All of those quirks and inside jokes were forcibly removed to assure customers and government agencies there were no 'hidden' code or features in a product - just the released, documented, and tested pieces of the product.
I really miss the freedom of usenet.
1000's of odd and niche discussion areas.
The lack of any moderation lead to a massive influx of spam.
Reddit was looking like a good alternate, until the various ban waves shutdown any hope. Oddly enough 4chan still seems the only place for discussion outside the overtown window.
Hmmmmm....
I was one of the original backers at the minimal amount. I think 35$.
I absolutely loved the Wing Commander series and it still ranks as one of my all time favorites so I eager to see what Chris Roberts would produce.
I've played the game co-op with a friend on and off over the years and have definitely gotten more then 35$ enjoyment from the game.
As long as they keep moving forward, I have little to complain about.
Less and less.
I don't care about the larger subs - but even niche subs are getting silenced without breaking site rules. While activist subs that openly and actively brigade are left alone. There are less and less places to have conversations outside the Overton window. thedonald.win is good for a laugh, but voat and gab are just cesspools.
I've been using Discord for meeting prior to the 'shelter in place' and have been trying to continue to use it afterwards. There's been a markedly degradation of it in the last 2 weeks. We've gone from nearly flawless voice/video to constant issues of Person A can't hear Person B, let's switch servers to see if it improves, etc...
https://www.ambient-mixer.com/ has a ton of these types of background noises. All the sounds can be individually leveled and you can easily create your own from their audio library.
Not really forgotten.
This era had a small number of 'gems' for fans: The Thrawn books series, the SW RPG (d6), and the Dark Horse comics - Dark Forces was another in the lineup for fans.
This was one of the pivotal video games for Star Wars fans and was probably (at least in my experience) one of the key games that opened the market for later Star Wars games.
I don't think we should try to stop it.
I like discussion groups where the only thing moderated is spam. Yes, you'll get a lot of noise - but they can also be the only source of discussion that lies outside the overton window.
I've found it easy to ignore content I don't like, but it is getting harder to find open discussion forums.