A city-building game in which the city would prefer you didn't(housing.over.pizza) |
A city-building game in which the city would prefer you didn't(housing.over.pizza) |
"Trigger warning", old fart rant: As someone who downloaded, over 28.8K modem, a version of the Jargon File (1) as a plain text file (2) to read during a school vacation, in the "good old days" of my imagination Silicon Valley was a lot cooler for hackers. But people noticed it was a place to make money, and all the money-hungry MBAs showed up, and now the whole industry has a stench to it..
(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jargon_File (2) https://jargon-file.org/archive/jargon-4.4.7.dos.txt
> Every rule, vote count and case in this game is drawn from the public record. Sources are in docs/research/ in the project folder. Neighborhood politics scores and the economics are simplified for play.
Nice, I'm happy to hear that, Claude. This kind of silly game is supposed to help you understand a complex issue in a fun way. But this is missing the plot entirely. Why is this so overwhelmingly complex? Why would I spend time learning this ugly, convoluted and verbose UI? Who is this for??
EDIT: I'll link to an example of what I think this game should have been: https://research.wmz.ninja/projects/phd/index.html
A game made with intent, that is easy to pick up, respects its player's time, and makes its point effectively.
Like most vibe coded projects, it is for the person who created it. And usually only them.
There's no reason a "housing crisis" game couldn't have been done like that, with simple choices and immediate reactions. A game that respects the player's time, is easy to pick up and makes the point effectively.
Locked supply. Affordable housing. Growing standards of living (or population). Pick two.
If you lock supply and want taxes and wages to grow, you're choosing unaffordable housing. That's San Francisco's current policy choice. Over decades, it filters the poor to San Francisco's "outer boroughs" or onto its streets.
For what it's worth, my friends who lived in San Francisco "took the hint" and moved out when they chose to have kids. They didn't sell their place, however, since the above policy mix together with California's property-tax system strongly disincentivizes that.