deerstalker

https://blacknerdproblems.com/first-impressions-of-despots-game-dystopian-army-builder/

Despot’s Game: Dystopian Army Builder is the latest early access from developer Konfa Games and published by tinyBuild. The game’s been in early access for just under two weeks at time of writing: and is a pleasant curiosity. An auto-battler roguelike, the name of the game indicates exactly what you’re doing: building a dystopian army.

Light on Story, Heavy on Unit Building

Like other roguelike-likes, there’s not an involved, grand narrative in play. You’re given a fledgling team of puny humans equipped with a variety of armaments and are forced to navigate a weird sewer. You fight everything from zombies to robots to monsters, your opponents growing exceedingly extravagant as time goes on. Your “army” starts small, but as you slowly put them through various challenges, you’ll grow your ranks. Although, you’re probably going to die several times before you learn how to effectively manage your team of ninjas, yogis, football players, eggheads, shield bearers, cultist, gunslingers, and magician.

Unequipped human units are referred to as newbies and for the most part will be early cannon fodder. Unless, that is, you give them a piece of equipment that gives them a class. While you have your standard sword and shield, the various titles I listed should give you a good indication of the absurdity of the different units. Apparently when you’re fighting for your life, you’ll use whatever’s on hand as a tool for survival.

All Weapons are the Right Weapons

Despot’s Game incentivizes you having multiple units of the same classification, but specifically with different weapons. While you may be tempted to equip four units with a chainsaw, you’d get more benefit from having one chainsaw, one sword, one sword in a stone, and one laser sword instead. This array of weapons allows you to leverage the innate class bonuses. The nature of the game gives you ample opportunity to spec into different formations and employ slightly different tactics, although the actual combat is completely out of your hands. You just send your army marching into the monsters.

The mechanics are very intuitive and reasonably well balanced. You can enlist a massive army, but you also have to make sure you enough food to motivate them. Clearing rooms gives you a rudimentary tokens currency that can be used to buy mutations/modifiers or more units. Random events in different biomes force you to deal with a handful of situations that you may or may not benefit from. And then you get to the boss fight and if you win, you repeat the process over again.

Despot’s Game Takeaways

With leader boards and different challenges available, and plenty of mutations to unlock as you get deeper into the game, Despot’s Game: Dystopian Army Builder has a lot to tinker with. Different events offer tokens or unique abilities, making the roguelike nature more enthralling; and there is a lot of replayability. That said, the game’s unit management doesn’t particularly appeal to me in terms of long sessions. The game feels like it has random difficulty spikes where you go from clearing hallway fight after hallway fight, decimate the boss without taking damage, only to die to the next biome’s hellish new units.

Between the comically edgy aesthetic and the pop culture laden dialog, Despot’s Game does have a nice casual appeal to it that could easily transmute to a more min-max-y type of experience. I’m not sure it’s the game for me, if you like the autobattler genre, you should definitely check it out.

Despot’s Game: Dystopian Army Builder is currently available for Early Access on Steam.

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The post First Impressions of “Despot’s Game: Dystopian Army Builder” appeared first on Black Nerd Problems.

http://nerdywithchildren.com/best-science-experiment-kits-for-kids-by-age/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=best-science-experiment-kits-for-kids-by-age

From LEGO and slime to solar and wind power, these best science experiment kits will have kids of all ages eager to experiment!

Reading about science and playing with science toys are great ways to build your kids’ interest in STEM. Conducting actual experiments is the logical next step, but it requires more preparation than reading or playing. The science experiment kits on this list have simple ways for kids to use the scientific method to learn about the world around them. There’s a lot going on with these kits: building circuits, launching rockets, and the ever-popular making slime! This list reflects my and my family’s interests. My engineer brother and scientist father even did some of the middle school activities when they were still in elementary school, and maybe your kids can too. Like our other articles, the age categories here are only suggestions.

Elementary School (Ages 6-11)

Lego Chain Reactions Klutz Science/ STEM Activity Kit

This kit includes a small but versatile complement of Lego pieces and the instructions for using them to make 10 chain reaction, or Rube Goldberg machines. There are instructions for making paper ramps and other components as well. The instructions are only a gateway: once kids have made a few of the machines in the book, they can start experimenting with new pieces and configurations to make their own chain reaction machines and learn some engineering principles in the process!

National Geographic Stunning Science Chemistry Set

Chemistry sets have come a long way since the 1950s, you know, when one science kit for kids contained four little jars of uranium and equipment for measuring radioactivity (the Fallout video game series would be so proud). Thankfully, this National Geographic-branded kit does away with hazardous materials and instead includes all of the apparatus you’ll need to conduct 15 fun experiments, along with instructions for conducting an additional 30 experiments with safe, everyday household materials. Most of the experiments fall squarely into the department of things that bubble, fizz, and/or make a big mess. There’s a volcano to build and paint, a gas powered rocket, and instructions for making your own fireworks. National Geographic does an excellent job in its materials for kids, and this set is no exception. The instructions are clear and the scientific explanations are solid. Unlike the chemistry sets of my own childhood, there are no dangerous chemicals that require special disposal and no alcohol burner for your kids to set on fire. (Truth be told, that was always my favorite part.)

Elmer’s Color Changing Slime Kit

At some point along the line, making, playing with, and having long, scholarly discussions about slime became A Thing for elementary school students. My daughter’s slime phase is over, but there were a couple of years there when we made a lot of slime, and I would find vials of the stuff squirreled away in the house in places where I did not wish to find vials of slime. Elmer’s budget-friendly color changing slime kit includes all the materials you’ll need to make color changing slime, including the glue and the “magical liquid” that consolidates the other slime ingredients (lens solution, baking soda, etc.) into one bottle. The kit also includes an ultraviolet pocket light that you can use to “write” on your slime. Kids can experiment by varying the type and amount of ingredients on their path to their perfect slime. Elmer’s is really leaning into the slime making space, with snow slime, crunchy slime, and a celebration slime kit perfect for birthdays, wedding anniversaries, Festivus, and other happy occasions!

National Geographic Edible Science: Experiments You Can Eat

I know this book isn’t an experiment kit exactly, but it’s so good I needed to include it in this list. There are lots of great chemistry experiments in this book that are easy to do and have a tangible result that you and your offspring can eat. I used this book quite a bit with my daughter’s Girl Scout Troop. One night, we made laxative-based edible slime. I explained to the girls what a laxative is (What did you do at Girl Scouts tonight?) and told them not to eat the slime. Those words were still hanging in the air when one of the girls turned to me with a mouthful of the stuff and said, “Don’t eat what now?”

Middle School (Ages 12-14)

Snap Circuits Pro SC-500 Electronics Exploration Kit

Many scientists, including Richard Feynman and my father got their start in STEM by building a crystal set. This Snap Circuits kit is an updated version of the crystal sets that they built and a lot more besides. Snap Circuits kits contain color coded parts that snap together onto a plastic grid, forming electrical connections without soldering. This kit contains the pieces for 511 electronics projects, including a voice recorder, a light controller, and something called a “screaming fan.” The color coded parts and documentation help kids understand what they are making and what role each part plays in whichever device they’re making. There are several Snap Circuits expansions available: the Snap Circuits Extreme SC-750 kit is the next step up, if you and your kiddo are looking for a challenge.

4 in 1 Solar Power and Electric Motor STEM Kit

This kit contains a solar cell and a battery powered electric motor to serve as the foundations for building a little car, or a solar powered propellor, or two other machines. The kit has enough options that kids can experiment with different circuits and combinations of pieces to make their own machines too. It also comes with a magnetized screwdriver, which is really nice given how small the screws are. The description on Amazon assures parents that this kit does not require welding, which is a real relief.

High School (Ages 14-18)

Tycon Systems 24V Horizontal Wind Turbine

If you’ve got a kid who’s a serious gearhead and $425 burning a hole in your pocket, this may be the project for you. This kit produces a functional wind turbine that will generate a significant amount of electricity. It is most definitely not a toy. That being said, putting it together and getting it to work will require experimentation, but at the end, you’ll have a real wind turbine that does real work. 

Indulge me for a second while I go off on a tangent: much of the way that we middle class people structure our teenagers’ lives deprives them of the opportunity to do meaningful work. This is deeply harmful. Filling our kids’ lives with busy work that they can see is pointless deprives them of the only way to build self respect: doing things that are worthy of respect. Any teenager with a functioning brain knows that their homework means almost nothing and has no result, which makes it a task unworthy of respect. Your kids are going to benefit a lot more from doing something like building a functioning wind turbine <Link to Best Science Books for Kids Here>, taking apart an old car, putting on a musical, playing in a band, or any one of the “secondary” activities that mean a lot more to your kids than their classes do. My high school drama club had a far greater impact on the course of my life than any of my classes did, because to me it was meaningful work and worthy of respect. I sincerely hope that building a wind turbine, or a project like it, can play that role for your kids.

The post Best Science Experiment Kits for Kids by Age appeared first on Nerdy With Children.

https://www.themarysue.com/transphobic-republican-suspended-twitter/

Content warning: misgendering, transphobia.

Earlier this year, Dr. Rachel Levine made history when she was named the assistant secretary for health, making her the highest-ranking openly transgender federal official to ever hold office in the U.S., as well as the first trans person to ever win a senate confirmation. Her position in the Department of Health was also a clear message that transgender health issues are an important priority for the current administration.

A Republican congressman from Indiana was suspended from Twitter this weekend after he tweeted out some transphobic BS about Levine, who was also recently commissioned as a four-star admiral in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.

From his official Twitter account, Rep. Jim Banks tweeted a completely unoriginal jab, misgendering Levine and attempting to diminish her accomplishments. “The title of first female four-star officer gets taken by a man,” he wrote, broadcasting his own ignorance on main for all to see.

That kind of transphobic nonsense is distressingly prevalent on Twitter, but for once, the platform actually intervened to uphold its own code of conduct. Banks’ official government account was temporarily locked due to his violation of the site’s Hateful Conduct Policy.

Banks has not apologized for his hateful comment. Instead, he’s doubled down, moving his transphobia over to his personal account and accusing Twitter of “canceling” him for stating “facts.”

My statement on being censored for tweeting a basic truth and banned from using my official account at @RepJimBanks👇 https://t.co/N5MBvJKz6g pic.twitter.com/bwQxhRAUOO

— Jim Banks (@Jim_Banks) October 23, 2021

I very much hope Banks’ personal account also ends up being “canceled.” I also hope Twitter starts enforcing its own terms of service in regard to the countless randos who also engage in this sort of hate speech daily. (via The Hill)

• There are more Americans getting their booster shot right now than there are those getting their first COVID-19 vaccine dose. With only 58% of the population fully vaccinated, that’s not great! But also, those numbers are likely to change dramatically once kids are finally approved to receive the vaccine. (via CNBC)
• Succession’s Kieran Culkin will host SNL next month! (via TV Line)
• Halyna Hutchins’ husband announces an AFI scholarship fund set up in her memory to support aspiring female cinematographers. (via AV Club)
• This is the spooky season content I crave:
  

  Saw the best thing ever today pic.twitter.com/z1uLqPuqtL

  — Michelle Lanz (@michellemlanz) October 23, 2021

• Pinhead was really having a day today:
  

  I AM PAIN #HOTTIEWEEN pic.twitter.com/VPZxCptGLX

  — TINA SNOW (@theestallion) October 24, 2021

• Did You season 3 get its ending all wrong? (via Pajiba)
• Edgar Wright curated a list of spooky watches available to stream on Peacock for their delightfully named Peacocktober. (via /Film)
• It looks like Ryan Gosling will be playing Ken to Margot Robbie’s Barbie. (via IGN)

What did you all see out there today?

This is an unfriendly reminder that 2022 starts less than 10 weeks from today.

— Katie Kaitchuck (@KatieKaitchuck) October 24, 2021

(image: Mario Tama/Getty Images)
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—The Mary Sue has a strict comment policy that forbids, but is not limited to, personal insults toward anyone, hate speech, and trolling.—

The post Things We Saw Today: Twitter Suspends Republican Rep. For Misgendering Trans Health Official first appeared on The Mary Sue.

https://blacknerdproblems.com/the-harder-they-fall-review/

The Harder They Fall is a western in its truest form and an ode to the real cowboys of America. With a swagger that rivals your favorite music videos, the cast alone excites your nether regions. Regina King and Idris Elba battling it out with Jonathan Majors!!? You would think this was your wettest of dreams, but when you open your eyes, you realize it’s a nitty-gritty spaghetti western, and the buck stops there. My take may be an unpopular opinion, but the story and structure weren’t as strong as their cast. Don’t get me wrong; it gave me a special feeling in my heart to see all the melanin just radiating off of the screen and the badassery. It is important for representation, no doubt about it. But if you are reading this article, you know we have some Black Nerd Problems with representation alone. So, before I’m shut down in the comments, let me tell you how I really feel. Don’t worry, no spoilers ahead, just unfiltered opinions.

The Hateful Eight

I rush to the screening room for The Harder They Fall, sweat dripping and out of breath in excitement. I pull out my phone, promising the PR reps I don’t have COVID and showing them my vaccination records and negative test results. I sit down in high anticipation at what should be a masterpiece in film craft and acting acumen. Of course, with my critic hat on –  I’m also ready to tear it to shreds if need be. The film begins with a reminder that these characters may not be real, but they do exist. If you don’t know, let me give you a quick lesson. The real history of cowboys begins as all things do – slavery. The cowboy was the boy who tended to the cows, yea the slave. But I digress in the western reality that tinsel town never wanted to depict, was cowboys consisted of Mexican, Black, and Native people and was run by women. (Forreal look it up). The point is, this cast is a better representation of a western than John Wayne and Clint Eastwood flicks could ever be. It brings a smile to your face as these talented eight play on the screen. 

In an interesting choice, (possibly directorial) certain characters use a lower register and accent than they usually have. I only mention this regarding Zazie Beetz, who is taking on a character we have not yet seen her play. She is a badass saloon owner (again historically accurate) “Stagecoach Mary,” playing up her swag with a deep voice and a physicality that favors a shotgun owner. Her hair is inspirational as always to boot. It was refreshing to see her out of her norm, but I couldn’t help but feel it was an interesting casting choice. Nothing against her performance, she did what needed to be done, and I ship her always. However, I couldn’t help feel a more ‘Mischone type’ of actor could have also done it justice. Regina King hits the scene as “Trudy Smith,” of course holding her own. She sits as Idris, “Rufus Buck’s” right hand, along with Lakeith as “Cherokee Bill.” Her lower register and grit resembled a particular Boondocks character. If I closed my eyes, I could just see Huey in a leather hat and gun holster complete with toothpick in mouth, and I loved it. Seeing Regina play what I feel is a villain – was everything and gave further proof we have only yet to see the depths of her range. Then, of course, Delroy Lindo fit like a glove in his role as the ‘justice by any means’ sheriff and Lakeith, the strange muscle who uses his knowledge and skill to justify cruelty. 

Idris plays our antagonist in his full-on cowboy “Stringer Bell” and then some. Opposite our protagonist Jonathan Majors, playing “Nat Love” who is still looking fit. Yes – his allure is something most cannot put their finger on – but really want to put their fingers on… I digress. He never holds back, and we thank him for that. I especially want to give props to Danielle Deadwyler, who, along with this seasoned cast, held my attention and gave a stellar performance as Zazie Beetz’s right-hand muscle Cuffee. This character who breaks the confinements of conventional gender norms is so welcomed, and Deadwyler holds her own. I have my gripes on how the writing and direction handled this character at times—forcing them to wear a dress and making light of their outward presenting appearance versus their gender assignment. If I am lenient, as a period piece, that choice is probably accurate for the times. 

As predicted, the performances were delightful, from to RJ Cyler as “Jim Beckworth” –  the Quick and The Dead ‘Kid’ character who wants to be the fastest hands in the west, the sharp shooting “Bill Pickett” played by Edi Gathegi down to the surprising dramatic role Deon Cole plays as “Wiley Escoe.” Now I know this sounds like the highest praise, but would you have thought any different with this cast? Where the film lacks is obviously not in talent.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

The movie begins with classic bold text splashed across the screen as we’re flown into the credits. The first scene gives us the good ‘ol backstory—the motivation for a lifelong path of revenge. The story stays the course of every classic western to a fault. Instead of innovating for modern storytelling, it sticks by the book. Back in the day, westerns emphasized the shootout, the allure of the cowboy, and the story was avenging their family, protecting their town, farm, or whichever from bandits. They always include the show of skill, a standoff, and a big reveal at the end that mirrors a telenovela twist. This film was no different, and I wanted it to be different. This doesn’t make it a bad movie, but with a cast this appetizing, I wanted something a bit more inventive, with a story more engaging than the performances. 

Even when the twist is revealed, you see it coming a mile away. The quality of the film was up to par, the budget was just right, and it was all presented in a nice tight package. However, it just doesn’t wow or engage in a way that you would expect, especially after such a magnetic trailer.

True Grit

The movie also takes on a level of gore resembling a – and I HATE to say it, a Tarantino film. I want to be clear I am not aligning this movie with Quentin Tarantino – not at all. Only as a comparison to a modern storyteller of westerns who leans into the violence of the genre. This film is not shy with blood, flesh wounds, and bullet holes through the head. Limbs are lost, and a lot of blood is spilled – but all of that is standard for a modern western flick. Where the film seeks to innovate is in music and stylistic shot selections. The first low camera angle brought me right back to 90s music videos and good ‘ol SWV and Da Brat kick camera sequence. Instead of kicking cameras, they’re hatching out an ambush plan. Once I took a deeper look at the credits, I noticed the Director Jeymes Samuel is known for his music direction on the Great Gatsby and his experience as a singer/songwriter. The movie is also Executive Produced by Sean Carter himself. Yup, it’s the HOV Jay-Z. No wonder I thought I was watching an extended music video. Soundtracks in films like Belly, Atomic Blonde, and Baby Driver added an underlining element of storytelling through music. The Harder They Fall used it as a mood or swag dripped over these dramatic sequences. I would have enjoyed the former, where the music would enhance the story and engage us in the characters’ plight. 

Mr. Samuel also had a hand in writing the film along with writer-producer Boaz Yakin, whose notable works are the New York Indie film Fresh and the iconic Remember the Titans movie. This explains the intensity of the singular plot point, the choice of music, slow motion entrances, and the unconventional camera angles. I wasn’t mad at them. It just gave the movie a certain flair you don’t usually see in feature films and left you wanting a bit more. 

It gets top marks for hitting the target right on the bull’s eye and a cast that wears the boots oh so well. As the audience, you just wish you had some skin in the game and more to write home about.

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The post ‘The Harder They Fall’ Review: A True Ode to the Western appeared first on Black Nerd Problems.