brandonsh avatar

brandonsh

@brandonsh@kbin.social
brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

What are you defining as childhood in this case? I started writing a little bit, but ended up breaking up my response into different ages. My memory might be a little fuzzy, but here goes:

In elementary school, some of the most important games I played were X-Wing/TIE Fighter, Wolfenstein 3D, Super Metroid, Mega Man X, and Pokรฉmon Red (at least off the top of my head). I loved getting lost in the different worlds, and Super Metroid in particular was really cool because it seemed like there were so many secrets waiting to be discovered. Pokรฉmon Red launched when I was at pretty much exactly the right age to catch the wave, and I took a lot of pride in grinding out levels for my Pokรฉmon so I could win battles against friends. Ever used a game link cable?

Around middle school, Perfect Dark came out and I basically played it for an entire summer. Practicing against bots and playing co-op multiplayer against them was a lot of fun, and I also ran through the campaign cooperatively a bunch of times with my best friend. Smash Bros Melee was also a great one, and Rogue Leader blew away any previous expectations I had about graphics in video games.

In high school, I got hooked on Phantasy Star Online after borrowing my friend's Dreamcast for a week or so. I never got a Dreamcast, but I picked up the GameCube version and the broadband adapter so I could play online. By the time I stopped playing, I had a couple memory cards with four characters each. My main character had well over 2,000 hours, and all of them had at least a few hundred. The chase for loot, the grind to level up, and the silliness of playing online (look up PSO symbol chat) captivated me like no other game I had tried to that point.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Cowboy Bebop was the first thing that came to mind, but now I'm wondering how many modern shows actually have banger intros that we all automatically skip.

dansup, to kbin
@dansup@mastodon.social avatar

Excited to start my mobile app this week!

It will be open source from the start, and I'll be blogging about each daily milestone and the behind the scenes of development.

It will be a nice change from my usual workflow, and maybe I'll get better at blogging ๐Ÿ˜

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

@dansup Will this be for iOS, Android, or both?

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

@midgephoto Kbin is a link aggregator/microblogging platform for the fediverse. It's most similar to Lemmy, but also features some Mastodon-like functionality. I personally like the interface more than Lemmy so far, but YMMV.

The official instance is at https://kbin.social/, and the project page is at https://kbin.pub/.

@dansup

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Just did that for the first time yesterday, actually!

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Kbin reminds me so much of what I loved about Reddit when I first joined 14 years ago. Is anyone else struck by the complete lack of ads on any of these instances? Itโ€™s crazy how quickly almost everything loads.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Oh, I've been a uBlock Origin user for years. On the desktop, at least, it's just neat to see the adblocker sitting idle for once.

BasicAppleGuy, to random
@BasicAppleGuy@mastodon.social avatar

To Beta or not to Beta?

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

@BasicAppleGuy I go through this every year. In a few weeks, I'm due to install the beta on my iPad and immediately regret messing with what was my most stable device. The annual tradition!

/kbin server update - or how the server didn't blow up

Currently, on the main instance, people have created 40191 accounts (+214 marked as deleted). I don't know how many are active because I don't monitor it, but once again, I greet all of you here :) In recent days, the traffic on the website has been overwhelming. It's definitely too much for the basic docker-compose setup,...

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Thanks for the update, and keep up the amazing work!

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Thereโ€™s probably a large percentage of Reddit users that are still getting everything theyโ€™re looking for with the official app and whatโ€™s left of the site. Quick hits of memes are fun, and I do take some pleasure in correctly guessing the top comments in a thread.

The level of conversation on Kbin/Lemmy reminds me more of what old Reddit used to be like back in the day, and I think Iโ€™m okay with that being a smaller community than Reddit at large. I keep reminding myself and others that these communities donโ€™t ever need to be as big as Reddit, they just need to be big enough.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

The GameCube controllers are probably my all-time favorite, but honorable mention goes to Dreamcast. Only thing missing was a second analog stick and those would've been pretty close to modern.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Safari for anything personal (for easy sync with my other devices), and Edge for work stuff. Safari meets all my basic needs in a browser, and iCloud Keychain has been great.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

I've noticed something similar a couple times so far. When I check my notifications I can see when new replies show up, but sometimes when I click into the thread, the reply isn't visible anywhere. I can browse to the user's profile and see their comment on the feed, so I know it exists somewhere.

Definitely smells like a bug, but I'm not sure where to officially report stuff like that.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Hey, it just happened again! I had to click through to your profile page to see your full comment.

Bugs aside, I'm really happy with the overall Kbin experience so far.

spicy_biscuits, to RedditMigration
spicy_biscuits avatar

Sup y'all, newest arrival from the Reddit exodus here :D

Been lurking for a coupla days to check you guys out and get my bearings, now I'm here and I figured I'd say hi officially ๐Ÿ˜Š

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

@spicy_biscuits Welcome aboard!

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Back in high school, I had an older friend that got me into Phantasy Star Online. I have absolutely amazing memories when I'd head over to his place and we'd hop online in split-screen to clear some levels and look for gear. Can't forget the copious amounts of Code Red and Domino's pizza!

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Self-hosting will give you the most control, and 30GB really isn't all that much data in the grand scheme of things. I haven't done much research into it yet, but I've also seen PixelFed listed as an option for image sharing on the fediverse.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Have stories ready, and try to use the STAR method of explaining them. You can search for 'STAR method' on your favorite search engine and you'll find plenty of articles about it, but here's a quick summary:

The STAR method is a popular technique used in job interviews. It provides a structured framework for answering questions by focusing on four key elements: Situation, Task, Action, and Result. By describing the situation you encountered, explaining the task at hand, detailing the actions you took, and sharing the outcome or results, you can provide a concise and effective response that showcases your skills and experiences. This method helps interviewers gain a clear understanding of your capabilities and problem-solving abilities.

Aside from that, I always remind myself that I'm interviewing them as much as they're interviewing me. I don't want to work at a shitty company with shitty people, so I'm going to try and find out as much about their culture as possible.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Gotta be TIE Fighter. X-Wing was great too, but TIE Fighter scored extra novelty points for letting us play as Imperials.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

Your comment totally gave me a flashback. I was always fascinated by the huge ships in the X-Wing/TIE Fighter games, and I spent soooo much time daydreaming about those games in elementary school. No internet required, just imagination!

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

That looks incredible, thanks for the link!

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

The redesign seems fine, but it's definitely a little half-assed. Did anyone else notice the iOS-inspired toggles in settings? Still, it's really nice to see some movement on the design after years of looking almost completely the same. Almost everything looks pretty modern now, it's just inconsistent.

brandonsh,
brandonsh avatar

I've been trying Kbin more the past couple days, and I'm really liking it a lot more now that I understand what's going on. Seems like it might be helpful if there was a quick (optional) onboarding process for new users to point out the basics of the interface and how to find content.

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