As I said however, it depends on when in the timeline we’re looking. For 3-year bachelor’s programmes, there’s significantly more focus on producing graduates who can move straight into the industry, having already learnt the tools they will use. For theoretical 5-year master’s programmes, knowing specific hardware or software is secondary to the general reasoning, maths and planning that’s expected in research or R&D industry work.

Using more limited or restricted tools, if thought out well, can force students focus on the parts that matter. I haven’t actually used the Playdate, but for first-year students I would think the most important thing is to actually get to designing games. The core ideas you’d want to teach do not require fancy graphics or platform support, rather, that’d just be a time sink. Learning industry tools can be done in later courses or on the job. While being able to work efficiently is important - I don’t want to discredit the handiwork of the process, learning what buttons to push in eg. Unreal is arguably much less ephemeral than learning ”game design”.

However, using limited tools in teaching must be well motivated. Forcing old, obsolete tech onto students might be a learning experience just as well as a time sink.

Touchdesigner is more popular and I suppose declarative, but vvvv is more general purpose and similar to the processing workflow. It’s a very weird tool I’ve used for everything between MIDI instruments, live installations, escape rooms, VJ rigs and, well, proc art.

Adding this type of rep system would destroy a lot of what is so cool about the internet though. There’d probably be segregation based on rep if it’s very visible, new IDs drowning in a sea of noise. Being anonymous but with a record isn’t the same as posting for the very first time as a completely blank identity and still being given an audience. Making online comms more like real life would alleviate some problems but would also lose part of the reason they’re used in the first place. I don’t see much any other way to do it besides maybe a state-provided anonymous identity provider (though that’s risky for a number of reasons), but it’s going to be sad to see things go.

Either way, although Trump might every now and then be a bit too friendly with Putin, but a) cooperation at this scale and b) the bad looks and damage to Russian investments I think makes it seem unlikely. Putin doesn't stick his neck out for others unless it serves him. I'm not that well read on the Russian involvement in the area though...

On that topic, I've looked some at building games in Rust but I'm thinking it mostly looks like you're creating problems for yourself? Using it for implementing performant backend algorithms and containerised logic could be nice though.

On the other hand, it shows how much coding is just repetition. You don't need to be a good coder to perform serviceable work, but you won't create anything new and amazing either, if you don't learn to think and reason - but that might for some purposes be fine. (Worrying for the ability of the general population however)

You could ask whether these students would have gotten anything done without generated code? Probably, it's just a momentarily easier alternative to actual understanding. They did however realise the problem and decided by themselves to write their own code in a simpler, more repetitive and "stupid" style, but one that they could reason about. So hopefully a good lesson and all well in the end!

Roadside Picnic is a lovely perspective on the genre, in that it isn't at all about the zone or any supposed aliens. The zone makes for a fascinating backdrop for the story, but in the end it is about the people just trying to carve out a life while exposed to an extraordinary, incomprehensible situation grown mundane. The zone could be swapped out for a disaster area or a hostile jungle or whatever, but by being the zone it becomes very alien to the reader as well. It contributes to what I really like about the book, simply being very atmospheric and immersive. It's all show-don't-tell, the reader experiences everything through what the characters see or hear, and the reader's picture of the world is as clouded and uncertain as those living in it. I found a bit of the same feeling in Metro 2033, where anything happening outside of a couple kilometers range is just rumours. Nobody really knows anything for sure and neither does the reader!

Also there was actually a RP TV-series in production with a really cool trailer, but I think the pilot didn't take off so it shut down.

Strangely, Spotify have also made their API a lot more powerful, even with embedable players on webpages. Kind of seems like a step in the opposite direction, although they might have tightened up that as well since last time I checked.