u/INFOSLAVER

Figured I should share this in here for all the old-head RTS fans from the late 90's. I've been working on this showcase for a few years and I'm glad to be able to finally share it. I saw some people mention Dark Colony in here in recent years and would be remiss to not reveal my work here for everyone to see.

Take-Two has announced 13 remasters coming before 2030 and I'm hoping they include Dark Colony in that. Its 30th Anniversary is coming very soon (next year) and I figured it was best to reveal this now to give them time to consider doing an official remaster or sequel. Thanks for keeping this game alive!

DISCLAIMER: I'm aware that there was an unaired pilot somewhere that was a bit different than the show's final product. I'm NOT talking about that whatsoever.

Anyways:

Didn't it strike anyone else as odd that the second episode "Manny's First Day" kind of felt like the real pilot? It had all the makings of a pilot, from the character introductions through flashbacks ("remember you hired me?") to the awkwardness of showing Bernard and Fran's characters going casually about their lives. Manny works perfectly as an introductory lens to world in this episode. It essentially establishes the permanent format of the series. It introduces the central relationship triangle as we know it for the rest of the show: Bernard the misanthrope, Manny the foil, and Fran the moderator.

It just SCREAMS pilot episode in every way. I think technically you could start with episode 2 and you wouldn't miss anything narratively... at least as far as I can tell. Now, of course, the actual first episode is really fantastic and I would never recommend skipping it.

But that's just my point!

Do you think it's possible that episode 2 was the original drafted pilot and, upon further inspection, it came off as a bit drab and they decided to heavily modify a later episode to precede it? One which was ultimately much more exciting and tactile? Because if someone told me "Yeah, episode 2 was the pilot but it didn't do well with test audiences because it wasn't funny enough so they reformatted a later episode's script to lead into it" I'd believe them.

There's just something about Episode 2 that feels like the true start to the show, and the first episode has this "tacked on" feel to it; it's bigger, stranger, more cinematic. In fact, it's so well shot and full of locations that it almost felt more like a Black Books movie than a proof of concept... especially when compared to the small scale of episode 2.

And while I don't think the second episode was shot with the intention of being the first episode, I think perhaps it was outlined early on as the first episode before they realized it wasn't hooking enough and perhaps moved another episode to the forefront. "Cooking The Books" does seem like an episode 2 or 3 thing, with perhaps Manny's role in it being retrofitted so it could serve as the pilot. This is my best guess as to what happened...

Thoughts?

Why... ON EARTH... do websites like VeryWellMind.com and ClearMindTreatment.com, and even Google's own AI search result, all spew completely fictitious nonsense, such as the following:

"Sociopaths and psychopaths, both categorized under Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD), differ primarily in behavior and origin. Sociopaths are erratic, impulsive, and often created by environment (trauma), while psychopaths are calculated, charming, and typically have a biological basis. Psychopaths mimic emotions and lack remorse, while sociopaths may feel limited remorse and have hot-headed emotional reactions."

That is almost entirely incorrect information. It's almost impressive how wrong all of that is. And if I could put more quotes around "sociopathy" in the title, I would have. And every one of those websites says roughly the same thing.

First of all... "sociopathy" hasn't been an officially recognized term in over 50 years.

Psychopathy and Sociopathy were competing terms a long time ago. Psychopathy is the only recognized term in professional criminal psychology and it's been that way for a very, very long time. Sociopathy is an outdated fixture from a different era; it's a literal historical artifact that only appears when uneducated people use it glibly in conversation. I blame television mostly for its persistence in psychological pop culture.

Furthermore, the only real difference there ever was between "psychopathy" and "sociopathy" (in theory) was how it originated; childhood/later development VS born/genetic. And that's all been overturned anyways. We know now that it can go either way, with a larger focus on environmental factors and possible genetic predisposition in some cases.

But the thing is, in medicine, we don't need multiple terms for the same thing; how you ended up with a condition doesn't play a factor in its naming process, typically. This is especially true when the symptoms are identical. We name things based on symptoms and treatment for this reason. For instance, if you got HIV from sex or a needle—it doesn't matter because it doesn't change how you move forward or how the disease is handled. The only time we have different names related to how a condition was ascertained is when it affects treatment or the overall nature of the condition (Extrapulmonary Tuberculosis for example).

Secondly... psychopathy isn't a psychiatric diagnosis.

There is literally no such mental disorder as "psychopathy". It is not something you will find in the DSM-V anywhere (or any previous editions). The aforementioned websites, and Google AI itself, appear to conflate it with Anti-Social Personality Disorder (or ASPD, which IS a psychiatric diagnosis). While you can have both, one does not necessarily qualify you for the other. They are two different, though often intersecting, aspects of diagnostic criteria.

So... what is "psychopathy"?

It's a criminal behavioral designation used in risk assessment; it's specifically part of criminology, or "criminal psychology".

Psychopathy, as its derived, is a behavioral model created by criminal psychologists for people with tendencies that suggest feeling no remorse, resulting in certain patterns of behavior and an inability to be easily reformed. It originates from the PCL-R (are Psychopathy Checklist-Revised), which is a tool to measure likelihood of criminality. It's primarily used in forensic settings, so, for the most part, psychopathy requires a degree of criminality to even be considered. So your therapist, psychiatrist, and guidance counselor cannot "diagnose" you a psychopath.

While psychopathy can overlap with ASPD, as people with ASPD have a higher likelihood (predisposition) to develop into psychopaths, they don't necessarily overlap as consistently as people thing. Many folk with ASPD do not become criminals or fall into the legal category of "psychopath". The criteria for psychopathy has mostly to do with risk, impulse control, and criminal behavior.

...

Overall? I'm flabbergasted by all the pseudo-psychology websites. I assume their presence is why Google's AI generated response model is getting the information so wrong... but it's still shocking. To see that degree of misinformation being thrust to the top of the search results bothers the hell out of me. And it means people who are ill-informed will have their misconceptions constantly reinforced.

This probably runs deeper than this single instance (that goes without saying). Anyone else spot any such misinformation loops perpetuated by Google's lack of critical scrutiny?