Novamdomum

It's not easy to describe but here goes. If I'm doing something for someone (the dishes, cooking a meal, tidying up, decorating a Xmas tree) and they don't know I'm doing it, then I hear them approaching (keys in the front door, the sound of someone getting out of bed upstairs) and I get a huge panicky feeling because if they discover me before I've finished it and they:

1 - Thank me 2 - Don't approve of what I've done 3 - Try to help me 4 - Change what I'm trying to do like "Oh thanks but there's a better table cloth in the cupboard. Here lemme get it" 5 - Try to correct what I'm doing

I will lose all motivation and feel immediately depressed cos I missed the big dopamine hit of going "Tadaaa".

I wonder if there's a term for that situation?

I run a small business and do a lot of networking and I've noticed that people aren't really handing out business cards anymore. Do you still use them?

No wrong answers. Could be a game show, docu-series, fiction, sci-fi, anything that didn't make it but should have.

I've been driving trains, learning how to build a medieval town and killing a bunch of zombies in Bel Air. How about you?

I know there are some notepads that divers use but I was more hoping for something specifically for the shower that I could maybe stick to the wall like a waterproof whiteboard maybe? I've had no success searching online unfortunately.

I have yet to meet anyone who enjoys a patronising grandad's voice, introducing a game while making terrible attempts at humor. The Universim did the same thing and it's just so grating. When did this become a thing?? Also, why do all the characters have floaty hands with no arms. In fact, there's so many odd design choices in this thing. It's a shame because there's a lot of work done here. I'd love to hear from anyone who finished the demo and enjoyed it.

It feels like it's really getting out of hand and the language of the negative reviews seems really fake too. I just bought a game that got review bombed and it was fine. From the reviews it sounded like it was going to destroy my graphics card, corrupt my hard drive and be full of bugs. Luckily I watched some gameplay vids and it turned out none of those things were true.

Is Winter Games 2023 still the most recent/best game I can do that with? It seems like such an under developed genre considering everything else in the entire world has a simulator game now.

Say it was the size of Corsica and traveling at the speed of a reversing truck and bumped into a land mass. Would it still be an extinction level event?

These days it's so hard to sort the marketing from the reality isn't it?

My brain squirrels cannot sit still long enough to focus on an ordinary news/current affairs website. It's all so painfully slow and boring. There was (a long time ago) a java script wall of news from all over the world that updated in real time. It closed years ago and I never found anything similar. It was just a wonderful mosaic of headlines and stories that didn't sit still. The mosaic felt alive and if something caught your attention you better click on it before it turns into something else! You kind of see things like this in some movies, where they look at a wall of info on a big screen and everything is moving and updating. It's not waiting for clicks. You have to chase it! Is there anything like that or maybe a site that lets you construct a bunch of real time feeds that update constantly?

p.s. I realise that to many what I'm describing probably sounds like hell on earth but to my brain squirrels it would be heaven 🤣

(Update the first: Looks like the Feedbro Add-on in Firefox is the closest I'm going to get at the moment)

(Update the second: Thanks so much to geekwithsoul for finding that old javascript site I was talking about. I never thought I'd see it again. I've added a pic of what it looks like on my wide screen. Now that's what I call a wall of information ❤️)

These are the games I've been obsessing over (includes medieval themed ones):

Super Mini Mart - https://store.steampowered.com/app/1914060/Super_Mini_Mart/

Winkeltje: The Little Shop - https://store.steampowered.com/app/949290/Winkeltje_The_Little_Shop/

inKONBINI: One Store. Many Stories - https://store.steampowered.com/app/2723430/inKONBINI_One_Store_Many_Stories/

Cozy Keep: Farm, Craft, Manage - https://store.steampowered.com/app/2261350/Cozy_Keep_Farm_Craft_Manage/

Super Mini Mart is my favourite at the moment. It's not perfect, but it's a really chill experience. Staff are pretty useless, as they cost a lot and get in everyone's way. It's more fun to do everything myself anyway. It's just a really satisfying game loop and I hope, as it develops, we get qol improvements like auto stock buying for essentials and auto stacking of goods by sell by date. That last one is important because I always end up waiting till all the stuff in the shop is gone before ordering more. That's so that customers aren't given so much choice that they never get around to buying stuff before it goes out of date. It gets 5 stars from me though, cos it's really fun 🙂

Winkeltje was the game that got me into the whole shop running experience. The top down view is kind of restrictive though and it's not nearly as fun as Super Mini Mart. I'd still give it a solid 3 stars. I love the screenshots of peoples fully developed shops but it feels like it would be such a huge amount of work to get there 😥.

inKonbini is just a demo at the moment, but it's so atmospheric and lovely. I can't wait to play the full game. It really leans into the fascinating culture of the Konbini store and the people who run them, as well as their relationships with their customers. It's a deliberately slow paced, thoughtful game, and it's really interesting that in the discussion groups, when someone recently asked for the devs to speed the main characters movement up, a ton of other players shouted all together to please NOT do that. It's just a demo but I'd still give it 5 stars 😁.

Cozy Keep is basically Winkeltje in first person, as far as I'm concerned. I'm classing it as a supermarket sim because most of the same mechanics apply. You buy stock, including all the standard groceries, put it on display and sell it. Then you develop the shop, increase it's appeal through decorations and reputation and sell more and more until you're successful and the shop is thriving. It's really fun, but maybe a little less accessible than Super Mini Mart. There's kind of an overwhelming amount of different things to do as well, which I'm finding a little off-putting. Still giving it a good 3 stars though 😎.

I've seen that there are several other shop/supermarket type games out there, but I haven't tried any so far. Do you know of any good ones? and are there any that have really cracked the hiring staff thing yet?