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Re:Ask HN: Boring but important tech no one is working on? by chrisweekly on Friday August 26, 2022 @04:27PM (#32612369)
Related tangent - I'd love to see more games (whether or not explicitly "educational") that are more collaborative and less focused on violence. I remember playing GTA and enjoying its then-new (to me, at least) open-world dynamics and imagining a more peaceful version or mode where you'd play the role of an EMT or field surgeon, running around helping people and saving lives or something.
Re:Ask HN: Boring but important tech no one is working on? by frakkingcylons on Friday August 26, 2022 @06:32PM (#32613504)
You should check out Death Stranding! It has a unique asynchronous multiplayer model that rewards collaboration.

Players can place items and structures as they walk from place to place and you can see stuff placed by other players as you bring each in-game area "online". These items can be storage lockers, ladders and ropes to climb up difficult terrain, charging stations for your motorcycle, or even entire roads/highways stretching across a landscape. If you use an item from another player, you can give them likes. Note that you never see another player's character.

It's such a nice experience to come back to a river you bridged with a ladder and see hundreds of likes. There's not much combat in the game because it's generally easier to avoid confrontations, and the little combat that is present is heavily geared towards non-lethal weapons.

Re:Ask HN: Boring but important tech no one is working on? by Jensson on Friday August 26, 2022 @05:10PM (#32612801)
Tens of millions buys and plays truck simulators, so these games already exists. You have many other kinds, but the truck simulator one is the most popular. This type of game is much more popular in Europe than in USA though.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/227300/Euro_Truck_Simulat...

Re:Ask HN: Boring but important tech no one is working on? by fzzzy on Friday August 26, 2022 @05:29PM (#32612973)
GTA 5 roleplaying servers are getting pretty popular now and do what you want. I haven't tried them yet but I've wanted what you describe and it might be fun to check them out.
Re:Ask HN: Boring but important tech no one is working on? by jtsnow on Friday August 26, 2022 @04:51PM (#32612603)
SimCopter and Crazy Taxi are older titles that come to mind.
Re:Ask HN: Boring but important tech no one is working on? by ethbr0 on Monday August 29, 2022 @08:50PM (#32645435)
>> less focused on violence

> Crazy Taxi

You must have been a much better Crazy Taxi driver than my friends and I...