Comment by affiliate@lemmy.world on Anon is a nostalgic gamer

we have successfully urbanized online games. the days of a small town feeling in new online games are over

I don’t think urbanised is a good word to describe that alienation. The urbanism movement has as one of its key goals the creation of more vibrant local communities. It’s more like suburbanism.

The urbanism movement exists to help remedy some of the downsides of urban living. One of which is social alienation and isolation as a result of the scale and diversity of cities.

No, it exists to fix the problems caused by car-dependent suburbia. Inner cities can have problems too, but a lot of those are created by cities wanting to support suburban commuters rather than the local community.

Suburbia came into being as a result of urban dysfunction. Cities have existed and had problems since long before cars were invented. People nowadays really love to blame everything on cars lmao, if only it were that simple

Cities were literally demolished to run highways through them, cutting right through vibrant communities to do so. Auto companies lobbied governments and ran public relations campaigns to change the law and societal mores to make car-centric infrastructure and norms the only way things are done. Ripping up public transport, inventing the concept of “jaywalking” (itself just a form of car-centric victim blaming), and banning the building of more people-friendly communities through strict Euclidean zoning.

Did you forget to respond to my point? Are you suggesting that cities were happy, egalitarian communes prior to the invention of the automobile? Slums and tenement housing would seem to indicate otherwise.

Highways were constructed because it provided an economic advantage to do so. A city without car infrastructure is not economically viable. With more advanced transportation and communication technology, we will eventually supercede the automobile, but to delude yourself into thinking that it was an arbitrary development is silly. There are many negative externalities caused by automobiles, just as there are many negative externalities caused by electricity. That doesn’t negate the advantages.

But regardless, the social dynamics of cities predate such problems; even if we reverted to a pre-car culture cities would still be lonely, violent places for some. They would still be the engines of inequality and hierarchy, because they are the hubs of the economic system.

Lmao started reading not loving yr usage of urbanized (still probs not the best term…), however you really are outlining much of what was so classist, and very much racist, about city development. I wouldnt justify the guy you’re replying to with a reply

what i meant by “urbanized” is that these days, playing online games feels like living in a big city where there are a ton of people but it’s hard to feel like you know everyone. you can still make a group of friends and find “local communities”, but i think that’s distinctly different from the feeling of a small town where you know a lot of the people there.

all that being said, there are advantages to living in a big city instead of a small town. in this context, that would look like faster matchmaking times, making it easier to find a full server, etc. but i still wish games gave you the option of picking a community server. i miss having the option of joining custom servers and getting to know the locals.

IMO games should support picking a community server if only for archival purposes once the official servers are taken offline.

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