Narrative Warfare: Establishment Protects Its Gaming Investment

Today in legal fuckery.

What is missing here is that Stupid Irvine Game Company hired a former Bush 43 official to senior management prior to all this coming to light. I said at the time that this was likely a sign that the company aligned itself with the Establishment, and there would be backchannel communications about what to do about this.

I did not expect this specific thing happening, but I did say that we'd see the decision to retain or cut loose the company via those communications, and now we have our answer: Protection and Retention.

The Feds here gave Irvine Company a sweetheart deal. Every element of the settlement is easily gamable to avoid any substantive reform, stymie any would-be internal coups, and--and this is key--sandbag any other efforts to hold them accountable (earnest or corrupt).

Irvine can and will use this development to screw the California suit into the dirt. Then they'll game the settlement terms to screw, humiliate, and flex on the parties that made this scandal erupt. They will clean house, retrench behind a fulfilled settlement, and resume Business As Usual. Spending $18M when the top shot-caller gets an annual bonus nearly ten times that amount means spending pocket change and not any punishment that matters.

Don't expect that union action with the National Labor Relations Board to do anything either. That agency is also captured and serves Mammon.

You, the individual, can only do two useful things: Don't Give Them Money, and Don't Give Them Attention. (Hence why I refuse to name the company.) There's plenty of other virtual card games, Real Time Strategy games, Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games, Action RPGs, out there and many now are better than what Irvine offers. Several of those games are by companies that don't hate you. Play those instead. Talk about those instead. Leave Stupid Irvine Game Company behind for good.