintage now, sure. But Enemy Mind? That’s retro. Because retro means new media made to feel old. It’s aesthetic intent, not historical accident. And this game nails it. It’s what we remember DOS or Genesis games feeling like—even if those systems couldn’t quite do what this game does.

It feels like either a DOS game or a Genesis game—but not quite. Especially with the pixel art. Enemy Mind does things a lot of those platforms would’ve struggled with. Especially in terms of lighting. But if somebody was super skilled? If somebody was really skilled and working on a Pentium around 1995? Absolutely. They could’ve made it happen but it would have taken lots of effort.

I’ve seen older games with a similar art style. You get the sense playing this that it was designed to make you feel like you were back in the ’90s. But it also gives you this kind of “what if?” Because in the ’90s, there was no game with these mechanics. Nothing. These gameplay mechanics in Enemy Mind—they’re new. They’re novel. And I still haven’t seen very many games do what it does—where you take control of enemy ships and just cascade your way through.

Getting back to 2015—when I played Enemy Mind—it’s interesting. Because again, I played this on a cheap laptop. At bus stations. At coffee shops. Sometimes I’d be at a convention, carrying this thing around, playing it. And it was the perfect game for that laptop.

You could play it with a gamepad. Absolutely. But my god, it was also amazing on a laptop keyboard.

And though this game was designed to make me feel like I could’ve been playing it in the ’90s, when I think back on it, I think mid-2010s. And despite the fact I was going through a rough time—things were about to get rougher—when I had time for myself, when I had to emotionally decompress, cut out all distractions and just chill—Enemy Mind was there for me.

And the beautiful thing about PC gaming? I want you to think about this for a second. I’ve played this game on all kinds of hardware. All kinds of displays. I’ve played it on a TV. On a monitor. On a big desktop. On my Steam Deck.

Hell, I remember going to a cyber café in Richmond, BC. It was right after a night of karaoke with friends. I’d been belting out tunes for three hours and I was exhausted. I left the karaoke joint, walked into that cyber café, ordered a bowl of instant noodles and a Coke, logged into my Steam account, started up Enemy Mind—and I just let go.

Enemy Mind is a great game. Just absolutely phenomenal. One of my favourite shoot-'em-ups of all time.

But I also feel like this: it’s not about the game anymore. Because stuff is about life.

Enemy Mind is not just about the game. Though I’ve played the game, I love the game. It’s about my experience with the game. It happened because my wife wanted to get me a gaming PC. It wasn’t the perfect gaming PC. But goddamn, was it a gaming PC. And it came from her heart.

Then I got this game for free, on a lark, on a website—and that game ended up accompanying me everywhere.

And yeah, a whole lot of junk happened during that time. But I got some rest. I got some respite.

When I think about that game, I don’t just think about the mechanics. Or the graphics. Or the feel. I think about the moments.

It’s 9 PM. I’m sitting down for a break. At a local coffee shop. Exhausted. And for a few minutes, I launch Enemy Mind.

And for a moment… things feel like they’re going to be okay.

We always hear about people's bad habits but what's your good habit? Mine is whenever I have a meal that has vegetables in it I always eat that first. That way I get it out if the way then I can enjoy the rest of meal without having to worry about eating it.

I was looking at the protondb for Battlefield V and it has a gold medal despite the fact that it has been literally unplayable (the game won't even start) fpr 6 months now.

Are medals impossible to lose? Or do they run on some sort of manual verification? Is there some way to request a game to have it's grade changed.

For reference, the change in this case was the addition of EA Anti-cheat, which breaks linux compatibility and borked a considerable number of games, even older ones.

https://tidal.com/browse/track/17825556?u

Oklahoma case is part of a broader push to erode separation of church and state, and a test of role of religion in schools

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Adolf_Hitler

photo: Front page of the US Armed Forces newspaper Stars and Stripes on 2 May 1945

Adolf Hitler, chancellor and dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945, committed suicide via a gunshot to the head on 30 April 1945 in the Führerbunker in Berlin[a] after it became clear that Germany would lose the Battle of Berlin, which led to the end of World War II in Europe. Eva Braun, his longtime companion and wife of one day, also committed suicide by cyanide poisoning.[b] In accordance with Hitler's prior written and verbal instructions, that afternoon their remains were carried up the stairs and through the bunker's emergency exit to the Reich Chancellery garden, where they were doused in petrol and burned.[1][2] The news of Hitler's death was announced on German radio the next day, 1 May.[3]

OC by @[email protected]

Ubisoft is promising more Assassin’s Creed Shadows updates than you can shake a bo at, with plans to deliver “free updates on the regular” that will add items such as a new game plus mode, new quests and story expansions, and community-driven improvements, the publisher announced Wednesday.

As previously announced, Shadows’ first expansion, Claws of Awaji, is coming later this year. Claws of Awaji will introduce a new area to the game’s map: Awaji Island, which is located in the eastern part of Japan’s Inland Sea. (Well, technically, it’s already on the map — you can see it lying approximately due west of the port city of Sakai. But you’ll actually be able to explore it in the expansion.)

Claws of Awaji “continues Naoe and Yasuke’s story right after the end of Shadows’ epilogue,” Ubisoft said in a blog post. It will add about 10 hours’ worth of content to the game, including a new weapon for Naoe: the bo, a staff used in Japanese martial arts. Ubisoft offered the expansion as a bonus for anybody who pre-ordered the game, but has yet to announce a price for everyone else.

In addition to Claws of Awaji, Ubisoft will release a number of free updates that the company is calling Story Drops, starting in May with “The Works of Luis Frois.” Frois, a Jesuit missionary and scholar, is among the group of Portuguese men who land in Japan with Yasuke at the beginning of Assassin’s Creed Shadows. The second Story Drop is scheduled to be released in June, and will add to the game another ally that you can recruit into the League of the Hidden Blade. Each Story Drop will include “additional backstory that will permanently impact the game,” according to Ubisoft.

Assassin’s Creed Shadows’ developers are also working on more quality-of-life improvements. Following the game’s first post-launch patch earlier this month, which added auto-follow for the player character’s horse, the team is planning to add new parkour moves to give Naoe and Yasuke more options. (Here’s hoping the developers bring back the ability to sell or dismantle multiple items at once — which was included in the early April patch but was later disabled due to bugs.)

For instance, it’s currently impossible to jump from a standstill to grab a ledge that looks like it’s within reach; that’s coming in a future patch. Also in the works are community-requested features such as the option to wear headgear in cutscenes. Larger features are on the way, too, such as a new game plus mode that will raise the level cap, and new difficulty settings for both stealth and combat that will make them more unforgiving.

From Polygon via this RSS feed

From BBC News via this RSS feed

The WiZ HDMI sync box can make your WiZ lights dance with movies and music.

Budget smart lighting brand WiZ has announced a new HDMI sync box that syncs with its line of Wi-Fi-based LED lights to match what’s playing on your TV.

WiZ’s HDMI Sync Box with TV backlight will be available next month. It comes in two models: one with a TV backlight strip for screens 55 inches to 65 inches in size for $89.99, and the other for screens 75 inches to 85 inches in size for $109.99.

The new HDMI box is similar to that of WiZ’s sister brand, Philips Hue. But Hue’s HDMI Play Box starts at $249.99, with light strips sold separately. (Hue and WiZ are both owned by Signify, but their bulbs are not compatible with each other.) WiZ bulbs also use Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, whereas Hue relies on Bluetooth and Zigbee (via a hub).

Unlike camera-based light syncing systems from companies like Nanoleaf and Govee, WiZ and Hue’s sync products read the signal directly from the video source, which can help avoid latency issues.

This makes WiZ’s option a great budget alternative for those put off by Hue’s high prices. However, there are some concessions. The WiZ box only has one HDMI input, whereas the Hue Play supports four. This means if you have multiple devices connected to your TV, you’ll have to manually switch between them.

The WiZ Sync Box supports HDMI 2.0 and video formats up to 4K at 60Hz with HDR10 Plus and Dolby Vision. Hue’s latest Play HDMI Box supports up to 8K video, HDMI 2.1, and refresh rates up to 120Hz for 4K for console gaming. It also costs $350

The WiZ box also features a built-in microphone that captures audio, allowing the lights to change in sync with music as well as movies. The box can be controlled with the WiZ app, with voice via Google or Alexa, or the WiZ remote control.

According to the company, the Sync Box can connect to any color-capable WiZ light that supports both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, including its new Gradient Light Bars ($59.99) and Gradient Floor Light ($89.99), which can sit alongside your TV to add more ambient light. As with all of WiZ’s lighting products, these support the Matter smart home standard, so are compatible with most smart home systems.

From The Verge via this RSS feed

Marie Ange Blaise had been detained since Feb. 12, when she was stopped by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at Henry E. Rohlsen International Airport in Saint Croix while trying to board a flight to Charlotte, North Carolina, according to ICE.

Croix. Trump Mass Deportations ICE Photo by: Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. By: Scripps News Group Posted 8:08 AM, Apr 30, 2025 and last updated 5 minutes ago

A 44-year-old woman from Haiti died in a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Florida last Friday, the agency said.

The cause of her death is still under investigation.

Marie Ange Blaise had been detained since Feb. 12, when she was stopped by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at Henry E. Rohlsen International Airport in Saint Croix while trying to board a flight to Charlotte, North Carolina, according to ICE.

She was then taken to ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Miami’s staging facility in San Juan, Puerto Rico, on Feb. 14, according to ICE.

A week later, Blaise was transferred to Richwood Correctional Center in Oakdale, Louisiana.

ICE said she was later transferred to the Broward Transitional Center in Pompano Beach, Florida, on April 5, where she later died.

It’s unclear why Blaise was transferred to various facilities.

According to ICE’s online records, this is the fourth person to die in custody since January.