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My Options Overview / Guide (V2)

Greeting Theta Gang boys and girls,
I hope you're well and not bankrupt after last week. I'm just now recovering mentally myself. I saw a few WSB converts and some newbies asking for tips, so here you go. V2 of my Options guide. I hope it helps.
​
I spent a huge amount of time learning about options and tried to distill my knowledge down into a helpful guide. This should especially be useful for newbies and growing options traders.
While I feel I’m a successful trader, I'm not a guru and my advice is not meant to be gospel, but this will hopefully be a good starting point, teach you a lot, and make you a better trader. I plan to keep typing up more info from my notebook, expanding this guide, and posting it every couple months.
Any feedback or additions are appreciated
Per requests, I added details of good and bad trades I made. Some painful lessons learned are now included. I also tried to organize this better as it got longer.
Here's what I tell options beginners:
I would strongly recommend buying a beginner's options book and read it cover to cover. That helped me a lot.
I like this beginner book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GWSXX8U/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_OxNDFb2GK9YW7
Helpful websites:
Don't trade until you understand:
Basics / Mechanics
General Tips and Ideas:
Profit Retention / Loss Mitigation
Trade Planning & Position Management Tips
-Advanced Beginner-
Spreads
Trading Mechanics, Taxes, Market Manipulation
-Intermediate / Advanced Strategies (work in progress)-
You’ll notice many of these strategies inverse one another.
Options Strategy Finder
This website is great for learning about new strategies, you’ll see many links to it below.
https://www.theoptionsguide.com/option-trading-strategies.aspx
Short Strangle / Straddle
Iron Condor and Iron Butterflies
Long Condor (Debit Call Condor)
Short Condor (Credit Call Condor)
Reverse Iron Condor
LEAPs
PMCC / PMCP
Advanced Orders
​
Disclaimer:
I’m not a financial adviser, I'm actually an engineer. I’m not telling you to invest in a specific stock/option or even use a specific strategy. I’ve outlined and more extensively elaborated on what I personally like. You should test several strategies and find what works best for you.
I'm just a guy who trades (mainly options) part-time for financial gain and fun. I don't claim to be some investing savant.
submitted by CompulsionOSU to thetagang [link] [comments]

Old Austin Tales: Forgotten Video Arcades of The 1970s & 80s

In the late 1980s and early 1990s when I was a young teen growing up in far North Austin, it was a popular custom for many boys in the neighborhood to assemble at the local Stop-N-Go after school on a regular basis for some Grand Champion level tournaments in Street Fighter 2 and Mortal Kombat. The collective insistence of our mothers and fathers to get out of the house, get some exercise, and refrain from playing NES or Sega on the television only led us to seek out more video games at the convenience store down the road. Much allowance and lunch money was spent as well as hours that should have been devoted to homework among the 8 or 9 regular boys in attendance, often challenging each other to 'Best of 5' matches. I myself played Dhalsim and SubZero, and not very well, so I rarely ever made it to the 5th match. The store workers frequently kicked us out for the day only to have us return when they weren't working the counter anymore if not the next day.
There is something about that which has been lost in the present day. While people can today download the latest games on Steam or PSN or in the app store on your smartphone, you can't just find arcade games in stores and restaurants like you used to be able to. And so the fun of a spontaneous 8 or 10 person multiplayer video game tournament has been confined to places like bars, pool halls, Pinballz or Dave&Busters.
But in truth it was that ubiquity of arcade video games, how you could find them in any old 7-11 or Laundromat, which is what killed the original arcades of the early 1980s before the Great Crash of 1983 when home video game consoles started to catch up to what you saw in the arcade.
I was born in the mid 1970s so I missed out on Pong. I was kindergarten age when the Golden Age of Arcade Games took place in the early 1980s. There used to be a place called Skateworld on Anderson Mill Road that was primarily for roller skating but had a respectable arcade in its own right. It was there that I honed my skills on the original Tron, Pac Man, Galaga, Pole Position, Defender, and so many others. In the 1980s I remember visiting all the same mall arcades as others in my age group. There was Aladdin's Castle in Barton Creek Mall, The Gold Mine in Highland, and another Gold Mine in Northcross which was eventually renamed Tilt. Westgate Mall also had an arcade but being a north austin kid I never went there until later in the mid 1990s. There were also places like Malibu Grand Prix and Showbiz Pizza and Chuck-E-Cheeze, all of which had fairly large arcades for kids which were the secondary attraction.
If you're of a certain age you will remember Einsteins and LeFun on the Drag. They were there for a few decades going back way before the Slacker era. Lesser known is that the UT Student Union basement used to have an arcade that was comparable to either or both of those places. Back in the pre-9/11 days it was much easier to sneak in if you even vaguely looked like you could be a UT student.
But there was another place I was too young to have experienced called Smitty's up further north on 183 at Lake Creek in the early 1980s. I never got to go there but I always heard about it from older kids at the time. It was supposed to have been two stories of wall to wall games with a small snack bar. I guess at the time it served a mostly older teen crowd from Westwood High School and for that reason younger kids my age weren't having birthday parties there. It wasn't around very long, just a few years during the Golden Age of Arcades.
It is with almost-forgotten early arcades like that in mind that I wanted to share with y'all some examples of places from The Golden Age of the Video Arcade in Austin using some old Statesman articles I've found. Maybe someone of a certain age on here will remember them. I was curious what they were like, having missed out by being slightly too young to have experienced most of them first hand. I also wanted to see the original reaction to them in the press. I had a feeling there was some pushback from school/parent/civic groups on these facilities showing up in neighborhood strip malls or next to schools, and I was right to suspect. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First let's list off some places of interest. Be sure to speak up if you remember going to any of these, even if it was just for some other kid's birthday party. Unfortunately some of the only mentions about a place are reports of a crime being committed there, such as our first few examples.
Forgotten Arcade #1
Fun House/Play Time Arcade - 2820 Guadalupe
June 15, 1975
ARCADE ENTHUSIASM
A gang fight involving 20 30 people erupted early Saturday morning in front of an arcade on Guadalupe Street. The owner of the Fun House Arcade at 282J Guadalupe told police pool cues, lug wrenches, fists and a shotgun were displayed during the flurry. Police are unsure what started the fisticuffs, but one witness at the scene said it pitted Chicanos against Anglos. During the fight the owner of the arcade said a green car stopped at the side of the arcade and witnesses reported the barrel of a shotgun sticking out. The crowd wisely scattered and only a 23-year-old man was left lying on the ground. He told police he doesn't know what happened.
March 3, 1976
ARCADE ROBBED
A former employee of Play Time Arcade, 2820 Guadalupe, was charged Tuesday in connection with the Tuesday afternoon robbery of his former business. Police have issued a warrant for the arrest of Ronnie Magee, 22, of 1009 Aggie Lane, Apt. 306. Arcade attendant Sam Garner said he had played pool with the suspect an hour before the robbery. He told police the man had been fired from the business two weeks earlier. Police said a man walked in the arcade about 2:45 p m. with a blue steel pistol and took $180. Magee is charged with first degree aggravated robbery. Bond was set on the charge at $15,000.
First it was called Fun House and then renamed Play Time a year later. I'm not sure what kind of arcade games beyond Pong and maybe Asteroids they could have had at this place. The peak of the Pinball craze was supposed to be around 1979, so they might have had a few pinball machines as well. A quick search of youtube will show you a few examples of 1976 video games like Death Race. The location is next to Ken's Donuts where PokeBowl is today where the old Baskin Robbins location was for many years.
Forgotten Arcade #2
Green Goth - 1121 Springdale Road
May 15, 1984
A 23-year-old man pleaded guilty Monday to a January 1983 murder in East Austin and was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Jim Crowell Jr. of Austin admitted shooting 17-year-old Anthony Rodriguez in the chest with a shotgun after the two argued outside the Green Goth, a games arcade at 1121 Springdale Road, on Jan. 23, 1983. Crowell had argued with Rodriguez and a friend of Rodriguez at the arcade, police said. Crowell then went to his house, got a shotgun and returned to the arcade, witnesses said. When the two friends left the arcade, Rodriguez was shot Several weeks ago Crowell had reached a plea bargain with prosecutors for an eight-year prison term, but District Judge Bob Perkins would not accept the sentence, saying it was shorter than sentences in similar cases. After further plea bargaining, Crowell accepted the 15-year prison sentence.
I can't find anything else on Green Goth except reports about this incident with a murder there. There is at least one other report from 1983 around the time of Crowell's arrest that also refer to it as an arcade but reports the manager said the argument started over a game of pool. It's possible this place might have been more known for pool.
Forgotten Arcades #3 & #4
Games, Etc. - 1302 S. First St
Muther's Arcade - 2532 Guadalupe St
August 23, 1983
Losing the magic touch - Video Arcades have trouble winning the money game
It was going to be so easy for Lawrence Villegas, a video game junkie who thought he could make a fast buck by opening up an arcade where kids could plunk down an endless supply of quarters to play Pac-Man, Space Invaders and Asteroids. Villegas got together with a few friends, purchased about 30 video games and opened Games, Etc. at 1302 S. First St in 1980. .,--.... For a while, things, went great Kids waited in line to spend their money to drive race cars, slay dragons and save the universe.
AT THE BEGINNING of 1982, however, the bottom fell out, and Villegas' revenues fell from $400 a week to $25. Today, Games, Etc. is vacant Villegas, 30, who is now working for his parents at Tony's Tortilla Factory, hasn't decided what he'll do with the building. "I was hooked on Asteroids, and I opened the business to get other people hooked, too," Villegas said. "But people started getting bored, and it wasn't worth keeping the place open. In the end, I sold some machines for so little it made me sick."
VILLEGAS ISNT the only video game operator to experience hard times, video game manufacturers and distributors 'It used to be fairly common to get $300 a week from a machine. Now we rarely get more than $100 .
Pac-Man's a lost cause. Six months ago, you could resell a Pac-Man machine for $1,600. Now, you're lucky to get $950 if you can find a buyer." Ronnie Roark says. In the past year, business has dropped 25 percent to 65 percent throughout the country, they say. Most predict business will get even worse before the market stabilizes. Video game manufacturers and operators say there are several reasons for the sharp and rapid decline: Many video games can now be played at home on television, so there's no reason to go to an arcade. The novelty of video games has worn off. It has been more than a decade since the first ones hit the market The decline can be traced directly to oversaturation or the market arcade owners say. The number of games in Austin has quadrupled since 1981, and it's not uncommon to see them in coin-operated laundries, convenience stores and restaurants.
WITH SO MANY games to choose from, local operators say, Austinites be came bored. Arcades still take in thousands of dollars each week, but managers and owners say most of the money is going to a select group of newer games, while dozens of others sit idle.
"After awhile, they all seem the same," said Dan Moyed, 22, as he relaxed at Muther's Arcade at 2532 Guadalupe St "You get to know what the game is going to do before it does. You can play without even thinking about it" Arcade owners say that that, in a nutshell, is why the market is stagnating.
IN THE PAST 18 months, Ronnie Roark, owner of the Back Room at 2015 E. Riverside Drive, said his video business has dropped 65 to 75 percent Roark, . who supplied about 160 video games to several Austin bars and arcades, said the instant success of the games is what led to their demise. "The technology is not keeping up with people's demand for change," said Roark, who bought his first video game in 1972. "The average game is popular for two or three months. We're sending back games that are less than five months old."
Roark said the market began dropping in March 1982 and has been declining steadily ever since. "The drop started before University of Texas students left for the summer in 1982," Roark said. "We expected a 25 percent drop in business, and we got that, and more. It's never really picked up since then. - "It used to be fairly common to get $300 a week from a machine. Now we rarely get more than $100. 1 was shocked when I looked over my books and saw how much things had dropped."
TO COMBAT THE slump, Roark said, he and some arcade owners last year cut the price of playing. Even that didn't help, he said. Old favorites, such as Pac-Man, which once took in hundreds of dollars each week, he said, now make less than $3 each. "Pac-Man's a lost cause," he said. "Six months ago, you could resell a Pac-Man machine for $1,600. Now, you're lucky to get $950 if you can find a buyer." Hardest hit by the slump are the owners of the machines, who pay $3,500 to $5,000 for new products and split the proceeds with the businesses that house them.
SALEM JOSEPH, owner of Austin Amusement and Vending Co., said his business is off 40 percent in the past year. Worse yet, some of his customers began returning their machines, and he's having a hard time putting them back in service. "Two years ago, a machine would generate enough money to pay for itself in six months,' said Joseph, who supplies about 250 games to arcades. "Now that same machine takes 18 months to pay for itself." As a result, Joseph said, he'll buy fewer than 15 new machines this year, down from the 30 to 50 he used to buy. And about 50 machines are sitting idle in his warehouse.
"I get calls every day from people who want to sell me their machines," Joseph said. "But I can't buy them. The manufacturers won't buy them from me." ARCADE OWNERS and game manufacturers hope the advent of laser disc video games will buoy the market Don Osborne, vice president of marketing for Atari, one of the largest manufacturers of video games, said he expects laser disc games to bring a 25 percent increase in revenues next year. The new games are programmed to give players choices that may affect the outcome of the game, Os borne said. "Like the record and movie industries, the video game industry is dependent on products that stimulate the imagination," Osborne said "One of the reasons we're in a valley is that we weren't coming up with those kinds of products."
THE FIRST of the laser dis games, Dragonslayer and Star Wan hit the market about two months ago. Noel Kerns, assistant manager of The Gold Mine Arcade in Northcross Mall, says the new games are responsible for a $l,000-a-week increase in revenues. Still, Kerns said, the Gold Mine' total sales are down 20 percent iron last summer. However, he remain optimistic about the future of the video game industry. "Where else can you come out of the rain and drive a Formula One race car or save the universe?" hi asked.
Others aren't so optimistic. Roark predicted the slump will force half of all operators out of business and will last two more years. "Right now, we've got a great sup ply and almost no demand," Roark said. "That's going to have to change before things get- significantly better."
Well there is a lot to take from that long article, among other things, that the author confused "Dragonslayer" with "Dragon's Lair". I lol'd.
Anyone who has been to Emo's East, formerly known as The Back Room, knows they have arcade games and pool, but it's mostly closed when there isn't a show. That shouldn't count as an arcade, even though the former owner Ronnie Roark was apparently one of the top suppliers of cabinet games to the area during the Golden Era. Any pool hall probably had a few arcade games at the time, too, but that's not the same as being an arcade.
We also learn from the same article of two forgotten arcades: Muthers at 2522 Guadalupe where today there is a Mediterranean food restaurant, and another called Games, Etc. at 1302 S.First that today is the site of an El Mercado restaurant. But the article is mostly about showing us how bad the effects were from the crash at the end of the Golden Era. It was very hard for the early arcades to survive with increasing competition from home game consoles and personal computers, and the proliferation of the games into stores and restaurants.
Forgotten Arcades #5 #6 & #7
Computer Madness - 2414 S. Lamar Blvd.
Electronic Encounters - 1701 W Ben White Blvd (Southwood Mall)
The Outer Limits Amusements Center - 1409 W. Oltorf
March 4, 1982
'Quartermania' stalks South Austin
School officials, parents worried about effects of video games
A fear Is haunting the video game business. "We call it 'quartermania.' That's fear of running out of quarters," said Steve Stackable, co-owner of Computer Madness, a video game and foosball arcade at 2414 S. Lamar Blvd. The "quartermania" fear extends to South Austin households and schools, as well. There it's a fear of students running out of lunch money and classes to play the games. Local school officials and Austin police are monitoring the craze. They're concerned that computer hotspots could become undesirable "hangouts" for students, or that truancy could increase because students (high-school age and younger) will skip school to defend their galaxies against The Tempest.
So far police fears have not been substantiated. Department spokesmen say that although more than half the burglaries in the city are committed by juveniles during the daytime, they know of no connection between the break-ins and kids trying to feed their video habit But school and parental worries about misspent time and money continue. The public outcry in September 1980 against proposals to put electronic game arcades near two South Austin schools helped persuade city officials to reject the applications. One proposed location was near Barton Hills Elementary School. The other was South Ridge Plaza at William Cannon Drive and South First Street across from Bedlchek Junior High School.
Bedichek principal B.G. Henry said he spoke against the arcade because "of the potential attraction it had for our kids. I personally feel kids are so drawn to these things, that It might encourage them to leave the school building and play hookey. Those things have so much compulsion, kids are drawn to them like a magnet Kids can get addicted to them and throw away money, maybe their lunch money. I'm not against the video games. They may be beneficial with eye-hand coordination or even with mathematics, but when you mix the video games during school hours and near school buildings, you might be asking for problems you don't need."
A contingent from nearby Pleasant Hill Elementary School joined Bedichek in the fight back in 1980, although principal Kay Beyer said she received her first formal call about the games last Week from a mother complaining that her child was spending lunch money on them. Beyer added that no truancy problems have been related to video game-playing at a nearby 7-11 store. Allen Poehl, amusement game coordinator for Austin's 7-11 stores, said company policy rules out any game-playing by school-age youth during school hours. Fulmore Junior High principal Bill Armentrout said he is working closely with operators of a nearby 7-1 1 store to make sure their policy is enforced.
The convenience store itself, and not necessarily the video games, is a drawing card for older students and drop-outs, Armentrout said. Porter Junior High principal Marjorie Ball said that while video games aren't a big cause of truancy, "the money (spent on the games) is a big factor." Ball said she has made arrangements with nearby businesses to call the school it students are playing the games during school hours. "My concern is that kids are basically unsupervised, especially at the 24-hour grocery stores. That's a late hour for kids to be out. I would like to see them (games) unplugged at 10 p.m.," adds Joslin Elementary principal Wayne Rider.
Several proprietors of video game hot-spots say they sympathize with the concerns of parents and school officials. No one under 18 is admitted without a parent to Chuck E. Cheese's Pizza Time Theatre at 4211 S. Lamar. That rule, says night manager David Dunagan, "keeps it from being a high school hangout. This is a family place." Jerry Zollar, owner of J.J. Subs in West Wood Shopping Center on Bee Cave Road, rewards the A's on the report cards of Eanes school district students with free video games. "It's kind of a community thing we do in a different way. I've heard from both teachers and parents . . . they thought this was a good idea," said Zollar.
Electronic Encounters in Southwood Mall last year was renovated into a brightly lit arcade. "We're trying to get away from the dark, barroom-type place. We want this to be a place for family entertainment We won't let kids stay here during school hours without a written note from their parents, and we're pretty strict about that," said manager Kelly Roberts. Joyce Houston, who manages The Outer Limits amusements center at 1409 W. Oltorf St. along with her husband, said, "I wouldn't let my children go into some of the arcades I've visited. I'm a concerned parent, too. We wanted a place where the whole family could come and enjoy themselves."
Well you can see which way the tone of all these articles is going. There were some crimes committed at some arcades but all of them tended to have a negative reputation for various reasons. Parents and teachers were very skeptical of the arcades being in the neighborhoods to the point of petitioning the City Government to restrict them. Three arcades are mentioned besides Chuck-E-Cheese. Electronic Encounters in Southwood Mall, The Outer Limits amusements center at 1409 W. Oltorf, and Computer Madness, a "video game and foosball arcade" at 2414 S. Lamar Blvd.
Forgotten Arcade #8
Smitty's Galaxy of Games - Lake Creek Parkway
February 25, 1982
Arcades fighting negative image
Video games have swept across America, and Williamson and Travis counties have not been immune. In a two-part series, Neighbor examines the effects the coin-operated machines have had on suburban and small-town life.
Cities have outlawed them, religious leaders have denounced them and distraught mothers have lost countless children to their voracious appetites. And still they march on, stronger and more numerous than before. A new disease? Maybe. A wave of invading aliens from outer space? On occasion. A new type of addiction? Certainly. The culprit? Video games. Although the electronic game explosion has been mushrooming throughout the nation's urban areas for the past few years, its rippling effects have just recently been felt in the suburban fringes of North Austin and Williamson County.
In the past year, at least seven arcades armed with dozens of neon quarter-snatchers have sprung up to lure teens with thundering noises and thousands of flashing seek-and-destroy commands. Critics say arcades are dens of iniquity where children fall prey to the evils of gambling. But arcade owners say something entirely different. "Everybody fights them (arcades), they think they are a haven for drug addicts. It's just not true," said Larry Grant of Austin, who opened Eagle's Nest Fun and Games on North Austin Avenue in Georgetown last September. "These kids are great" Grant said the gameroom "gives teenagers a place to come. Some only play the games and some only talk.
In Georgetown, if you're from the high school, this is it." He said he's had very few disturbances, and asks "undesirables" to leave. "We've had a couple of rowdies. That's why I don't have any pool tables they tend to attract that type of crowd," Grant said.
Providing a place for teens to congregate was also the reason behind Ron and Carol Smith's decision to open Smitty's Galaxy of Games on Lake Creek Parkway at the entrance to Anderson Mill. "We have three teenage sons, and as soon as the oldest could drive, it became immediately apparent that there was no place to go around here," said Ron, an IBM employee who lives in Spicewood at Balcones. "This prompted us to want to open something." The business, which opened in August, has been a huge success with both parents and youngsters. "Hundreds of parents have come to check out our establishment before allowing their children to come, and what they see is a clean, safe environment managed by adults and parents," Ron said. "We've developed an outstanding rapport with the community." Video arcades "have a reputation that we have to fight," said Carol.
Kathy McCoy of Georgetown, who last October opened Krazy Korner on Willis Street in Leander, agrees. "We've got a real good group of kids," she said. "There's no violence, no nothing. Parents can always find their kids at Krazy Korner."
While all the arcade owners contacted reported that business is healthy, if not necessarily lucrative, it's not as easy for video entrepreneurs to turn a profit as one might imagine. A sizeable investment is required. Ron Smith paid between $2,800 and $5,000 for each of the 30 electronic diversions at his gameroom.
Grant said his average video game grosses about $50 a week, and his "absolute worst" game, Armor Attack, only $20 a week. The top machines (Defender and Pac-Man) can suck in an easy $125 a week. That's a lot of quarters, 500 to be exact but the Eagle's Nest and Krazy Korner pass half of them on to Neelley Vending Company of Austin which rents them their machines. "At 25 cents a shot, it takes an awful lot of people to pay the bills," said Tom Hatfield, district manager for Neelley.
He added that an owner's personality and the arcade's location can make or break the venture. The game parlor must be run "by an understanding person, someone with patience," Hatfield said. "They cannot be too demanding on the kids, yet they can't let them run all over them." And they must be located in a spot "with lots of foot traffic," such as a shopping center or near a good restaurant, he said. "And being close to a school really helps." "Video games are going to be here permanently, but we're going to see some operations not going because of the competition," which includes machines in virtually every convenience store and supermarket, Hatfield said.
This article talks about three arcades. One in Georgetown called Eagles Nest, another in Leander called Krazy Korner, and a third called Smitty's Galaxy of Games on Lake Creek Parkway "on the fringes of North Austin". This is the one I remember the older kids talking about when I was a little kid. There was once a movie theater across the street from the Westwood High School football stadium and behind that was Smitty's. Today I think the building was bulldozed long ago and the space is part of the expanded onramp to 183 today. Eventually another unrelated arcade was built next to the theater that became Alamo Lakeline. It was another site of some unrecorded epic Street Fighter 2 and Mortal Kombat tournaments in the 90s.
But the article written before the end of the Golden Era tell us much about the pushback I was talking about earlier. Early arcades were seen as "dirty" places in some circles, and the owners of the arcades in Williamson County had to stress how "clean" their establishments were. This other article from a couple of weeks later tells of how area school officials weren't worried about video games and tells us more arcades in Round Rock and Cedar Park. Apparently the end of the golden age lasted a bit longer than usual in this area.
At some point in the next few years the bubble burst, and places like Smitty's were gone by the late 80s. But the distributors quoted earlier were right that arcade games weren't going completely away. In the mid 1980s LeFun opened up next in the Scientology building at 2200 Guadalupe on the drag. Down a few doors past what used be a coffee shop and a CVS was Einsteins Arcade. Both of those survived into the 21st century. I remember the last time I was at Einsteins I got my ass beat in Tekken by a kid half my age. heheh
That's all for today. There were no Bonus Pics in the UT archive of arcades (other than the classical architectural definition). I wanted to pass on some Bonus newspaper articles (remember to click and zoom in with the buttons on the right to read) about Austin arcades anyway but first a small story.
I mentioned earlier the secret of the UT Student Union. I have no idea what it looks like now but in the 90s there was a sizable arcade in with the bowling alley in the basement. Back in 1994 when I used to sneak in, they featured this bizarre early attempt at virtual reality games. I found an old Michael Barnes Statesman article about it dated February 11, 1994. Some highlights:
Hundreds of students and curiosity-seekers lined up at the University of Texas Union to play three to five minutes of Dactyl Nightmare, Flying Aces or V-Tol, three-dimensional games from Kramer Entertainment. Nasty weather delayed the unloading of four huge trunks containing the machines, which resemble low pulpits. Still, players waited intently for a chance to shoot down a fighter jet, operate a tilt-wing Harrier or tangle with a pterodactyl. Today, tickets will go on sale in the Texas Union lobby at 11:30 a.m. for playing slots between noon and 6 p.m.
Players, fitted with full helmets, throttles and power packs, stood on shiny gray and yellow platforms surrounded by a circular guard rail. Seen behind the helmet's goggles were computer simulated landscapes, not unlike the most sophisticated video games, with controls and enemies viewed in deep space. "You're on a platform waiting to fight a human figure," said Jeff Vaughn, 19, of Dactyl Nightmare. "A pterodactyl swoops down and tries to pick you up. You have to fight it off. You are in the space and can see your own body and all around you. But if you try to walk, you have to use that joy stick to get around."
"I let the pterodactyl carry me away so I could look down and scan the board," said Tom Bowen of the same game. "That was the way I found out where the other player was." "Yeah, it's cool just to stand there and not do anything," Vaughn said. The mostly young, mostly male crowd included the usual gaming fanatics, looking haggard and tense behind glasses and beards. A smattering of women and children also pressed forward in a line that snaked past the lobby and into the Union's retail shops.
"I don't know why more women don't play. Maybe because the games are so violent," said Jennifer Webb, 24, a psychology major whose poor eyesight kept her from becoming a fighter pilot in real life. "If the Air Force won't take me, virtual reality will." "They use stereo optics moving at something like 60 frames a second," said computer science major Alex Aquila, 19. "The images are still pretty blocky. But once you play it, you'll want to play it again and again." With such demand for virtual reality, some gamesters wondered why an Austin video arcade has not invested in at least one machine.
The gameplay looked like this.
Bonus Article #1 - "Video fans play for own reasons" (Malibu Grand Prix) - March 11, 1982
Bonus Article #2 - "Pac-Man Cartridge Piques Interest" - April 13, 1982
Bonus Article #3 - "Video Games Fail Consumer" - January 29, 1984
Bonus Article #4 - "Nintendoholics/Modems Unite" - January 25, 1989
Bonus Article #5 and pt 2 "Two girls missing for a night found at arcade" (truly dedicated young gamers) - August 7, 2003
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Google Play Fake Reviews: Why is Google allowing this?

I've stopped purchasing on the Playstore and I stay away from it now because
  1. Google Play allows app developers to pay people to leave positive reviews (developers use Micro Jobs to do this. Despite it being against their policy.
How do I know this? Because I used to do Micro Jobs 6 odd years ago when I was bored at home..there are a LOT of micro jobs for leaving fake reviews. How it works? Theres a big list of jobs you can choose to do, IE proof read this article, download this app and come back and tell me in 120 words what you think, leave comments on selected YouTube videos, upvote YouTube videos, download an app from the Playstore and leave a 5 star reviews that says "X=Y", go to this website and click this link...ect.
  1. Google Play is allowing tons and tons off apps that are potentially dangerous to the user or are known to be dangerous to the user multimine
check out the reviews, again inundated with fake 5 star reviews and not a single real review about the app actually paying out, so what is the app collecting and sending from your phone? The developmers have the same tactic which you can see in the reviews. They pretend that you're mining ETH/BTC and not a single real person has gotten paid and the BTC that people do mine, it disappears all the time so people cannot get enough to withdraw, it's all wirtten in black and white in the reviews.
Pi Network
this has been proven time and time again to be a scam , just have a look through reddit
World News: Breaking News, All in One Feed Reader
This app developer is extremely dodgy and rude ( I've got an email trail with him). His app has gambling links in it and when you open the app a full screen ads pops up advertising his gambling website, without being able to get rid of it till its done. It is a paid app that has no ads. But it does ;) he specifically makes sure there isn't ads in this version because it's the paid version. The free has ads...but* now he's changed his Playstore app page to 'contains ads'. It doesn't contain ads from his AdSense account..he uses his own in app ads (code) to advertise his gambling website to everyone from kids up. The website is also a legitimate scam. ( I've written to Google extensively about this guy and forwarded our emails to Google as well as all the proof, Google said they'd look into it and months later they struck his app down, but only the paid one..then a few days later, he's got his app back up. He just needed to change a few backend code to comply with Google....thing is, he hasn't changed anything! His full screen ad to his scam gambling website are still all there. And who knows what his apps even sniffing out*
PHT cloud earning
This one is a scam that's collecting your data and promising kids a rich future in their fake crypto currency
Fair Go Pokies online
This is an actual gambling app that's rated for 3 year olds. I have reported it many times for months, other people have aswel, yet Google seem think Gambling apps are fine for 3+ year olds, Google have been informed about this but Google WILL NOT enforce their own policies on its developmers which is harming kids and our privacy
This is just a few off the top of my head. All these apps have extremely concerning reviews. Also all the positive reviews are all extremely fake.
How do I know they're fake? Well like I said earlier, I used to do Micro Jobs and it's full of jobs asking to leave positive reviews on their Google Play store app. If you have a look at the positive reviews in every single one of the apps I posted, you will see that all the positive reviews are exactly the same (minus a few purposefully placed grammatical and spelling errors), all say the exact same thing pretty much and look how people post the same emojis along with very similar, almost word for word reviews.
I've reported the reviews many times on these apps. And none of the obvious fake reviews have ever been removed. I believe Google to have given up on the Playstore all together. There is like 80/20 of apps that are very suspicious or are definitely fake and scans 80% Then there's 20% of real apps.
I have checked a lot of the developers out over the course of my research into this and found that most 90+% of these apps come from Asia, specifically India. Nothing against India the country, but the people are absolutely appallingly when it comes to scams. We all know that Indians are the biggest scammers, so why isn't Google doing anything about these apps? And why isn't Google doing anything about the massive amount of Indian scammers on their Playstore, let alone all the other people who are posting useless apps that aren't tested. Google is more interested in bringing in the developer fees rather than the community who buys the apps.
Most of the kids games are literal gambling apps by definition. All these free games that are not games, but money printing machines for the Devs. Put out a free app and then make it near impossible to continue after level 10 unless you pay massive prices for coins and such. Today's kids are having their gaming experience ruined by greed and their childhoods taken away from them unless they pay to progress. Do I think kids should just play games all day? No, I believe they should play outside and explore the dirt. But as a gamer myself, I believe kids should be allowed to spend hours playing video games too. When I was a kid, I'd play donkey Kong country for hrs and no paywalls to continu
I used to run my own online business a few years ago now and I used to market through Google ads, this opened me up to a magnitude of scams from Indians. Every single day I could guarantee I would have one cold call me, claiming to work for Google, wanting me to sign up through their marketing platform. Which kind you again, they claim they're working with Google.
1 of those calls was an actual person working for Google... Well actually he didn't work for Google, although his email signature says he does, he says he does and his company says they do. However, they are working contracted to Google. What they really are is just a call centre in India, that Google has outsourced their Adsense to. I confirmed he was a 'google partner' by checking out his partner id against Google's partner id check.( this is just way of saying they're a telemarketer that's contracted by Google to bring in sales to their Adsense.)
This guy wouldn't leave me alone, called me 3 times a day to try get me to put more money into my marketing, then he wanted to take over my account so he could manage it...this guy was full on trying to rob me of every cent I had. (He didn't get anything)
Every day/week the Playstore top 10 is the exact same apps. Intact they really haven't changed in a couple years. Google's Editors favourite apps, is always only ever the same apps that have paid to be Google's Editors favourite.
I left apple 8 years ago for Android...loved it! But today I feel like my expensive phone is an expensive spam farm because Google have drop the ball. I feel I miss apples clean look and lack of rubbish. Their app store is dynamically changing. I don't want to go back to apple cause their phones suck..but I'd rather an iPhone right now than be inundated with rubbish apps and nothing but fake review after fake review.
Google doesnt care about the Playstore and that's evident by my evidence in this post.
Google has allowed for almost a year now, for this one specific Gambling app aimed at kids, to exist on their store. The store is full of apps that are completely useless and apps that are so bad, they shouldn't have even been able to make it on to the playstore.
Just look at this what sort of app store is this when it allows crap like this.
Why am I writing this?
Because I'm done working for free for Google, doing a job they should be doing. But nothing I do changes anything, no matter how much you report, Google doesn't do anything. So I'm hoping maybe someone will see this and sort this shit out. Why not even have an algorithm that flags an app as a potential risk automatically when it's received X amount of 3 and blow star reviews ÷ the amount of downloads. When an all flags, you can check it out, this would solve the mass amounts of reports because you won't be having to sift through them, you'll just need to check the app out that's got flagged.
I know this is super long, it's so long that I cbf writing a TLDR because I believe it needs to be read as a whole.
And fix the top apps..how is there two QR readers in the top 8? How TF is Australia Post app in the top 20?
And Service NSW #1? 🤣
how TF is this even in the top 50 when it's rating is 1.8 stars
Why arent apps like these ones in the top ever? fuel meter
Motion Ninja
My Budget Book
Soul Browser
Pulse Messenger
Simpan
Easy Join
aCalander
submitted by biglezmaate to googleplay [link] [comments]

Unleashed pt. 33

From u/eruwenn and I, another chapter
First / Prev / Next
Estrilla sat at her desk, a cup of Eluin flower tea in her hand and a selection of human biscuits resting nearby. How had she ever enjoyed tea without the ritualistic dunking and the fascinating science of biscuit integrity? Choosing just the right one to complement your tea was also a science, no, an art. Holding the dunk just long enough to absorb the maximum amount of tea without biscuit collapse added an exhilarating edge to the process. She couldn’t help but smile as she turned the Hob Nob between her fingers. How wondrous must Earth have been to have created such a thing.
Her communicator buzzed loudly and she flicked on her desk screen; this was the call she had been waiting for. “Hello Councillor. I was surprised you scheduled a call at this time, isn’t it very late where you are?”
With a kind smile, Eruwenn Aix Sponsa bowed her head. “I wanted Cygna to be gone so we could talk less formally, ‘Rilla.” The Anatidae spotted the disc between the Kachna’s fingers. “A new biscuit?”
The doctor smiled. Being on the Porkchop Express gave her early access to all of the human’s creations, and sometimes it was good to rub it in the face of an old friend. “Indeed, there are a dozen new varieties. This particular one also comes with a chocolate coating, although I find that too sweet for Eluin flowers.”
The councillor looked on hungrily. “I’m not sure if I should thank you or curse you for my new obsession. The first selection you sent were quite the adventure. Fortunately, thanks to your detailed instructions, I only lost one to over-saturation.” She looked quite literally crest-fallen, as her golden green plumage sagged at the memory. “Still, the decorative tin they came in has been repurposed to hold some odds and ends, and I have since gifted dozens of tins to my tea club.” The doctor, she observed, had quite sensibly dunked her biscuit, but had been holding it in the hot drink for far too long. "Rilla! Your biscuit!" she cried, her eyes widening.
Savouring the moment the doctor took her time in looking up and, with a deliberately slower move, she brought out the biscuit, structurally sound and heavy with Eluin tea. “I wanted to show you the mighty Hob Nob, possibly the human’s greatest triumph. It has the strength of a hundred lesser biscuits. You can dunk this bad boy like nothing else!” She suddenly realised how human she sounded as she repeated his sales pitch, and her yellow feathers ruffled.
The councillor chuckled at the odd phrase. “Biscuits can be bad? And boys?”
She had been caught up in the moment and Estrilla was irritated she had let the words slip out. “Damn human. Even his vocabulary is catching.”
Eruwenn laughed warmly at her friend's discomfort. “Still, it is nice that he seems to have settled down. Biscuits and leokits are a more restful use of his time. I have certainly appreciated the lack of reports on my desk.” She excitedly plucked a small leokit plushie from her desk drawer. “This gift was also greatly appreciated.”
The little yellow Kachna smiled at her friend's playful attitude. “You are very welcome, I know you have a soft spot for things to cuddle in bed.” The intimacy of the comment startled her, and she briefly looked away. “So, shall we get to the reason for this call?”
“Unlike you, this one does not kick.” A moment passed between them of something that hadn’t been there in a long time, and it tugged at Eruwenn’s heart. The councillor put away her gift as she pushed it from her mind; business first. “I wanted to check on how your patient was doing?”
With a disapproving eye-roll the doctor poked a button or two, bringing up the latest video of Aaron, Sassie and Aiov. “See for yourself.”
Adorable as it was to see the leokit clambering over the sleeping dog, Eruwenn was quick to clarify. “No, I mean mentally. It must be difficult to be at a stale-mate. I heard the Kasurians have sold all but three of the potential leokas homes. They have only given him the one closest to you for testing.” She noticed some minor movements in her friend’s face. “On top of that, there are new platforms launching soon to compete with his GalacTube. I know it continues to expand, recently becoming financially rewarding, so this must be a concern for him?”
Estrilla was only partially aware of the details, but she still tried her best to not give anything away. “The Grand Council of Kasur have improved security around the new reserves as well as installed many observation posts. We're moving Tony shortly, and once a few more leokas are strong enough Aaron intends to release them as well. It's a good start.” She considered her next wording carefully; did Eruwenn know the human was behind those new portals as well? “As for the rival media portals, he is in fact happy. He said competition breeds strength, and he plans to use those platforms as well.”
Eruwenn was relieved. The human was much more reasonable than she had expected. It was only a matter of time before others attempted to replicate his success, and embracing them allowed him to increase his visibility to sell his food items. “I am pleased. After that business in Arkellis I feared you had made a mistake in joining them. It seems he has now found something constructive to put his energy into.”
Conversations with her old friend were rather game-like, as Eruwenn always seemed to be getting more information from you than you wanted. The doctor was playing it cool. “He’s definitely putting that energy to good use. Surely you didn’t call just for this?”
The councillor shifted in her seat, a more serious demeanour now in place. “Very true.” She shifted her face to be closer to the screen, and her voice lowered with it. “I want to give you a friendly warning. The sentinels have taken an interest in the last human.” Seeing the surprise on Estrilla’s face she cut off her next question. “I don’t know why. All I do know is that I had a long conversation with two of them regarding my interactions with him. They had a lot of questions regarding Darnis, and what his intentions were. They did not seem happy that he had snatched the system.”
Estrilla decided that correcting her friend on the name of Earth Two Electric Boogaloo would not be wise at this time. The paperwork for ETEB was still being prepared, along with the human's other name changes. “It’s a plague world in the middle of nowhere. Other than being on the border with the Imperium, it has little value.” The Kachna was thinking out loud. “Why would they care?” She really hoped the human’s insane plan had not leaked.
The Anatidae leaned back in her seat. “Who knows? The sentinels do not report to the council.”
The doctor nodded. Her friend was lying; she definitely knew. “Well, I don’t think he has given it a second thought. Currently, the leokas are his primary focus. After that we are planning to take Alexa and Norrin to their homeworld for repairs, or treatment. Whatever it is you do to fix an Inorganic.”
“And after that?”
Estrilla took a sip of her tea. This friendly chat was beginning to feel like an interrogation. “As you suggested, we are going to the Bardul of Shi’an. He still wishes to search for his home and requires a ship for the extended journey.”
“So, he has no interest in Darnis?”
Maintaining her casual tone the doctor replied, “He has no interest in Darnis.” Now, ETEB and its system are another matter she thought. “I think he plans to leap from place to place, striving to put right what he sees as wrong and hoping each time that his next leap... will be the leap home.”
Eruwenn nodded, seemingly satisfied. “Well, if I can be of any assistance, anything at all, please don’t hesitate to reach out.” She seemed to relax. “I hope things go smoothly with Tony, and make sure you keep my desk clear of reports on last human activity.”
The doctor laughed and waved. “I’ll try.”
As the call ended, Eruwenn’s eyes rose to face the darkness beyond her desk. “They are definitely up to something.”
Cygna turned on the light beside her. “You should be careful, Councillor. I removed all of the monitoring devices from this room, but your communications will no doubt be under the watch of the sentinels.”
The tall Anatidae stood, smoothing her clothes and preparing to leave. “I hope so, or else this whole show was for nothing.”
A large crowd gathered near the Porkchop Express day and night, and the excitement in the air was palpable. A barricade held the onlookers at a safe distance as the Kasurian interest in them grew. Today that crowd had swollen to fill nearby streets, and large screens had been erected to prevent the masses from surging forward. The local forces were in place, additional security had been planned, and the morning of the event additional reinforcements had to be called in on top of that. It had been thirteen local days since their arrival, and Kasur was now firmly in the grip of leokas mania. Local news groups, and even some crews from further afield, were present as news of the last human and his leokas crusade spread.
Beyond the barricade a sprawling market of pop up stalls and vendors had blossomed. A festival-like atmosphere had taken hold, with local musicians and performers being paid to entertain the crowds. As well as the traditional local fare there was human food, arcades and fairground games. Clothes, souvenirs, plushies and anything else the human could come up with were being sold and market tested. The smell of sweet and savoury food being deep fried filled the air and the floor crunched underfoot with spilled popcorn.
Behind the scenes, Aaron had been working like a man possessed. Allistan and Jar’Bek had given up hiring directly and had started buying entire companies, putting them to work. Doing things the human way they had evaded, bulldozed or simply thrown credits at anything that stood in their way, watching barriers evaporate before their eyes. Still they struggled to keep up with their new Captain of Enterprise as he poured forth ideas and instructions. The human corporate machine was like a snowball on a mountainside, becoming an unstoppable avalanche as it swallowed Kasurian law firms, entertainment companies, music labels and more. Even science facilities were being repurposed for recipe development, while whole new industries were being created from the endless ingenuity of the human’s home.
Inspired by a tribal tattoo on Aaron's upper right arm he had woken up with after a beer festival in Glasgow, the Black Dragon Syndicate was born. This was an umbrella corporation, above more umbrella corporations, with a growing number of subsidiaries below that, allowing them to quickly expand without drawing attention to themselves. The complex structure also allowed Jar’Bek to manage profits and taxes in the most efficient way possible. The job had grown considerably more manageable for the Ashi with the dozen accounting firms under the Golden Dragon umbrella, along with their legal counterparts.
To the surprise of all, Chae'Sol seemed to have detailed and intimate knowledge of the entertainment industry, and offered many helpful bits of advice. Jaym had been the most intrigued by this, and during one meal seemed to have a sudden and startling realization. The Niham swept her from the room, and muffled and excitable screaming followed before they returned, Jaym having taken an oath of secrecy. The navigator and former security officer took a guiding role in the functions of the White Dragon, responsible for music, cinema, arts and entertainment. His idea to hire local musicians to play for the crowds had been an instant and resounding success, bringing in even bigger crowds and, thus, increasing sales across all of the stalls.
The Ruby Dragon was the umbrella company that controlled the marketing firms and advertising companies. This was where humanity shone, and Aaron quickly started his own company more tailored to their unique approach. He named it BCre8ive, mostly to irritate Allistan with the spelling. He also brought Ranjaz on board as he had a knack for creative thinking; it just lacked direction. The Kittran immediately came up with a gambling mechanic to the cupcake wrappers. Just look on the bottom of your wrapper to see if you've won free cupcakes, merchandise, games, or even credits. The idea was quickly implemented, and was successful to a ridiculous degree.
GalacTube became its own company under the Bronze Dragon umbrella for social media, PR and less obvious political interests. The new business quickly made advertising and monetisation easily accessible, along with automated comment moderation. As the advertising revenue from GalacTube was diverted to the creators, minus a small percentage, there was a sudden explosion of interest. This was accelerated after some of the bigger channels reported that they were earning significant sums in the first few cycles. Direct advertising also brought revenue, with a new game being launched to coincide with the addition of advertisements. Thousands of GalacTubers were all suddenly very interested in playing Raid: Shadow Legends and extolling its virtues to their fans.
Development began on new mass sharing portals, Glitch, Chirper, SpaceBook, InstaSnap and more. Each one under a new subsidiary, all unwittingly competing with each other with alternate approaches as part of one larger entity.
The Silver Dragon, under Alexa’s keen watch, focused on the companies created to adapt human games as well as design new ones. Their initial focus was incorporating legends, heroes, and environments from specific worlds, and their first offering was an assortment of Minecraft skins to help your randomized world look a little more like home. In combination with the newly-created merchandising companies, the human had unleashed a monster.
Aaron had insisted on naming the group responsible for food the Blue Dragon, repeatedly joking about authentic asian food, which made no sense to the rest of the crew. The first new brand he began was a luxury doughnut selection called Deadly Delicious. Combining gourmet flavours and charging a premium, he began attracting new markets of more affluent customers. Next was the creative world of fusion food. First to be tackled was Kasurian cuisine, whose traditional foods and flavours were taken and mashed with human techniques. In the trial market of the fair surrounding the ship, the food was an unbelievable success, particularly a thinly sliced, fried, and seasoned local vine that Aaron liked to call Space-Pringles.
Taking anything he could from his home world and adapting it to his advantage, he now had hundreds of thousands of Kasurians working for him, both directly and indirectly. An explosion of employment, positivity, and hope rippled out from the Porkchop Express as Kasur embraced Lefu’Yendra. The tendrils of the Black Dragon Corporation also spread as they silently began to creep to other worlds to feed the ravenous economic beast.
Danyd walked onto the Overlook, heading directly for the former meeting room opposite Jar’Bek and Allistan’s shared office. The meeting room had been repurposed to a sort of economic war room, and as he entered Alexa was standing with her shirt off and Aaron was standing very close to her. “Tulseria’s rump! Didn’t mean to interrupt! Damn kids, can’t use a bedroom!”
As the flustered engineer began to back away, the confused pair looked up. Alexa turned her shoulder towards the Satryn, and Aaron, pulling his short sleeve up, did the same. “Look, we match!” they chorused.
Looking closer Danyd could see they did in fact match, the human’s tattoo now mirrored on Alexa’s upper arm in shimmering silver like her hair. “Very nice.” He stepped into the room, and as Alexa put her long sleeved shirt back on he coughed and looked away. “I was wondering if I could ‘ave a moment, Captain?”
Aaron waved the engineer to a seat at the long boardroom table at the centre of the oblong room. Instead of directly sitting down himself, he took a quick detour to the far corner of the room where a large bed, with raised sides, was on the floor. Sassie was stretched out in the luxurious bed, closely watching little Aiov as the leokit shakily stumbled around between her long legs. He gave Sassie a biscuit and scratched her behind the ears. “Good girl.”
Alexa looked to Danyd. “Would you like me to leave?”
“No, no,” the old engineer swiftly reassured her, “this is business, not personal.”
The human perked up. Not personal was good, as it meant there was a significant chance that it wasn't something Ranjaz had done. “So? Actual business?”
“Aye.” Danyd rubbed at the stubble on his chin. “Better call your number guys in, I guess.”
Aaron took a seat at the centre of the broad side of the table, opposite Danyd, Alexa jumped into the seat on his left, draping her legs over the arm with her back to Aaron as she idly played on her phone. The human reached out and pushed a button. “They’ll be here shortly, they’re currently finalising the paperwork to transfer ownership of the lungs.”
Danyd suddenly looked confused. “You’re selling them? After all the trouble you had to buy them all?”
The human laughed. “I’m not selling them.”
The Satryn felt a mixture of relief and bewilderment. An answer came in the form of Allistan's voice as he and Jar'Bek walked in the door. “He’s giving them away.”
Jar’Bek pushed the button to close the door, and the pair sat on Aaron’s right. Danyd’s mouth sat open so the lawyer decided to elaborate. “We’re creating a charity, called Tony’s Trust; it will hold the land rights on behalf of the leokas.” The Ashi smiled. It was a relief to see everyone else being as confused as he had been when Aaron first explained his plan. “Yes, the human intends to have the creatures own their home. The money from donations, merchandise, and their GalacTube channels will fund research, security and medical care. It’s actually quite ingenious. Even after we have left, their futures will be secure.”
Alexa’s hand reached back, her eyes still focused on her screen, and she gave Aaron a pat on the back. “Clever boy.”
Danyd looked down at his hands. He realised his own idea was quite simplistic, perhaps too simple. “That is pretty clever.”
Aaron had pushed Alexa’s sarcastic hand away and was messing up her hair in retaliation. “So, Chief. What did you want to talk with us about?”
Danyd sighed, letting the large seat support him as he deflated into it. “I’m getting too old for this.” He seemed about to leave when his resolve returned and he sat up straight again. “Look, I’ve been an engineer for a long time, longer than most of you have been alive.” He nodded to the Fae’Dan. “Not you Allistan, ‘course. I started off on one of them big corporate ships, worked my way up to Engineer First Class.” He puffed out his chest proudly. Aaron didn’t quite know what that meant but nodded his approval regardless, prompting Danyd to continue. “Forty celes I put in for those assholes. Someone too high up to know my name wanted to make savings and us long standing, higher waged workers were let go; cheaper to bring in new kids.”
Alexa piped up. “Bastards.”
“Aye, bastards is right.” The Satryn smiled. “Well, I was older than most, and it was hard to get work. Ended up running with a few crews on smaller ships - independent’s, ya’know.” He paused, and Aaron nodded, though he did not know. “Eventually, even they stopped taking me on, and so I was stuck on that station, working whatever repair jobs I could get.”
Jar’Bek wasn’t sure where this was going, but he had a lot of work to do and Aaron had to prepare to move Tony. “A sad, if not unique story. But what does that have to do with the Captain?”
Danyd gave the Ashi a stern look. “Ah’m getting there, kid.” He focused on Aaron. “Look, those big ships take all the good jobs, even the stuff the smaller ships can handle better. They have their big trade alliances making sure people use them, and even charging more because no one stands up to them. The small ships and the local groups can’t compete. But, can you?”
It was Aaron’s turn to look confused. “I have one ship, and we’ve never hauled cargo.”
The Satryn seemed irritated. “I damn well know that. What I mean is, can’t you come up with one of your schemes or tricks? Something to level the odds, I dunno. Jaym’s family barely scrapes by, and her dad has to beg and plead for work. It’s not right! You’re helping the leokas, helping the Kasurians. I just figured…” He shrugged. “Ah dunno what I figured. Just thought you could do something human about it.”
Allistan put his pen down. “You know you’re supposed to bring us an idea, not a problem.” He looked to Aaron. “That’s how this works, this Dragon’s Den process you enjoy so much.”
The human gave a half hearted nod, then shook his head. “What I’m doing right now is all about things I know about from Earth. I know nothing about space truckers.”
Danyd deflated once again. It had been a long shot. Jar’Bek felt bad for the engineer and tried to explain. “The problem is that they are, as they are named, independents. Single ships have little power, and even local groups of hauliers don’t have much weight outside of their own system. The trade alliances have all the power, they’re just too big.”
A hand cuffed Aaron across the back of his head and Alexa put down her phone. The human rubbed his head for effect. “Ow. And what was that for?”
Running her fingers through her silver hair to straighten the mess Aaron had made earlier, the Inorganic pointed her finger at him. “Did you forget your thinking cap?” -There were a few confused looks, the human never wore a hat of any kind. “Don’t think of it as a spaceship problem, think of an Earth equivalent. What would you do then?”
People looked at him expectantly, and he couldn't help but shrug. “They just can’t compete alone...” Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. “I mean, the first thing is to stop being alone, or independent. You need friends, people to group together with to form a team. If we took over enough of the smaller ships, or had them sign on as independent contractors or something, we could set up a trade network. It would take on all the small jobs and by spreading it out, sharing the load, we could maximise speed and efficiency. One ship bouncing from place to place dropping things off individually is inefficient; we could set up hubs. All ships collect and all ships deliver, and the hubs make sure we maximise efficiency by collating and sorting everything. Like a post office, a space post office.”
Allistan dropped his pen, and Danyd looked equally stunned. “That’s... That’s kinda brilliant, kid.” He hesitated. “Problem is, nobody is going to trust that system. Random folks just passing it around, hoping it gets to where it's supposed to. The current norm is that you give it to one ship, and it goes directly where you want.
Aaron nodded, then smiled. “Give them uniforms, and paint all the ships the same. Easy. Then it’s one big company you’re trusting, not just any ship that’s passing. Make every shipment trackable, and have a strict code of conduct that people can trust. Standardise the prices and make it convenient.”
Jar’Bek, with his knowledge of pirates and raiders, was quick to raise a hand. “You don’t want tracking signals.”
The human shrugged. “Barcodes, or QR codes, whatever. Not a constant signal, but just a quick scan as the package arrives at every separate step along the way to notify the shipper of its progress. I dunno, I’m just throwing out ideas.”
Alexa patted his head again. “Don’t stop, this might be important. You will need a lot of transport to set up your new colonies. Why pay someone else?”
A predatory grin broke out on Aaron’s face. Cost-saving and money-making - this was definitely worth pursuing. “Fine, but the most important thing is the name. Something reliable, and official sounding.” There was a pregnant pause as Aaron’s mind churned through options. Alexa prepared her hand and eyed the back of his head. “Tulseria’s Wings Intergalactic Transport.”
Smack.
“We could hire only Jaims’Mae and call it Snail Mail!”
Smack.
“Professional Unified Shipping and Storage-”
Smack.
“Fine! I couldn’t think of anything for Y anyway. Space Post, it is. We can use the tagline Express Recorded Mail.” He laughed, and ducked.
Alexa's phone on the table suddenly played the Mario coin sound, and she stood up. “It is time to say goodbye to Tony.”
The fun diversion had taken Aaron's mind off the task he had been dreading all day, and he swallowed hard as reality slid back in. He wasn't laughing now. He had grown to think of Tony as his pet, which to him was family, and he did not want to say goodbye. He’d spent as much time as his busy schedule would allow with Tony, exercising him and preparing him for his release. To several of the crew's dismay he had begun feeding Tony parts of the local prey animals, even tying them to string and making Tony chase them, worried that the leokas might have lost his killer instinct. His worries were unfounded, as Tony had excelled at the mock hunting. It had shown the leokas was truly a wild animal, and that releasing him was the best decision, but it still stung.
Next
submitted by Sooperdude24 to HFY [link] [comments]

2020 Playing Card Holiday Gift Guide

My favourite decks from the past year

Playing cards make the ideal gift, particularly the many beautiful custom decks available nowadays. Almost everyone can use a deck of cards at some point, so they have an instant and universal appeal, especially if a deck has some customized artwork and is packaged in an appealing tuck box.
In this list I want to focus on some of my favourite decks that have come out in the past year 2020. This year has been a challenging year for many of us in light of the coronavirus that has swept across the world. But in the middle of all this darkness, there have also been some bright spots, which include the brand new crop of custom decks that have appeared in the marketplace.
The suggestions I'm making are very much a matter of personal choice, and other playing card enthusiasts might make other choices. I haven't seen each and every deck that hit the market in the past year, and there are undoubtedly plenty of other worthy decks that qualify for a list like this. I've also not included any decks that have haven't yet been produced, even if they have been crowdfunded. This list strictly covers decks that you should be able to obtain from online retailers and resellers. I've also not included so-called "hype decks" that sell out almost immediately at the publisher level (e.g. Fontaines), but only those that enter retail channels and are more widely and readily available.
I've also included links to where you find them at PlayingCardDecks so that you can see images of the tuck boxes and cards for each item, and because they're the retailer I personally buy playing cards from the most. But you should be able to find these decks at most online retailers.

Popular Series

Several series of playing cards have become brands of their own, and achieved nearly cult status from collectors. This past year has seen some great additions to the line-ups from popular series that include big names like Jerry's Nuggets, Cherry Casino, and NOC.
● Jerry's Nugget Aqua Playing Cards - Jerry's Nuggets are a modern icon in the world of playing cards, due to the cult status of this deck, which was praised by cardists around the world. It was originally printed in the early 1970s, and was so much in demand in recent decades that copies fetched over $500 in the secondary market. A very successful reprinting of the original blue and red decks happened in 2019, and in the past year we've seen multiple reprints in different colours. Among my favourites in this series are the bright colours like orange, yellow, and green, which have all appeared in the past year. But there's also something for those who prefer a more muted look, such as steel and black. For more in this series, see Jerry's Nugget decks.
● Cherry Casino Tropicana Teal Playing Cards - The Cherry Casino decks capture a retro vibe, and are a throwback to the old fruit machines from gambling halls, with their distinctive cherry artwork. For me the real appeal of this series lies in the gorgeous card backs, which have a metallic sheen making them feel instantly different from all other decks. The face cards are all quite standard, so that makes them ideal for card games or card magic. Multiple new colours continue to appear in this series, such as Flamingo Quartz Pink, and most recently McCarran Silver. For more in this series, see Cherry Casino decks .
● NOC 3000X2 Purple Playing Cards - The acronym NOC originally stood for Nothing Only Colour, and in line with this the initial decks in this series were all very minimalist. Many people like to collect and use the NOC decks, and over time the series has evolved somewhat. The most recent releases show some new splashes of creativity, and with the NOC 3000X2 deck we travel into the future, past the year 3000. Vibrant purples and pinks inhabit the landscape of the cards, for a very modern and flashy look that is particularly well suited to cardistry. This particular deck is also available in a matching pink version. For more in this series, see NOC decks.

Popular Brands

There are several big brands that you can count on for quality, and this year was no exception, with big companies like Theory11, Ellusionist, and Art of Play all continuing to contribute wonderful playing cards to the market.
● James Bond 007 Playing Cards - When it comes to glamorous tuck boxes, it doesn't get much better than the luxury of playing card producer Theory11. This wonderful deck is a tribute to agent 007, James Bond. I collect most of the Theory11 decks, and this one is particularly terrific, with a supreme tuck box, and Bond-inspired paraphernalia on the court cards and on the card back. Close observers will find many Bond gadgets and more. Theory11 have put out several stylish releases in the past year, another one being the Hollywood Roosevelt deck. For more, see Theory11 decks.
● Shadow Masters Legacy v2 Playing Cards - One of the companies at the forefront of the custom playing cards movement was Ellusionist and their Black Tiger deck continues to be a modern icon. While they've since been overshadowed by the many custom decks produced in the crowd-funding era over the past decade, they continue to produce some memorable decks from time to time that are worth picking up. The Shadow Masters Legacy v2 is a black deck in the classic Ellusionist style, and represents the kind of thing that made them great to begin with. A jet black background is the chief feature of this deck, and the red and white used for the artwork and pips stands out beautifully against the inky black. This deck compares favourably with any other deck from the modern era. For more, see Ellusionist decks.
● Yellow Wheel Playing Cards - The brand Art of Play is the home of influential cardists Dan and Dave Buck. Their Red & Blue Wheel decks are among my all-time favourite decks, with gorgeous metallic inks as part of a split-pip design. The Yellow Wheel deck is their latest entry in the Wheel series, that retains the original card backs but now in yellow. But the highlight is the card faces, with the split pips employing a stunning metallic silver that complements the cards beautifully. This is a completely custom deck that is certain to impress anyone who sees it. Art of Play produces many new decks each year, and their Henry & Sally deck is a fun novelty release also worth checking out. For more, see Art of Play decks.

Popular Designers

They are a very select group, but there are some notable designers in the playing card industry who have developed a real name for themselves, have generated a large following of loyal fans, and continue to produce high quality custom decks on a regular basis.
● Italia Radiosa Playing Cards - Italian designer Giovanni Meroni is the man behind Thirdway Industries, and his playing cards are in high demand from collectors around the world. His signature style is immediately recognizable in each of his decks, and this one is no exception. Along with its companion Italia Segreta, it's themed around the wonders and secrets of Italy. The unique court cards are the real highlight, showcasing Giovanni's usual creativity and style. The number cards are also fully custom. These are the kinds of decks that will hold their value well in years to come. If you want even more vibrant colours, check out Modern Idols, from the same creator. For more, see Giovanni Meroni decks.
● Postage Paid Playing Cards - Behind the brand Kings Wild Project is Jackson Robinson, who is one of the few professional designers that actually makes a living out of designing playing cards. This deck was inspired by the idea of playing cards functioning as postcards, each with its own stamp and post paid stamp. All 50 US states are represented on different cards, and everything about this deck is fully customized. This deck was produced in only limited numbers, so it will be out of stock in most places. But if you're quick, you can still grab Jackson Robinson's General Admission deck, which applies a similar concept to tickets, with each card representing a vintage ticket stub from the early 20th century. For more, see Jackson Robinson decks.
● Kodiak Playing Cards - From popular designer Jody Eklund and his Black Ink Playing Cards Company, comes this delightful deck of playing cards that is geared to the poker player and collector. The cards have a very classic look, but offer a fresh take on the designs of the court cards and pips. Jody is highly respected for his approach to graphic design, and these cards will prove an excellent choice if you like playing card games, and want to bring something stylish and attractive to the table. For more, see Jody Eklund decks.

Magician Decks

Most magicians can perform their magic with any deck, but typically they prefer to do card magic with a deck where novelty and customization are minimal, so as not to distract from their magic. These decks are well suited to performing magic, and contain bonus gaff cards or other secrets that enable them to produce miracles not possible with ordinary decks.
● Card College Playing Cards - These decks are a tribute to the most outstanding modern teacher of the fundamentals of card magic, Roberto Giobbi. Mr Giobbi is the author of Card College, a series of best-selling books which are the modern gold standard for learning card magic. Available in red and blue, these decks are simple and practical for the working magician, and as a bonus each contains two double backer gaff cards. If you want more luxury, check out the stunning Luxury 3 Deck Set, which has even more stylish cards, individually numbered tuck boxes with unique origami style features, packaged in an attractive acrylic box - the ideal collectible or gift for magicians.
● Remedies Royal Blue Playing Cards - The Remedies decks come from popular creators Daniel Madison and Daniel Schneider, and this is a successor to the Remedies Scarlet Red deck. Many collectors love the Black Roses brand of playing cards, and collect whatever they produce. This blue Remedies deck has a classic and minimalist look with bold blue card backs, and is very functional and practical. The inclusion of a special Angle Zero gaff makes it ideal for magicians.
● DMC Elites Red v5 Playing Cards - Of all the marked decks I own, the DMC Elites is easily my first choice whenever I want a marked deck with cards that can be easily read from a distance, due to the clever and yet almost invisible marking system it uses. This deck has previously been released in several different colours, and now incorporates Tamariz's Mnemonica stack. All you need is the deck, but there is a terrific Passport book available separately, which will give you some great ideas for routines you can pull off with this great marked deck. For more, see Marked decks.

Cardistry Decks

Card flourishing has really boomed in recent years, and especially shines when cardists use a deck that has colourful and striking patterns optimized for cardistry, that enhance the visual aesthetics of cards in motion, as these decks show.
● Neon Orange Cardistry Playing Cards - This deck represents Bicycle's attempt to meet a demand for a relatively low-cost deck geared towards card flourishing. The card backs have a geometric design, and the faces are all identical and completely non-standard, showcasing the latest evolution in playing cards optimized entirely for cardistry. Bright colours ensure that the cards look visually appealing in fans, spreads, and flourishing moves. Alongside this vibrant orange deck is its blue companion, the Neon Blue Aurora deck.
● Autumn Circle Cardistry Playing Cards - Tally Ho is a classic brand that USPCC has been producing for a long time. The circle back design of the typical Tally Ho deck has become iconic, and is especially appreciated by those who enjoy card flourishing. Each year the folks at Bicycle produce some in-house decks for special occasions, and the Autumn Circle Back deck is a lovely result. The colours capture the warmth and glow of autumn leaves and the mood of harvest time, while the pattern on the card backs is perfect for cardistry.
● ArrowDynamix Cardistry Playing Cards - Given the high volume of cardistry decks appearing all the time, it can be difficult to come up with something completely original, but this minimalist deck has accomplished exactly that. Each card features a giant vertical arrow on the card backs, and a giant horizontal arrow on the faces. With carefully choreographed sequences and moves, you can create truly unique patterns and effects that you simply can't achieve with any other cardistry deck.

Animal-themed Decks

Do you love animals, or do you have an animal lover in your life? There are a lot of wonderful custom decks that are tributes to our four legged friends, or depict some of our favourite creatures.
● Woof and Whiskers Dog Playing Cards - The real appeal of this deck is the cute tuck box, which has cardboard ears that fold up, to complete the look of the friendly dog on the front of the box. I would have liked to see some more customization with the number cards, but it's still a very charming deck, with delightful custom artwork on the court cards and aces. This is one of two Zoo 52 decks, so if you like the Dog deck, you'll also want to pick up the Playful Paws Cat deck, which is equally cute.
● Aviary Playing Cards - There are a lot of independent creators that produce Bicycle branded playing cards with the help of industry giant USPCC, but this big name producer also releases its own in-house decks. This is my favourite of their four newest releases that hit the market at the end of 2020, and is a very classy looking deck with artwork inspired by a traditional look, but with adjustments to give it a custom feel, and the presence of several birds carefully positioned throughout the deck. Of the four new releases from Bicycle, the Sea King deck is also proving to be very popular.
● King of Tigers Playing Cards - If you're looking for a deck with bling, this is it. The card backs have a borderless tiger skin pattern, which has been printed with some of the latest technology that makes use of foil for a truly eye-catching look. The tuck box is even more glamorous. While the court cards are clearly inspired by traditional courts, the Jokers bring back the tiger theme strongly, and the tiger skin look recurs throughout the deck.

Food-themed Decks

Recent years have seen some wonderful novelty decks themed around different kinds of food. These are always a great way to whet your appetite for a card game, or to show off to family or friends, and have proved a real hit with collectors.
● Squeezers V3 Playing Cards - Good luck getting your hands on decks from this extremely popular series from Organic Playing Cards, because they sell out quickly. These fruit inspired decks have delightful tuck boxes, and this grapefruit themed deck even comes in a tuck box that looks like a juice box, and is actually scented like grapefruit. The cards themselves are quite practical, but add humorous grapefruit themed elements to the court cards, and new bold colours. OPC's 2020 releases also included the watermelon-themed Carvers deck, while their current release sees the brand go in a slightly new direction with the corn-themed Shuckers.
● Noodlers Chicken Playing Cards - If you like the concept behind the Organic Playing Cards series, you'll probably also enjoy this deck, which has a similarly styled tuck box to the Squeezers decks, but represents a packet of ramen noodles. The orange colour on the card backs and pips has also been inspired by the noodles theme. The artwork on the court cards has a quaint and cute style, with each character depicted in a light hearted style quite different from standard courts, and all holding a bowl of noodles. For a final laugh, the Jokers provide us with the necessary packet of "chicken seasoning" to add to our noodles.
● Citrus Playing Cards - Created by Flaminko, the Deliciousness series has been somewhat overshadowed by the more successful fruit inspired cards from Organic Playing Cards. But I love the Flaminko decks, because they apply customization to all elements of the cards, including the pips. This novelty deck is well suited for card flourishing, card games, and collectors, and cleverly captures all that is juicy and wonderful about citrus fruit.

Music-themed Decks

Music is another evergreen theme, and there's a solid range of lovely decks for the music lover, whether your taste is classical or more contemporary rock-and-roll.
● Composers Mozart Playing Cards - This deck is part of a series that also includes other composers like Bach. These decks are true collector pieces, and make a wonderful tribute to some of the greatest composers of all time. The tuck boxes have a very classical look, and metallic ink enhances the gorgeous card backs. Meanwhile completely custom artwork on the faces emphasizes a vintage and classical feel. They are great for music lovers and collectors, but if classical music isn't your thing, then check out the Rock and Roll deck.
● Piano Player Playing Cards - If the piano is your instrument of choice, this is a deck for you. The creative tuck box is available in two styles, one with two black keys and the other with three black keys, which means you can place two decks alongside each other to create a larger keyboard. Fully custom characters inhabit the court cards, with the keyboard motif returning in the details of the artwork. Small touches like this really make this creative deck a thing of unique beauty.
● Soundboards v3 Midnight Playing Cards - Remember the old walk-man cassette players? In the 1980s these revolutionary electronic devices were among the first to make your personal music collection portable. The Soundboards deck replicates the look of a classic walk-man, and the Jokers complete the look by bringing the cassette tape look into the box. This Midnight edition has a dark look, so you might also want to consider the red deck if you prefer a more traditional colour.

Fiction & Film themed Decks

Most of us love a good story, whether it's in the pages of a novel or on our screens. Here are some great custom decks that are loving tributes to some of the best from the worlds of fiction and film.
● Jane Austen Playing Cards - Fans of the classic novel will appreciate the loving treatment that Jane Austen's famous novels have received in this delightful tribute from the Art of Play label. Each suit represents a different novel, with the court cards featuring the lead characters in the story. The design of the characters is inspired by period costumes and reflects the fashions from the time in which the stories are set. The classy tuck case ensures that everything is nicely packaged and well presented.
● Star Wars Playing Cards - Theory11 achieved a real coup by acquiring the rights to bring the Star Wars brand to playing cards. They were the perfect company to ensure that the result was a classy deck that did justice to the world of the films. This pair of Light Side and Dark Side decks begins with a top quality and highly attractive tuck case, as we've come to expect from Theory11. The court cards all feature different characters from the movies, and the design is the perfect blend of customization and playability, making this a practical deck you can bring out for your favourite card game, or to give to the Star Wars fan in your life. A similar pair of decks was produced later in the year in White and Black.
● King Arthur Playing Cards - The result of a collaboration between Riffle Shuffle and Studio Muti, this pair of red and green decks tell the story of the famous Arthurian legend. For me it's a personal and nostalgic childhood favourite, in light of the adventure and imagination it evokes. But as impressive as these decks are, they pale besides the King Arthur Gold deck, which has gold metallic ink on the faces, and gold foil on the card backs, for a truly extravagant look. Inside and out, this is a stunning tribute to a timeless classic from the world of fiction.

Space-themed Decks

So I cheated. I already have a section devoted to cardistry, so I figured I'd sneak in a second category, by including some cardistry decks that all have a space theme. These decks all feature colourful visuals that work well for flourishing, but can also be enjoyed by collectors who appreciate their vibrant colours and exuberant designs.
● Solokid Constellation Playing Cards - This set of twelve decks captures the twelve different star signs. It was produced by Bocopo, a company well known for producing colourful custom decks that appeal especially to cardists and collectors. These decks are typical Bocopo offerings, with evocative colours that are unique to each different deck, to help capture a different feeling for each and every constellation. If you like vibrant colour, you'll certainly find something to enjoy here.
● Stargazer New Moon Playing Cards - Several different decks have now appeared in the Stargazer series, but the recent New Moon deck is probably my favourite. The circular moon that appears on all the card backs makes it an ideal deck for card flourishing moves like spins and twirls. The face cards have some truly vibrant colours, and capture well the feel of a night sky bursting with colour and life.
● Sirius B v3 Playing Cards - I fell in love with the style of the original Sirius B deck, so this third edition was always going to win me over. The court cards consist of a blur of colours that look like paints mixed together, and this style has also been applied to the pips. The colours are the real appeal here, and the signature design of the card backs also looks very nice in card flourishes.

Transformation Decks

I personally adore transformation cards, and consider them to be one of the most fascinating and memorable types of playing cards there is. The idea is that you take the pips and incorporate them into a larger picture that forms a unique work of art, for each and every card in the deck.
● Cotta's Almanac #1 Reproduction Playing Cards - This historic deck was first created in 1805 by J.C. Cotta, and was the very first of its kind. Themed on the "Joan of Arc" play by Schiller, the beauty and creativity of these cards will still win over collectors today. Lovingly produced in a high quality modern edition, this recreation is the first of the entire series of Cotta transformation decks that is being reproduced by PCD.
● 5th Kingdom Playing Cards - This deck is possibly my favourite original release from PCD in the past year. It is an outstanding example of the creativity and originality of a semi-transformation deck, where the pips have been cleverly incorporated into the artwork. Each suit represents a different culture, turning each individual card into a work of art that can be admired and enjoyed.
● Pack of Dogs V2 Playing Cards - This transformation deck is the work of John Littleboy, who has produced a number of such decks in his inimitable style, including Pack of Dogs, Kitten Club, Mermaid Queen, and Bag of Bones. The number cards are my favourites, and in this deck each of these represents a larger art piece with a dog. Each suit has a progressive image, so they don't feel totally unique from each other. It's more like a series of consecutive snapshots, and you can use flip animation to tell the story. Littleboy's Kitten Club V2 deck applies a similar concept to cats.

In-House Decks

PlayingCardDecks doesn't just sell playing cards, but Will Roya also uses his wealth of experience to team up with designers and graphic artists to produce high quality custom decks under the PCD label. Here are some great custom decks that were published in-house over the course of 2020.
● Astronaut Playing Cards - This novelty deck is a delightful creation that will please anyone who has an interest in space and space travel, in light of its unique theme. The Kings are all depicted as astronauts, while the Queens and Jacks represent space travellers. The card backs have a futuristic look with neon lights, and this look carries over to the number cards, which are highly customized with unique red and blue pips.
● Beekeeper Playing Cards - There are plenty of bee themed playing cards already on the market, but the artwork style gives this one a truly unique feel. Two decks were produced, one with light card backs and the other with dark card backs. This is a great novelty deck for the collector, because there's especially some delightful creativity to be found with the bee-inspired pips, and the detailed custom artwork on the court cards.
● Testament Classic Playing Cards - This is a Biblical themed deck created by artist Ben Green. It's intended as an art deck, with the images on the cards depicting Biblical characters from well-known narratives. Representing a dual love for playing cards and a love for Bible-inspired art, this deck will especially appeal to the collector.

Out-of-the-Ordinary Decks

I'm a sucker for highly unusual decks with a high degree of novelty, and even though these are not ones I'd typically use for playing card games, they have very unique features that make them stand out from your average custom deck.
● Starry Night Puzzle Playing Cards - Fancy a deck that doubles as a jigsaw puzzle? This clever deck takes its inspiration from Vincent Van Gogh's famous painting, The Starry Night. The artwork on the card faces is all taken from the painting, and all the cards can be pieced together to make a single giant picture, thus effectively functioning as a large puzzle. Yet each card has clear indices so it's still something you can use for card games too. Definitely unique and out of the ordinary, this set of playing cards is a perfect choice for fans of classic art and paintings.
● Falcon Razors Deluxe Throwing Playing Cards - Rick Smith Jr has made multiple world records in throwing playing cards. His baseball background holds him in good stead, but anybody can learn to throw playing cards if you use the techniques Rick teaches. These throwing cards were a collaboration with legendary flourisher De'vo, and were featured in one of this year's viral videos from Dude Perfect, which featured Rick and his amazing card throwing. The cards are slightly thicker than standard Bicycle stock, to ensure extra durability and performance for card throwing.
● AQUA Invisible Plastic Playing Cards - If you're looking for something completely different, this might hit the mark. This is a ground-breaking deck that is the closest thing to being invisible. All the cards are made out of completely transparent plastic, after which a high gloss transparent printing is applied to selected areas of the cards to produce the designs and pips. So each card is effectively completely transparent, and yet you can see its unique artwork and determine its value and suit. The handling is surprisingly better than you'd expect for a completely plastic deck, and it's certainly something unique.

Other Gift Ideas

Do you want to let your gift recipient make their own decision about what to get, or are you not quite sure what to buy? Here are a couple of special gift ideas that might help out, even if it is to give your family or friends a convenient way to enable you to select your own gift!
Firstly, there's a wide range of accessories available for playing cards, like card clips, card cases, and more. Alternatively, consider a gift card, which is available in amounts of $10, $25, $50, $100, and $200. There's also the popular Pip Box Club, which has been around for over two years. Subscribers get a selection of decks and goodies shipped to them each month, and offers great value with each box.
Boxing Day Sale: Right now you can take advantage of a special sale at PlayingCardDecks, and save $10 off any order over $30 by using the code box20. This coupon is valid from Boxing Day until the end of 2020.
Happy shopping, and happy holidays!
submitted by EndersGame_Reviewer to playingcards [link] [comments]

Ultimate setupapping guide

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This is a script for a youtube setupapping guide that I made last month, however I speak English too poorly and don’t have much to show with the long narration so I decided to format it to a written guide instead. I have censored the forbidden terms so that’s why in some places the terminology might sound a bit weird.
Hello guys, today I will try my best to make the ultimate setupapping guide. This is a very long and complicated subject, I might miss some information as it will be difficult to crank up everything in a single guide. I will try to make it as informative as possible.
First of all setupapping methods change from time to time but the basics are mostly the same.
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  1. The first topic is why you should blyatpass.
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As you know setupapp locked devices are not technically defective. They are simply crippled by software. The setupapp lock is server sided and not stored on the device itself, unlike the FRP of android phones. The most popular argument for defending setupapp lock is that the device cannot be used by anybody except its owner however this practically wont benefit the owner in any means. As it cant be used, it wont be able to be tracked by its imei number if it gets reported as stolen so it actually significally lowers the owners chance of getting the device back. Until last year setupapp devices were used mostly for parts, nearly everything except the motherboard in a locked device can be used.
Setupapp locked devices are often sold for parts on a much lower price than unlocked ones. Now because of the blyatpassing and unlocking methods this ends up being a great deal for getting a functional apple device which is usually much more expensive than a locked one.
Obviously not all locked devices are lost or stolen, just most of them. Some people end up forgetting their accounts and don’t know how to recover them. Keep in mind that apple devices are often used by elderly and other people who arent good with techology because of their simplicity. Find my iphone, ipad or ipod or FMI for short is the activation lock. After you log in with an apple account it is activated by default, so if you don’t disable it and forget your account you can get locked out of your device. You can check the FMI status of a device by looking up the IMEI or the serial number in some websites such as iunlocker and ifreesetupapp co uk.
One more thing that I can say is that the lock is also not good for the environment as it basically creates electronic waste.
So I think I said enough for this topic, lets move on to the second one.
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  1. The second topic is what hardware and software do you need for blyatpassing
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This seems like an odd topic however it is quite important to mention it in the beginning. There is no doubt that windows is the most popular operating system, however the most important blyatpassing tools are for mac. That doesn’t mean windows is bad for blyatpassing, it will still do the job with some exceptions. The first issue is that there isn’t checkra1n for windows. To sum it up checkra1n is the jailbreaking tool for ios 12 and newer devices and it is required for every blyatpass. That can be resolved by making a bootra1n or checkn1x bootable usb that contains just checkra1n. I will recommend using a free program called balenaetcher for that. Turn off your pc, boot from the usb, jailbreak your device and then restart back to windows to complete the blyatpass. However in some instances it is good to have more than 1 checkra1n version to try out and this might be an issue, I’m refering to 0.9.7, 0.10.2 and 0.11.0, these 3 versions should be enough. The other major issue is that currently the windows version of sliver, which is one of the most important blyatpasssing tools mildly said lacks features compared to it’s mac counterpart. The current version 5 has just the passcode blyatpass, I will explain later. Of course this might change in future if somebody makes a better version of sliver for windows.
On windows you will need this version of itunes as the latest one doesn't seem to work well for blyatpassing programs: Itunes64setup from 15.09.20
I should also mention that checkra1n is a tethered blyatpass, this means that on every reboot you will need to jailbreak the device again.
Best case scenario is having both mac and windows, like in my case. If you have mac only then you will lack some of the blyatpassing programs which are mac only. If you have linux then you got checkra1n but nearly nothing else. There should be few blyatpassing tools for linux but I’m not familiar with them.
If you consider buying an old mac for blyatpassing I recommend that you get a model that natively supports high sierra, which is the best os for blyatpassing. I had previously installed mojave with mojave patcher on my macbook mid 2010 and it caused ipwndfu not to work, which is required for blyatpassing old devices like iphone 4 to ipad 4. If you are targeting the ios 12+ devices then this wont be an issue.
A hackintosh will probably do the job as well. Also make sure you have a proper cable while blyatpassing. It doesn’t need to be original but just a good quality one.
Enough said here, its time for the next topic.
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  1. Which devices can be blyatpassed and how
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The current blyatpass methods rely either on ramdisk payload for older devices or jailbreak for newer ones and both methods use the checkm8 bootrom exploit. The program that we use for jailbreaking compatible devices is called checkra1n.
Checkra1n supports all devices with processors apple a7 to a11 on ios versions 12.0 to 14.2+ . Currently on ios 14 you can jailbreak all devices but there might be incompabilites after a big ios update, for example it took 2 months until a10 and a11 could be jailbroken on ios 14. If you are unsure what processor your desired devices uses you can just google that, check it on a website like gsmarena or similar. There arent ipods on gsmarena so I can just mention them now as the ipods that can be setupapp locked are just 3-ipod touch 5, 6 and 7th generation. 5 uses apple a5 , 6 uses apple a8 and 7 uses apple a10. All of them can be blyatpassed by using various methods, we will discuss that later.
The ramdisk method supports everything from a4 to a7 devices. For this methods we use mostly sliver with some exceptions. For apple a4 also known as iphone 4 you have the sliver mac ramdisk method which is super simple, the ssh manual java method which is quite complicated or the geeksn0w method which also seems quite simple, the last 2 methods are on windows. The a5 devices require arduino uno and sliver so basically if you are on windows or you don’t feel like spending about 30 dollars on arduino you are out of luck for saving the motherboard in the device. I personally don’t like that you need arduino for this blyatpass but well that’s just how it is. There is also the storage full method but realistically it wont work for like 95% of the people and its just frustrating. For ipad 2 at752 has a blyatpass server. Here I can simply recommend you to buy a new motherboard for your a5 device from aliexpress, they are quite cheap, infact they are cheap for a6 too. For a6 we got the simple sliver method and the manual one which is also quite simple. The shipping is slow though. For a7 in my opinion an untethered blyatpass on ios 12 is a better option but the ios 10 ramdisk blyatpass also exists in sliver with more instructions there.
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  1. Next topic is what are the options for a12 and higher?
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The answer is simple, nearly none. If the device is open menu with a logged in account, you can jailbreak it with something like uncover if its on ios 13.5 or older then I think you can perform fmi off also known as full unlock with the epic ok.zip, I will explain more about it later or if you feel like spending money in case it is on ios 12 or 14, a paid service. I have no experience and I have never performed such a blyatpass so this is the only time I’m gonna mention it. I have also seen one more method with wifi proxy and a trusted certificate or open menu. Currently unlock isn’t possible for passcode or hello screen, unless you have the receipt of purchase for the device. You can probably get a receipt from some sources and try to unlock It with the help of apple if it’s fmi status clean.
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  1. So lets move on to the next topic, which is about the more exotic unlock methods
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I know 2 such methods. Both of them don’t work on iphones. The first one is breaking the baseband method. For this method you need an ipad 2, 3 ,4 or mini 1 with celluar. I have also heard that this works for ipad mini 2 and ipad air too if you downgrade them to ios 10 but I don’t know how to do this. So basically you open up the ipad and break the resistor which is for the baseband. By doing this you effectively turn a celluar tablet into a wifi only one and unlock it, as this works just up to ios 10.
The next method is more interesting, it is the magiccfg method. It works on wifi only ipads and ipods, but I think if you break the baseband on a celluar ipad it would work as well. You basically change the SN, BMAC and WIFI address with ones that are fmi off and it's permanent unlock. To explain, the apple servers rely on these identificatiors to create an activation ticket and changing them is like changing the device. Obviously you must use ones from the same model device. For some devices like ipad 6 you can do it with a regular cable but for older ones you need a special DCSD cable which is like 10-30 dollars and its not available worldwide. Also if you are wondering from where will you get a clean SN, bmac and wifi adress, I think I have seen them for sale on aliexpress for a 2-3 dollars, however don’t quote me on this.
​
  1. The next topic is about the state of the device after you get it and which blyatpass method you should use
​
There are 4 possible states of a device: Restored commonly called ‘’Hello screen’’, on passcode/disabled/lost mode, open menu or MDM, also known as remote management.
First I should say that MEID devices can’t be blyatpassed with sim functionality if they are on hello screen. If they are on passcode you can perform the passcode blyatpass with sim functionality without issues. To check if your device is meid, while you are on hello screen press the info button at the bottom right and see if there is a meid number next to the imei. iPhone 6S and below also can’t be blyatpassed with sim functionality, even if they don’t have meid. This is the reason on most paid blyatpass websites you will see that only iphone 7-X are supported for gsm blyatpass.
Another thing I should mention is that if you are dealing with an older device that supports up to ios 10 you should treat is as a hello screen one. As I already mentioned checkra1n doesn’t support versions older than 12.0 so you can’t pull out the activation files and the FMI token without a jailbreak.
The hello screen state does not contain activation ticket. You cannot perform the passcode blyatpass and FMI off on it because of this obvious reason. For the newer devices you need to create an activation ticket or factory activate them, said with another words or just delete setup.app for the older ones up to ios 10. Deleting setup.app also works up to ios 12.4.4 and 13.2.3 as far as I remember, however this method is sub optimal in my opinion, as you don’t have baseband which is sim card functionality, you don’t have notifications, you don’t have account storage and you cant sync it with itunes since itunes will just pop up with the activation lock screen. Basically the sliver ramdisk blyatpass works this way, except for some a5 devices which can be factory activated with more functions but oh well that still requires an arduino and a mac.
To factory activate one of the newer devices you need to jailbreak them with checkra1n first and then use one of the tools to activate them. By doing so you basically activated the device locally. Obviously, the device is still locked on the servers but it won’t lock itself unless you update or reset it.
Here I’ll introduce one of the activation methods. For example most untethered blyatpasses that don’t have celluar functionality rely on having a pincode locked sim card into the device. In that scenario you just press cancel when the pin code screen comes up and that makes the device untethered. It sounds weird but I think doing this disables the baseband without causing battery drain. If you remove the sim you will be kicked back into the activation lock. However in case that happens, you can put back the sim card, restart the device and press cancel on the sim card pin prompt, that will unlock it again. This kind of blyatpasses are either free with limitations such as notifications, account storage, facetime and imessage not working or paid with everything except the sim card working.
However recently I have noticed that many newer blyatpasses without sim functionality work without the need of a pin locked sim card. In their case if you insert a sim card you will trigger the activation lock.
First of all I should mention that some of the activators require dependencies on both windows and mac. On windows that is mostly itunes for the correct drivers and net framework, on mac it’s a different story. You have itunes preinstalled, usually if an activator needs a dependeny there will be a script in its folder that will install it.
I personally recommend oc34n and st0rm. The price of their service is currently just $7.50 making them the most affordable paid option. Oc34n is the older service and it simply works fine. It is very reliable and works mainly on windows but there is also a more complicated terminal version of the activatior for mac os that will also do the job. St0rm on the other hand is very similar to oc34n except its newer, it also has a simple well working activator for windows, unfortunately there isn’t any version of the activator for mac. Others activators support mac as far as I remember however I haven’t used any other paid service different from oc34n or st0rm so I can’t give much more feedback on this topic. I will only mention that x-activator has bad reputation, some people say it is a mac trojan.
As a disclamer the paid blyatpasses of this type have everything working except sim card functionality, update and factory reset. If you end up locking your device you can unlock it infinitely as you already have paid to register your serial number into the program.
However I understand that not everyone will be willing to pay for this for various reasons. Maybe you don’t have a paypal, maybe you have an older device that it isn’t worth to pay for or maybe you simply won’t use the device that much, so you are ok with having no notifications, account services, facetime and imessage.
For the free untethered methods, they changed from time to time but recently there are many new free options. AT752 recently made a video showcasing f3arra1n which works fine. You can check the youtube channel of FRPFile, free tools are often being showcased there. As a third option you can see the subreddit or ask in the discord for the current free untethered blyatpasses if you don't manage find anything.
As a side note some of these blyatpasses are quite shady. Most or nearly all of them are likely safe but I would still recommend running them in a virtual machine.
For the tethered methods, generally there are many but you can just use sliver if none of the free untethered ones works. Not much to say about it, it will make the device usable as a last resort. You can install safeshutdown or sentinel jailbreak tweak to make the device go into hibernation while on low battery, so it won’t turn off. If it does turn off you will need to blyatpass it again, however as far as I remember your data on the device will remain. Needless to say this method lacks notifications, account services, imessage and facetime.
The blyatpasses with sim functionality are all paid, unless there is a cracked one that will last for a few days. I have seen this happening just once though. St0rm is my recommendation here, it’s 15$. Not much to say about it, it works as well as the 7.5$ blyatpass but with sim functionality. For mac os I already mentioned that there are other blyatpass options.
With this we covered the hello screen state.
The next state is the passcode, disabled or lost mode one
This state is very epic because if the is on ios 12.0 or newer there is a chance to perform full FMI OFF unlock, not just blyatpass. Even if FMI OFF fails you can still perform a perfect blyatpass that works as well as a paid one if you manage to jailbreak it. So go ahead and jailbreak the device with checkra1n, try with multiple versions from recovery mode until you succeed. If you keep getting errors try using the tool called minausb, however in my experience simply using checkra1n from recovery mode is enough. After you jailbreak it you can use the ok.zip (Dr. Moe) FMI off package to try to perform the full unlock.
First run maverick.exe->full dump->copy paste token in phpdesktop-chrome.exe from the other folder
Keep in mind that this free (leaked) package works only on ios 13, it doesn’t work on 12 and 14. FMI OFF on ios 12 is also possible but the services that offer it are less, I think st0rm has one if you ask them on discord. FMI off can fail if the apple id owner has changed his password.
In that case you can procceed with sliver passcode blyatpass, pull the activation files, if its an ios 13 device you can erase the device directly from the mac os version of the program and then after the erase is done jailbreak it, place the activation files while following the instructions and you are good to go. The sliver passcode blyatpass is quite reliable, it works most of the time. Make sure to save your activation folder, you will be able to use it multiple times.
If you can’t manage to jailbreak the device at all then it is most likely on version older than 12.0 . In that case unfortunately you lose the possibility to do FMI OFF and also you have to take a gamble-there is a windows program called 3utools, when you connect a device to it in recovery/dfu mode you will get an option for flashing a firmware, then if you look down on the flash tab you have 2-3 flash options, one of them is ‘’retain user data’’. Select this option and hope that the update will succeed, however if the device has too little storage it will return an error and then you will have to perform a clean restore, losing the activation files. I’m not sure which is the alternative of this program for mac os, so try to use windows if possible.
The next state is open menu.
I don’t have much to say about open menu as it is quite straight forward. You don’t have to deal with the usb restriction and you can directly see what ios version is the device running. Here if you are on version older than ios 12 you can delete all photos, apps and data from the device to free up storage before updating it with 3utools. On ios 12 and newer you can directly perform fmi off or the passcode blyatpass which still works on open menu, as it basically takes the activation files from the device regardless if it has passcode or no.
Now for the last state- MDM remote management
MDM can be blyatpassed with sliver-mac and similar tools. The process is easy-you just jailbreak the device, press 2 buttons then it is done. Untethered and with everything working, just don’t reset or update the device or it will come back. The sliver mdm blyatpass has been tested from ios 12 to ios 14.
A windows alternative for the MDM blyatpass is the skip setup option of 3utools but it doesn’t seem to always work and it is worse than the sliver method.
Now we have covered pretty much every state of the devices let’s move on to the final topic.
​
  1. It is troubleshooting.
​
I can’t deny that it is frustrating when something doesn’t work as intended. Please be patient and think out the options you have before making rash decisions such as restoring or using a possibly incompatible blyatpass. Stacking blyatpasses on each other will most likely cause a bootloop. What I’m trying to say if you are unsure if a blyatpass still works it is better not to use it, as you will most likely have to boot into dfu or recovery mode and restore the device afterwards which can be problematic in some situations.
For example, let’s say currently you have an iphone x on ios 13 and you want to try blyatpassing it with one of the free untethered methods but you are not sure if that blyatpass still works, you also notice some errors in the program. In that case search for a different blyatpass or just wait until a good one is released. Currently you can only restore iphone x to ios 14 which is not jailbreakable yet so you have just 1 chance. Actually you can jailbreak it to ios 14 as I mentioned earlier, forgot to edit this. But still, be cautious.
Some blyatpasses might also not work from the first try, keep this in mind. Ususally if a blyatpass doesn’t work after 3-4 tries then there is something wrong with it, there are exceptions though, mostly with the ipwndfu blyatpasses for old devices. Some of them might take more than 5 tries.
Also I understand that this is frustrating on windows as if the blyatpass fails you need to boot into the checkra1n usb then jailbreak again then boot into windows and try again. Hopefully you have a good ssd for that scenario.
Another thing I should mention is that some windows blyatpasses need to be on the system drive to work properly. So make sure they are on your :C drive or wherever you have installed windows. They just need to be in the same partition, not in the windows directory. It might sound obvious but I’m saying just in case some people misunderstand my words.`
Blyatpassing in general also requires some common sense. Obviously I can’t include detailed instructions for working with every popular tool as this will make the guide even longer than it already is. Most of the tools take just a few clicks and have easy to understand user interfaces. Sliver-mac is a great example for that, it has a ton of functionality in a very simple and user friendly program. Oc34n and St0rm one click tools for windows are also very simple.
Please make your research before asking to be spoon fed in the subreddit or discord. If you made it thit far in the guide, you are most likely educated enough to deal with nearly everything.
With this I should end this guide, I covered every topic that I could think of.
First of all I should thank Paul from discord for helping me out with editing the script of this guide, he is awesome.
Keep in mind that I’m not a developer, I’m simply a user with a good amount of knowedge and experience, that is why I made this guide. I must thank appletech752 for basically being the founder of the blyatpassing community, I am very grateful for his work. I should also thank the members of the setup.app subreddit and discord, the developers of the blyatpassing tools, the checkra1n team and everyone else I forgot to mention. They are doing a great job. I hope this guide helped you out.
As you can see I haven’t included links as I’m not particularly sure if that’s completely allowed, you can get pretty much all of the tools mentioned from the pinned post, from googling or from the discord server.
submitted by MaRtYy01 to setupapp [link] [comments]

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