Snowpiercer Food, Game Nostalgia, and API Banking

Eat like a Tailie

Sep 13, 2021

Hello Randominians! How are you doing this fine Monday?

So far we have 5 contestants for the 1K giveaway - and there’s 11 days to go. If you still want to enter, you can go here

It’s been a crazy last few weeks in the internet world. Knights of the Old Republic is getting a remake. A REMAKE! the most glorious news about the best Star Wars game. Yes, I do love the Force Unleashed too.

Did you get in on that Sneaky Vampire Syndicate NFT drop? I made the mistake of trying to get in from my phone. Never again. It froze up on me.

Oh - did you hear that the vehicles from Mad Max: Fury Road are going up for sale?

That would be a lot of fun to drive around town. I’m sure there’s a way to make it street legal.

Throw on some punk clothes and some food-safe silver spray paint and you’re good to go!

Wait. Holy crap - that exists

Most of us won’t be bidding for one - so we can at least listen to the playlist for nostalgia’s sake.

Anyway, let’s hop on into today’s topics, shall we?

🍖Snowpiercer Food

Remember those dystopian food blocks that the “Tailies” in the Snowpiercer movie would eat?

Black bars that kinda looked like charcoal Jello.

Well, now there’s a company that’s really making them! Hahahaha, I’m kidding - kinda.

I’m wildly intrigued by the idea of eating literal square meals. Here’s the American meal.

Thost literal squares your eyes behold is a meal. In fact, it’s “Prime cut beef with green mixed vegetables and high quality carbs. Mustard sauce and Herb infused Italian extra virgin olive oil on the side.”1

What are these six squares, you ask?

3x Beef Square - Beef, Salt, Black pepper, Oregano
2x Sweet Potato Square - Sweet Potato, Salt, Black pepper
1x Broccoli & Spinach Square - Broccoli, Spinach, Parsley, Salt, Black Pepper2

Worried about dietary restrictions? This particular meal is Gluten, Dairy, Nut, Soy, Sugar, and Eggs free.

Currently, SquareEat is not selling any meals quite yet - but once they open for business - they’ll have meal plans and individual boxes you can purchase.

What do you think? Are you intrigued with these square meals?

I think they’d be perfect for taking in a little insulated bag on a hiking trip, a plane, or maybe the beach if you’re short on space. When you have limited room, something like this would be awesome.

As a long term meal substitute - I’m not so sure. Part of the joy of eating is the aestheticc.

I plan to buy one of them when they’re available! I’ll let you know what they taste like. Heck - maybe I’ll even do a video review!

Check em out.

SQUAREAT

🎮Game Store Nostalgia

The game stores are dying. Whether it’s 2030 or 2040, it won’t be long before Game Stop ceases to exist.

If they do still exist, they’ll look very different. If todays stores are any indication - they’ll be mostly funko pops and t-shirts - with few games.

With the rise of subscription gaming and Steam sales - the joy of buying a physical game is being lost.

For the foreseeable future, it will be possible to still buy physical copies of games in stores, just as vinyl record releases have held on in the era of music streaming. Yet, with the game industry and consumers increasingly moving away from games on discs and toward all-inclusive subscriptions, that unique experience of “buying” physical games in a physical store may become increasingly niche. (Source)

It may have taken over 10 years for the legacy of OnLive to finally sink its dead teeth into gamers - but subscription gaming is here to stay. Whether Stadia, Luna, or Xbox - it’s only a matter of time until most people are subscribed to at least one of them.

while downloading a huge library of non-physical games does feel efficient, the whole buying interaction seems to have lost all its mystique. Buying a game is now a mere online transaction involving packets of data sent on the platform of choice. It’s a purely utilitarian process, without any of that thrill of seeing a wall of boxes at your local store. (Source)

It’s kinda sad, isn’t it? Kids are growing up in a world where they look forward to the next season of Fortnite, Warzone, or Apex - as opposed to buying a crisp new game at the game store.

For example - I bought The Last of Us 2 last year at Target. It was exciting to buy it and go through the ritual of loading it up on the ole PS4.

However - I bought Cyberpunk 2077 on Stadia.

It just wasn’t . . . the same. I lacked the joy of cracking open that Cyberpunk case.

Hopefully, physical games will make a comeback at some point . . . but I believe it will “get worse before it gets better.” Heck, maybe Gamestop will completely die before physical games get popular again.

💳API Banking

Remember when that fintech neobank Simple came out? People were like WOAH. No physical bank??? That’s crazy.

Now it’s becoming pretty commonplace for people to never use a real bank. There’s tons of neobanks like Chime, Ally - and newer players like Venmo and Cashapp.

Heck, even Google is getting in the game with the Google Plex card.

Well, we’ve reached the point in time where anyone with the right credentials and funds can add banking to their service with the right API’s.

Own a company and want to issue your employees debit cards? Yup

Want to launch your own braned bank as a service? Yup

For example - there’s Cashfree which offers Banking as a service.

Pretty wild, right? Cashless partners with banks to provide these awesome services. Users of Cashless can even connect their current banks to the service too!

Want to issue a real Debit Card or Credit Card to your users?

Green Dot Bank can do just that - Full service Online Banking with Branded Cards.