Given the malleability of value in general, I think it's fairly reasonable to assume that a successfully digitized or in any way 'uploaded' human mind and its relative value would be a highly polarizing topic of debate, made no easier by the fact that it would be impossible to know just what sort, if any, sentience such a being would possess (unless we are assuming a full-blown, reliably testable theory of consciousness also exists). I only bring up sentience because I think that would end up as the determining factor in such debates, or perhaps 'personhood' is a more likely name for the same basic idea.

Your last point is the most relevant I think, and the trickiest. While I can certainly imagine a scenario such as that, it still leaves open the question of whether the uploaded mind was capable of being enhanced, which seems very likely -- and at that point, is there really much of a difference between it and an artilect?

I want like, at least three different kinds of TSA video game off the top of my head:

1. Basically an RTS that combines some of the lighter elements of nation-running akin to Age of Empires, but mostly just something like Starcraft in terms of controls, with Inchoroi = Zerg, Nonmen = Protoss, and obivously Humans = Terrans. The sheer size of the armies you control -- and fight -- should be one of key elements (need something for Sranc to swarm over, and sorcerors to destroy in epic magnitude). All of this spans the history of Earwa, from the Cuno-Inchoroi the Breaking of the Gates, to the First Apocalypse and then finally the Great Ordeal (and whatever comprises the 'final battles' of the Second Apocalypse) -- not necesarily in that order.

2. Action-focused RPG with precision melee combat a la Dark Souls/Sekiro, but with an actually nuanced/fun to play version of a Sorceror.

3. Elder Scrolls-like open world RPG that basically lets you travel across all of Earwa. Character creation, only with better and more realistic combat (things like weapon vs armor choices actually reflect reality, I.E. blade weapons can't cut through heavy plate armor, etc.).

Add Zeum for DLC expansion.



(Really, you could just combine the last two for my ideal TSA action-RPG)

I like literally everything I heard about him from that article! I'll definitely have to check out the TED  talk, at the very least.

“The Hierarchic Qualm: The sword kills. But the arm moves the sword. Is the arm to blame for murder? No. The mind moves the arm. Is the mind to blame? No. The mind has sworn an oath to duty, and that duty moves the mind, as written by the Throne. So it is that a servant of the Throne is blameless.”

― Seth Dickinson, The Traitor Baru Cormorant

I quite like that last one, H!

"There is much talk, and I have listened, through rock and metal and time. Now I shall talk, and you shall listen."

-- Halo 2

“The truth about the world, he said, is that anything is possible. Had you not seen it all from birth and thereby bled it of its strangeness it would appear to you for what it is, a hat trick in a medicine show, a fevered dream, a trance bepopulate with chimeras having neither analogue nor precedent, an itinerant carnival, a migratory tentshow whose ultimate destination after many a pitch in many a mudded field is unspeakable and calamitous beyond reckoning. The universe is no narrow thing and the order within it is not constrained by any latitude in its conception to repeat what exists in one part in any other part. Even in this world more things exist without our knowledge than with it and the order in creation which you see is that which you have put there, like a string in a maze, so that you shall not lose your way. For existence has its own order and that no man’s mind can compass, that mind itself being but a fact among others.”

― Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian: Or the Evening Redness in the West

So yeah I should have been more specific, as I had foreknowledge of Wilshire's experience with the games in my comment. Certainly I would always suggest to a new player to play the games 'as intended', and no doubt there is a persistent sense of reward after overcoming seemingly impossible enemy or boss encounters (which then end up seeming like a cakewalk the further you get into the games).

That being said however, I do think that once someone has familiarized themselves with the game enough and are into it but find themselves frustrated by certain things -- in particular, the run back to the bosses -- I don't at all discourage/admonish someone for just relying on summons or co-op to ease their way through. The boss runs are easily my biggest issue with the games (Souls/Bloodborne anyhow, haven't played Sekiro yet but it seems they mostly fixed this issue by putting the 'bonfires' or whatever very near or directly beside the boss). But in the Souls games and even Bloodborne I truly think the 'boss run' element is a flatout bad design choice. It made sense in Demon's Souls the most, but it feels like something they just carried over into the Dark Souls games mostly arbitrarily. It is a pure time-waster, and seems to me like one of the few examples of just plain 'artificial gameplay', and I've lost count of how many times I've heard of other people (myself among them) getting burned out specifically because of this aspect.

So yeah, I totally would suggest people try beat a boss solo or whatever at least a few times, even if just to get an idea of their attack patterns, but I also would ALWAYS prefer that someone be able to experience the vast wealth of content (especially if they're into the story aspects) in these games even if it means doing a save-state cheat to let you respawn in front of a fog door. Hell, even if FromSoftware just made the mandatory bosses have respawns occur no less than a minute away and with no or minimal enemies, while keeping side-bosses (of which there are always a crapload in these games) with the more traditional 'boss run' element, I think it would make a big difference.

I have no problem with a game being challenging but it needs to be justified, and it should never be a pure time waster...which in many cases is what the boss-runs end up being (inevitably, really -- once you know the 'route' and just run past the enemies, it's not even a challenge -- it's just a mindless dash that can frequently take 3+ minutes, not counting load times or whatever else). The games have plenty of challenges to overcome and deliver that rewarding feeling, and I really don't believe anything is gained by forcing this extra layer of punishment onto the player.