Take-Two posted a legally-required notice that it is laying off 70 workers and closing a studio in Seattle. This is part of mass layoffs announced across Take-Two. This has also been mentioned by Games Industry.biz, although without much more details than what I have here (at time of writing).

The only Take-Two studio in Seattle is Intercept Games, who have been making Kerbal Space Program 2. We also know that Intercept had about 65-70 people working there (half of which were on KSP2, half of which were on an unannounced project).

Various KSP2 devs have also posted on social media that they have been impacted by layoffs (not sure about the rules re: linking social media profiles, so I'll hold off).

We may or may not have more news in the coming days. It's hard times in the industry right now, and my heart goes out for everyone affected.

EDIT: From Game Developer:

When approached for comment by Game Developer, Take-Two wouldn't confirm whether Intercept Games has been impacted by the cuts–despite multiple Kerbal Space Program developers indicating they recently left the studio, with one expressly stating they were "laid off." A company spokesperson did, however, explain that its Private Division publishing label will continue to support Kerbal Space Program 2.

...

When pushed again on the current status of Intercept Games, Take-Two told Game Developer it has "nothing further to note."

As the title indicates, I am curious how folks have “gone with their gut intuition”, especially in circumstances where they are faced with tough decisions or life-altering changes. Some thoughts/prompts for discussion:

• What does your “gut” feel like to you?
• How do you reconcile differences between your “gut feeling” and what your brain is thinking/telling you?
• How do you get to the point where you decide to “go with your gut”?
• Can you share examples of when you went against your brain, and followed your gut, and it turned out to totally be the right decision for you?
• Do you have any examples of when you followed your gut intuition, instead of what your brain/logical mind was telling you, and it came back to bite you?
• How have you learned to “trust your gut”?
• What tactics or steps have you learned to take when trying to parse between what your “gut” is telling you and what your “brain” is telling you?

Curious how other people listen to their gut and use that intuition to make decisions or choose which direction to go in (concerning life stuff, career stuff, relationship issues, etc.).

I have a guitar multi effects that has a headphone out with 47Ω

I want a budget somewhat neutral headphone to use with it and I am getting confused with the answers I found so far.

The AKG K240 mk2 (55Ω) seems to be a popular choice with people who own another multi effects (HX Stomp) with a different impedance (I think it's 12Ω).

This headphone is within my budget, but it seems too close to the 47 output of my multifx.

Will I have a problem with this?

I read somewhere that the headphone impedance should be much bigger than the output impedance, but another text I read somewhere explained that they should match closely.

I'm really confused about this.

I'm getting ready to try a long-term media fast, at least a month or two. That means no Social, no general forum talk (I have a couple of task-specific groups I have to stick with), no general Internet browsing, and minimal news.

But I don't want to completely divorce myself from the major news events of the world. In case Russia invades the EU, I want to know about it before Russian soldiers are knocking on my door. If a new global pandemic kicks off, or they fix global warming ... you know, Big Ticket items.

So that's the question. If you only get one news source, that provides objective (-ish) reporting focused on actual news (not sports, not pop culture, not click-bait-y diet-fads and vitamin recommendations) ... news of the state of the world (preferably including the world beyond the United States).

I realize there probably isn't a single source that hits all my bullets, but that's okay; I just need one that's close.

Danke, y gracias.

Edit: For now, my first pick is AP News' World News section ( https://apnews.com/world-news ). So, that's sort of my baseline; anything better than that available?

Edit #2: So, apparently, AP News has either handicapped or completely eliminated their RSS feed(s); I'm getting some results, but all old and suspiciously incomplete, and the 'Net is full of "here's how to cobble together the equivalent of a real AP News RSS feed" tips. So, unless I figure this out quickly, I'm just about to lose interest in AP News.

Anyone have any tips on this?

This thread is posted weekly - please try to post all relevant US political content in here, such as news, updates, opinion articles, etc. Extremely significant events may warrant a separate topic, but almost all should be posted in here.

This is an inherently political thread; please try to avoid antagonistic arguments and bickering matches. Comment threads that devolve into unproductive arguments may be removed so that the overall topic is able to continue.

Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

As soon as Deimos graciously adds the nominated book titles, we will be voting on the next set of books to read for the book club. Voting will close end of day Thursday May 2 Pacific time.

If you plan to read with us, please upvote as many as five titles. We will select at least four, possibly more if there are books with solid support. Each voting thread requires Deimos to work, and I am going to have less availability for a few months so we want to select books to read for the next few months.

I look forward to reading and discussing with you all.

Fair warning, I'm a dummy trying to talk about stuff I don't fully understand, but I wanted to see others' thoughts on this.

In the 1960s, America's GDP (per capita) was $3,000.
Also, in 1960, the federal poverty limit was $3,000 for a family of four.

In 2023, the GDP (per capita) was $82,034.
The federal poverty limit for a family of four in 2023 was $30,000.

This can't be good for the American people. Unless I'm drawing comparisons between two completely unrelated things?

People who are barely in poverty today would have to earn ~2.7x the amount they earn to stay consistent with those who were barely in poverty in the 1960s if GDP and FPL were still equal to each other. So what about the families caught in the middle? Too high earnings to get help and too low to thrive? They just suffer, I guess.

Out of curiosity, I calculated what the thresholds would be if the percentages of GDP to FPL were swapped between 2023 and 1960.

1960s numbers adjusted if FPL matched 2023's percentage:
GDP=$3,000
FPL=$1,111

1960s numbers adjusted if GDP matched the percentage comparison of 2023:
GDP=$8,100
FPL=$3,000

Please let me know if it actually matters that the GDP per capita is 2.7x the federal poverty limit for a family of four. Also, let me know your thoughts.

With life, work and other hobbies, I confess I'm not the gamer I used to be- lack of time being the main culprit. But RPGs- specifically Fantasy Fantasy- are the type I've always loved. Since then, hack-n-slash (I'll keep calling them this name!), action-adventure... I've enjoyed them too.

Given those genres, I'm sure you can think of big-name titles that are excellent. Cool. That's not what this is about. I should also add, I'm going back two generations with this, to the PS3.

You may have heard of a game called Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. It's never been called a bad game, but phrased as "it's definitely a dungeon crawler". It's certainly NOT a big name game. And yet... I've been putting in TONS of hours to it recently. For a game that isn't one of the Big Names (I actually do have Final Fantasy and many other Big Name games), I'm finding it to be massively fun. I'm wondering if because it's a relatively uncomplicated game- and I admit I also chose Casual mode.

Meanwhile, I also got Monster Hunter: Rise on Steam- it was on a MASSIVE discount. This is DEFINITELY a Big Name game... and Holy Shit. Barely an hour into the game, and it just throws so much at you at once. Granted, playing it on PC rather than Switch is probably also a factor. I wouldn't describe it as complicated... more like, it gives you hundreds of options right from the start, and it feels very overwhelming. And that seems to be the case with games that have been around for a while and are well-known: they give you tons of options early-game. For some people, that's probably awesome- I suppose those with lots of time could easily spend hours working on it. But for someone who has limited time? It almost feels like too much.

Or in other words: those of us with not so much time, having fewer options to worry about is a better things. And that seems to be something only found in "not great" titles. I get that gamers want tons of options- been there, done that- but I find myself wanting fewer things thrown at me now.

-----UNDERMOUNTAIN SPOILERS-----

-----HALASTER BLACKCLOAK SPOILERS-----

I've been playing and DMing D&D since the late 70s. Most of my campaigns have been homebrew worlds with my own rulesets. But as with many of us, the pandemic became a personal golden era of online gaming with friends around the world, especially with the old classic modules and Roll20.

This campaign began simply enough. It was called Thug & Thugger, and it only had two players. I told them they were thieves who stole from other thieves, interrupting the thefts and taking what they wanted for themselves. And it worked fine for the first 7-8 levels. But then we got ambitious and I sent them on a Spelljammer ship into the Phlogiston. There, they found the protection of an elder goddess who had been imprisoned and needed them to rescue her. But in the course of their rescue, things went sideways and instead of being murdered by Nalfeshnee and Hezrou demons, the elder goddess in a last gasp to save her heroes sent them "somewhere random."

Where they landed was the seventh level of The Dungeon of the Mad Mage in Undermountain. Not only that, but the demons had been compelled to be their familiars and... once they figured out their scale issues... all of them were no more than nine inches tall. The characters discovered that they couldn't go up any floors, only down. If they were going to survive this, they would have to conquer all 23 levels of the dungeon. Now, I'm well aware that this plot sounds like it came out of the diary of a 12 year old, but ultimately what we wanted was a campaign that finally took players all the way to the end and allowed them godhood after level 20.

With all our play these last few years, the schedules of daily life had defeated nearly every campaign. That was why we only had two players. And that was why we shoe-horned our narrative arc into the only module we could find that would get the players to 20.

The first five floors or so were an absolute bloody blast. They were immensely overpowered, despite being only nine inches tall, and they went through entire hordes like a buzzsaw. After the near-death challenges of the Phlogiston it felt like a victory lap. And as the DM I was fine with it, knowing their bully ways wouldn't last. At a certain point, one of their foes banished the Nalfeshnee (which was a massive loss--those things are stupidly powerful) and they regained their former physical height.

Then it was a fight. The two characters were a warlock/bard and a ranger/monk. Both fought well in the magical dark without disadvantage. That was their main strategy: cast darkness and then wade in. It worked for most of the levels and against a wide variety of enemies, especially since the vast majority of spells require you to "see" your target. But then the monk started spamming stunning strike and they got back to running the table on me. Dungeon of the Mad Mage was written before stunning was a thing, so not a single foe had resistance or immunity to it. He would burn through the legendary saves of nearly any bad guy and still have extra ki points left over.

They leveled and leveled again. They also became clerics to appropriately worship the elder goddess. Their bag of holding filled with gear and each action or attack became as convoluted as a Disney contract. The number of saves, reactions, buffs, etc. that needed to be accounted for on every move was something I won't attempt again without an AI assistant. As they approached the final battle, I realized that I needed help.

One player had told me that another friend group of ours had tried the year before to take on Undermountain but that campaign had fallen apart. So I secretly texted the DM of that group with a proposal: Since you know this campaign so well, I need some assistance for the end. He happily agreed.

On the day of the final battle, the players were locked in combat with Halaster's most senior minions. Suddenly, the Mad Mage himself arrived. That's right. On the Zoom channel, someone new joined. Someone named Halaster. He appeared in a wizard robe and fake white beard, wielding a scepter he'd bought on Amazon, with a screen behind him generated by AI to look like Halaster's lair.

My players lost their minds. They thought I was just going to put on a corny voice and be Halaster myself. No no no. But this wasn't to be just a cameo. I told the new player to legitimately have Halaster kill them. I wasn't looking for a happy ending. And as the DM I wasn't going to be anything but the referee, adjudicating what had now become a PvP situation. Two players against the Mage. My two players finally realized what I had in store for them. This was a serious no-holds-barred fight to the death.

The Halaster player is also a legendary game designer in his own right, a video game designer turned executive who has worked on many games we all know. He called in several other legends of the industry to help him figure out his moves. I even handed him the gift of cursed gloves I'd tricked the monk into putting on several levels before, which made his stunning strikes against Halaster something he needed to roll on the wild sorcery magic table.

And they still beat him and won their freedom and the freedom of their elder goddess. But man was it a battle. They withstood his meteor storm and made saves against his most potent spells. At the end, the bard only had 3hp and nearly everyone else was dead.

But we did it! We finally finished a level 20 campaign. And now we know we never need to do that again, lol. It became so unwieldy and slow after about level 15 that it felt more like work than play.

We look forward to starting over with simple characters who do simple things. The monk will be the DM this time, leading me and the other player in the Lost Mines of Phandelver. And each of us will try playing two simultaneous classic characters this time: me a dwarven cleric and elven illusionist, he a half-orc fighter and wood elf rogue. At least we know our schedules work.