Communists shaking and crying right now.
Capitalism is a very common/popular tag for games on Steam. Of course, it’s a fantasy version of capitalism where you can actually get ahead.
These games are tagged capitalism, but they use this wild version of capitalism where the person doing the work gets to keep the value their work creates. I think there’s a name for that…
Usually in these games I tell workers to do the work, I’m just the guy giving orders.
Openttd, the communist utopia, where you personally lay out the tracks and drive the trains.
IS A MAN NOT ENTITLED TO THE SWEAT OF HIS BROW?!?!
Being fair, capitalism works great in games. The system necessarily determines a winner, there are no externalities inside of a video game, and the people whose labor you’re profiting from are NPCs.
Just now I realized I’m the NPC in some rich asshole capitalists life.
👨🚀🔫👨🚀
Wake up sheeple 🐑
This is true for board games as well. The classic example being Monopoly.
I think it works pretty well in real life too. Nevertheless, I’d be thrilled to see an emergent economic simulation game that was serious enough that you could imagine it reflecting reality. That you could test out real economic politics and see how they work out.
I don’t think there’s such a thing. And also, economics is hella boring so it could be that an accurate game like this would also necessary be a bit boring.
I think it works pretty well in real life too.
Privileged, child, or petite bourgeois aspirations?
Asshole, stupid or communist? Oh wait, that was redundant.
Yeah, to be a communist you have to be stupid enough to read books on economics.
Reading an actual book on economics makes it impossible for a benevolent individual to be a communist, at least without a physically painful amount of cognitive dissonance.
Do you feel angry or depressed often? It’s cognitive dissonance. ;)
Reading an actual book on economics makes it impossible for a benevolent individual to be a communist, at least without a physically painful amount of cognitive dissonance.
Oh, you sound really informed on this. What books of marxist economics have you read to come to this conclusion? What theory of subjective value based economics books?
I mean, I’ve just spent over a decade studying various schools of economics, maybe you have much more insight than me on this topic.
The only good capitalism sims are GameDevTycoon, which makes you complicit in the enshittification while playing a plagiarized game, and Roller Coaster Tycoon, which accurately depicts the tycoon mindset.
0.01$ super salty fries, 80% ice 1500% overpriced drinks FTW
In the first game I remember charging about $5.00 or something for the bathroom. Easiest fake money I’ve ever made to fuel the construction of my psychopathic murder rides.
RCT does a really good job emulating the massive desire to drown your guests that all tycoons eventually get.
The fun thing most of these games aren’t even truly capitalist. City builders like Cities Skylines, Tropico and Anno have little or no free market and you’re just in control of a centralized planned economy.
The only truly capitalist games I saw on that list are X4 and Offworld Trading Company since you play as a single private owner competing with others on the market.
idk, space warlord organ trading simulator seems pretty spot on for late capitalism
My friends who play PDX games with me and know my politics sometimes tease me about the game using currency or referencing profitability. And then I remind them that we’re all meticulously planning our economies with virtually nothing left for a privileged class to decide. And our decisions, though made in a context of imperialism, aren’t being made for personal wealth but state power.
Except when you’re playing Victoria and the capitalists decide it’s time to build the 34th arts academy with the building capacity it took you sweat and blood to build.
The first game it has shown me is…
WORKERS & RESOURCES: SOVIET REPUBLIC
Gabe knows some irony
Cities skylines is definitely a capitalist economy as you literally make your earnings by changing tax rate and the only thing you control insofar as unmodded goes is zoning and city services lmao
Its not capitalist, its a planned economy. Taxes can exist outside of capitalism
This just in: America not capitalist. You have exactly as much control as the average American town/city does in that game. Control of zoning and road development isn’t a “planned economy” lmaoo. The entire game is based in and around a capitalistic society and the demand created by said society in your town for it to grow that’s the whole reason for the demand bars.
You also don’t really have to worry about satisfying the demands of huge multinational corporations. So it’s pretty idealized, as though capital has no undue influence on state-level political decisions.
Cope
That is a really funny theme to pick
I hope next week is the Socialist and Communist Fest.
Tetris clone week would actually be pretty sick tbh
Isn’t it celebrated every week on torrents
when is valve gonna release capitalism 3?
3
What’s that funny symbol?
- Valve
I think it’s some kind of indian luck rune
I notice that 3 looks like a sideways ω, which is the symbol used to represent an ordinal number larger than all finite ordinal numbers.
In other words Valve might see 3 as essentially meaning infinity, and is thus unreachable. No matter how many new versions they make, they can never get to 3.
I feel old that I remember when people made this joke about Capcom - That they didn’t know how to count to 3. Now it’s just Valve, it’s for all their games instead of one, and I feel like it’s been true way longer than I could make the joke about Capcom lol.
For context, there was like a million versions of Street Fighter 2. (SF 2 : Champion Edition, SF II: Turbo, Super SF II: New Challengers, Super SF II: Turbo, Hyper SF II, it went on and on).
Right after Capitalism 2: Episode 2
And Capitalism: Alyx
Upgraded to run on the new GoldSrc Engine 2
communists will disagree but this is capitalism 3.
Valve would have to go to mom before Google would let them have a turn on the capitalism 3.
jokes aside, it’s just not a really attractive title.
I’ve played 48 hours in one of the games in there, Traveller’s Rest, about running a tavern. It has money, supply, employees, trends etc. But I’m not enjoying it because Yay Capitalism! It’s because when you’re running your own cute shop with virtual money it’s fun. I do like the genre, but being reminded of the systems that are causing a lot of real world shit is just a bad title.
But I guess “Business Sim Sale” wasn’t flashy enough.
But I’m not enjoying it because Yay Capitalism! It’s because when you’re running your own cute shop with virtual money it’s fun.
You can run a private business without engaging in capitalist exploitation. That’s something a lot of people would probably find enjoyable.
As fun as that is, I love a game that starts out innocent fun then slowly reveals as you progress that you were always a monster, the only difference is now it’s starting to impact the world in a way that you can’t ignore anymore. It’s up to you when you want to stop.
Baldur’s Gate?
I mean they got our attention, so they’ve done it right ig
Games showing us that it has never been about the monet/credits. It’s about making and experiencing
Not only that but by necessity the money/credits in nearly all games (EVE Online a possible exception) is closer to a labor voucher of sorts than a commodity. And labor vouchers are a potential avenue for transitioning a society away from currency.
Also, these games are not about failing, fear and hunger. Capitalism is.
It wouldn’t be fun to play, if you’d have to grind 16h a day and be in danger of homelessness or starvation if you lose.
People play CoD all the time, but I’m sure a substantial percentage of the players would decidedly not enjoy bleeding out in an abandoned cottage.
I keep noticing an alex jones game selling for 20 bucks on steam and wishing I had a way to deface it or harm him personally in some way
Came across this game too. I took a peek in the discussions for the game and oh boy was that a trip. I’d suggest making some post in there about his court cases or something. IMO steam probably shouldn’t allow anything about jones on their storefront period.
Choices you can make before you sell a game called “Sex with Hitler.”
On the bottom right of the page, next to “Share” and “Embed,” there’s a flag icon. Click it, and you can report the product. I figured “Defamatory” was a likely category…
Thanks Grue, I reported it for defamation. I wonder if it would be possible to land a DMCA claim against the game on top of the report
Won’t be buying any games while this is up
Because the capitalism isn’t flavored to your taste this week? I take it you would rather throw money at the corporations when they brand their products with hammer and sickle
Try some lube next time Satan.
No I’d rather not fund politically themed marketing from any company of any political alignment
“Capitalism and Economic tagged games” is no more political than “War games fest” or “First person shooter fest”.
It’s just a genre of video games that the sale is focused on.
Or they just think the theme is in bad taste? But hey, csn’t make a snarky zinger out of that hm?
I already did that.
By the way, fix your federation
Valve will be just as Capitalist when it ends. If you aren’t okay with Capitalism for video games, or see it as a necessary evil while we live under Capitalism, you need to consume FOSS games and buy straight from indie devs, essentially.
There’s room to accept the realities of the world we live in and still not support a company at their worst. Things don’t have to be either or.
My point is that this isn’t Valve “at their worst,” it’s the exact same Valve. Valve has always been Capitalist, and always has functioned in a Capitalist manner. Valve taking a brand new stance, like “fuck trans people,” would be Valve at their worst.
Basically, there’s no difference in how much Valve supports Capitalism between last week and now, but if Valve changed their stance for the worse then that would be cause for a shift in consumer sentiment.
You are missing my point. Have a good day, friend.
Piracy also works quite well. But my stance isn’t capitalism bad (it is bad though) but rather that I don’t want to support marketing that is politicised.
Buy Kapital and Soviet Republic en masse
Seize the means of unproductivity.
That’ll show those capitalist pigdogs!
Good point, piracy better
I have Soviet Republic on my wishlist, so it was literally first game i saw just below the “Capitalism and Economy Fest” sign.
Same
I was confused until I saw the games for sale. Well played, Valve.
I considered uploading this as well, under the title “How to break a Gabe Loving Communist brain”
Glad to see I wasn’t alone lol
I’m anti-war and guns, I play a lot of war games and shooters.
Or just hoard your actual wealth like Scrooge McDuck and play openttd without paying a cent.
Probably a better game than 99% of that junk too.
Based take ngl
Personally, I think it’s pretty tone deaf. Lots of people are suffering at the hands of both currently.
Valve itself is Capitalist, it isn’t a shift in positions.
Very few people realize that Valve just barely managed to get enough votes to pay lip service to BLM, and then their CEO overturned it.
World End Economica isn’t even in this sale. I feel cheated.
That sounds horribly painful. How on earth can it be remedied.?
Good post
