Different regions of the U.S. are prone to different types of natural disasters. While you may already have a basic emergency kit on hand with food, water, and a first aid kit, there are other tools you can—and should—invest in, depending on where you live and the type of natural disaster most likely to strike near…
Becoming a fiscally responsible adult is possible at any age and stage of life. Whether you’re in your 20s and worrying about paying off student loan debt or in your 40s and wondering how to ramp up your retirement savings, better money management can help you achieve your goals.
Becoming fiscally responsible is largely about changing your relationship with money — how you think about it, manage it, and spend it. It doesn’t have to mean living a life of constantly saying “no” or scrounging to save every dollar you earn. It’s about improving your understanding of your finances so you can leverage them optimally.
By doing so, you can attain greater financial stability, eliminate fear and stress related to money, and live your own Rich Life. That means a life that’s fulfilling to you and doesn’t leave you wanting for the things you truly cherish, whether that’s exotic vacations or designer brands. Read on to learn how you can become a fiscally responsible adult in just seven steps.
Being fiscally responsible doesn’t just mean cutting spending and saving more. Rather, fiscal responsibility is about achieving a balance between income and expenses and leveraging your money in the savviest way possible. Fiscal responsibility is rooted in smart money management. This means knowing how much you earn, how much you spend, and how to plan accordingly.
Fiscal responsibility looks different for every person. A millionaire may splash their cash on luxuries that others might deem wasteful or extravagant, like flying in a private aircraft. However, these expenses aren’t fiscally irresponsible if the person is living within their means. This approach allows for guilt-free spending.
Taking the steps toward fiscal responsibility can be daunting at first. Long-term success is just as much about adapting your mindset about money as it is about changing the way you manage it. However, the many benefits of becoming fiscally responsible will make the effort worth it. Here are some of the rewards you’ll reap:
It’s never too late to take steps toward fiscal responsibility. However, it is important to take the first step. Getting started is more important than becoming a money management expert overnight. You’ll make mistakes on your path to becoming fiscally responsible, and that’s OK. We like to follow the 85% rule: Get 85% of the way there and move on with your life. Here’s how to start.
Fiscal responsibility means living within your means, whatever those might be. Start by creating an overview of your finances by tallying up the following:
With your list of income and expenses in hand, it’s time to get organized — that means creating a budget. However, that doesn’t mean you’re about to forego all of your favorite life pleasures. The aim of your budget is to structure your spending in a way that fits your lifestyle. Budgeting shouldn’t mean punishing yourself.
To this end, consider the conscious spending model of money management. This strategy promotes positive spending habits and smart money management by creating space for guilt-free spending. It’s based on organizing your expenses into four buckets:
When it comes to your guilt-free spending, it’s important to consider your Money Dials. What nonessentials truly add value to your day-to-day life? Maybe it’s your fancy gym membership or perhaps it’s pricey scented candles. Understanding your Money Dials can help you prioritize how to spend your money, allowing you to cut back on expenses you don’t need and leaving more for things you love.
To implement the conscious spending approach, you need to establish guidelines for how to allocate your monthly funds. For example, you might spend 50% on fixed expenses, 30% on wants, and 20% on savings and investments. How you divvy up your spending will depend in part on the amount of money you earn and your expenses.
Then, put a system in place to monitor your spending. You might try using the cash envelope system, for example. There are also many useful apps that can help you keep track of where your money is going. Some link directly to your bank account, credit card, and debit card, recording all of your transactions.
When creating your conscious spending plan, make sure to include an emergency fund. This can be used to cover everything from medical care to car repairs. When you save money, you’ll be able to manage these unexpected expenses without having to borrow cash or use credit. This can help you avoid taking on high-interest debts, which can be enormous liabilities (and can potentially damage your credit score).
Debt can be both a drain on your finances and an emotional drain, leaving you stressed about unpaid IOUs. Tackling debts, especially high-interest debts, is another important step toward fiscal responsibility and financial freedom. There are a few different ways to pay off debt, including the debt avalanche method and the debt snowball method.
You can further enhance your fiscal responsibility through economic growth. Establishing multiple streams of income is one way to enhance your earnings and boost your net worth. There are many side hustles that can serve as a responsible means of making extra cash, from delivery services to selling goods on Etsy.
Passive income streams are ideal because they don’t require a great deal of time and attention, allowing you to grow your money without constantly hustling. Examples of forms of passive income could include real estate property rentals, real estate investment trusts, certificates of deposit, and peer-to-peer lending.
As with most aspects of money management, when it comes to growing income, success starts with the right mindset. Being able to look beyond the limits of your current earnings and identify new opportunities is critical. This earnings quiz can help you get a better sense of what’s possible for you.
Investing can be another means of generating income and saving for retirement. When you first start investing, stick to the basics, like putting money toward a 401(k) and a Roth IRA. You can later expand from these baseline investment vehicles. Asset allocation, including a mix of short-term and long-term investments, helps divide up your investments in a way that makes sense and is sustainable.
As you start on the path toward becoming a fiscally responsible person, you’ll have a lot of learning to do. There are many resources to help, from our “I Will Teach You to Be Rich” book to spending tips, retirement guides, and more.
Continue to read up as your knowledge expands. The financial freedom and peace of mind that smart financial planning brings are great motivators. Your future self will love you for it.
Download the first chapter of I Will Teach You To Be Rich below and learn how to take control of your finances for good.
100% privacy. No games, no B.S., no spam. When you sign up, we’ll keep you posted
How to Become a Fiscally Responsible Adult in 7 Steps is a post from: I Will Teach You To Be Rich.
It’s Jamais Vu all over again If you’re jumping into Disco Elysium today, you might find something new waiting for you. Studio...
The post Disco Elysium: The Final Cut receives a mysterious new update appeared first on Destructoid.
AMD has released a new video showcasing all of its FSR (FidelityFX Super Resolution) AAA Games that are available and coming soon.
The first year of AMD's FSR technology has been jam-packed with tons of games and developer partnerships. So far, AMD has over 70 AAA games that either support or will support FSR and the red team isn't stopping there.
In its latest video, the red team lists down 47 major titles that come with FSR support, and these include:
In addition to these, there are 24 upcoming titles that will support AMD's FSR technology, and those are listed below:
While most of these titles have already been confirmed, it looks like AMD gave us a tease of their graphics performance within God of War running at 4K and FSR 'Ultra Quality'. The game ran on the Ultra graphics preset (DirectX 11) and delivered an average of 57 FPS on the Radeon RX 6800 XT graphics card. Considering that the 6900 XT is a bit faster than the 6800 XT, we can expect 60+ FPS at 4K but only with FSR enabled. It looks like God of War is going to be quite an intense AAA game to run but that's to be expected given that it boasts some incredible visuals and has been a major hit on the PlayStation consoles. The following footnotes also provide more detailed insight on the configurations and settings used during the tests:
Aside from God of War, AMD also provided some average performance results of other titles running with FSR enabled. The following pictures show a few titles that were displayed:
With that said, AMD's FSR has definitely gained a lot of traction within a year of its launch and the adoption rate is further improving thanks to the open-source nature of the technology. Expect a range of new titles to be announced by AMD during its CES 2022 keynote.
The post AMD Shows off Over 70+ Current & Upcoming AAA Games With FSR Support: 57 FPS in God of War at 4K Using FSR on Radeon RX 6800 XT by Hassan Mujtaba appeared first on Wccftech.
It's all been leading to this. The gang from "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" have dropped the penultimate and final episodes of their record-breaking fifteenth season, and they are some doozies.
"Always Sunny" season 15 has been all about interrogating the past and the gang's total inability to mature, and its final two episodes bring those themes to a head. In the first, "Dee Sinks in a Bog," Charlie's (Charlie Day) two dads fight for his love, while Dee (Kaitlin Olson) runs into an old foe from her past that makes things very tough on her. In the second, "The Gang Carries a Corpse Up a Mountain," the myriad conflicts of this season are resolved in typical "Sunny" manner: with lots of yelling. Both are full of reveals that make the rest of the season even funnier, making this one of their most complex seasons yet.
While callbacks to previous episodes and inside jokes are nothing new for the series, this is the first time an overarching plot has gone on for more than two episodes. The Ireland arc of "Sunny" is an incredible piece of television, so let's break down how things end on the Emerald Isle, and I'll recommend two more library episodes to help wash them down. Those recommendations will be a tiny bit different this week; since this two-parter is really one big story, I'll be recommending another two-parter to go with it. Buckle up, jabronis, it's finale time.
Spoilers ahead for season 15 of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia."
When we last saw the gang, they had split up a bit due to growing annoyed with one another on their Irish vacation. Mac (Rob McElhenney) has gone to try and join a seminary and become a Catholic priest, while Charlie has finally met his biological father, Shelley Kelly (Colm Meaney) and wants to get to know him better. Dee has a hot date with a doctor, which means Frank (Danny DeVito) and Dennis (Glenn Howerton) are left on their own in the dilapidated castle Dennis rented.
Frank enlists Dennis' help in trying to separate Charlie and Shelley, bringing them closer than they've ever been. Dennis even gives Frank a little kiss on his head, in one of the few genuine moments of affection ever shown between members of the gang. Dennis thanks Frank for making him the man he is ... though considering how sinister they both are, it's not really a good thing. It's kind of sweet, in a twisted way, given that all three of the people Frank thought were his children turned out to be someone else's.
Mac thinks that he's bonding with his new priesthood buddy when things take a dark turn. On "The Always Sunny Podcast," McElhenney revealed that they had to change the plot of an early episode ("Charlie Got Molested"), which featured a pedophile priest. They changed the priest to a teacher, but now, 15 years later, they've finally come back around to the concept. Mac thinks that Brother Gus (Mark Prendergast) is another gay man, but instead discovers he's actually a pedophile. Mac is shaken, his last shot at identity tainted. Meanwhile, Dee gets stuck in a bog while looking for peat moss to burn in the castle to cover up the smells from Dennis' illness last episode. The Waitress (Mary Elizabeth Ellis) happens by and only agrees to help her if Dee can say her name. Of course, Dee cannot, and only eventually guesses the name while throwing out random ones. The Waitress ends up getting stuck in the bog instead, and Dee leaves her to her fate.
Frank and Dennis come up with an elaborate plan to host a "banquet of humiliation" for Charlie and Shelley, but Frank messes it up by putting poop in Shelley's soup. Charlie calls his bluff and forces Frank to eat one of the "special meatballs" himself. When he can't, Charlie tells them that he's staying in Ireland to make cheese with his dad, and they leave the castle. Dee, covered in mud, stops them, and Shelley believes that she is the banshee who appears before all Kelly men before they die. Things are looking grim for the gang, who have never been driven quite this far apart.
After the horrific events of the previous evening, it seems like the gang might split up for good. Charlie invites them all on a "hike" with his dad, and miraculously, they all show up. Frank has even brought extra supplies to try to prove his worth to Charlie, though it should be noted he has a contingency bottle of urine in case things turn sideways. Plans change quickly, however, when Charlie reveals that Shelley Kelly is dead, and he's enlisted the gang to help carry his dad up the mountain to fulfill a Kelly family funerary tradition.
On the way up the mountain, some brutal truths about the trip are revealed: Dennis probably killed Dee's date when he showed up and Dee was stuck in the bog, Mac actually is Irish and the gang paid his mom to lie to him about it, and Frank caught mild COVID from Dennis and gave it to Shelley, who died gasping for air. Furious with one another, members of the gang peel off one by one and head back to Patty's Pub to wait for their flight back to Philly. In the end it's only Charlie and Frank, and Charlie tells Frank to leave him alone.
Back at Patty's, the gang tell one another how they're going to never speak again when the Waitress, having escaped from the bog, shushes them. With a mutual enemy, the gang unleash on her, screaming about their right as Americans to be as loud as they want. "You are not in America!" the Waitress yells back, and Frank has the perfect response: "We are America, sweetheart! And we carry our country wherever we go! Because we love her, and when you love someone, you can't bear to leave 'em behind, not ever!" This rouses the gang into going back for Charlie, tearing over the beautiful Irish hillside in a huge American pickup truck.
What happens next is one of the most emotionally wrenching scenes in the series' history. Charlie, dragging the corpse of his dead deadbeat dad in the rain, breaks down and begins to sob. "You were supposed to carry me," he cries as he collapses in the mud, overwhelmed by grief. He grieves the father he never really had, he grieves the little boy he once was, and he grieves what could have been. Day's performance is heartbreaking. Charlie has always been the heart and soul of the gang, the one member who somehow keeps them all from being completely awful. His anguish is palpable, and he really doesn't deserve to be abandoned. Thankfully, he hasn't been, and Frank and the rest of the gang arrive to help him finish what they started. Though they aren't very good at being friends, or even decent human beings, the gang love and need one another. They deserve each other, and the finale's ending is a stellar reminder of that.
"It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" also closed out its eleventh season with a two-parter: "The Gang Goes to Hell" parts 1 and 2. In "The Gang Goes to Hell," Mac signs the gang up for a Caribbean cruise to try and get them to shake their bad habits by getting out of Philly. Instead, the trip makes their bad habits even worse. Dennis, who attempts to curb his lust, terrifies a young woman with his advances. Dee, unsuccessful at tempering her rage, punches a magician in the face. Mac is searching for his faith and instead complicates it by finally recognizing that he's a gay man. And Charlie and Frank? Well, they promise to try to be less weird and then end up drinking boat fuel.
The brilliance of "The Gang Goes to Hell" comes near the end of its second episode, when it looks like the gang are going to drown. The ship is sinking and they're all trapped in the brig together because of their bad behavior. At first, they're furious with one another, but soon realize that at least they get to die together. They all hold hands and sink to the bottom, strangely at peace for the first time possibly ever. Then the hatch opens, and they fight one another to escape. The moment is gone, and they're back to being just as horrible as they always were. Frank, Mac, Charlie, Dee, and Dennis will always bicker amongst themselves, but they'll also always stand united against a common foe: even one as inevitable as death.
Much like this week's two episodes, "The Gang Goes to Hell" shows that the gang cannot change, and that instead they force the world around them to change instead. You can take "It's Always Sunny" out of Philadelphia, but they'll bring Philly with them wherever they go.
The gang's interconnected nature, whether you want to call it love or co-dependence, has turned into the main focus of this season. Season 14 ended with "Waiting for Big Mo," a riff on the Samuel Beckett play "Waiting for Godot," leaving many fans wondering if the gang behind the gang was still interested in continuing the series. The season ended with the characters questioning whether laser tag was fun anymore, and it was a brilliant allegory for the journey the series and its creators had made.
With "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" season 15, they're letting the viewers know that they'll be around for as long as it's fun to work together, which might be forever. After all, McElhenney, Day, and Howerton don't just write "Sunny" together; they also host a weekly podcast about the series, and McElhenney and Day co-write the Apple+ series "Mythic Quest" with fellow "Sunny" writer Megan Ganz, who also produces the podcast. This crew clearly loves spending time with one another as much as the gang, though according to the podcast, there is plenty of bickering, too.
There are many sitcoms about terrible people behaving badly, from "Seinfeld" and "Friends" to more subversive fare like "Workaholics," but what's helped "It's Always Sunny" stay relevant and hilarious for 15 seasons is the love that goes into making the show. They care about these characters as if they were real people, and give their plots far more consideration than most viewers will ever notice. By giving these characters pathos, the creators made us care as much as they do. FXX has greenlit the series through season 18, and I look forward to watching the gang fight the world (and each other) for many years to come.
Read this next: 14 Shows Like Rick And Morty That Are Worth Your Time
The post It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia's Finale Defines the Past, Present, and Future of the Gang appeared first on /Film.
Jessica Henwick is no stranger to big franchises, having played the "Sand Snake" Nymeria Sand on "Game of Thrones," martial artist Colleen Wing on Marvel and Netflix's "Iron Fist," and Resistance fighter pilot Jess Testor in "Star Wars: The Force Awakens." Henwick can now be seen co-starring in "The Matrix Resurrections," a continuation of the mind-bending sci-fi film series. Henwick plays Bugs, a blue-haired hacker who plays a key role in the movie's story. However, before she decided to take the red pill and see how deep the rabbit hole goes, Henwick came close to giving up acting entirely.
In an interview with /Film's Jack Giroux, Henwick talked about how she found her way into the "Resurrections" cast and the headspace she was in at the time:
"It was my agent. I was in a weird space and I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do. I think I was going through a quarter life crisis, and basically I've been acting for 14 years now and I just took a second to think, 'Am I doing this because I still want to do it and I love it, or am I doing this because it's what I'm used to?' And so, I stopped and I decided to get out of town and I bought a one-way ticket to France. And then, I just started walking.
"I just started hiking and I was halfway through a 40-day hike. I turned on my phone, it was near my birthday and I wanted to tell everyone I was alive, and I got an email saying, 'Would you like to audition for the Matrix?' And I just said no, because I hadn't finished the hike and I hadn't come to an answer yet of what I wanted to do in my life. I turned it down."
As Henwick explained, it wasn't until after she finished her hike that she got a call from her agent, revealing that Lana Wachowski (who made her solo directing debut with "The Matrix Resurrections") still hadn't cast Bugs:
"I made a self tape, flew to America a couple days later, tested with Yahya [Abdul-Mateen II, who plays Morpheus in the film], and had the phone call from Lana a few days after that."
When asked if playing Bugs left her feeling "rejuvenated" about acting, Henwick clarified:
"No, I mean, it's a long -- that thing was such a journey emotionally. It was a part of it, but I think I came to that decision without the script. And then it was just nice that this was the first thing that appeared to me after."
Henwick, who recently turned 29, has acted she was a teenager, so it's perfectly understandable that she would want to pause and think more about her future. Besides working on "Resurrections," she's since lent her voice to the animated show "Blade Runner: Black Lotus" and will co-star in two major Netflix movies due out in 2022: the Russo Brothers' "The Gray Man" and Rian Johnson's "Knives Out" sequel. Henwick is also co-writing the upcoming Amazon comedy series "Nancy Wu Done It," which could signal that she intends to continue branching out beyond acting from this point on.
"The Matrix Resurrections" is now playing in theaters and streaming on HBO Max.
Read this next: The 14 Greatest Action Movies Of The 21st Century
The post Jessica Henwick Explains Why She Almost Quit Acting Before The Matrix Resurrections [Exclusive] appeared first on /Film.
Thanks to the Bizarre Albums podcast, I just discovered this Max Headroom Christmas song. While there's not much of an interesting story behind it, it's certainly bizarre. There's actually a whole hour-long Max Headroom Christmas special episode, too, if you're so inclined.
"It's the question that drives us. It's the question that brought you here."
"What is the Matrix?"
And why does Morpheus look different in "The Matrix Resurrections?"
With his pince-nez glasses, black trench coat, and measured diction, Laurence Fishburne made an indelible impression as Morpheus in "The Matrix" in 1999. Fishburne went on to reprise his iconic role in the 2003 sequels "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions," and he and his co-star, Keanu Reeves, have since reunited in the "John Wick" film series. However, Fishburne is one of several principal cast and crew members from "The Matrix" trilogy who haven't returned for the newly released fourth movie, "The Matrix Resurrections."
Others have explained their reasons for not returning. Hugo Weaving, who played the original Agent Smith, had to back out due to a scheduling conflict. Lilly Wachowski, who co-directed the first three films with her sister, Lana Wachowski, said that she found the idea of revisiting her past work "expressly unappealing." Fishburne, on the other hand, has said he wasn't invited back. "You'd have to ask Lana Wachowski why," he told Collider, "because I don't have an answer for that."
Fishburne is 60 now, so it's possible that the sheer physicality of the Morpheus role may have been a factor in the recasting. Reeves is 57, however, and he's right there onscreen in "The Matrix Resurrections," saying, "I still know kung fu" and practicing it with the new Morpheus, played by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II (who is 35).
Whatever behind-the-scenes reasons there might be for Wachowski recasting Morpheus, "The Matrix Resurrections" and the broader canon of "The Matrix" franchise also reveal some narrative reasons why she may have decided to go this route. Spoilers for "The Matrix Resurrections" below.
The video game "The Matrix Online" — which was considered a canonical part of "The Matrix" saga and still appears to be so — actually killed off the character of Morpheus back in the mid-2000s. The decision to discard the messianic narrative of Neo (Reeves) as the One had already somewhat deflated the character of Morpheus, since his whole thing was that he believed in the Prophecy of the One, "a man born inside the Matrix who could remake it as he saw fit."
"The Matrix Reloaded" confronted Neo and Morpheus with the harsh truth that the Prophecy was merely another "system of control" implemented by the Matrix. There had been others who held the title of "The One" before Neo; he was part of a cycle that kept resetting itself without most of humanity ever being freed from its enslavement to the Matrix. At the end of that movie, Morpheus — who takes his name from the Greek god of dreams — was left saying, "I dreamed a dream ... but now that dream is gone from me."
If you've seen "The Matrix Resurrections," you'll know that Abdul-Mateen's Morpheus is a digital construct, programmed by Neo in his guise as a game designer. Neo mixed some of his old nemesis, Agent Smith, into this construct, which is why Morpheus first shows up looking like an Agent and spouting Smith's old lines. He soon explains to Bug (Jessica Henwick) how he had his mind unlocked in front of the bathroom mirror. Even though he's an artificial intelligence, he's still self-aware -- much like this very meta "Matrix" movie.
For more on the new Morpheus, check out our spoiler review of "The Matrix Resurrections," which is in theaters and on HBO Max now.
Read this next: The 10 Best Sci-Fi Movie Villains
The post Here's Why Morpheus Looks Different In The Matrix Resurrections appeared first on /Film.
CodeWeavers CrossOver is one of the most popular ways to run Windows applications on other operating systems. It combines the excellent work of the open-source Wine project (of which CrossOver’s developers contribute code to) with an easier-to-use interface and front end. CodeWeavers released CrossOver 21 back in August, and now the company has shared details about its work to bring modern game support to Linux and Mac.
Many recent Windows games (and other graphics-heavy applications) rely on DirectX 12, the latest version of Microsoft’s DirectX graphics library, which uses lower-level APIs to achieve faster performance. DirectX is only available on Windows (and Xbox consoles), so the Wine compatibility layer uses the VKD3D graphics library to execute Direct3D calls on top of Vulkan (which is available on Linux, Windows, and other platforms). The Vkd3d library is primarily developed by Valve Software for its Proton compatibility layer, and the rapid progress on VKD3D is the main reason why so many Windows games are now playable on Linux.
Even though CrossOver already includes VKD3D, CrossOver doesn’t officially support DirectX 12 games while its developers figure out a few performance issues, according to a new blog post:
CrossOver uses VKD3D to run DirectX 12 games. VKD3D is a 3D graphics library built on top of Vulkan. Currently, lots of work is being done to improve VKD3D performance. With the help of the Vulkan descriptor indexing extension, which allows for functionality similar to DirectX 12 descriptor heaps, Vulkan descriptors are written less often and far less GPU memory is used. As a result, VKD3D can support games that use enough descriptors to require resources from Tier 2 and Tier 3 hardware.
CrossOver plans to officially start supporting DirectX 12 games and applcations on Linux in 2022, with the future release of CrossOver 22. However, the company isn’t so sure when VKD3D will be functional on Mac. Apple doesn’t support Vulkan at all on macOS (or iOS), instead asking developers to use its Metal graphics library. That’s a problem for CrossOver, as the blog post goes on to say:
In general, Metal does tessellation differently, and is missing geometry shaders and transform feedback. Specific to DirectX 12 and Metal, there is an issue with limits on resources. Generally, games need access to at least one million shader resource views (SRVs). Access to that many SRVs requires resource binding at the Tier 2 level. Metal only supports about 500,000 resources per argument buffer, so Tier 2 resource binding isn’t possible. Metal’s limit of half a million is sufficient for Vulkan descriptor indexing, but not for D3D12. This limitation means CrossOver Mac can’t support Tier 2 binding and therefore a lot of DirectX 12 games will not run.
Despite these challenges, CodeWeavers is hopeful DirectX 12 games and applications could be functional on Mac with the future CrossOver 23 update. New major versions of CrossOver usually happen on a yearly basis, so that would likely be in 2023.
Even if you don’t use CrossOver, most of the compatibility improvements developed by CodeWeavers are submitted back to the Wine project. That means the company’s work could help improve Windows games on Lutris, the Steam Deck console, PlayOnLinux, and other projects based on Wine. That being said, once full DirectX 12 support arrives, CrossOver could be a compelling choice for playing Windows games on Linux outside of Steam.
The post CodeWeavers is helping make DirectX 12 Windows games playable on Linux appeared first on xda-developers.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Disco Elysium puts you in the shoes of a troubled detective on a path to crack a murder case, so naturally there's a whole lot of mystery to grapple with - and now developer ZA/UM has added even more to the beloved RPG. The studio has just launched a new patch called the Jamais Vu ('never seen') update to coincide with the holiday season and a big Steam-y discount on the Final Cut of the game which adds a batch of new mysteries to solve.
The announcement aptly comes heaped with plenty of mystery. "The static hisses in your ears as you slowly spin the dial," it teases. "Nothing but warbling data from a planar anomaly. Is there anything at all? A small sadness creeps in. '...' Wait! Go back. Between your finger and thumb the hiss becomes a hum and your hairs stand to their end. You hear the sounds of waves roaring; a formidable chorus of water.
"A small splash, and then... '... or weaker… now ... dying is an art,' it continues. "The static returns. But there is no doubt. A man’s voice, one you’ve never heard before, telling secrets from a place that could be anywhere and nowhere at all." Hmm. Mysterious indeed.
RELATED LINKS: Disco Elysium review, Best RPGs on PC, The best PC gamesBefore I talk about my games of 2021, I want to circle back and talk about a couple of older games. I spent a lot of time with them this year, and I didn’t get around to writing about them at the time.
Let’s start with…
I think I spent about a month with the title, although I can’t be sure. I didn’t write about it at the time, and my post-hospital memories are a bit of a blur.
The campaign scenarios were mostly an exercise in frustration and tedium. Each map would be built around a single concept or disease. One map teaches you the importance of keeping people warm in a cold climate. Another teaches the importance of keeping the place cool and clean in a warm climate. Then you get one near a ski resort where you need to deal with lots of broken bones. Each scenario takes a few hours. So it ends up feeling like the whole game is one excruciatingly long tutorial, where 20 minutes of learning are stretched out over 40 hours of gameplay. Then to keep it challenging, the designers make your buildings small and inconveniently shaped.[1]
But the game really shines when you get to sandbox mode. You’re given a few huge buildings, a large variety of challenges, and you’re free to tackle them however you like. In this mode the game starts to feel a bit like a city builder where it’s less about finding the one correct answer to a given problem, and more about refining your design over time.
I really dig it.
Eventually I got bored with the old maps and decided it was time to pick up the newest entry in the series. But then I discovered that it was still an Epic Games exclusive, with no date for when it might show up on one of my preferred platforms.
This wouldn’t be a big deal, but they[2] went out of their way to link the three games together so that you can use Hitman 3 to play maps from the previous two games. So they created a strong incentive to buy all three games on the same platform, and then they made the third game exclusive to the Epic Games Store. This is self-defeating nonsense. They could have done either of these and gotten away with it, but by doing both, they’ve discouraged me from buying a product I already wanted.
What’s the opposite of marketing?
But then I figured I could revitalize Hitman 2 by picking up some DLC. I saw people playing the Maldives map, which isn’t available in the base game. So which DLC do I need to buy?
Hitman 2 - Expansion Pass Hitman - GOTY Legacy Pack Hitman - GOTY Legacy Pack Upgrade Hitman 2 - Silver to Gold Upgrade
I just… WHAT? What’s the difference between an “Expansion Pass” and the “Silver to Gold Upgrade”? What version do I have now? Is this based on preorder nonsense? Because I don’t remember which games I preordered and which ones I didn’t, particularly not three years after the fact.
The “Silver to Gold Upgrade” states that:
Downloading this item grants access to all of the content included in Expansion Pack 2 and essentially upgrades Silver Edition owners to Gold Edition owners.
What the fuck is “Expansion Pack 2”? That’s not in the list above! The description describes the contents in terms of it containing another product which isn’t for sale.
It’s like I’m trying to buy fast food, and so I ask the guy at the register what’s on a “Superburger”. And he tells me that a Superburger is basically a Deluxeburger. But there’s no Deluxeburger on the menu and no way to determine what it is or what it contains.
How many maps am I buying? Which ones? WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO SELL ME? Is there an intended order of progression to these? Do some of these contain others? Why not just name them something like “Map pack 1”, “Map Pack 2”, etc?
After taking the time to read the descriptions of all four products, I was mostly convinced that what I needed was the “Expansion Pass”. It was marked down, 80% off. I could get it for just $8.
After I bought the DLC, I discovered that it included only two new maps: Maldives, and New York. It makes it seem like you’re getting four new locations, but two of the locations are “Sniper Assassin” maps where you just headshot waves of idiot AI mooks from your sniper loft, which is pretty antithetical to the Hitman experience and is totally uninteresting to me.
Maldives is actually a bit janky. Normally the game acts like pushing someone into water is an instant-kill. That makes sense when you’re pushing someone into a well, off a coastal cliff, or into a steep-walled water reservoir. But it makes no sense whatsoever when you’re pushing them off a low pier into hip-deep water that is clear, calm, and inviting. That’s not a murder. That’s barely even a prank.[3]
Also, the AI seems to have trouble with the massive open spaces. I spent a lot of time getting spotted by distant guards through blinds, opaque foliage, and curtains. There’s an entire beachside house where you can’t see much inside because the windows are too reflective, which doesn’t impact the AI. This would be fine as a way of making the level more challenging, but it’s not clear what the rules are or how line-of-sight works. It doesn’t feel like they made the map hard on purpose; it feels like they didn’t do enough playtesting.
The New York map is absurdly undersized. The whole thing takes place inside of a single bank, and it doesn’t offer nearly the complexity or depth of the locations in the base game. You can compare this to (say) Marrakesh, which has three different locations that are the approximate complexity of the bank, all contained on a single sprawling map.[4]
So despite that deep discount, I still feel like I was kinda ripped off. I paid $8 for 1.3 flat and unpolished new maps. And without the discount, this DLC would cost forty dollars. That’s so outrageously overpriced that it offends me.
I don’t even know who to blame for this mess. Hitman 2016 was published by Square Enix. Then developer IO Interactive self-published some DLC. Then Hitman 2 was published by Warner Brothers.
We can’t blame either publisher, since the same marketing and pricing problems persist across both games. So do we blame IO? Are they deliberately dumbing down their own game while also overcharging for it?
And don’t even get me started on their always-online single-player bullshit. That would make for an entire article-length rant, all by itself.
I don’t know where to point the finger, but someone, somewhere is making a mess of this series. Maybe they’ll get around to putting Hitman 3 on a real platform[5] eventually, but I’m not in a hurry to reward this clumsiness, apathy, and appalling sense of entitlement with $60 of my money.
I think most people have the gist by now, but if you’re looking for a quick recap then Destructoid has you covered. Here are the highlights from the Destructoid article:
[In July 2021] Activision Blizzard is sued by the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing, as the result of a two-year investigation from the agency, citing allegations of harassment, discrimination, and a toxic workplace culture.
Blizzard executives J. Allen Brack and Fran Townsend address the suit in internal memos. (Townsend’s letter was later found to be written by Kotick.)
Activision Blizzard employees sign a letter, declaring leadership’s response to the lawsuit “abhorrent and insulting.”
Employees organize a walkout and also set forth demands, including a removal of required arbitration and new practices for recruiting, hiring, and promoting.
Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick calls the company’s response to lawsuit “tone deaf” and promises “swift action.” Employees respond to the letter, highlighting several demands that were not addressed.
[In August] A class action suit alleges Activision Blizzard misled investors over its failure to disclose internal problems.
Workers at Activision Blizzard form a coalition, the ABK Workers Alliance. They send a joint letter to the CEO and leadership criticizing the firm brought on to handle an internal review, WilmerHale, for its previous record of discouraging collective action.
Blizzard Entertainment president J. Allen Brack leaves the company to “pursue new opportunities.” Mike Ybarra and Jen Oneal are installed as co-leaders of Blizzard moving forward. Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier also reports that Blizzard head of HR, Jesse Meschuk, is no longer at the company.
Shareholder group SOC calls Activision Blizzard’s response to the lawsuit “inadequate.”
The state of California expands its lawsuit against Activision Blizzard, alleging the publisher has interfered with the investigation.
Several Blizzard developers, including the director of Diablo IV and the namesake for Overwatch‘s gunslinging cowboy hero, leave the company.
[In September] the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) launches its own investigation into Activision Blizzard.
Activision Blizzard releases a statement saying it is cooperating with the SEC’s investigation, as well as those from regulators at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, National Labor Relations Board, and the California DFEH.
Blizzard Entertainment’s chief legal officer Claire Hart leaves the company.
The U.S. EEOC and Activision Blizzard reach an $18 million settlement in lawsuit over the company’s reported harassment and discrimination.
[…]
[In November] Blizzard co-leader Jen Oneal confirms she is leaving the company at the end of the year, with her co-head Mike Ybarra assuming her responsibilities.
A Wall Street Journal report alleges CEO Bobby Kotick was aware of sexual misconduct at the company for years. The story also sheds light on the departure of Oneal, who was reportedly paid less than her counterpart at the helm of Blizzard, and on Kotick’s own alleged interactions with his employees.
Kotick responds to the report, saying that “anyone who doubts my conviction to be the most welcoming, inclusive workplace doesn’t really appreciate how important this is to me.” The Board of Directors says it “remains confident” in Kotick’s leadership.
Activision Blizzard workers organize another walkout, calling for the removal of Kotick as CEO.
Sony Interactive Entertainment president and CEO Jim Ryan sends out an email to employees, as reported by Bloomberg, that criticizes Activision Blizzard’s response to the report. Ryan says Activision Blizzard has “not done enough to address a deep-seated culture of discrimination and harassment.”
Over 1,000 Activision Blizzard employees and contractors sign a public petition calling for Kotick’s removal as CEO.
Xbox head Phil Spencer says he’s “evaluating all aspects” of their relationship with Activision Blizzard and making “ongoing proactive adjustments” in light of the reports, as reported by Bloomberg. “This type of behavior has no place in our industry,” said Spencer.
Activision Blizzard quietly announces a “Workplace Responsibility Committee,” chaired by two existing board members. The company also says it will seek out a “new, diverse director” to add to the board.
Jessica Gonzalez, a senior test analyst who was one of the organizers of the July walkout, announces on Twitter that she is leaving Activision Blizzard, with her last day on Dec. 10. In a message to CEO Bobby Kotick, she says that his “inaction and refusal to take accountability is driving out great talent and the products will suffer until you are removed from your position as CEO.”
[In December] U.S. State Treasures from California, Delaware, Illinois, Massachusetts, Nevada, and Oregon co-authored a statement of intent to meet with Activision’s board, with the general intent seeming to be confronting the company about the ongoing situation at the publisher.
The Game Awards showrunner Geoff Keighley confirms that Activision Blizzard will not be featured at this year’s event outside of the categories its games have been nominated in. Following backlash over an interview with The Washington Post that suggested indecision on how to “navigate” the situation, Keighley posted a series of statements to Twitter. “The Game Awards is a time of celebration for this industry, the biggest form of entertainment in the world,” he wrote. “There is no place for abuse, harassment or predatory practices in any company or any community.”
Following sudden layoffs at Raven Software in the QA department, developers at the studio walked out. They demanded members of the QA team, including those laid off, be offered full-time positions. Reports soon circled that they were promised a pay restructure for months, only to be called in one-by-one and let go. One report indicated employees moved cities for the roles just a few weeks prior.
I apologize for the wall of text. I realize that’s a lot. But I felt it was important to post the whole thing to give you a sense of just how much has happened in the last six months.
On one hand, I realize that changing the company culture isn’t something you can do overnight. Culture shapes almost everything in a company. How people are hired, how they’re paid, how good work is recognized, how meetings are held, how bad work is discouraged, how problem people are handled, how disputes are settled, how schedules are created, how projects are assigned, how leaders are chosen, and how employees engage with the public.
You can’t magically change all of those behaviors with a memo. A lot of people – middle managers in particular – are going to see this scandal as a temporary disturbance. They’re just hoping to hold onto their positions until this whole thing “blows over” and they can get back to being lecherous, duplicitous, predatory little bullies. At the same time, a lot of other folks are eager for reform. Your problem as a leader is that you can’t tell which group someone belongs to by looking at them. You can’t tell by asking them. Sure, you can ask their boss and colleagues, but how do you know which of them you can trust? No matter how much you care, you can’t personally get to know all of the thousands of people involved. You have to start at the top with people you trust, and push the reforms downward. It’s difficult, slow work.
You need to push your reforms through as quickly as possible, or people will assume you’re all talk. At the same time, you can’t just start firing people or your reforms will turn into a grotesque Stalinist purge. Once the pink slips start flying, people will be eager to demonstrate their fealty to the New Ways by weeding out “evil doers”. That probably sounds nice, but the track record of these sorts of things is not good. What you’re left with is a combination witch hunt / Squid Game. Those sorts of contests favor the ruthless and cunning. The survivors will be people who are good at pointing fingers and tracking grievances, not people that are good at trust and collaboration.
So yes. Fixing Activision is going to be hard. It will take years. It will be messy. Some injustices will go unpunished.
But the first step – the first thing anyone needs to do to begin the process of fixing this – is to get rid of the guy who cultivated the existing way of doing things. It doesn’t matter if he’s magically turned over a new leaf and he’s 100% serious about reform and he’s not just a predatory creep trying to save face. He must go.
He has to go because nobody can take the promises of reform seriously while he’s there. This rotten company culture was created by him. Either he allowed this behavior to fester due to indifference / incompetence, or he served as the toxic template that everyone else emulated.
Here is how stories like this normally go:
Kotick is given a massive severance package and allowed to retire in peace, without needing to admit to any wrongdoing in public. In the following months, the ongoing investigations with various governmental groups will be frustrated Nuremberg-style, with all of the remaining leaders insisting that they didn’t know about and couldn’t stop all of Kotick’s shenanigans.
Kotick’s chair is filled by one of his lieutenants. The new boss will be cut from the same cloth as the old one, and once the media frenzy dies down everything will go back to business as usual.
None of the leaders are punished, and none of the exploited workers receive amends.
The company will experience some very slight reforms. While nobody will say it explicitly, the general gist of it will be “In the future, don’t have so much fun that you create a public scandal.” Instances of harassment will be a little less brazen and a little more “he said, she said”. The company will do a better job at covering up its lies, and exploited overworked people will get paid some tiny percent more.
That sucks, but that’s usually the closest we can get to “justice” when dealing with corruption at this scale.
And we couldn’t even get that.
So that’s the big disappointment of 2021 for me. Next time I’ll run through my list of 2021 titles and talk about what I liked.
Also: If you bump into Santa, please tell him that all I want for Christmas is a good launch for the James Webb Space Telescope. Merry Christmas everyone!
The latest content update for the post-apocalyptic ATOM RPG: Trudograd is now available, offering numerous quality of life improvements that include custom portraits, improved equipment comparisons, cloud saves, and more. Here's the full list:
Greetings, friends!
We are glad to announce that v.1.04 content update has finally been completed.
In this version, we paid the utmost attention to the quality of life updates we decided upon in earlier community posts.
Now you can finally use your own picture files to create portraits for your character, and even customize their appearance in-game.
Also Trudograd now supports the ATOM Cloud save transfer system, using which you can not only save progress between different versions of the game on different devices, but also transfer a character from the original ATOM RPG to Trudograd, using our cloud server instead of an actual save file.
Based on your suggestions, we introduced the mechanic of comparing equipment, expanded the set of icons for aimed shots, and of course added several new characters, quests and locations to the game.
There is still a lot of work ahead of us, for example, the creation of a ModKit, but for now we hope that you will appreciate the work we have done so far, and get enough pleasant impressions from returning to the snow-covered streets of Trudograd :)
In conclusion, we would like to thank you again for your support and wish you a pleasant game, as well as a very merry Christmas and a happy upcoming New Year. And now… Let there be ATOM!
Changelog:
- Implemented support for ATOM Cloud;
- Added the ability to customize the portrait and character during creation;
- Added new random encounters;
- Added a new bunker with its own quest;
- Added new characters;
- Added a new mechanic for comparing items;
- A new set of icons for aimed shots;
- Work has been done to optimize the game on low-end devices;
- Fixed a bug that did not allow to hand over the task to Shapkevich when switching from revolutionaries to the police;
- Fixed a bug due to which the quest Mother's Heart did not end correctly;
- Fixed a bug in the vignette of the Cockfighting ring quest;
- Fixed a bug where the tellurium quest would not close if you rob Cipollino first;
- Fixed a bug that caused the console to appear during a dialogue with Arashi in the village;
- Fixed a bug where the transferred weight of the player and teammates did not change when carrying a stack of items;
- Fixed a bug with looping Laptev's song;
- Fixed a bug where alternative attacks were incorrectly displayed for some types of weapons;
- Fixed a bug where moving an item to the belt slot caused the console to appear;
- Fixed a bug where the blow with the butt of the weapon option disappeared after cutscenes;
- Fixed bugs in localizations;
- Minor edits and fixes.
This morning — because the sky was clear and I hadn't anything better to do — I let the dog lead me on a six-mile walk. For two hours, we wound our way through the streets of Corvallis. We sniffed drains, barked at squirrels, and in every way had a merry old time.
If I'd allow her, Tally would spend hours every day sniffing drains around the city.
As we walked, I reflected on how fortunate Kim and I were when we decided to move here. We were deliberate about our choice, sure, but it was still something of a gamble. Sometimes research and experience don't align. In this case, they have.
After four months Corvallis seems like a perfect fit for us. There's so much we love about this place, such as:
There's so much more we love about Corvallis: the traffic (or lack of it), the people, the parks, the wildlife, the culture, and more. Plus, to balance things out, there's another town of similar size (Albany) just twenty minutes away — and that town provides some of the things that Corvallis doesn't (Costco, etc.). Suffice it to say that we feel like we made the right choice when we elected to move here.
During this morning's dog walk, I also recalled the rating system I developed during last summer's home search. I had intended to write a GRS blog post about this in July, but then got distracted by the actual process of, you know, buying a house.
Here's how my system works.
When evaluating a potential home, I rate it in five categories: region/city, neighborhood, property, structure, and “other factors”. These categories are very much subjective. And, in fact, your personal preferences might change over time. (Mine sure have!) I score each category with a letter grade: A, B, C, D, or F.
Once I've rated a potential property in all five categories, I convert the letter grades to a standard GPA. In the case of our current home, the five grades (A, B+, B+, A-, B+) average to an A-/B+ (3.52 gpa). Not bad.
With this system, perfect 4.00 homes are tough to find. In fact, we didn't see a single one during the five months we were watching the market. Part of this was due to price, of course. When home prices are high, it's tough to get an A in the “other factors” category. Even so, it was very rare for us to see a house that had full marks in city, neighborhood, property, and house. This leads me to believe that a “perfect home” does not exist.
Just for kicks, I decided to grade each of the homes I've owned in the past. These grades are based on my experiences living in each place, not on pre-purchase impressions and expectations.
Kris and I bought our first home soon after we were married. It was a solid little ranch house with a good location in my hometown. Our second home, where she still lives, was a hundred-year-old farmhouse in a scrappy neighborhood.
After our divorce, I bought a riverfront condo. That place was fantastic except for the expensive HOA and the lack of a yard for pets. The country cottage that Kim and I just sold had an amazing yard, which was almost enough to redeem the place. Almost.
It's early days yet on our Corvallis home, but so far we love it. The next two years will be telling as we work to upgrade both the house and the yard.
As I used this rating system to guide our search this summer, Kim and I found it useful to take a “top-down” approach. That is, we began our search by looking at the Big Picture, then gradually refined things until we found homes that we liked.
So, for instance, we spent the first three months of the homebuying process driving to dozens of different cities. Our aim was to find places where we really, really wanted to live. By being ruthless about eliminating options, we were able to only consider those towns that earned a grade of A or A-.
Once we picked Corvallis, we spent two weekends down here during which we simply drove around to get a feel for different neighborhoods. We wanted to figure out which parts of town worked for us.
Picking the right neighborhood can be tough. To really know where you should live in a city, you need to spend time there. This fact created a big debate between me and Kim, actually. I was keen on a neighborhood just south of the high school and close to downtown, but she was afraid it would be filled with noisy college students. We never could get a clear answer on the neighborhood's character, so we eventually eliminated it as an option. (And after four months here, I still don't know what that neighborhood is like!)
Once we had some neighborhoods picked out, only then did we begin viewing available properties.
I know this might seem silly to some of you, but this nerdy approach to homebuying really helped me. Combined with my spreadsheets filled with facts and figures, grading properties helped me to keep things in perspective.
Ultimately, we're pleased with the choice we made. Kim frets that we paid too much for this house (but I think she's ignoring the fact that we sold our existing home in the same high market), while I wish we were ever-so-slightly closer to businesses. Other than that, however, I think we made a good choice.
One thing's for certain: The city of Corvallis is almost ideal for us and our family of beasts. I expect us to be here for a long time — perhaps forever.
You Tuber Just an Observation shares this wonderful analysis of Alan Rickman's phenomenal portrayal of the ultimate bad guy, an exceptional thief, Hans Gruber.
(Welcome to Pop Culture Imports, a column that compiles the best foreign movies and TV streaming right now.)
We're nearing the end of 2021 (!) and it's time to play catch-up on all the movies and shows you missed in the final months as we head towards another new year. And yes, that means catch-up on the international titles, which, thanks to the wealth of choices on streaming platforms now, is easier than ever. 2021 has been an incredible breakthrough year for international shows and movies, and somehow, this column has felt like it's only scratched the surface. Yes, we've got your share of prestigious arthouse dramas here, but also your regular old head-chomping Korean genre shows, and animated French adventure films.
With that, let's fire up those subtitles and get streaming.
Country: France
Genre: Animated adventure
Director: Patrick Imbert
Cast: Lazare Herson-Macarel, Eric Herson-Macarel, Damien Boisseau
"The Summit of the Gods" is a French animated film that adapts a Japanese manga, which itself was inspired by the real-life story of English mountaineer George Mallory who disappeared while summitting Everest. But its concoction of international influences only makes its ode to the heights of the human spirit even more powerful. Written and directed by Patrick Imbert, who co-writes with Magali Pouzol and Jean-Charles Ostorero, "The Summit of the Gods" takes place in the '90s setting in which the original manga was published, following a Japanese reporter named Makoto Fukamachi, who encounters a mysterious climber named Habu who has found the camera of George Mallory, which might contain proof that Mallory and his companion Andrew Irvine actually reached the summit of Mount Everest. But Makoto slowly becomes engrossed in Habu's story, which plays out in flashback alongside Makoto's own investigation into Habu's life, and decides to join him to document Habu's own expedition to reach the peak of Mount Everest. A tale of obsession and ambition, "The Summit of the Gods" is a truly breathtaking film with majestic, awe-inspiring animation that truly fits its rather portentous name.
Watch This If You Like: "Free Solo," "127 Hours," fooling yourself into thinking you could rock climb if you wanted to.
Country: South Korea
Genre: Sci-fi thriller
Director: Kim Jee-woon
Cast: Lee Sun-kyun, Lee Yoo-young, Park Hee-soon, Seo Ji-hye, Lee Jae-won, Uhm Tae-goo.
At one point, Kim Jee-woon was one of filmmakers at the forefront of Korean New Wave cinema — standing alongside the likes of Bong Joon-ho and Park Chan-wook with his stylish, shocking thrillers like "A Tale of Two Sisters" and "I Saw the Devil." But apart from one ill-conceived foray into directing in Hollywood (the 2013 Arnold Schwarzenegger action flick "The Last Stand") and a prestige spy drama that barely made waves in the west ("The Age of Shadows"), Kim Jee-woon had all but faded from the global stage. But now he's made his comeback with TV. And what a TV series it is.
"Dr. Brain" is an atmospheric sci-fi thriller which stars "Parasite" star Lee Sun-kyun as a brilliant neuroscientist with a autism who pioneers a new technology that will allow him to sync brain waves with the recently dead. But when he experiments on himself with the technology, he starts to struggle with separating the memories of the dead with his own reality. All the while, a mystery unfolds regarding his comatose wife, and his technology might be the only way to solve it. A mystery drama, a medical thriller, and a creepy ghost story all in one, "Dr. Brain" is yet more proof that South Korean television has never been better.
Watch This If You Like: "Hannibal," "Mr. Robot," Frankenstein stories but with ghosts.
Country: Italy
Genre: Autobiographical drama
Director: Paolo Sorrentino
Cast: Filippo Scotti, Toni Servillo, Teresa Saponangelo, Marlon Joubert, Luisa Ranieri, Renato Carpentieri, Massimiliano Gallo, Betti Pedrazzi, Biagio Manna, Ciro Capano.
Oh great, another "lyrical" autobiographical drama in which an auteur looks back on his life through a nostalgic (often black-and-white) camera lens and finds some deeper meaning in the sociopolitical context in which he was raised. It's "Call Me By Your Name," but straight. But Paolo Sorrentino's "The Hand of God" is more than the sum of its parts. Part memoir, part coming-of-age neorealist drama, part Gothic comedy, "The Hand of God" is Sorrentino's intensely personal story of finding solace in the beautiful fantasy of filmmaking after tragedy strikes his family. "Reality is lousy," the teenage Fabietto (played by a wonderfully guileless Filippo Scotti) bemoans, quoting the great Fellini in the process. "That's why I want to make films." But reality never appears lousy, even in its darkest moments in "The Hand of God," which paints a surreal, ravishing portrait of Naples, and of Sorrentino's own strange, bewitching childhood.
Watch This If You Like: "Roma," "Call Me By Your Name," aggressively gesturing in Italian.
Country: Japan
Genre: Romance drama
Director: Ryusuke Hamaguchi
Cast: Masahiro Higashide, Erika Karata.
With Ryusuke Hamaguchi's masterful Haruki Murakami adaptation "Drive My Car" steadily earning more critical buzz this awards season, there's no better time to visit some of the Japanese filmmakers' other works. Both his breakout hit "Happy Hour" and his acclaimed follow-up "Asako I & II" are available to stream on The Criterion Channel, but I chose to highlight "Asako I & II" because it's the one I arbitrarily clicked on.
But that choice turned out to be fortuitous, as "Asako I & II" is a curious little romance, following a young woman, the titular Asako, as she falls in love at first sight with the mysterious drifter Baku (Masahiro Higashide). They both fall hard and fast, embarking on a whirlwind romance that is untenable — Asako can't stand to be without Baku for more than a day, while Baku can't stand to be tethered to one stop for too long, eventually wandering off to buy shoes and never returning. Two years later, Asako meets a simple, straightforward businessman named Ryohei (also played by Higashide) who looks just like Baku, and reluctantly begins to fall in love with him as well, despite being reminded of her greater, fiery first love. Even with a slight and slightly fantastical romantic drama such as this, Hamaguchi's penchant for humanism (and love for featuring the works of Anton Chekhov in his films) shines through.
Watch This If You Like: "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," "Before Midnight," Japanese stage actors performing Chekhov's plays.
Country: South Korea
Genre: Supernatural horror
Director: Yeon Sang-ho
Cast: Yoo Ah-in, Kim Hyun-joo, Park Jeong-min, Won Jin-ah, Yang Ik-june
Yeon Sang-ho, best know for "Train to Busan" and its sequel "Peninsula," bestows his brand of outrageous genre filmmaking to the Netflix series "Hellbound," one of the most original shows to hit the streamer this year. The series takes place in South Korea in the near-future, which suddenly has been beset by a series of strange "murders." But these are murders: they're decrees from otherworldly "angels" that drag the condemned to hell in a fiery display of mauling and incineration. The emergence of these terrifying monsters lead to the foundings of various cults, which play into the people's fears and manipulate them to their own gain. Yoo Ah-in ("Burning") in particular strikes a sinister figure as the leader of the apparently benevolent New Truth Society, which has its own darker machinations.
Watch This If You Like: "Train to Busan," "Legion," "Death Note," not getting sent to hell.
Read this next: The Best Movies Of 2021 So Far
The post Pop Culture Imports: The Hand of God, Dr. Brain & More Foreign Movies and TV Streaming Now appeared first on /Film.
Oh my Hulk, they did it! "Hawkeye" managed something no other Marvel Disney+ show has managed so far: They stuck the landing. I suppose in a way this episode did advertise the upcoming "Echo" show, but it wasn't hammered over our heads. It didn't look like a commercial. Alaqua Cox did more to make me want to watch it than any particular scene. It was a full story, despite hinting at the upcoming "Echo" spin-off show. (Thankfully, that wasn't hammered over our heads, it didn't feel like a commercial, and Alaqua Cox's performance did more to make me interested than any given scene she was in.) We even got a special holiday gift from Marvel at the end.
If you somehow missed the headline and a rogue owl made you click on it, you are being warned that there will be spoilers in this post, in which I'll run through tons of the Easter eggs featured in this season finale episode. Proceed with caution.
Before we really even get started, naming the episode "So, This Is Christmas?" is a great nod to the John Lennon song "Happy Christmas (War is Over)." War is indeed over ... for now, at least. Let's get into some of the biggest Easter eggs of the episode.
I want to start with some fun stuff, so we'll be going a little out of order. Let's talk arrows. We've seen a ton of fun ones since the series started. In the Matt Fraction run of "Hawkeye," there are a lot of them including sonic, boomerang (which was sort of a joke in this series), putty, and net arrows. This episode features so many: One with Pym Particles that will come in later in the very best way, Stark Industry tech arrows, and since Kate has a label maker, we know there are also ice breaker (was this the one that froze that guy's leg, or was that the freeze arrows?), flash bomb, air bag, and "too dangerous" arrows.
Well, we didn't learn that Eleanor is or is working for Madame Masque. What she is doing is dirty work for Kingpin. It was a nice trick to watch the scene between Eleanor and Kingpin, and then find out that we were watching what Kate was watching on that phone video Yelena sent her at the end of the last episode. Eleanor has been working off the debt her husband had to Kingpin, but she's paid, as she says, 10 times over. That means she probably could have stopped working for him. I mean, he doesn't want her to leave now, so maybe he wouldn't have let her anyway, but I don't know. The writing of Kingpin's character and Vincent D'Onofrio's stunning performance really leaves you guessing. You know he's going to do the wrong things, and that he will sacrifice people he loves if they betray him, but you also see that he does truly love people. It's fascinating to watch.
What's interesting here is that Eleanor says she has copies of everything she's learned about Kingpin's empire. She's ruthless, whether it was just for her daughter as she says, or if it's because of who she is. She did make a promise in the first episode to protect Kate, and maybe she thinks she's doing that here. (She does try to kill Kingpin with her car later to save Kate.) But that's not an excuse for framing your fiance, killing Armand, and working with this guy. She does tell Kate she knows the world better and that Kate couldn't survive with nothing. Of course, the cost of what she did ends up leaving Kate with nothing. (Well, nothing from her own family, anyway. I'd argue she has a lot more now.)
Will Kate or Maya ever need to access the blackmail material Eleanor set aside? More on Kingpin in a bit, but there is no way he's dead. He wears armor under his very fancy Hawaiian Christmas outfit. (Cosplay, anyone?) We learned that back in "Daredevil." We don't know how much of that series is canon now, but since we've seen Kingpin and a certain other person from the series in "Spider-Man: Far From Home," (don't pretend you didn't see the spoilers out there), at least some of it might be.
Well, Jack turned out to be just adorable, didn't he? I really hated him in the first few episodes, but he's just a goofball. He's free from the clink because the father of the little Armand VII (entitled jerk of a kid) bailed him out. I don't know who that kid's pop is, but I bet he and Jack will be in either "Hawkeye" season 2 or in "Echo" in some way. He's just too good to pass up. The LARPers as well! I absolutely love that they all showed up as waiters at the Bishop family holiday party at 30 Rockefeller Center. I've been in that building several times and it's a crazy place! Anyway, Grills, Wendy (A.K.A. Bombshell - did she get her bag back?), Orville, and Missy not only act as back up, they use their first responder skills to get everyone out! Here's an Easter egg for you: In Grills' apartment, there is a poster for "Dragons of Despair," which is the first of 16 novels by one of the Dragonlance authors, Tracy Hickman, set in that universe. I've read it. Do not judge me. I would totally hang out with Grills and so would you.
Wendy implies that Jack, who is really good with that sword and actually wore it to the party, should join the LARPing group. Since we know Bombshell isn't exactly the nicest person in the comics, and Jack is known as Swordsman in those pages, could they team up in some way? I mean, I'd totally watch it. I do love that we'll likely see them all again, and that there was a tribute to first responders here. I will not get choked up. I just know a few (including my nephew), and they're pretty great. Sniff.
Oh, Maya. Things are rough for you right now. Here's what I'm talking about in terms of "Echo" set up. They really did it masterfully. Maya asks to leave, and tells Kingpin, who is indeed her boss, that she's tired of vengeance. She needs a few days off to get her head straight. You can see that Kingpin loves her -- not that this stops him from hurting people. He learned a lot of ASL for her (and we know from "Daredevil" that he's good with languages). He probably knows more than he's saying, but it's a gesture. Crucially, he also knows that she's going rogue. He sends Kazi after her. Oh, Kazi. Maya really does want him to leave with her, despite the fact that it was implied that he knew who killed her father and was part of the set-up.
During the big fight, she stabs Kazi with an arrow. I really was expecting him to make it through, though in the comics, Clint kills him with a toothpick. Wishful thinking? I just really liked Fra Fee. Maybe he survives (like Kingpin definitely will)? Probably not, but you never know. So when we start "Echo," Maya is going to be in a really bad place. There is also that moment when Maya shoots Kingpin that echos what she does in the comics. I wonder if we're going to get a Disney+ street level hero series with her in the way we did on Netflix.
Let's talk about the Clint and Kate portion of the episode's big fight. (We'll go back to Kate and Yelena later.) All those arrows are used in the very best ways. Frozen legs on bros, rappelling down buildings, blowing up things, spiky arrows that shoot out other spikes, magnet arrows: It's a holiday massacre! So festive! Honestly, having this fight in Rockefeller Center in front of the tree on an ice rink is the best conceit. It may be silly, but it absolutely works. So does Clint getting himself stuck halfway down the huge tree, something several of the cats I've had over my lifetime can sympathize with. He sees an owl, a nice nod to the little owl named Rocky that was found in that tree in 2020. Kate shoots an acid arrow at the tree, sending Clint to the ground.
Not a lot of Easter eggs here outside of the arrows, but the big one was Kate shooting the Pym Particle arrow at the Trust a Bro moving van, making it tiny, and that owl swooped right down to get it. We don't know what will happen to them, but the subtitles saying "children screaming" is pretty wonderful. Clint does say he'll ask Scott (Ant-Man) about what will happen to them, and I'm assuming we'll get a callback later. I hope the bro whom Kate counseled about listening to his girlfriend regarding Imagine Dragons wasn't in there. I like that guy. He thanked her for it before he tried to kill her, and for a villain, that's at least something.
The moment Kate was on the giant foot piano was a nod to the Tom Hanks movie "Big," and I'm absolutely here for it.
One more thing, and I don't think this spoils much, but the ending of "Spider-Man: No Way Home" does pass through Rockefeller Center, and the tree is still up, meaning that the movie happened before this moment, but after Yelena's appearance in Kate's apartment where she talks about seeing the new Statue of Liberty.
I'm not one to mention fashion. It's not my jam. That said, I don't know who did Yelena's hair for the party, but as I also have long blond hair, I must learn how to do this. Plus, we get to see Kate's comic (but not exactly) costume (made by Missy) after a coat spin from Yelena. (Clint has his on under his tux.)
Would anyone else sign on to watch a road trip film with Yelena and Kate? Florence Pugh and Hailee Steinfeld have the best chemistry, and I love that while Yelena is an assassin, she's fair to those she isn't contracted to kill. (Oof, my standards have really gone down since the pandemic started. I miss people.) The banter between them in the elevator and their fight through the offices of 30 Rock in those long tracking shots was a riot, and it was cute when Yelena praised her for what she did well. It made me smile while I was rooting for one of them not to die and the other not to kill her. This show has made me feel things that aren't healthy. I really should get out of the house.
I do hope they team up. Don't put Yelena on the Thunderbolts or Dark Avengers or whatever you're planning to do. I want to see her fight alongside Kate and Clint in the future.
What a beautiful scene this was. Watching Yelena and Clint beat the hell out of each other while stating their cases evolved into a moment of healing for them both. Clint gets to tell Yelena the truth about Natasha's sacrifice, and he does it by using the whistle that Natasha and Yelena did as children, something we learned at the beginning of the "Black Widow" movie (which took place years before these events). He also references how Natasha flew the plane as a child after Melina gets shot. He tells Yelena that Natasha loved her, and she finally begins to mourn her sister properly. It's lovely.
Also, we have that brutal fight between Kingpin and Kate, which makes it look like Kate has bones of steel. Though she does some really great work getting those arrow bits (after Kingpin snaps them) to zap him, he does survive. Man, does no one get head injuries in the MCU? I bonked my head on a doorframe and almost blacked out this morning! What I got from this scene, though, is that Kate can stand on her own, which is why she is a good partner for Clint now. I'd also just like to point out the fact that Kingpin uses a cane here, something we see in the comics. Nice touch, though a man who can live through all that destruction does not need a cane.
Clint brings Kate and Lucky the Pizza Dog to Christmas dinner at the Barton farm, and it's a joy all around. Watching Kate help Clint get rid of the Ronin suit was lovely. I love the names she comes up with for herself like Lady Hawk (a great movie, by the way), Hawk Eve, Lady Arrow, Hawk Shot ... and then Clint says he has an idea. Now, in the comics, Kate Bishop uses a few, but her ultimate superhero name is Hawkeye. Is Clint's idea to pass the torch now that he's healed and his family is ready to have him home? Is that what's happening here? I want to see them both fight together and I don't think Jeremy Renner is leaving the MCU, but this could be what he was referencing.
Now, about that watch. Clint brings it back to Laura, and she reveals that it is indeed hers. On the back is the S.H.I.E.L.D. symbol with the number 19. In the comics, Hawkeye is married to Bobbi Morse, Agent 19, also known as Mockingbird. Bobbi changes her name to become a civilian, so Laura may be an alias here. Will we ever see Laura fight? Can we, please? I mean, I know we already got a holiday gift from Marvel, but I want this, too!
As I said, Marvel gifted us with a little treat, and it was the entire staging of the song we saw part of in "Rogers: The Musical." It's goofy and fun with some great voices and dancers, but it's also bittersweet, with the Omicron variant of the coronavirus shutting down shows on Broadway just a few days ago. (It's Loki's fault, I'm sure.) It was cool to see Marc Shaiman, one of the composers of the song, in the scene. Fans have been clamouring for this, and though Marvel released the full audio for the song "Save the City," we hadn't seen the full performance until now. Happy holidays to us all!
Read this next: 11 Marvel Comics Villains We Really Want To See In The MCU
The post The Hawkeye Easter Eggs You Might Have Missed in Episode 6 appeared first on /Film.
Sign up here to get What’s in my bag? a week early in your inbox.
After a 25-year career as an eCommerce product leader, I recently retired after the loss of my central vision caused by Stargardt Disease, a genetic eye disease that affects the retina. In my newfound retirement, I am concentrating on my photography practice, as well as documenting my vision-loss journey at kinablind.com. Becoming legally blind has caused a great deal of change in my 40 year-long photography practice, and certainly, the contents of my camera bag have changed to accommodate my vision challenges. I currently live in Pensacola, FL with my wife, sculptor Carrie Fonder, and with our two English Bulldogs. You can follow me on Instagram at @llazare
Like most photographers, I am on a never-ending search for the perfect camera bag. My current bag is the Lowepro Photo Hatchback BP 250 AW II. I like the fact that the cube that holds my gear cab be removed so that I can use it as a non-photo bag. It also has a built-in rain cover as well as being a very sturdy bag. That said, I just ordered a new bag just this week that I am anxious to try out.
I usually carry two cameras along with a number of lenses:
Infrared photography is my main photo focus, and I shoot with an Olympus OM-D E-M5 Mark II that has been converted to Infrared. My camera was converted by a fantastic company in NJ called Kolari Vision. My OM-D EM5 has a full-spectrum conversion which allows me to use filters to shoot different light spectrums. The Kolari site has a wealth of information about Infrared photography in general. If you’re interested in learning more, here’s a good video that provides an intro to Infrared Photography. You can see some of my infrared photos here.
I keep a non-converted camera in my bag, an Olympus E-M1 MARK III. Olympus is known for its image stabilization, and the EM1 has features like star auto-focus. That makes it possible for me to do astrophotography despite my vision challenges.
I hardly ever wore sunglasses before my vision loss, but I am now extremely light-sensitive, so I almost always wear sunglasses when I am outdoors, and sometimes even when I am indoors in brightly lit spaces. I wear a pair from Two Blind Brothers, a company run by two brothers who are afflicted with Stargardt Disease, the same disease I have. The glasses are designed to meet the need of the visually impaired, but they are great choice for anyone looking for high-quality sunglasses.
My light sensitivity also necessitates that I also wear a hat whenever I am in the sun. I recently ditched my trusty NY Mets baseball cap for this embarrassingly named Fisherman’s Chillba Hat from Kavu. Although it’s certainly not runway-ready, it’s a fantastic hat. It has a metal band in the brim that allows you to fold it into a tiny disk, making it perfect for tossing in your bag. It’s water-resistant and fully reversible.
My European friends have long sung the praises of hiking poles, but I have only recently become a convert. What I love most about these Trekology Trek-Z Trekking Hiking Poles is that they fold down to a size where I can put them in the side pocket of my pack.
Lastly, I always keep a 30000mAh Solar Charger in my bag — I like the fact that in addition to plugging it into the wall, I can charge it by setting in the sun. There are many different solar chargers out there, but I like the fact that my current unit can be charged using a lightning cable ( as well as with a micro-USB cable) which allows me to use the same cable to charge the unit as well as my iPhone. When I get my next charger, I will get one that includes a flashlight as well as a USB-C port.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Man, remember the days when the "Flash" movie was meant to be the first "solo" film to be released after "Justice League" in 2017? How quickly things change. In the time since, multiverse stories have become all the rage -- though general audiences have come to associate that with "Spider-Man" of all characters, through the double-whammy of "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" and the most recent runaway success of "Spider-Man: No Way Home." That sort of leaves the time-traveling, multiverse-hopping Flash out to dry, who is downright infamous for wrecking timelines and causing all sorts of temporal headaches in the comics.
But with "The Flash" clearly taking its cues from the popular "Flashpoint" comic series, fans quickly gravitated towards the appeal of seeing DC characters from past franchises coming together in one massive multiverse extravaganza. Ezra Miller, of course, returns as the speedster superhero Barry Allen, but he'll be joined by famous faces such as Ben Affleck reprising his role as Bruce Wayne/Batman, Michael Keaton stepping into the shoes of Bruce Wayne for the first time in decades, and Sasha Calle as the DC Universe's first appearance of Supergirl.
But the film appears to have a couple more fascinating DC characters who may be coming back as well. If Warner Bros.' official 2022 movie preview tease is to be believed, fans can look forward to seeing none other than Michael Shannon's villainous General Zod and Antje Traue's formidable second-in-command Faora making an unexpected return in "The Flash." Read on for all the details.
The last we saw of General Zod in "Man of Steel," Henry Cavill's rookie Superman had just finished snapping his neck, effectively making himself the last son of Krypton. Poor Zod ended up becoming resurrected as Lex Luthor's (Jesse Eisenberg) little pet project Doomsday in "Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice," who managed to exact some measure of revenge on Superman from beyond the grave. That seemed to be the last we'd ever see of Zod, but think again! Life comes at you fast, especially when there's an entire multiverse of possibilities that means anything and everything is on the table. That apparently includes the return of Michael Shannon and Antje Traue for "The Flash" in some capacity, at least.
This intriguing development comes straight from Warner Bros. themselves, as their 2022 movie preview on the official website includes a rundown of all the studio's most anticipated projects -- including "The Flash." First, the brief tease reiterates the synopsis of the film:
"Ezra Miller stars as Barry Allen, AKA The Flash, who pushes the limits of his superpowers in the DC Super Hero's first-ever standalone feature film."
That seems straightforward enough, but the real newsworthy item relates to the cast list: "Ezra Miller, Ron Livingston, Michael Keaton, Kiersey Clemons, Michael Shannon, Antje Traue, Sasha Calle, and Michael Keaton." The inclusion of Keaton's name twice over seems like an innocent enough typo (cue the conspiracy theories that there are two Michael Keaton Batmans running around for some reason), but the inclusion of Michael Shannon and Antje Traue will definitely raise eyebrows. It's unclear what sort of role either one would play in the events of "The Flash," but that's the beauty of the multiverse. With a big enough imagination, anything goes. Perhaps Barry's time-travel shenanigans will bring him to the events of "Man of Steel," or maybe even the other way around as Zod and Faora end up pulled from their timeline into Barry's. Whatever the case, Shannon's Zod and Traue's Faora have always been considered fan-favorites despite their brief appearance in the DC Universe, so nobody will be complaining about seeing more of them should this pan out.
"The Flash" is directed by Andy Muschietti and is scheduled for release on November 4, 2022.
Read this next: Superman Movies Ranked From Worst To Best
The post The Flash Will Apparently Bring Back Man of Steel's General Zod & Faora appeared first on /Film.
If you’re diving into DIY home repairs or building projects, the cost of tools can be prohibitive. That’s when a tool library can come in handy, especially if you’re looking to use a tool once for a specific project or if you’d like to test drive a type of tool before investing in your own. Rather than buying or…
It seems that huge portions of the internet are struggling right now, including Slack, Imgur, the Epic Games Store, and more. Huge portions of the internet are reliant on Amazon Web Services, known as AWS, and when they face issues, so does the entire internet. If you’re having problems with some of your favourite websites, you definitely aren’t alone. Other affected sites include Coinbase, Hulu, and Udemy, to name a few.
User reports recently spiked on Down Detector. At first, Amazon said on its AWS status page that it was investigating “increased EC2 launch failures and networking connectivity issues” in its USE1-AZ4 availability zone.
“We are investigating increased EC2 launch failures and networking connectivity issues for some instances in a single Availability Zone (USE1-AZ4) in the US-EAST-1 Region. Other Availability Zones within the US-EAST-1 Region are not affected by this issue.”
However, since then, the company has confirmed a power outage in the USE1-AZ4 availability zone.
“We can confirm a loss of power within a single data center within a single Availability Zone (USE1-AZ4) in the US-EAST-1 Region. This is affecting availability and connectivity to EC2 instances that are part of the affected data center within the affected Availability Zone. We are also experiencing elevated RunInstance API error rates for launches within the affected Availability Zone. Connectivity and power to other data centers within the affected Availability Zone, or other Availability Zones within the US-EAST-1 Region are not affected by this issue, but we would recommend failing away from the affected Availability Zone (USE1-AZ4) if you are able to do so. We continue to work to address the issue and restore power within the affected data center.”
Outages like this are extremely rare, and very few last more than an hour. We’ve seen some more significant outages though recently from the likes of Facebook, and even another outage from Amazon just last week. As Amazon notes, the company is currently working towards restoring power to the data center, and companies should try to fall away from the affected availability zone if possible.
At 5:18 PST, Amazon confirmed it restored power to the majority of instances and networking devices.
“We continue to make progress in restoring power to the affected data center within the affected Availability Zone (USE1-AZ4) in the US-EAST-1 Region. We have now restored power to the majority of instances and networking devices within the affected data center and are starting to see some early signs of recovery. Customers experiencing connectivity or instance availability issues within the affected Availability Zone, should start to see some recovery as power is restored to the affected data center. RunInstances API error rates are returning to normal levels and we are working to recover affected EC2 instances and EBS volumes. While we would expect continued improvement over the coming hour, we would still recommend failing away from the Availability Zone if you are able to do so to mitigate this issue.”
“We have now restored power to all instances and network devices within the affected data center and are seeing recovery for the majority of EC2 instances and EBS volumes within the affected Availability Zone. Network connectivity within the affected Availability Zone has also returned to normal levels. While all services are starting to see meaningful recovery, services which were hosting endpoints within the affected data center – such as single-AZ RDS databases, ElastiCache, etc. – would have seen impact during the event, but are starting to see recovery now. Given the level of recovery, if you have not yet failed away from the affected Availability Zone, you should be starting to see recovery at this stage.”
The post [Update: Power restored] AWS is having another outage, causing issues with Amazon, Slack, Imgur, Epic Games Store, and more appeared first on xda-developers.
GOG has a vulnerability exploit that has been seemingly ignored by the CD Projekt RED subsidiary ever since it was first sighted. The exploit was first archived as a vulnerability by the National Vulnerability Database (NVD) in August 2020. This vulnerability allows for local privilege escalation from any authenticated user to SYSTEM.
This exploit essentially allows users to inject DLLs into GOG's Galaxy client. Simply put, GOG can be used to escalate privileges. Thus, users can gain an administrative role in the system itself. This can essentially open the way for hackers to gain access to supply chain attacks on different systems.
As the NVD Database entry puts it:
The client (aka GalaxyClientService.exe) in GOG GALAXY through 2.0.41 (as of 12:58 AM Eastern, 9/26/21) allows local privilege escalation from any authenticated user to SYSTEM by instructing the Windows service to execute arbitrary commands. This occurs because the attacker can inject a DLL into GalaxyClient.exe, defeating the TCP-based "trusted client" protection mechanism.
Needless to say, any user profile can give itself administrative privileges through GOG Galaxy and then gain access to every computer where the GOG Client is installed. The exploit was originally discovered by white hat hacker and Positron Security Founder Joseph Testa. However, that happened in January 2020.
GOG reacted by releasing an update that would fix this issue. However, it was found that this simply updated the signing key used for verifying messages. This key has been recovered and the proof-of-concept has been updated with it. So yes, the exploit still works, unmodified, and has been reported as a 0-day vulnerability in GOG's Galaxy client.
Joseph Testa posted a comprehensive analysis that detailed some of his conversations with GOG Support. This conversation started on June 4, 2020, and the entire thread can be read in the link above.
GOG.com Support replied with:
“I was informed that our Developers are working on fixing the issue, but executing the attack requires the machine to be already compromised.”
Because this sounded like GOG was not taking the issue seriously, I responded with:
“It is indeed true that an attacker must have low-privilege access to the machine already. But the problem is that this can be escalated into Administrator rights by abusing the GalaxyClientService software. […] Local privilege escalation (LPE) is a serious vulnerability.
GOG customers may install software/games from other untrusted sources without Administrator rights, which normally would protect them from full system compromise. Unfortunately, due to the vulnerabilities I’ve discovered in GalaxyClientService, all user accounts are effectively administrators.”
Shortly afterward, GOG told Joseph that their developers needed three months to create a solution. Of course, since the Advisory is currently online, that means that this fix wasn't provided after the 3-month time passed. In fact, as recently as September 2021, it's been confirmed that the GOG Galaxy 2.0 exploit continues to work.
In other words, any user who installs Galaxy 2.0 will run the risk of having an attacker gain administrator access. As the poster of the Reddit thread that discovered that the exploit still works puts it:
My major concern is people assume that, since it has been so long past the 3-month timeline the developers proposed for a fix, that it has been fixed. Hell, why would a development team not fix something like this in their software? Too bad this is not the case, and your system is still vulnerable if you have GOG Galaxy 2.0 installed.
When Wccftech reached out to GOG earlier this week for comment regarding this situation, they replied with the following statement:
We’re aware of the security issue in GOG GALAXY and we confirm that the works on the fix are ongoing. It turned out to be a very complex matter and require changes made to the design of the client itself. As always, we will inform users about the fix in the GOG GALAXY changelog once the patch is deployed. Furthermore, we want to reassure everyone that security topics are important to us and we take all of them seriously.
In its current form, the proof of concept exploit outlined by Joseph Testa only causes the Galaxy client to crash. As such, it can easily be inferred that this might be a temporary measure made by CDPR to prevent any attacks from happening while they work on solving this issue. Of course, this could also mean that the exploit no longer works with the outdated proof of concept and can be accessed by malicious attackers with a more refined process.
You can watch a comprehensive timeline of events that outlines the severity of the exploit below in the YouTube video linked below.
For now, it's best to be careful around the GOG Galaxy program, and it's heavily advised to keep an eye on what programs get installed through the service.
The post GOG Has Had a Severe Internal Vulnerability Problem for Nearly 2 Years; GOG: It’s a Very Complex Matter, but Works on the Fix Are Ongoing by Ule Lopez appeared first on Wccftech.
