I recently watched Designated Survivor: 60 Days which I felt was decent on this topic. Spoilers for the first couple of episodes:

But this was 2019, during the Moon Jae-In presidency and the attempts at reconciliation then, so maybe this was just reflective of the political climate at the time.

one of my favorite bits in Freeman’s Mind is him rationalizing the batshit level design as Black Mesa making sure to fully spend its budget

“If we don’t spend a billion dollars one year, then we don’t get a billion dollars the next year. And if we don’t get a billion dollars the next year, then we have to go and spend more money on lobbyists to get the laws changed so that we get our billion dollars the year after that! … in the long run it’s probably faster and cheaper just to build a giant nutcracker, write it off and be done with it.”

yeah, I think the idea was to achieve ambidextrous controls without having to double the controls on both sides of the gun (as you would need to with a more typical thumb safety/selector), but it doesn’t seem to have caught on outside of these two specific FN guns

Love the Half-Life games, although I definitely prefer 2 over 1. I dunno, I’ve never really got the takes that the games are outdated, I really wish I lived in the world where they were because I’d fucking love to have more games like this, but I really don’t see anything that has surpassed HL2 (I can see it to some extent with HL1), there’s just something about it. Even with the whole boomer shooter trend, most games seem to be taking inspiration from the earlier generation of shooters, few true HL2-style games around.

Black Mesa’s alright, but I really don’t like a lot of the changes that were made. Never understood the On A Rail hate (especially when, like, Residue Processing exists, no way On A Rail is worse than endless fucking conveyor belts), I actually genuinely love all the vehicle segments and wish more games had that “road-trip where you occasionally stop to explore a little or deal with something blocking the path” vibe, Metro: Last Light had its own On A Rail style section and it was pretty good. So that getting cut down was kind of annoying, and Xen I just really don’t like - it drags way worse than the original ever did, that one cable puzzle just comes up again and again, and aesthetically, while the whole space jungle thing is kind of neat (and the “Sauron-eye tower as landmark to indicate how close you are to the end” is really cool, although of course HL2 did that with the Citadel too to some extent, but I just love shit like that, give me less minimaps with objective markers and more massive towers for me to inch towards), the barren wasteland (or really, little pockets of floating mini-wastelands) of the original Xen makes it feel so much more unique, and, well, alien. I’ve had several Black Mesa playthroughs which just fizzle out at that point - maybe the final section is better, but I’ve played through it so few times because my spirit was drained by cable puzzles that I can’t really comment on what happens there.

How about other mods? There’s just so much amazing stuff, HL1 in particular basically has several extra expansion packs thanks to mods - Echoes, Field Intensity and Delta Particles are all amazing and I would pretty much consider them on the level of the actual expansions (maybe even better than Blue Shift, tbh), maybe short of voice acting but that’s understandable for free mods. Plenty of great stuff for HL2 as well.

far better military protection for the people of Canada

PROTECTION FROM WHO, DONALD

I love the random capitalization too, Lumber folks, we’re going to have so much Lumber , more Lumber than you’ve ever seen before

“I see… so that’s what the signal is” is still my favorite bit from this video, I chuckle every time

Yep! They’ve really got everything there (not sure if many SMGs have made it to Yemen though, there might not be much interest in smaller weapons if basically everyone can get an AK… you can get a PPSh though)

Belgium and Portugal have adopted it as their service rifles, plus lots of smaller contracts here and there for various special forces and police units: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FN_SCAR#Users. The SCAR-H also seems some use, mainly in its DMR variants - the French for example adopted it to replace their Cold War-era sniper rifles.

But in the US civilian market, yes, it’s not that popular (but that’s generally the case for anything that’s not an AR-15 - import restrictions mean stuff costs a lot more that it’s supposed to, so a lot of European manufacturers’ rifles that were designed as cheap mass-adoption items instead end up as essentially boutique products, at which point the price isn’t really justifiable for anyone who’s not a collector)

There seems to be a 1950 marking on the receiver, which would preclude it from being a non-Soviet AK.

Chinese AKs also have a fully-hooded front sight, as opposed to the semi-hooded one on most other AKs, that’s one of the main ways to tell them apart since it’s pretty unique feature

the peak in STALKER

the '80s-90s really were such a good time for gun aesthetics, it’s been all downhill since the quad-rail was invented

Yeah, it’s a compact variant of the QSZ-92, which would be the full-length USP in this analogy. It’s pretty neat, it’s also got a relatively unique rotating barrel setup, rather than the Browning tilting barrel seen on the vast majority of modern pistols.

I concur with the other comments that it’s some kind of custom job (although it doesn’t have to be Khyber Pass specifically, Iraqi & Syrian gunsmiths do cool stuff as well) - the gas tube is way too short, the handguard’s a bit shorter too, there’s… something going on with the rear sight, and the magazine looks off as well (although I’m not sure if it’s 7.62x25 exactly, maybe 8mm Kurz? Dunno)

nope, it’s 5.56, it’s just the peculiar Beta C-Mag style of drum (which is actually two drums that combine into a single straight magazine section)

It could be that, but it might also just be a holdover from the then-current style of stock designs, meant for rifles which didn’t have a separate pistol grip. Tokarev’s prototype from this same period is one of the most egregious, it’s basically just an SVT with a pistol grip tacked on (and converted to 7.62x39mm, of course), leaving that part of the stock pretty much pointless

I feel like the protrusion here is a bit too small, some examples of proper machine guns with stocks meant for you to hold on for contrast:

It could be that for the prototype itself, the designers were just using existing materials (like, they just took a stock from another gun they had lying around the workshop), and this would have been changed had the gun gone further into trials - for example, Bulkin’s entry starts out with a stock with a lump like Kuzmishchev’s, and gets a straighter stock (much like the one the AK has) later on:

huh, apparently: https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/DS-1_Orbital_Battle_Station#Imperial_construction

Star Wars lore really has everything covered, I guess… also what:

The project dragged out over nineteen years as labor union disputes along with the supply and design problems slowed the construction

uh… good on the Empire for still having unions, I guess (do not hand it to 'em for the slavery though)? I love how this project is simultaneously using both slaves and unionized workers

I think the meme was made mostly in response to the “the Rebels were actually evil for blowing it up because of all the innocent workers on board” takes, by the Battle of Yavin there probably weren’t any Wookiee slaves still hanging around

https://xcancel.com/BrianJBerletic/status/1862865293284192720

Regarding Syria:

1. Maintain perspective - as bad as the worst case scenario may seem, Syria had previously been almost entirely overrun before Russia’s intervention in 2015 including fighting in and around Damascus itself;

2. This is going to shape Russia’s calculus regarding Ukraine - clearly any deals made with Western proxies to freeze a conflict toward “peace” will only be used to prepare for more war;

3. Russia/Syria still maintain an advantage in military aviation, taking a heavy toll out on advancing US-backed terrorists - a factor that played heavily in their defeat leading up to the long-standing freeze in the first place;

4. Escalation in Syria is going to stretch Russia, Syria, and Iran, but also the US and its allies;

5. Only time will tell how this plays out, no one should assume one way or the other unless compelling evidence emerges - opensource information only gives part of the picture;

https://xcancel.com/BrianJBerletic/status/1863068727337710071

• be very careful with information coming out. US-backed terrorists use disinformation as a weapon. Believe nothing until it is confirmed;

• That doesn’t mean the situation is not dire, but wait for reliable information before drawing conclusions;

• AGAIN - be VERY careful with “opensource” photos/videos which do not provide a full picture of the situation;

• It is very easy to stage a scene and then post it making claims that do not reflect reality, if the Ukrainians do this, surely US-proxies elsewhere can;

• Do not panic. Much of the US’ success depends on psychologically overwhelming opponents. Panic aids terrorists and their US sponsors;

• Criticizing the Syrian military for withdrawing is easy to do from a comfortable desk chair. Unless you are on the front holding your part of the line, don’t complain about those who are not;

• There are many legitimate reasons why the Syrian army would withdraw from certain areas, just as the Russian army withdrew in 2022 from Kharkov and Kherson, it does not signify the end of the war;

It might actually be a magazine, this other picture doesn’t seem to have anything sticking out:

but it’s definitely not the normal magazine that would be used, that one would be (rather ridiculously long):

“for when you go to the range and want to shoot EXACTLY <small-number> rounds” magazines do actually exist - they’re meant for the early stage of development, when you’re testing the purely mechanical aspects of the gun’s accuracy (so, not the ergonomic aspect of how a real person aims it and controls the recoil, just “does the barrel stabilize the bullet enough”, things like that, and also “will it not blow up when firing” if you happen to be developing a whole new cartridge), and will have the gun locked in some kind of vise, where a long magazine sticking out the bottom can be very inconvenient

it’s an internal magazine loaded via stripper clip, like the C96 Mauser, but in a much more inconvenient spot (hence why it’s so tall):

Gotta be Pripyat in Call of Pripyat, it’s maybe a bit too empty, but that adds to the atmosphere to some extent. That’s something I actually really appreciate about CoP, it doesn’t feel the need to throw enemies at you nearly everywhere you go, it’s content to just let you wander around a pretty much empty factory complex and jump at shadows.

Limansk from Clear Sky I like conceptually, but the actual level in-game is mostly a linear shooting gallery, unfortunately. But still, I’m just a sucker for exploring decaying urban environments