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I didn't want to declare myself a winner, because even after going over the votes three times I was afraid I'd mess it up...

As it seems the other contestants are fine with the idea, I'll start the next contest tonight or tomorrow, as soon as I come up with a solid idea.
Thanks, everyone, for participating and voting!

Shall we put up the Durinde signal, Commissioner? Or should we get someone to call the competition so we can get the next theme going?

Plus, I'm a sucker for a real mushy ending.

That's horrible! (And I love it!)

[Sinitrena]

Best Writing: Sinitrena
Best Character: Baron
Best News Event: Baron
Best News Coverage: Baron


Sinitrena: I'm not really feeling the way this one was written. Too many repetitions of certain words and phrases, and considering the scale and form of the event being depicted (in Biblical terms) I'm not really sure who or what the storyteller here is.

I think I'm mostly bothered by how obviously biblical the inspiration here is, and by how inappropriate the format and feeling of the writing seems to me for that setting and period.


Baron: A screenplay of sorts? I always feel odd about these stories that seem to consist of nothing but names and dialogue, so my expectations weren't exactly high when I started this one.
It went a lot better than I expected, though, and I have to admit I laughed out loud a couple times! It manages to drive home its setting and comedy through the clever mimicking of modern TV methods of conveying information to audiences, and the dialogue and characters are clever and funny enough to do it.
Sinitrena still gets the vote on technical writing, though, for having more vivid descriptions on a technical level, but all other categories: you've earned these points!

[WHAM:]

WHAM: That's certainly a news-worthy event happening in your story. It's a bit disappointing that your story has, in itself, fairly little to do with it. We learn more about th shanangians of Matt than the creation of the new island. It's an interesting view into a culture that becomes more and more influenced by the fact that just about everyone can stream nowadays and a glimps at how far people might go to get more viewrs (though Matt didn't really do that much ore than be there - - coincidence). But this growing culture of streamers would also mean that there should be several people filming, streaming, live commentating this event, which doesn't seem to be the case, considering the TV station choose someone so ill-equiped personality-wise as Matt. I noticed a couple spelling mistakes that your standard word processor spell-checker would normally catch (e.g. cosncious). Did you turn it off by accident? In general, an enjoyable story, but not your best work.

Quick response to Sinitrena. (And if you are just another reader and haven't yet scored the stories, please refrain from reading.)

Spoiler

Google doesn't want to keep spell-checker on for English, since I am located in Finland. It keeps resetting and I keep ignoring it, since it basically highlights all English words as incorrect because it's trying to auto correct into Finnish. A poor excuse, though, combined with the fact that I was just moving house over the past couple weeks, leaving me with less time than I'd like to write and read. I also like to have a friend or two read the story first, but none had time to do so.

I had some loose idea about why Matt was the one picked for the streaming. It had to do with the island still recovering from the 2019 hurricane (which was topical on my mind from recent news, and directed me to write this story), leaving mobile connections spotty and weak. Matt was supposed to be some rich idiot with a fancier phone or connection, but the story was already feeling too long for my tastes, so I decided to omit the technobabble. All around the focus was on the self-centered nature of our society, how Matt focused his camera toward himself rather than the event until being reminded of it, how he fails to ensure his own, or anyone else's, safety as he livestreams, reminds people to like and subscribe out of habit, and generally focuses on himself, his ego and on his fancy phone.

[close]

I'll try and take time tonight or tomorrow to properly read the other stories, and cast my own votes into the mix too.

I guess it depends what the meaning of "is" is.   One would hope that said rules would be applied equally regardless of political persuasion but that sadly has not always been the case.

We are all human, and make mistakes and errors in judgement, as well as hold our own individual biases that can impact how we view certain topics and conversations, so it's not really possible to be 100% equal in applying such rules.
Let us have faith that the moderators will apply rules equally and fairly to the best of their ability, now and always.

While I am always opposed to restricting the freedom of speech of individuals, it is still good to see a more clearly outlined set of rules, and to know that there is readiness in the moderation staff to take action.
Keep up the good work! The AGS forums have always been a great place full of great people, so the recent hostility has been a sad surprise to me. Let's hope these rules won't need to be applied too often.

I have been in touch with Ghost off-site.
It is not my place to comment on their personal affairs or matters, so I'll just say that they deserve all the time they need, and I hope that will be enough for them to, one day, be in such a state that they might return to grace us with their lovely games and art.

Some low-level issues with red and green, which I believe is called Deuteranopia (my doctor never used that term back when I was diagnosed as a kid).
Very minor issue, but I can't make out most of those circles with the coloured dots. In a game I think I recall an issue with the old Medal of Honor -game, where the password entry screen was black letters on yellow background, and one of the letters flashed red. I could never see that red flash in that situation, though my friends could make it out easily, so I always thought it was related to this.

[Livestreaming]

Livestreaming

Matt stretched out his arm and saw his face on the screen. He wasn't all that happy with what he saw: a pasty, pale man with a coarse beard that had slowly gotten out of control during his vacation. The kind of cheap straw-hat that marked him out as a tourist no matter where he went. A pair of fake Air Pods that nobody would ever notice, or care for, but Matt was endlessly cosncious about. And he was wearing one of those dumb floral-pattern shirts, because his mother had given it to him and expected to see it in his vacation photos.

I don't even like taking selfies -he thought to himself as he grimaced for the camera. Holding his phone out like this was already uncomfortable, and moving his face around made the burned skin on his forehead hurt. He pulled the phone closer to inspect the tiny icons that lined the outer edge of its screen, verified that the connection looked fine, then pushed it out again and tried to smile.

Just think of the payout. They promised ten thousand bucks for a special report, live on the scene. Just act natural!

A woman gasped nearby, and somewhere off in the distance a child was crying. Matt looked up, over his phone, and saw the same sight that had elicited such reactions. He knew the sound would follow soon enough.

A distant female voice said a few reassuring words, her voice tinny in Matts fake Air Pods, and began to count down from ten.

“Thanks, uhh- Linda, right?” No, stupid, don't ask questions, just say the lines. “...and, uhh, yeah, um- we're live out here on the, uh- Grand Bahamas. My name is Matt Westerlund, reporting for UK-Dubya-News live as we-”

The image on the phone screen had frozen. Matt could see himself, mouth open, tongue prominently visible in a way that made him feem distinctly uncomfortable, as the idea of his face being plastered like that over millions of TV screens crept into his head. He shook the phone, realised how dumb that was, then moved it closer to his face to see if the icons showed some kind of issue he could fix.

Shaking his head as he stared down at the device he began to mutter: “Oh fuck. Come on! What the f-”

The female voice shouted at him, audibly shocked at the language he'd spewn forth in a live broadcast. The feed was live and people could hear him, he just couldn't see himself because of the glitch in the streaming app. The image flickered back to life, updating in segments. Matt could see inside his nostrils, and thanks to the wonders of modern camera technology, he could even count his nostril hairs. Again he thrust out the phone to restore the view of his face to something more normal, even as the redness on his face glowed brighter by the second, compounding the sunburn.

“Anyway guys, we've got a special report here, as we are looking at what might b-”

The ground shook beneath his feet, and the air was filled first with the sounds of shrieking birds, then people shouting again, and finally the loud, distant rumble as a vast soundwave finally reached the island. Matt scrunched his eyes shut and put his free hand over his head, his knees buckling as he instinctively tried to become smaller, less significant before the enprmous force of the sound washing over him.

The female voice in his ear was insistent, demanding he stand up and finish the introduction.

Shaky on his feet, Matt did as he was told, wondering if he could negotiate even more money out of this deal considering how much of a pain it was.

“Yeah, um- A special report indeed, as another shockwave washed over us just now! And oh boy, this one was even bigger than the last two! They're coming in every five or six minutes now, or maybe, like, ten? Huge explosions! Bigger than any I've ever s-”

Matt's idea of adding a bit of flair to the description stumbled and fell as it passed his lips. The female voice sounded desperate as it pointed out he was facing toward the spectacle, which meant the camera, pointed at his face, was not.

Matt cursed under his breath and turned on the spot. Behind his head, at an awkward angle, the camera panned over a crowd of people gathered on the beach, then a shot of the open blue sky, until finally the black pillar of smoke, rising from the sea in the distance, came into view.

The female voice delivered more instructions, trying to keep this broadcast from falling apart. She fed Matt his lines, and he did his best to follow along despite the time delay.

“I am standing just off Bayshore road, and what you are seeing in the distance is apparently the birth of a new, unknown, volcanic island! Fire, smoke and ash have been spilling up into the air all morning, or some time after eleven when I woke up to the first- oh, yeah- yeah, neverm- erhm- and, uh, it was just half an hour ago when we had the first explosion!”

Matt brough his free hand into the view and enthusiastically mimicked an explosion by wigglign his fingers in an expanding pattern.

The female voice ordered him to stop that immediately.

Matt gestured off into the distance, where the base of that black pillar had begun to glow and flicker in bright hues of ominous red and orange.

“The island, just recovering from hurricane Dorian last year... wait, that was in 2019, right? Oh, y- yeah, yeah, sorry!”

The frustration in the female voice, as Matt became confused again, was palpable. It turned into another angry shout as Matt went to wipe sweat off his brow with the same hand he was using to hold his phone, which caused the image being broadcast out to the world to tumble and turn, and briefly display a closeup of his straw hat.

A man on the nearby beach was pointing and shouting something, but Matt didn't catch most of it due to the thick islander accent. The water, far off in the distance, seemed to be bubbling white, as if boiling. Large pillars of water shot up into the air, only to collapse again in a spectacular fashion.

Matt turned his head to look, as the female voice asked about the phenomenon, and instructed him to focus the camera on it.

“Yeah, um- it looks like the water's going crazy out there.”

The female voice delivered a sarcastic remark at Matt's observational abilities.

“Sorry, but it's, like... it's coming closer, though.”

The roiling whiteness of the water expanded like a wave, turning from a distant blurring of the water into a more prominent and noisy phenomenon as it came nearer. People closest to the water were running away from it. A woman hauled two small children in her arms while shouting in spanish. Two burly men struggled to shift a wheelchairbould old man from the sand. A dog barked at the water.

“The people seem to be, uh- I'm not really sure what's going on now. It's like rain or something, but it's just over the water, so-”

The sand on the beach exploded upward, loose grains shooting up into the sky as if struck by an artillery shell, leaving behind a shallow impact crater. The dog howled as it turned and ran to shelter beneath a van parked on the street.

“Oh shit!” Matt stumbled sideways, away from the impact. Someone was shouting at people to find shelter. Sirens were blaring in the distance.

“Sorry Laura...” That wasn't her name. It wasn't Linda, either. “...it, uh- it's raining goddamn rocks in here! Like big-ass rocks from the sky, and-”

Another impact, then another. The water was being peppered by small rocks, the edge of the rain rapidly approaching the beach, while individual larger lumps of hardened volcanic rock crashed into the water, and sometimes on land. An emergency vehicle was struck, and the electrical short-out caused it to emit a mournful wail as its sirens tried to fire up, but failed. Shattered glass spilled forth from its red-and-white corpse.

Matt ran, despite the female voice in his ear demanding a more steady shot of something, anything! The pillar of smoke, or the crater, or the sea, or the people, or the crushed car. Matt could barely hear her over the commotion and panic that surrounded him. People fled for their lives, stumbling and slamming into one another in aimless panic. A large man in a striped shirt bumped into Matt, and the phone flew from his hand, landing face-up so that it only showed the rapidly darkening sky.

Matt could be heard shouting, cursing and fumbling around, finally getting his hands on the device.

“I think I need to stop now, Laura, we've got a bit of a situation here. I need to get off this island! This is MattGamer signing off now, uhh-” Matt looked deeply confused. His straw hat was gone and something had left a small cut on his brow. Up above the sky was turning black. A lump of volcanic rock the size of a van hurtled down toward the camera.

The female voice shouted at Matt to look out.

“Don't forget to like and subsc-”

And btw, fuck nazis.

It's really common to see people getting called nazis these days, which probably explains that kind of reaction.
But yes, indeed: fuck nazis.

Oooh! Starship Troopers reference!

"IT'S AN UGLY PLANET! A BUG PLANET! A PLANET HOSTILE TO ALL LIFE AS WE KN-"

I'll be moving house in the coming weeks, but I'll try to squeeze in some time to write a proper entry!

I mean I'm certainly not going to "suspect you of believing in it", but it seems weird that you keep getting it wrong.

Well it's good to see you set this record straight, despite all the past accusations thrown about on these very forums.
I can now walk in peace again, not having to fear Khris ambushing me out of some misguided belief that I were a nazi.

But since this thread is about brexit, remember when Johnson was asked whether he had any hobbies and started talking really weirdly about crafting toy buses from wine crates? Some people suspect he did this to influence the search results when people google "johnson bus".
Anyway, it's a pretty good video.

It's damn sight clever, though. As an idea, that is, obviously it didn't work in the slightest, and if that was the plan then Boris or his team must have deeply misunderstood how online search engines work.
It's a similar kind of misdirected smarts as the whole "behave like a bumbling fool, pretending not to know you're about to give a speech when you are" -shtick he's been using over and over.
He may look like the village idiot, but there is some cunning to the man.

Isn't that what the AGS Discord is for? Seems like it'd serve the same purpose, really.

https://discord.gg/YbzZ86C

I can't think what's led you to imagine that I think Jeremy Corbyn or communism are beyond criticism. Especially since I've been very critical of Brexit and the British far-left is rather keen on Brexit.

I never said anything about you or your opinions of Comrade Corbyn or the labour party. My comment on this topic, on the general level of acceptance toward far-left ideologies, was a generalization of how much more accepted such ideals seem to be in the UK compared to the more easterly parts of Europe. As much as I like your games, Ali, not everything I say is about you particularly.

Far-right, far-left, extremist anything is always bad news and should be condemned in all of its forms. I would certainly hope we can agree on this particular point at least, if not on many other topics.

(Incidentally, the reason "populism" is seen as negative, is because of the mass murders.)

Ah, so that's why "communism" is also a bad word today, and people who walk around with hammer-and-sickle shirts and flags are called out and not elected into the British parliament to...
Wait. Corbyn did what now? And with who?

Oh. Oh dear.

(It's almost as if the UK never suffered Soviet oppression or something, and struggles to comprehend the wider European narrative.)

Please stay in topic, my virtual friends. We were talking about brexit effects, not make heat. 

Aye, it's quite easy to veer off topic since the very nature of Brexit is so hotly debated.
As it stands, however, it seems unlikely that we'll ever get to see what Brexit looks like after all.

Ah right, you're THAT guy. Gotcha. Bye.

\o   Fare thee well!

It's weird to me for "populism" to be seen as a negative, when it literally means trying to appease as many people as possible. Which is kind of the point of democracy, isn't it?
Sure, the majority doesn't always make the smartest decisions, or the best decisions, but that's also part of being human. As stated, in a parliamentary democracy we elect an elite to govern, and accept whatever governance they produce under the laws and regulations in place. Only sometimes a decision is such that a more direct manner of decision making is required, and if a matter is suitably important I feel the best way to gauge what people think of a topic, and how they would decide within a democratic system, is to ask them directly. A vote or referendum.

It is easy to say "we don't want to ask the masses, we just want a chosen elite to make decisions" as long as that elite aligns with your worldviews. Will you say the same thing if that ever changes, I wonder? If you find yourself opposed to the views of the elite?

Considering past statements made by certain individuals, the eagerness and willingness to inflict violence and destruction on those some of you disagree with, I highly doubt it.

It infuriates me to see Jack and WHAM insisting there's a nebulous, undemocratic conspiracy to prevent Brexit.

No, not a conspiracy, and whether it is undemocratic depends on your interpretation of that word. I value direct democracy over parliamentary democracy, which is why I view referendums and direct votes by the people as being more valuable than the parliaments decisions, as it allows people to directly voice an opinion on a singular topic. The exact same method which is used to elect the parliament, which wields power on a more wider scale. (A fine system, and Finland has a very similar one, where an elected parliament holds the power, our president has a right to veto the parliament, and rare important issues are put to vote among the populace.)

To see the parliament reject the people's vote, to me, is wholly undemocratic and paints the entire political system in a bad light. For indeed, if the parliament can legally ignore the people's vote on one topic, what stops them from doing the same for another topic? What stops them, at that point, from rejecting the next general election result? Or the next referendum on some critically important and timely topic?


As for my point of "lacking a proper democracy": the UK system is archaic, outdated and confusing at best. It relies on tons of ancient rulings and precedents that are not properly codified, and seems like it could do with a proper overhaul to standardize the process of election, parliament, and who can do what within that system. (For a fresh example: see the outrage over the manner in which the prime minister is elected. The very people of the UK don't seem to know these things themselves.) Hell, the UK parliament figured out a standardized term limit for the parliament itself in 2011 if I am not mistaken! And has subsequently failed to produce a parliament stable enough to function within that framework.

Has there ever been a plan to try and catalogue forum members by region? I'd be happy to meet some Finnish AGS developers, and may be traveling around Denmark, Norway and Sweden in the coming year or two, so seeing people abroad could be fun.

The UK won't be leaving the EU.
The nation lacks a proper democracy, and what sliver of democracy it has, has succumbed to a limited two-party system where smaller parties exist as unimportant outliers.

Thus the UK won't be abiding by the referendum and all the time and effort wasted on Brexit will be for naught. Nothing gained, plenty lost. A pitiable situation in all aspects, and along with many other policy decisions taken by the UK Government over the past 5 years or so, it has led to myself scrapping past plans of migrating to the UK one day. It's not a place I'd want to live in anymore.


As for how the theoretic Brexit might impact the videogame industry: that particular industry enjoys some lovely protections from such impacts. Global distribution platforms that enjoy prominence don't really care if you are in the EU or not, and so the only widespread impact (if any) is what comes from the UK's own internal legal changes. As for labour being free to move in and out of the UK, this is another area where the videogame industry enjoys some freedoms, in that most work done as part of this industry doesn't rely on being physically present. Outsourcing work and tasks abroad should not be widely impacted, even if Brexit takes place. Even payment methods shouldn't be much impacted, since the UK never adopted the Euro as its currency.

There may well be other aspects I am not seeing, but all in all it would seem to me like any impact on the games industry would be limited and temporary in nature.