I enjoy the premise of the game but to me the message seems to be blatantly anti communist, but I have not yet played it. Any thoughts on this?

For those who don't play paradox games or Hearts of Iron 4, I did a difficult achievement, which is starting as communist china and proclaiming the People's republic of china. You have to fight an uphill battle starting from a single province. I managed to consolidate, drive out the japanese, and turn on the Kuomintang in a few years. This last year has been researching and preparing a naval invasion to fully defeat Japan. Of course, I had to keep Mao as the head, otherwise how could I really claim to have created the PRC?

I honestly can not say I have a deep knowledge of the Syrian civil war except for a few things.

1. Multiple groups including Isis and the Syrian army are involved, some of which are US backed

2. Rojava and the Kurds seem genuinely unproblematic and cool, and are currently being attacked by Syria and Turkey, and their support was withdrawn by trump.

3. The resulting refugee crisis is a big deal, etc etc. I’ve actually been fortunate enough to talk with several refugees as my mother works in local government helping sponsor them, and one family threw a party and invited us. The food was delicious, but I felt like asking a family who had just been reunited with a family member after years about the civil war would not be a good idea. So I can’t say I learned much from the conversations I’ve had.

I see lots of Assad memes. Is it ironic? Is it unironic? Is it a big critical support deal like Kim Jong un? What’s the consensus? Can someone educate me or?

Thanks.

Anyway I’m an INFJ, let’s discuss

After all this I am not really bothered by juche gang posts, whether ironic or not, like damn. South Korea was just indefinitely worse than North Korea, it was like a fucking totalitarian state. It wasn’t until the 80s that the economic situation reversed. I mean I don’t think anyone should support the current regime but when you learn that more bombs were dropped on North Korea per capita than anywhere else in the world, ever, it becomes understandable why they’re seen as a backwards country with no development. The country was literally flattened by US bombing campaigns. And then you learn that Kim il sung gave rights to women while Rhee was murdering suspected communists by the thousands. The US was committing atrocities like No Gun Ri and yet in the common image America and South Korea are the good guys. I mean, fuck, I don’t think I can support the direction that Kim Jong un has taken North Korea in, but after learning this it solidifies my anti American views, there is officially no war after WW2 that America was justified in. I can’t believe that anti Korean War sentiment isn’t as high as anti Vietnam war, more people need to know about this

As the title says. I’ve been thinking about this. I’ll try and compare it to an apocalypse type scenario with more real world politics, obviously this could not happen irl but it’s just there for comparison.

First, the linking of the fire ending. You’re linking the fire and trying to continue the cycle. This is obviously not good because the age of fire is purely beneficial to the gods. Yes they build great cities and such but ultimately mankind is left to rot and suffer and the gods couldn’t care less about us, as evidenced by the twin princes refusing to help your cause or all the other gods fleeing lothric. This is basically like noticing capitalism in decline and trying to restart the system again, not a good idea. In any case you can’t even succeed at fully linking the fire, it’s incomplete. So you’re just delaying the problem for the next guy which is peak liberalism.

Second, the end of fire ending. In my opinion this ending is kind of the accelerationist ending. You have the idea that destroying the fire entirely will stop the cycle or cure the hollows or something. In reality though this just plunges the world into darkness, AND eventually the whole cycle will repeat and the age of fire will begin anew, restoring the gods to their full power. This is like letting society decay to primitivism then reintroducing capitalism, which is just bad. You shouldn’t do it. Same goes for killing the fire keeper which is the other ending inside this ending, you’re just cruel.

Now, the usurpation of fire ending. First, you have the group working within the system to take the power away from the gods. Sure, Kaathe probably has ulterior motives. But from what we know, this is a good ending. Basically it involves you usurping the fire and using it to better mankind in it’s true form, the hollow, much like the furtive Pygmy, who was the only god to split his part of the lord soul amongst humanity instead of using it to bolster his own power in the age of fire. So it’s like you’re destroying the system and bringing power to the hands of the people. Of course there’s the element of you being the new lord, but I like to think you aren’t exactly a god, more like a benevolent leader? Which isn’t the worst thing in the world and the people clearly want you as their leader to lead you into the new age of man, free from the gods. So yeah, this is the revolutionary ending and is therefore the only “good” ending amongst the others.

Thank you for coming to my ted talk