Feeling competent at something is great for your head! Being able to thus share things with others -- who, you know, actually want you to share them -- just multiplies that.
Feeling competent at something is great for your head! Being able to thus share things with others -- who, you know, actually want you to share them -- just multiplies that.
Maybe more significantly, it's a recent game with rave reviews that's still making Larian money without the use of mtx and/or dlc.
Aside, kinda expecting a lot of garbage D&D games since the endlessly greedy Hasbro has seen how much money it can make them. Doubt they'll do anything other than miss the forest for the trees in their execution of that, though.
No kidding, everything is heavily downvoted and 99% of the posts are incredibly lazy memes by its creator, 'LEFTWINGTEARS', who beyond the name and banal posts, has a meme that was already tired years ago as their user img.
Kinda seems like a stretch to even say that that community is being hosted there, given it's almost entirely just one very bored person. (Would be surprised if they were even 16 years old.)
I understand people's attachment to their community, but if even a significant minority of those who went dark mass resigned on the 30th, it would've had so much bigger an impact than any of the ongoing attempts at protest.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but since ETH moved to a proof of stake model rather than proof of work (i.e. "mining"), isn't its environmental footprint now a fraction of the wasteful behemoth it was previously?
(Though I 100% agree given the 'gas fees' (transaction costs), it's still absolutely useless as an actual currency.)
Don't know where you live, but my experience of NL is that everyone and their dog did things via WhatsApp. Even government services, would absolutely struggle to abandon all things Meta-related entirely while living there.
Another executive-driven decision by people who clearly don't use their own product (kinda impressive really when it's YT).
I can't help wonder if they saw an uptick in adblocking as a result of their absurd increases in ad-time recently and somehow thought this was a reasonable solution.
Yeah, I've known plenty of antifascists subscribed to, or otherwise technically "members" of awful online spaces just to keep an eye on things.
Got a bit carried away, but hopefully this is useful to somebody:
The Steam Deck is surprisingly versatile, especially now Valve have released the dock (enabling portable monitors). The most obvious benefits over a gaming laptop (beyond the price) are the smaller form-factor and relative quiet compared to a strong gaming laptop.
The main thing you should ask yourself is what you want to play.If your answer to that looks like "Crusader Kings III, Dota 2, and the latest competitive shooter", then it might not be the best choice. But in general, you'd be surprised by how many games work great thanks to its extremely versatile input options.
Games that released before controller support on PC was mainstream -- such as Oblivion, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., Deus Ex, or Baldur's Gate -- typically play fine thanks to its extensive input customisation (including custom radial menus), its dual trackpads and gyroscope, and the community layout system. There are exceptions where you'd want a keyboard and mouse, but not as necessary as you'd expect.
Beyond info on software compatability, ProtonDB also includes Deck-specific reports at the top of each page detailing others' experiences, such as whether they used a specific community layout or input method, performance under specific conditions (such as limiting power or frames to conserve battery life), and legibility on a smaller display. The wealth of shared controller configs is easily one of the greatest strengths the Deck has.
(And while other, more recent -- albeit more expensive -- options have stronger performance at higher power settings, the Deck has a strange persistence in outperforming its competitors at low power settings (source).)
Again, it's mostly down to what you want to play. If you want to play recent releases with all the bells and whistles enablesd, you'd need to pay for a laptop many times the cost of a Deck (desktops less dramatically). Given you're even considering handheld PCs I'm assuming that's not your priority. Cyberpunk and the ever-demanding Red Dead Redemption 2 have been in the top 20 most-played games on Deck since Valve started publishing that information, so simply playing them isn't an issue. (The top 100 games for 2023 by daily active players can be seen at the bottom here.)
To address some specific games and genres: If you're into MOBAs, League and Dota play fine but you'll want to be using a keyboard and mouse, while grand strategy games would at least warrant an external display.
If you want to play the latest CoD multiplayer, Valorant, or the upcoming Tarkov Arena, you should probably get a laptop. (You can install Windows on the Deck, but I can't speak to that firsthand.) The trackpads themselves are viable for FPS games, though a learning experience, but the main issue here is that most developers haven't enabled the option for their anti-cheat to work on Linux. Hunt: Showdown is a happy exception to this trend.
If you want to play MMOs, it'll depend heavily on the individual game. FFXIV has excellent controller support out of the box (Gabe Newell spent covid playing it on Deck), Path of Exile added strong controller support to improve experiences on Deck, and ESO reportedly runs great. People have made Guild Wars 2 work, as well as WoW via the impressive ConsolePort addon, but it won't be as clean an experience. The more niche, the more trouble it'll be. The problems here are universal to handheld PCs, and with MMOs you also need to consider whether you'd need a keyboard for social reasons. The Deck's on-screen keyboard is pretty decent, but it's not going to be a substitute for a real keyboard.
Almost any singleplayer RPG, FPS, or adventure game can be made to work just fine. Emulation has EmuDeck and can play most older games -- assuming general emulator compatibility -- up to some PS3 titles (like Demon Souls, Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix, or the MGS HD Collection) and even a lot of Switch titles. Traditional roguelikes include many among the few 2D/singleplayer titles that don't simply work out of the box. Yet a substantial number play great (e.g. Jupiter Hell, Tangledeep, Shiren the Wanderer, Caves of Qud); and many others have community layouts already so you don't have to take the time to set one up yourself. It was learning that Dwarf Fortress played fine on Deck that opened my eyes to just how flexible the chunky little handheld can be.
I hope that helps in determining whether the Deck suits your personal needs; if there's any angle I didn't cover adequately that you have questions about, please feel free to ask.
Edit: Slight clarification, re: "Almost any singleplayer RPG, FPS, or adventure game" -- this year, many multiplatform games have released on PC in a poorly optimised state, and depending on your personal tolerance the Deck may struggle to provide an adequate experience for them. Though it's hard to give a recommendation in one direction or the other without knowing your budget, as such titles are often found lacking on even the newest consumer desktop hardware (hardware very few laptops can compare directly against, and so many will suffer these issues in a similar manner). A relevant Digital foundry video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oav-pZyA8y4
Immersive sims that aren't combat orientated (though tbh I would take just-more-imsims).
It’s almost certainly a positive to see Bobby Kotick (boy do I struggle to maintain this site’s cardinal rule as far as he goes ) losing influence in the “AAA” games industry; but it’s not good to see MS buying every studio they can get hold of. Both these things can be true simultaneously.
My biggest concern with MS’s rampant acquisition spree is what happens when there’a an economic downturn (as already seems to be the near future); will those newly acquired studio be subject to the corporate euphemism that is ~dOWnSiZiNg~? How many working on moderately niche titles will be out of a job and their work indefinitely shelved?
Blizzard is desperate here. Am I right in thinking this is the first time they've put anything on Steam?
Enjoyed Overwatch back in the day, i.e. when it was new; but really not a fan of them reducing team sizes to make it a more conventional "fit" with other 'esports'.
I agree that everything is political, and that some people have the unfair advantage of being able to ignore things that affect others; but what I think this person is saying is that it seems to just be one person, rather than it hosting an actual mirror community for what was r/The_Donald.
And I get what he's saying when he says:
I’ve been here for only a month now at this point, and what was once an optimistic “lets make a cool new reddit ecosystem with an open and friendly community” has descended to nothing but hostility and vitriol between communities that are mostly filled with people that don’t actually care about politics. because it does seem a bit hasty to start internecine conflict over a single person.
(And I don't feel like I should need to say that I'm the "kind of person" harmfully affected by people like Trump, but I will say so out of hope that you'll hear what I'm saying and not dismiss me as another privileged person who doesn't care.
For as many marginalised people I've met who would feel discomfort around remaining federated, I've known just as many that get stressed out and exhausted by conflict over what to them seems like a 'minor thing', because of the vitriol, spite, etc. that comes with it. Especially when, as the other person above alluded to, some people seem to get involved in these things specifically for the sake of conflict, rather than any meaningful political stance.)
Ultimately I don't think there's a useful way to evaluate this until the admins respond (though I don't know how long it has been, I wouldn't be surprised if they were overwhelmed with the sudden peak of interest in lemmy and kbin). But given the community over there's clear, negative reaction to this person, I don't want to rush to designate them a toxic community.
edit: that instance's global rules say:
No bigotry - including racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, or xenophobia. Which leads me further down the path of thinking the admins are just preoccupied.
I haven’t played the Castlevania one yet (I know, shame on me), but wanted to second how seamlessly the rest are integrated into the game.
I mean if they start saying outright nazi shit it's already in the rules there that they get the boot. But one person getting off to themselves making cringe political memes that were old nearly a decade ago is, well, just that.
I guess I just think that it's a teeny, tiny bit dangerous to make out like this is actually them hosting a community of nazis, when it's essentially one user -- we have no idea how many of the small handful of people subscribed to it share their affiliations, versus how many are subbed just to keep an eye on their bs or even just to downvote their posts (personally I think those people would be wasting their time, but they certainly exist).
What @truckkun@lemm.ee said seemed pretty believable to me:
I think he just wants to give his little pet project Agora a test run to start things up since he just set it up lol.
(Much as I agree it's unnecessary to get communal consent to nuke what could only develop -- at best -- into a well of negativity.)
It just feels incorrect to even label it TD because it (as far as I can tell) has no relevant connection to that pile of filth beyond its "topic", ultimately being only one person.
Nintendo tax is so real — was a big factor in my deciding to buy a Steam Deck despite having a Switch (a gift).
Anyone know if there’s typically any change there when Nintendo announces a new console?
The person running it is gross, but I feel like it's important to keep perspective that it does seem to almost entirely be just that one person, and that everything they're posting is downvoted to hell and back. (As opposed to a coordinated attempt by that "community" to migrate to that instance.)
I do feel overwhelmed and intimidated by certain games, and sometimes it's paralysing (right now I'm a struggling with what job to level in Final Fantasy XI), but whether that's a bad thing depends entirely on the kind of "big" we're talking about.
If it's big in the sense of mechanical depth, I adore that. It's like a drug for me. I adore learning and games that reward that are often great for my mental health. Thinking of things like Project Zomboid, Dwarf Fortress, Loop Hero, Noita, or most of Zachtronics' titles. With those it really isn't about the scale of the world or the number of quests (often those metrics aren't even relevant).
My personal problem when it comes to some games like that, is that I know I'll love them -- like Factorio -- but I simply don't get around to them quickly, if at all; because I also know learning those systems will be a not insignificant time commitment. Ironically, that sensation of being overwhelmed with things to learn is part of why I love them, but I often fail to get around to actually playing many such games out of concern I won't be able to give them the time and attention that 'they deserve'. I'm not sure if that's the same as that FoMO you describe.
When it comes to the more conventional meaning of a "big game", it depends entirely on two things: the originality of the content, and the quality of the storytelling; i.e. the difference between Red Dead Redemption 2, and a modern Far Cry title. I would absolutely worry about missing stuff in RDR2, but would struggle to care much at all about modern Ubisoft titles in the same way.
Even if you're excessively concerned with morality and what people think of you, the only people realistically going to kick up a fuss about "pirating" games one already owns are Nintendo's lawyers.
Yeah, I'm on here and kbin.social, mostly because there's so many communities popping up and I have a million niche interests that I'd feel like I was shooting myself in the foot by locking myself out of communities that are defederated due to having too many spambots etc. but also because lemmy and kbin don't seem to play perfectly with each other yet.
(An uptick in spambots is presumably a natural consequence of a sudden influx in users, both due to bots having more reason to spam said instances, and due to the rapid rise in users making them somewhat harder to spot and expunge.)
Right? It’s literally bundled with one of the most popular headsets.
Though there are still plenty of indies that still exude quality and love from their developers. Things like Compound, Budget Cuts, Until You Fall, or Hot Dogs, Horseshoes & Hand Grenades (if you’re a gun person) are all a bunch of fun.
Though there’s that Walking Dead game if you want something with more money behind it (and are less anxious than me).
I loved RDR2, mostly for the storytelling, but I also found the mix of serene rides through nature a much needed contrast to the massive firefights.
Much akin to reddit, the best thing about goodreads isn't the product itself so much as the communities that use it, and the resulting history of reviews/comments/etc. that build up over time.
The absence of these user generated reactions (for lack of a better catch-all) is a big part of why I never really managed to permanently migrate to Librarything instead. Though, given their devs are quite technical, one could hope they would consider connecting up with the fediverse some day too.
(I realise that many reviews on GR are worthless, but sadly if you're interested in some particularly niche things, it can be not only awkward to find the right version of a book on LT, but often enough there just aren't any reviews at all due to make it useful when a particular text is rather niche to begin with.
But assuming it federates in a way that's actually useful, this at least might mean a beginning that could lead to alternatives that are not just an improvement on BookWyrm's UI/UX, but Goodreads' too.
It’s a really fun game although very grindy and i’m not even sure which genre it belongs to.
Absurdist sandbox?
It's a game I've never managed to get into, but it can be rather wild to watch others' antics.
I don’t think I fit either side of this dichotomy (though if forced to pick would choose extrinsically), as I love a good story but am very much about the journey and not just the destination.
If I had to guess, the limits of development scope and the resulting limits on worlds being believably reactive means a lot of people are going to see themselves as extrinsically motivated, with the big exception being people that just love building things in sandboxes. Intrinsic motivators would be much easier to come across if more avenues of interaction felt fleshed out but for some rare exceptions.
Feel like the trailer undersells the quality of the game.
This is nothing new, been the story across media since Tolkien, really.
Settled's Swampletics (OldSchool RuneScape) is wild, and popular among even people who have never played OSRS.
I'm not sure what's more painful, American Free Speech'ers who don't know it has no relevance outside being free of government censorship, or non-Americans thinking it's some universal truth.
Sands of Time was so cool. That series was flawed (Warrior Within was the emo-most game in an era full of emo sequels as the original audience reached adolescence), but I'm sad that it essentially got canceled by warping into AC.
Don't have Game Pass, but I believe the options on Deck are currently to either install Windows and use the Xbox app, or following these instructions to access Xbox Cloud Gaming from SteamOS. (Assume that's what you meant?)
MS have also been toyed with the idea of making a Game Pass specific environment for Handheld PCs including the Deck, but no concrete announcements afaik.
Do you only plan on playing games available through Game Pass? I know there's a couple of handheld devices (not really handheld PCs, Switch/Deck-esque with Android and smart phone hardware) that are built specifically for Xbox's cloud gaming. (Maybe you don't even know what you intend to play at this stage, and just expect to play whatever's available without paying more money?)
If you buy a Steam Deck you'd probably eventually end up getting a bunch of things through Steam's big sales (you'd have money spare to do so, if nothing else). If you buy a strong laptop, you'd have access to the same sales, and you might want to buy more games anyway to justify the relative price. Hard to really guess what use case would suit you without knowing what future you would want to play (or how well future Game Pass would correlate).
Also, are there any issues still plaguing the device?
The only real issue I ever had was some WiFi connectivity problems, but I haven't experienced those for months now. I genuinely struggle to understand the experience of the other commenter, simply because it's so far from my own experiences. And if anything I've found Steam's use of Deck-Verified to be pretty conservative at times.
As long as I've had the thing there's been a fairly constant stream of updates and bugfixes.
After all, the Steam Deck is still a first gen product. I can’t wait to see what they will do in their next iteration.
Hah, hard to know when that'll appear. I've been waiting years for a second iteration of the index, and at this point I wish I'd just bought one years ago. Valve aren't exactly the most transparent company with their ongoing projects.
I love X! (not that one) and I love reading this!
wanting gamedevs to be worked to death and uninformed demands for features with zero idea of the technical requirements = 'entitled gamers'
not wanting malware on your computer = not being 'entitled'
I don't pirate PC games for numerous reasons, but none of them are really moral. Trying to convince people that they should accept things like this on moral grounds is a poor argument anyway.
Sure are a lot of tech companies seemingly speedrunning their self-destruction right now. Is there something in the water in the SF?
On a more serious note, Discord has always been mediocre. Makes me sad that the third-party client(!), Ripcord, is more or less abandonware. Being able to monitor just the specific channels you're interested in is infinitely better than being forced to use servers wholesale given it's near impossible to keep an eye on one at a time beyond notifications -- which are clumsy at best. But for how useful that is, not having access to things like spoiler tags, most voip (and all video related) stuff really limits its practical use.
Oh well.
It's not "obsolete" for set characters, which is what this is if they have pre-established stories and personalities.
You think the PoE devs aren’t getting paid? lol
That's not how budgets nor gamedev work. It's not up to individual developers to just add huge amounts of content to a game that hasn't been budgeted for.
Absolute gem of a game, shame Bethesda forced them to use the Prey branding; a lot of fans of the original wrote it off because it has nothing to do with the original. One can't help but wonder if we would've had such a disaster as Redfall if Colantonio hadn't left as a result of all that.
Underrated even among Prey fans is Mooncrash, easily the best roguelite experience from a AAA studio, and just a great experience all around for anyone who wants 'more Prey'.
Hard to give a toss about most of them, they knew what they were getting into and it seems like the entire submersible community tried to warn against it, but such was ignored and disregarded as established interests stifling 'innovation'.
But I feel really bad for Suleman Dawood. He was just a kid, and was -- seemingly wiser than the rest of them -- rightly terrified of this aquatic death machine. A lot of people, especially in the media, have tried to make light of their collective, violent end, suggesting it should be some consolation that it would've been over before they knew anything was wrong, Except according those most informed on the situation, stubborn owner aside, those onboard seemed to be entirely aware something was wrong. (Why else would they have been trying to surface?) Really sucks that a teennager got roped into this stupidity on account of his Titanic-obsessed dad.
Gallows humour is to be expected with these things, but finding out about Suleman left me utterly depressed. Perhaps it's wrong to direct my irritation thus, but I felt particularly disgusted at someone who casted things as somehow beautiful for a father and son to die together, as though creating a deep, spiritual bond between them in the afterlife. So much media mindlessly lumping him in with his father's motivations as though he was a fellow extreme tourism enthusiast, rather than a scared kid simply looking to his father for validation.
Yeah, that sounds about right. Honestly, the thing that I find hardest about the internet -- and which makes me want to log off indefinitely -- is the constant wave of people assuming the absolute worst about everyone, and a kind of ignorance that people can come from different formative experiences without being an enemy.
Not really sure how we solve that one (though I did choose to sign up here because, ostensibly, it's a place where jumping the gun on judging people -- something that is often performative anyway -- is discouraged.)
It feels like a natural consequence of playing a lot of indie games; there's too many little gems you just don't hear much about on release, or which you end up only learning about because they end up bundled with something else you were being patient about.
Though I'm not even sure how I'd apply this label to traditional roguelikes, given how many are free, and how many more seem to be in a permanent state of development/'early access' (Caves of Qud is hitting 1.0 in a month does break my go-to example there though).
There's definitely an appeal with some of the better AA and 'AAA' games too beyond financial reasons though, given the tendency for bigger studios to launch titles full of bugs these days. (I loved Cyberpunk when I played it a couple of months after release -- was lucky to not experience many bugs at all on PC -- but it's so much easier to widely recommend it since it hit 2.0.