Results 61 to 90 of 1485
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2017-08-05, 02:08 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2015
- Location
- Berlin
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
The meaning of "Student Loan" is a bit different around here and has nothing to do with the "tuition fee" of private universities. As a student, you can get a loan that will cover your basic cost of living during the time you study, if it is necessary, like for example when you have to move to another city and can´t continue living with your parents.
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2017-08-05, 02:48 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2015
- Location
- San Francisco Bay area
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
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2017-08-06, 01:29 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2009
- Location
- Sweden
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Furthermore, the size of our loans tend to be an order of magnitude smaller when we don't have to pay for our university studies. After five years of studies with full loans*, I have roughly 40'000 USD in debt, and the interest rate is really low as well.
*Swedish study loans are issued by the state, so there's an upper limit to how much you're allowed to borrow every year.Clouddreamer Teddy by me, high above the world, far beyond its matters...
Spoiler: Banner by Vrythas
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2017-08-06, 02:03 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2015
- Location
- San Francisco Bay area
- Gender
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2017-08-06, 02:20 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2010
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Hail to the Lord of Death and Destruction!
CATNIP FOR THE CAT GOD! YARN FOR THE YARN THRONE! MILK FOR THE MILK BOWL!
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2017-08-06, 03:12 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2015
- Location
- Berlin
- Gender
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2017-08-06, 03:17 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2010
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2017-08-06, 07:47 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2015
- Location
- San Francisco Bay area
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Why so little?
The closest major university to me is in Berkeley, were the average monthly rent for a studio apartment is $2,004. Even if you move back in with your parents 3 months out of the year, your still looking at over $72,000 over 4 years in rent alone.
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2017-08-06, 07:56 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2012
- Location
- The Algol System
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
1) California's cost of living is outrageous, and not really indicative of the rest of the country.
2) Studio apartments are the most expensive way to house yourself. You could easily cut that in half with a flatmate or two, and I wouldn't be surprised if you could find somewhere reasonable to live for ~600-800/month.Avatar by FinnLassie
A few odds and ends.
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2017-08-06, 08:25 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2010
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
I suspect very few people are entirely covering the cost on their own, either. A lot of people have parents helping them out. If your income is lower or you're considered independent, there's often grants or scholarships available. Lots of academic ones too (I went to college on a 60% of tuition scholarship).
Hail to the Lord of Death and Destruction!
CATNIP FOR THE CAT GOD! YARN FOR THE YARN THRONE! MILK FOR THE MILK BOWL!
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2017-08-06, 08:27 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2015
- Location
- San Francisco Bay area
- Gender
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2017-08-06, 11:47 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2009
- Location
- Sweden
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
For five years of studies? I've been deceived...
Over here, at least the idea is that no one should have to help you out, and parental help is mostly just spoken of when the housing market is brought into question (the Swedish housing market is what you would expect of a country with larger cities, so especially freshmen moving away from family into one of the larger cities may meet a lot of trouble finding somewhere to live). Oh, and while scholarships do exist, they're mostly a remnant from the time before education became state funded, our meant to cover some odd expense not covered by the regular system.
ION:
Vacation over for this summer, so it's back to early mornings and long commuting times. Oh poor sleep numbness, how I've missed you~
It's a joke, of course, and its not like I haven't been treating my sleep pretty bad during these past four weeks either, but this specific sense of general numbness is something special for workdays, and while feeling fully rested is preferable, the sensation of perfect clarity on all your body's tiny shortcomings can be a bit jarring.Clouddreamer Teddy by me, high above the world, far beyond its matters...
Spoiler: Banner by Vrythas
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2017-08-07, 04:40 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2011
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
And here I am, having walked out of a five-year University degree with 0 debt to my name...
No parental help either. Monetary help, anyway. But I'm willing to admit that I'm definitely in the minority, even over here.
Mandatory leave at my company, now. So I guess I'm taking the next 4 months' worth of Fridays off. Sometimes it's not so bad, being meAwesome fremetar by wxdruid.
From the discomfort of truth there is only one refuge and that is ignorance. I do not need to be comfortable, and I will not take refuge. I demand to *know*.
So I guess I have an internets? | And a trophy. | And a music cookie (whatever that is).
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2017-08-07, 04:47 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2017
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
this is a public forum, where the current topic is nicely recorded for you, and not a conversation where you could have missed the beginning, please refrain from asking something to the effect of "What's the topic?". Please take the time to read up a bit first.very post should contain two visible, legible complete sentences, Subject and Predicate. C'mon, make your old English teachers proud.
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2017-08-07, 06:13 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2012
- Location
- Aldain
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Scientific Name: Wombous apocolypticus | Diet: Apocolypse Pie | Cuddly: Yes
World Building Projects:
Magic: The Stuff of Sentience | Fate: The Fabric of Physics | Luck: The Basis of Biology
Order of the Stick Projects:
Annotation of the Comic | Magic Compendium of the Comic | Transcription of the Comic
Dad-a-chum? Dum-a-chum? Ded-a-chek? Did-a-chick?
Extended Signature | My DeviantArt | Majora's Mask Point Race
(you can't take the sky from me)
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2017-08-07, 06:25 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2007
- Location
- Manchester, UK
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
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2017-08-07, 06:30 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2012
- Location
- Aldain
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Scientific Name: Wombous apocolypticus | Diet: Apocolypse Pie | Cuddly: Yes
World Building Projects:
Magic: The Stuff of Sentience | Fate: The Fabric of Physics | Luck: The Basis of Biology
Order of the Stick Projects:
Annotation of the Comic | Magic Compendium of the Comic | Transcription of the Comic
Dad-a-chum? Dum-a-chum? Ded-a-chek? Did-a-chick?
Extended Signature | My DeviantArt | Majora's Mask Point Race
(you can't take the sky from me)
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2017-08-07, 07:06 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2015
- Location
- Berlin
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
*Dark Laughter*
Prior to reforms, I did my time in the Master/Apprentice Programm, which used to be a cornerstone of German education until the Bologna Reform killed it.
At age 15, started my apprenticeship in Advertisement and finished that with a Master Craftsmen´s degree in PR, which enabled me for advanced learning and a "Master Loan", which I spent on a BA in Economics (Part Time), later went on a privat university for a MA in Politics (Part Time). Right now, I´m looking towards booking a part time course in what I actually Love, which is Philosophy.
Honestly, I´m tired right now. At age 38, I´m working more than 20 continuous years, started my solo-entrepreneurship and advanced that to a mid-sized company. And no end in sight, neither in learning nor in achievement.
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2017-08-07, 08:11 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2015
- Location
- San Francisco Bay area
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Probably not something we may discus much in depth here, but I've been interested in Germany's educational system since I read Thomas Geoghegan's Were You Born on the Wrong Continent?, and I'd be interested in learning more, unfortunately of the German I tried to learn when I was in High School in the 1980's, I can remember how to ask where Alois lives ("Wo wohnt Alois?"), but almost nothing else.
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2017-08-07, 08:51 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2010
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
My mum has expressed interest in playing video games. She doesn't have a clue. Any recommendations for a starting point? I was going to start off with Shovel Knight, nice and simple base mechanics.
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2017-08-07, 09:02 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2007
- Location
- Manchester, UK
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Nice and simple base mechanics, maybe, but requiring good twitch reflexes and can be very hard in places? Not sure that's a good first choice. Also, without knowing what she likes, very hard to give an answer--I know for sure if my first experience of video games had been a platformer I'd probably not still be playing them forty years later!
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2017-08-07, 09:17 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2011
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
The Sims, yo. It's basically Entry Level, the game. Plus it's addictive as hell.
Awesome fremetar by wxdruid.
From the discomfort of truth there is only one refuge and that is ignorance. I do not need to be comfortable, and I will not take refuge. I demand to *know*.
So I guess I have an internets? | And a trophy. | And a music cookie (whatever that is).
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2017-08-07, 11:09 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2009
- Location
- Sweden
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Believe it or not, I actually consider myself better off finacially for having taken those loans even though I lived with my family for most of my studies and didn't need the extra money. Since the interest rate was lower than you could get on a good bank account when I started (the latter has gone down since), I just piped the money from the former into the latter and called it a financial buffer. It'll come in handy when I get around to buying my first apartment, since a mortgage only is allowed to cover 85% of the buying price over here.
Nice! Almost as good as we have it here.
Ooof, that sounds painful...
You have my sympathies. Before I even could get back to work, I had to kick my sleep schedule back by 6 hours in one go. Then I had to figure out what I was doing before my leave, only to realise I only had the harest parts of my project left, and none of the people I need to discuss them with have returned yet. I ended up spending most of my day staring at the screen wishing my office chair was a bed while my program ran a multi-hour test suit...Clouddreamer Teddy by me, high above the world, far beyond its matters...
Spoiler: Banner by Vrythas
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2017-08-07, 06:51 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2015
- Location
- Berlin
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Our educational system is falling apart right now, due to EU-wide standardization and our politicians not being able to enact meaningful reforms to mesh the old and the new standards.
Basically, after Kindergarten and 4 years of elementary school, you have to chose one of 3 possible tracks: Worker school, middle class school, upper class school. (I´m using the old names for this, and yes, they reflect some of the inherent inequality of it).
- Worker School takes 5 years, gives broad education and is aimed to qualify for formal apprenticeship.
- Middle School takes 6 years, adds a specialized track (arts, economics, social..) and should aim to qualify either for formal apprenticeship or a focused upper school track.
- Upper school takes either 8 or 9 years, has a broad specialized track (math, physics, linguistics..) and should prepare for university.
(Special cases: Focused Upper School takes 2 years and 1 mandatory year of internship and also aims to prepare for university. Trade School can take 2 or 3 years and is either accompanying an apprenticeship or attended in "evening school" to expand upon an existing apprenticeship.)
When I write "formal apprenticeship", I mean what we call the "dual system". Companies and the educational system work together to train the workforce to an acceptable minimum standard. This always takes the form of a 3 years employment contract for hands-on experience, interspersed by formal education in "trade school" for broader work-related knowledge.
With two years of actual work experience, you can start training as a "Master Craftsman", which is basically lower management training, coupled with the basics of business laws, taxation, work-place security, accounting and certification to run certain kinds of businesses that are sensitive/freelance in them, as well as opening up the possibility for either focused upper school or university.
We don´t know the concept of "unskilled labor". Everyone has to go through the "dual system", from janitors to accountants, from a waitress to a nurse.
Important to talk about, because that also affects how universities used to function. With that high standard for workforce education, we skipped the "Bachelor" as unnecessary and you could only aim straight for a Master degree or drop out.
Now with the Bologna Reforms and the EU-wide standardization, we´ve got a problem. A lot of things that were part of the formal "dual system" are now also available as an Bachelor course. Right now you can be an apprenticed nurse or an studied nurse. That´s getting problematic, because the later counts as academics, en par with the former Focused Upper School model, but is far away from the actual work-related knowledge we came to expect from anyone coming up thru the apprentice system.
That leads to a related problem. Previously, "Trainee" programs were unnecessary because every non-student already came with 3 to 5 years of work experience.
Personally, I´m pretty unsatisfied with the situation.
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2017-08-07, 07:34 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2012
- Location
- In Orbit
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
=(
Lame. Hope things get better for you though.
I'd say go with something that she thinks is cool/fun looking maybe? I don't think focusing /too/ much on whether the mechanics are newbie friendly is necessarily as important because a lot of games (that I've played at least) have a forgiving difficulty setting anyway. Even Starcraft for example (though I think the first game is rather fidgety).
Some of my first video games were rpgs like Zelda, Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy and random shorter multiplayer hotseat games like Worms. They weren't too difficult for me and caught my attention well because I liked the story and world of the RPGs and the goofiness and social part of Worms.
I'm sure you'll also be able to find something your mum likes. =)I go by they/them/their or he/him/his pronouns
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2017-08-07, 08:04 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2010
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Hm. Further thought... I think most of her reasoning is that she knows I play games, and am interested in making them, and, well, she's my mum. Family connection, et cetera. If there's anything more specific it's things I've talked about regarding how playing a game can get a feeling or a story or an experience across very differently than books or films.
Except I can't think of any games that do that well and sufficiently front-loaded, because the really good moments can never come until you've had at least a few hours to get to know the characters so you care when something happens to them, or the mechanics so a change in them hits hard. Usually in RPGs the first one is the climax of the first act. The only game that comes to mind where that's not several hours in is Undertale, which relies very heavily on the player already knowing how JRPGs traditionally work. RPGs also seem like a hard place to start for someone who hasn't even got the feel of a game controller yet.
(Also, I currently only have access to a 3ds and a Switch)
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2017-08-08, 01:53 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2007
- Location
- Manchester, UK
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Bastion? It's a fairly simple game mechanically, it'll teach her some stuff about how RPGs work, and the story is being constantly fed to you by narration that changes according to what you're doing. It also looks beautiful if you like that sort of cartoony style. When you say you only have a 3DS and a Switch, though, do you really not have any sort of PC?
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2017-08-08, 02:59 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2011
- Location
- Canada
- Gender
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
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2017-08-08, 03:20 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2014
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Or rather, a PC that has good processing power to run games? Lag can artifically increase the difficulty of any game.
If you have a smartphone, how about mobile games? They tend to be geared towards casual gamers, and a good app won't force you to wait X hours for more energy to continue playing or somesuch.Last edited by goto124; 2017-08-08 at 03:20 AM.
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2017-08-08, 04:04 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Apr 2013
- Location
- Uusimaa
Re: Dark Shadow's Surprisingly Well-Lit Random Banter #217
Qwertystop:
Hidden Object Games. Full of puzzles, always has some sort of a mystery solving story behind it and most often has a female protagonist which might be a helpful thing when getting into games as a woman. The back stories are definitely clichés, but I personally find them extremely entertaining. Point & Click is a good start.Originally Posted by LaZodiac