The rise and fall of the Sid Meier's Civilization franchise from 1991 to 2018 is both one of the great tragedies of the computer gaming industry, and a window into the massive change in psychology of the US ruling class. This thread will explore both.
I have played every civilization game many times, but in preparation for this thread, I have replayed each civilization game at least once from beginning to end; with the exception of Civilization VI, which I refuse to dignify with my further attention.
Civilization I was a groundbreaking game in which the player acts a sort of archon spirit controlling a civilization from it's birth in 4000BC until either it's death by conquest, or it's conquest of the earth. The game was a genre-defining 4x.
The game was implicitly based on both the 18th century view of international relations - that all nations are continuous competitors and that peace is only ever an interlude between wars, and the 20th century notion that the all states are total states.
Civ 2 is essentially a straight remake of the game, but updated to reflect the then-current hardware constraints of the post window-95 world. The game retains the essential political and social perspective of the original game, but with a more elegant skin.
Civ III [2001] was an inflection point; introducing new game concepts which forever altered the telos of the game to reflect the changed underlying assumptions of the creators of the game. Strategic resources, ethnic citizens, stable diplomacy, culture, & non-conquest victory.
The 18th century frame on international relations is gone, replaced with a post-war American anti-colonial frame.
- It's a net-drag to conquer more than ~25% of the globe
- Stable peaceful relations are possible
- resources are scarce and a key cause of war
- Nations form coalitions to resist domination against aggressive players, even if the aggressive player is not the human player.
- Nations consider whether they can win before declaring war.
- Most games end in cultural victory or world government by the UN.
Civ IV [2005] begins is another substantial change in the franchise, ending the "reign of quantity" as the basic principle by which the game is organized through the introduction of real penalties for scale and the concept of "great people".
Civilization IV fundamentally disrupted the assumption of the three previous games that all great nations must control large territories in order to be able to control enough strategic resources and generate enough commerce to remain competitive.
With the addition of religion and diplomatic pledges; Civ 4 game had well begun it's transition into a game of politics and international relations instead of a game of industrial scale and conquest.
Civ 5 made two profound changes that ended the game as previously known forever. Cities defend themselves without the need to muster troops, and units cannot stack constraining dramatically the value of having a large army.
Civ 5 also has the distinction of being the first genuinely bad game in the series. A game with a user interface that is way less information dense, and with a real dedication to a number of mechanics that are totally irrelevant to the outcome of the game (e.g. religion).
Civilization 6 is less an actual game than it is a propaganda art-form designed to express to it's use that the world is constrained by geography which necessitates planning and the voluntary choice not to pursue the 4 x's that were the foundation of the genre. An utter disgrace.
When looked at in totality, you can see the fingerprints of the change in culture of the designers. The men that created Civ I were unapologetically part of the Faustian Western tradition. Civ 6 was created by men who completely disconnected from that tradition.
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Game of Thrones is, in many regards, the era-defining artistic achievement of the period between '08 and '21 in the GAE. It tells the story of the collapse of belief in a political formula into Machiavellian politics, and the rivers of blood that the collapse presages.
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The story lives in the shadow of the untold story of how Robert Baratheon assembled a monarchy by strength of the sword; and how that monarchy has descended into a degenerate oligarchy.
This an artistic rendering of FDR --> Obama
We enter into the story right in a moment of crisis within the oligarchy; We watch an absolutely perfect artistic picture of that oligarchy shredding it's legitimacy via the internal struggle for power through the eyes of a man of honor.
In 1999, Henry S. Rowen wrote an article for the Hoover Institution arguing that China would inevitably become a Western Democratic Country, his target date was between 2015 & 2019.
The failure of the GAE to assimilate China is the defining characteristic of modern geopolitics.
From the day that Bush Sr. made the New World Order speech in 1991; the US ran it's largest, most aggressive program to forcibly integrate China into the GAE. 4 prongs: 1) US Investment 2) Anticolonialism 3) Special Economic Zones 4) Left wing academic/street activism
This comprehensive program totally failed; with political power reconsolidating in the CCP under Xi Jinping, economic decoupling, and the alignment of China & Russia in opposition to the geopolitical goals of the US in Asia.
People think that Justin Trudeau is stupid, but he possesses the animal cunning of a consumate survivor. If the world ever experiences a nuclear holocaust, he will be Prime Minister of the cockroaches making them fly little rainbow flag and importing Indian cockroaches.
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6-9 months ago, Trudeau was facing political extinction. He had a caucus rovolt on his hands attempting to displace him as LPC leader, was facing insurmountable poll numbers, and a rebellion from the donor class because of asset price deflation.
Trudeau has moved to address each one of these concerns. First, to get his MP's back in line the Canadian intelligence publically reported that dozens of MP's, mostly his own party, are acting as foreign agents [and guilty of treaason]. A step against Trudeau could mean prosecution.
There is no one cultural shit-lib cultural artifact that speaks to me of the change in the leadership class of the American Empire than Star Trek; This thread will explore this parallel transformation below:
Star Trek's history can be divided into 5 major phases;
Star Trek "Progress"
Star Trek "Cold Warrior"
Star Trek "Science"
Star Trek "Transition"
Star Trek "DEI/Collapse"
The Original Series of Star Trek is the embodyment of self-confident Progressivism. It's about a band of wise brothers served by a support staff of attractive women conquering the galaxy by their inherant superiority in all respects. Absolutely secure in their moral judgements.
"Star Trek Progress"
The people of the American Empire today live haunted by the ashes of futures which were promised, but never materialized. This thread will review some of these unrealized dreams, which haunt us today.
The first of these unrealized dreams was a world order where nations remained sovereign & distinct, but took joy in mutual appreciation and cooperation and resolved their differences through negotiation and international instructions the UN, WTO, and ICC.
After 70 years of "the post war order", it is obvious to just about everyone that this vision has failed on all counts, and that the law of nations remains unaltered. The Nomos of the earth has prevailed over the well-laid plans of the great men of the American century.
Last night @AuronMacintyre & @OGRolandRat crossed paths on an episode of Cigar Stream. As Auron goes around and does the circuit of podcasts to sell the book, this is the one you should listen to. AA interrogates the work in a way others simply will not.
Here are my thoughts:
Auron MacIntyre hits hard in this episode what I most appreciate about him as a thinker; the difference between deconstruction for it's own sake, and the effort to re-nest the deeply held values of his people in institutions which will give life to those values.
Auron explains that he felt it necessary to point out in exhaustive detail that the power in the constitution exists in the men who value it as sacred rather than in the constitution itself in order to encourage his target audience to become worthy of sovereignty.