Demand from who? Not the users, that’s for sure.

DotAge. It’s a rogue-like turn-based strategy game where you try to build a village on cursed land, where you have visions of upcoming doom events and the eventual apocalypse. You have to balance stacking resources for growth and basic survival against efforts that will improve your chances of surviving doom events.

The board obviously is different every time. The factors you have to weigh and plan for are just complex enough, and just enough of the future is beyond your sight and control. The gameplay mechanics also change just a bit every time, due to a new mix of buildings and resource gathering methods, as well as new random events that can sometimes have a huge effect on your strategy. You’re not just accounting for randomness in your strategy–you have to adjust how you play the game all the time.

Just when you think the game is getting easy, the next chapter drops, you start doing the math, and realize you have overlooked something that may doom your village, depending on whether the RNG punishes you sufficiently. There’s definitely a big luck factor, as there is in real life. But you can make your own luck if you see far enough into the future and play well.

It’s a very well-made game that can run on a potato, and I’m a little obsessed with it.

Obligatory “every accusation is a confession.”

Yeah, I’m sure the workers are clamoring to slam their collective hands back on that hot stove.

Shortly before last November’s presidential election, before anyone could envision him defying his “America first” political base and launching a bombing raid on Iran

😐

Yeah, who could have guessed.

It mostly started with the cold war. The US was obsessed with stopping the perceived threat of communism. In the process, it discovered the benefits of power mongering and war profiteering.