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+ <title>Breathing Life Back To Paradise</title>
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+ content="Most games are colonial, about conquering a harsh world. But some, very special ones are about leaving the world better than you found it."
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+ content="Most games are colonial, about conquering a harsh world. But some, very special ones are about leaving the world better than you found it."
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+ <a href="../index.html">Home</a>
+ <div class="title-block">
+ <h3 class="blog-title">Breathing Life Back To Paradise</h3>
+ <h3 class="datestamp">20/07/2025</h3>
+ </div>
+ <div class="content">
+ <div class="content">
+ <a href="../img/entries/deathstranding2.jpg">
+ <img
+ class="blog-img-lrg"
+ src="../img/entries/deathstranding2.jpg"
+ alt="A screenshot of Death Stranding 2. Sam is sat on a road looking out over a foggy, valleyed horizon. His pick-up truck is parked next to him. The image could have been taken anywhere in the game's world, but for me, it was taken somewhere very, very special."
+ />
+ </a>
+ <h1>
+ this blog post isnt ready yet. if you found it, congrats, i
+ like you. we can make out.
+ </h1>
+ <p>
+ The screenshot above looks pretty generic. Death Stranding 2
+ is a very beautiful game and its vistas are what make it. But
+ not all of them are particularly breathtaking, and I'll
+ happily admit the above image is one of them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ To me, though, it's very special. Because the spot in this
+ image is the very last road I needed to build to complete the
+ entire Australian highway. It's probably the greatest
+ achievement I've ever accomplished in a game. And it's
+ completely unremarked upon.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Completing the road network doesn't earn you a new tool, or a
+ playstation trophy. Hell, unlike opening all the monorails, it
+ doesn't even warrant a Social Strand Service post. I didn't
+ know this, before I set out on the endeavour to complete the
+ network. But it didn't matter if there was a reward - it was
+ <i>the right thing to do.</i>
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Death Stranding 2 is a game all about
+ <i>the right thing to do.</i> It applies on the macro level,
+ of course; pummelling Higgs is
+ <i>the right thing to do.</i> But every order you take, every
+ action in the world, every ladder and anchor you place, is
+ <i>the right thing to do.</i>
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Kojima called Death Stranding the first game in a new genre,
+ the 'strand-type' game and while that might be grandiose, I
+ don't think he's strictly wrong. No other genre is as focused
+ on encouraging collaboration both inside and outside the
+ fourth wall, and it is undeniably successful. The whole game
+ is a joy of discovering a bit of cargo is positioned awkwardly
+ on a high ledge, then spotting a ladder from xXCriminalNukeXx
+ right next to it. Of course you're gonna hit the like button.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And the roads are the zenith of that idea. Restoring a road
+ between two destinations is a huge, expensive, multi-step
+ effort. It requires everyone involved to be completely
+ invested in the game, to be making side-quest deliveries to
+ get access to more resources, to expand the network. But the
+ reward it offers is unlike anything else - that challenging,
+ rough terrain that you've battled over to get to the paver is
+ instantly nullified by a flat, powered road.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Finishing a road connection is instantly rewarding, yes, but
+ the game makes concerted efforts to reward it long-term, too.
+ You'll fairly regularly be asked to retrace your steps, to
+ make a delivery to a prior bunker. Without roads this is
+ challenging - albeit less challenging than the first time
+ through since the network will have other player's structures
+ populated in - but with a road, it feels like you're being
+ congratulated. "You have made this world better for everyone
+ who inhabits it. Take a victory lap."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ I attached to the roads in the first game, and was rewarded
+ for it in a similar fashion - at the climax of DS, the chiral
+ network goes down, trashing all the structures you and others
+ have built. It's supposed to be one final test of what you've
+ learned. But if you built the roads, they remain and the
+ journey back to the start is trivial, that victory lap.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So I did the same in the second game, and it returned the
+ favour multiple times. But none of these events are a
+ traditional reward - it's purely generated from your own
+ knowledge of how much it would have sucked to backtrack
+ without it. It encourages you to <i>do the right thing.</i>
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So I built out all the roads, continuing after the game ended,
+ when there was no chance of any backtracking missions. Because
+ building this infrastructure, for the people you meet, the
+ porters you have played alongside, and those who will come
+ after you, is <i>the right thing to do.</i>
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ You're probably thinking that's a bit pretentious. It's just a
+ video game, after all, and most of the characters in Death
+ Stranding are just holograms. But all of that artifice somehow
+ falls away, because you're making this world better, and
+ doesn't that feel good? Doesn't
+ <i>doing the right thing</i> feel good?
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Of course it does. That's kind of the basis of most leftist
+ thinking, after all. The <i>right thing to do</i> may not be
+ the most optimal choice for you, personally - certainly
+ building every road was not optimal, the optimal choice would
+ be building roads just over the most tricky areas - but it
+ feels good to do it! It feels good to help others out!
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There's only two strand-type games in existence, but another
+ 2025 game actually comes... strangely close. It's a purely
+ single-player experience and it's called
+ <i>Promise Mascot Agency</i>, from the developers of
+ <i>Paradise Killer.</i>
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The high-level concept is batshit. You're a disgraced yakuza
+ who must transform a mismanaged love hotel into a successful
+ 'mascot agency,' that rent out giant mascots to events. Except
+ the mascots are sentient, not costumes. And also it's secretly
+ a game about leaving a run-down, corrupt and forgotten town
+ much better than you found it.
+ </p>
+ </div>
+ </div>
+ </div>
+ </div>
+ </div>
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--- /dev/null
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+<html>
+ <head>
+ <meta charset="UTF-8" />
+ <title>So Your Country Is Censoring The Internet. What Now?</title>
+ <meta name="twitter:card" content="summary_large_image" />
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+ content="So Your Country Is Censoring The Internet. What Now?"
+ />
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+ content="So Your Country Is Censoring The Internet. What Now?"
+ />
+ <meta
+ name="description"
+ content="The UK's online safety act sucks. Let's get around it."
+ />
+ <meta
+ property="og:description"
+ content="The UK's online safety act sucks. Let's get around it."
+ />
+ <meta
+ name="twitter:description"
+ content="The UK's online safety act sucks. Let's get around it."
+ />
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+ />
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+ <div class="title-block">
+ <h3 class="blog-title">
+ So Your Country Is Censoring The Internet. What Now?
+ </h3>
+ <h3 class="datestamp">24/07/2025</h3>
+ </div>
+ <div class="content">
+ <div class="content">
+ <p>The UK's online safety act sucks. Let's get around it.</p>
+ <p>
+ If you use one of many popular social networking sights and
+ are a resident of the hellhole commonly referred to as "The
+ United Kingdom," you have likely recently been asked to submit
+ your ID for age verification. If you haven't yet, it's coming
+ soon to whatever sites you use - Bluesky, as of this morning,
+ are asking every UK user to get an ID check in order to use
+ DMs or see 'adult' posts. Instagram and Facebook are about to
+ roll it out too. Twitter probably won't but only because it's
+ the nazi site. You should not be using twitter unless you're a
+ nazi.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ If you're like me, you probably think this is Quite Bad. And
+ it is Quite Bad! The cause of this is the 'Online Safety Act,'
+ a well-intentioned but ultimately disastrous effort by the UK
+ government to Protect The Children by preventing easy access
+ to 'adult content.' Unfortunately as ever this means a lot of
+ not adult stuff, particularly queer media and LGBT people's
+ accounts, get caught in the dragnet. Considering the UK's
+ current approach to queerness (they hate it, especially
+ transgressive genderfucks like me) this may worry you. It
+ should.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So, maybe you want to avoid uploading your ID to a third party
+ who can use that data how they then wish. (They all promise to
+ delete your ID. I do not trust them to do this.) Great news!
+ Much like all UK internet legislation, it is quite trivial to
+ avoid this. Admittedly, it is not as easy as avoiding IP
+ blocks on pirate websites, which was as simple as changing the
+ DNS settings on your connection. but it's not actually that
+ far off.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ You have probably heard of VPNs by now. Every other youtuber
+ is advertising them. Unfortunately, they are advertising the
+ dogshit ones that you simply should not use if you care about
+ privacy. Surfshark, specifically, will not hesitate to hand
+ your data over to authorities. It should ONLY be used for
+ watching other country's netflix catalogues.
+ </p>
+ <p>But I digress.</p>
+ <p>
+ As part of my own research to get around this, I had a scan
+ over the current crop of paid VPN services currently
+ available. After some evaluation, my recommendation is
+ <a href="https://protonvpn.com/"><b>ProtonVPN.</b></a> Proton
+ is a swiss company that specialises in privacy-focused
+ internet applications. They started with ProtonMail (which I
+ also use), but ProtonVPN is their next-most mature offering.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Proton offers exit points in basically every country in the
+ world, with quite a lot of servers in each. Speeds are solid
+ (I have basically not noticed a drop) and ping seems
+ serviceable for those of you who play a lot of twitch
+ shooters. The free offering lets you connect to 5 random
+ countries for one device, which isn't a whole lot of good - if
+ the countries you draw don't include say, Iceland, Switzerland
+ or the Netherlands, you're not gonna live a truly uncensored
+ life. The free tier is also what every other prole is using,
+ so speeds are going to be generally worse than on the paid pro
+ version. The pro version is <b>£8 a month</b> which is IMO
+ quite reasonable.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Like many other offerrings, Proton provides its own app on all
+ platforms that allows you to choose the country to connect
+ via, but it also supports router-level configuration via
+ OpenVPN and Wireguard, the two most common VPN protocols.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What are these things?" ok yes I just said scary words. You
+ probably don't need to worry about it - the pro tier supports
+ 10 independent devices, so you can install the VPN on every
+ geneal purpose computing device you have without worrying
+ about the router level stuff.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But I'm a nerd, and the purpose of this particular post is to
+ inform people about these things! So let's get into those
+ scary words. OpenVPN and Wireguard are open-source VPN
+ protocols, they are used to standardise how you connect to a
+ VPN on any device. All the apps that VPN services provide are
+ based on one of these two protocols. Most modern routers
+ <i>that are not provided by your ISP</i> support one or both
+ of them!
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So yes, if you want router-level protection you will probably
+ need to buy a new router, and realistically that's gonna be
+ another <b>£50 - £100.</b> Which I grant is a significant
+ outlay! Hence why I don't think any random person is going to
+ want to do this unless they're a nerd like me. I already
+ maintain a lot of my own network infrastructure, so yes, I'm
+ the freak here lol.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But! If you do go down that route, it's worthwhile, because
+ you can
+ <a
+ href="https://protonvpn.com/support/installing-protonvpn-on-a-router/"
+ >set up your network to route <i>all</i> traffic via your
+ VPN,</a
+ >
+ ensuring every device you use in your home is private. It's
+ what I'm doing! But like I said I'm a freak so don't
+ necessarily follow my lead on this one.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ ANYWAY. Point is it's actually kinda trivial to get this nerd
+ shit set up nowadays! The apps services provide are simple and
+ easy, and they're also pretty cheap! I suggest getting one
+ now, before the continued censorship of the internet gets
+ worse! OK thanks I'm out, see ya later for a more interesting
+ post probably.
+ </p>
+ </div>
+ </div>
+ </div>
+ </div>
+ </div>
+ <iframe class="embed-links" src="../shared/links.html"> </iframe>
+ <iframe class="embed-footer" src="../shared/footer.html"> </iframe>
+ </div>
+ </body>
+</html>
projects / gnargle.github.io.git / commitdiff
