site banner
PaperclipPerfector  4d ago (text post)   2601 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for February 13, 2026

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

2
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

MENACE came out in Early Access on Steam, and I've been enjoying the hell out of it. Sure, it's got rough edges and needs some balance tweaks, but the devs are absolutely cooking.

That includes a banger OST. Just listen to this:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=Xt55wnTWt60

Hoorah Major. Every time I hear it play, I absolutely lock the fuck in. It's going in my gym playlist, I don't even know what genre this is, but I want more. Inject it into my veins with a fire-heated needle.

I finished XCOM 2: War of the Chosen last night (strongly considering playing the base game on Ironman mode). Would you say it scratches that kind of itch?

Gotta say, Ironman might be the only way to play that kind of game for me because otherwise, I'm in reload hell.

I spent literally hundreds of hours trying to beat the first game on Classic difficulty with Ironman enabled, and finally cracked it a few years ago, something that apparently only 2.2% of Steam players have done. (Some day I'd like to compile a nonstandard CV, featuring accomplishments that wouldn't impress any prospective employer but which I am inordinately proud of all the same.) The funny thing about XCOM is that the difficulty is very front-loaded: for the first ~20 hours you're in Early Game Hell and a single mistake can completely fuck you, but once you get past that, the endgame is a cakewalk and you can steamroll over the final boss without breaking a sweat.

MENACE is not XCOM, but I'd say that a good fraction of XCOM players will enjoy MENACE.

Most skills transfer, but the scale expands. You're going from micromanaging individual soldiers in a squad to controlling a whole mechanized platoon, but each squad is effectively just a character. I honestly prefer MENACE over XCOM (or the final finished version in my head, it's still a good game rn), since you get a lot more toys and playstyle variety that isn't just knowing which special abilities to fire off when. There's this YouTuber called Perun who usually discusses military strategy and geopolitics IRL, and he's doing a play through where he applies said tactics in the game and finds that they transfer over pretty well. What more can I ask for?

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats