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Comment by paxys | Hacker News Reader

This looks like something I'll have an absolute blast with for a few hours and then keep away in a drawer and never touch again.

Although if your product's target market is rich nerds that's a great strategy.

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I think the slow drip of games will prevent this initially, as you’ll pick it up again every week or two to play whatever new titles drop in, even if only for an hour or two. I think by the end of the “season” there’ll be a decent number of other whacky little titles from other developers that will be worth checking out for short bursts of play as well. I’m personally still excited to receive mine, some of the limitations will push creativity from developers and hopefully lead to some fun, unique little experiences you wouldn’t find anywhere else.

The slow drip of games is a feature, not a bug?

The games are all done already, the press can play them. And the slow drip starts when you take it out of the box instead of being on a global schedule - it's an intentional design decision to give you a reason to pick it up periodically instead of just playing all the games once or twice over the course of a week and then putting it in a drawer somewhere.

I would even dare say that all those small gadget are an environmental nightmare and unethical. I know those who build them are passionated people but when you enter something in the market you should have moral rights to not build things whose more than 80% of the items end up in a drawer or bin before at least 2 decades of use.

Not that they are the worse offender, it is a global problem that touch both indie and big corps.

> I would even dare say that all those small gadget are an environmental nightmare and unethical.

What if a kid who plays with this today ends up being the next XYZ who makes something positive for the world? Im so tired of these dismissive, and while im here lemme say "performative" comments relegating everything to trash. Yes we know there is a "stuff" problem, but this is so far down on the list of concerns I cant even begin to imagine you're saying this seriously.

If you are truly worried about there being more "stuff" your concerns should start with non rechargeable batteries, which are still produced in record numbers, and rarely recycled.

>What if a kid who plays with this today ends up being the next XYZ who makes something positive for the world?

That is so irrelevant. And regardless of the positive things said kid would bring that would not erase the waste ALL other devices have created.

>If you are truly worried about there being more "stuff" your concerns should start with non rechargeable batteries, which are still produced in record numbers, and rarely recycled.

These concerns aren't mutually exclusives.

Compared to some forms of entertainment, $180 for a few hours isn't that bad. A flight in a small plane would run you way more than that.

See my point about rich nerds. If you are okay with spending a couple hundred bucks on something which you may throw away after a few hours – great, it's a fun quirky device made just for you. 99.9% of the planet does not fall into that demographic, however.

>99.9% of the planet does not fall into that demographic, however.

to be pedantic, 0.1% of the planet is 8 million. There aren't a lot of non-essential products selling 7.92 billion of anything so this is an unreasonable bar.

(and yes, I have no regrets being pedantic to a comment that comes down to "remember that you are a niche").

Yeah, it's definitely a thing for a particular group.

Then again, I suspect many raspberry pis meet the same fate; bought and played with for a few hours and then left to collect dust in a drawer somewhere.

If anything, flying is more akin to torture than entertainment...

I think the parent was referring to a private plane that you pilot. 180 would about cover the expense of fuel for the hour.

Yup, even if you never want to get a license you could spend $180 or so on an introductory flight or two for fun.

WARNING: you will get addicted and end up spending $15-20k on a license.

Same for me, although I'm the worst when it comes to that. I've done roughly the same thing with flagship gaming consoles and even an expensive custom-built (my me) gaming desktop.

I agree. I was skeptical of this from the start but now hearing that it doesn't have a backlight? No way. I will be shocked if even 25% of the people that buy this are still using it a year later.

That’s generous, I would probably play for up to an hour, or less.

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