thingsiplay avatar

thingsiplay

@thingsiplay@kbin.social

Space sim Squadron 42 is "feature-complete" and gunning for Starfield's lunch with massive new video (www.rockpapershotgun.com)

Squadron 42 is the single player campaign of Star Citizen, that is supposed to launch as a separate game. It's basically a small portion of Star Citizen, but with a story and ending. I'm still not confident; waited too long for that.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

But there is a big difference to all those games: Star Citizen (and therefore Squadron 42) is backed and payed by customers already.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

I like Romhacks (in other words modding of old games) that bring Halloween themed specials to known games. I haven't looked into it this season yet, but here is an example The Quest for the Candies (Super Mario World).

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

Reddit might cut off Google and force users to log in to Reddit itself to read anything, if it can’t reach deals with generative AI companies to pay for its data.

On the one hand I really hope this happens. On the other hand, it would be devastating to the communities. But this shows how Reddit has the last say and can hold the content hostage on their platform. People need to stop using Reddit and switch to open and free alternatives, that is not controlled by a single entity / company. The problem is, there is lot of good legacy content and solutions that would be not available for most people searching the web.

But for the search engines who do not respect robot files, would still be able to index. Right? Ironically an AI could also write summaries...

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

It's a Lose-Lose situation. Reddit has a fetish for that...

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

Google: Please let us use data without the consent of the authors and the license.

What is the point of Flatpak, AppImage, Snap, etc?

I don’t understand what problem they are meant to solve. If you have a FOSS piece of software, you can install it via the package manager. Or the store, which is just a frontend for the package manager. I see that they are distribution-independent, but the distro maintainers likely already know what’s compatible and what...

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar
  • package it once, instead many times by many different maintainers
  • solves the dependency hell
  • makes it easier to run multiple versions of same program (or driver) or install a program without it's complete desktop environment
  • sandboxed, better control of permissions (at least with Flatpak) and makes easier to backup the whole program version and state
  • same package manager across distributions (at least with Flatpak)
  • useful on LTS distributions which does not get new packages or programs or even beta software, other than security fixes (think of Debian)
  • useful for write only distributions such as SteamOS
  • does not need sudo to install new programs (at least with Flatpak and AppImages)

For simple applications this is probably not that wild. But the more complex programs we talk about, the more helpful are these formats. Programs like OBS or Firefox in example is a lot of trouble to compile quickly. And imagine more of these programs. Package maintainer of your distro could use the time in a better way. Those who want to package it themselves (probably Arch) could still do, but most who want to provide the newest Firefox could just use Flatpak, coming directly from the developer day 0.

One also does not need to wait until its packaged by your distro maintainer and it comes directly from the developer instead (maybe). The original developers often do not support all distros and would like to have a known state and version of the program that they can rely on, like a Flatpak.

That being said, I don't use Flatpak. But I used it in the past and it was helpful in some cases. Even on an Arch based distribution. Currently I use an AppImage for a program that is not in the official Arch repos. The AUR has it, but the -bin is outdated and the -git version building from source takes too long and power. Even on my new modern machine it would take at least an hour for every new version. Or I just download the Applmage once (88 MB) and use the self updating system of it (which downloads newest version automatically and renames it to current executable filename). I'm talking about RPCS3 emulator.

Linux way way slower than Windows?

So I jumped ship from Windows to Kubuntu last night, and It’s mostly been pretty good. However my general performance of the computer has been abysmal. Like it takes upwards of 5 seconds to open anything. All of my hardware seems to be running at max speeds, so I have no idea why it would be so sluggish? It’s as if I’m...

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

But only the first time you open it, right?

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

From what I have read it's only the initial phase when running the Snap for the first time. The package is setting up the environment and does some things only once. And the first iteration of the Snap concept was very slow, which is improved a lot. Didn't use Ubuntu in years, so cannot test it myself at the moment.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

I have some questions: How fast are read and write operations and random access? What are the expected prices, once it hit mass production for the average consumer? And how long is expected to take until this happens?

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

Makes sense. I hope Nintendo uses these as game cartridges in the future. :D

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

Fake reviews with false information or recommendation could lead to a lot of wasted money and disappointed people. Even refunding in mass. And probably avoiding to buy from Amazon. Well it's a bit dramatic, but I don't see a positive effect for Amazon with many fake reviews in place. I'm sure Amazon want them removed, but it is hard to do this automatically for millions of products and reviews. It's hard to find out automatically which one is real and which one is false. They don't want delete legit reviews either.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

A platform driven by customers, I would say this has direct impact for Amazon too, if it impacts the customer.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

Maybe the reason is to make it easier to use it with other shops? Me as a Steam only user, I would prefer if the game had Steam Workshop support, but I can understand if they want to bring the mods to other platforms as well.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

And yet the games on EGS are not cheaper, even if they are exclusive, taking the exclusivity deal and have less to pay to Epic Games. They still cost as much as on other platforms. So no, publishers would not sell the games for less, even if they could, even if it's a viable option. So exclusives does not solve this issue with pricing at all. The thing people "hate" is, that Epic forces exclusivity, taking the option to buy on their favorite platform/store, without giving the player anything in return. It's the same price. These deals incentives the publisher, not the player to sell/buy the games on the Epic Games store.

In example Epic does not even support Linux. Why would I pay money on their store then? On the other hand Valve actively developed and improves gaming on Linux; improving the situation against he Windows gaming monopoly. I would have supported Epic Games to build an alternative, but if the alternative they provide is like this, then I am not interested into it. I want to buy and play on Steam, because it is better. From my perspective, another game goes exclusive to Epic and I have to wait. If the game does not come to Steam, well, there is plenty other to buy and play for me. My money and time is limited anyway.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

I know about Heroic, but I refuse to support a company that is so much against Linux. They purchased Rocket League and took away the perfectly functioning Linux version back then (and made it unplayable for a while for me). Why would I pay Epic Games money, if they don't support Linux, while Valve actively pays developers to program and help the Linux world of sides?

I'm not interested into Heroic Game Launcher. It does not address the problems I have with Epic and does not support everything Steam has, when I purchase it on Epic Games.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

In the past I have used Lutris for itch.io and Humble Bundle (and GOG), plus the additional games provided through Lutris scripts itself. So I would use Lutris over Heroic, as it supports itch.io and Humble and for the familiarity I already have with the software.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

while our team has worked tirelessly to deliver the best experience possible, we have not achieved the benchmark we targeted.

In light of this, we still think for the long-term of the project, releasing now is the best way forward.

At least they admit the game is not finished yet. But sad another company pushes an unfinished game.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

The Anti-Lag software from AMD seems to get flagged as some sort of cheating from the Anti Cheat software by Valve, as it tempers the Counter Strike code. In other words, its not compatible. AMD should have tested and worked together with Valve, before shipping the update. It's not to blame Valve, because the Anti Cheat software works as intended, but AMD, because they did not work with Valve before launching their software.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

Amazing that they even write an entire article, because a Wii U was sold. I had to check the date if this is April Fool's day. It's a retro console and maybe they wanted save it. Or want to download roms to play for free on it (as the shop is not supported anymore) for authentic experience, instead emulating it. It was probably very cheap too.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

I don't trust Google or Microsoft for privacy and such stuff. But Microsoft does not give up as fast as Google.

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

My first instinct was it might be a function on the server that calculcates the years passed dynamically from today. A quick look with Wayback Machine showed this number 22 is hardcored into the webpage. So the question is, what that means. Obviously it cannot be 22 years ago from the time of writing the article. Valve didn't exist in 1987. Quake came out in 1996 and then someone did the Team Fortress mod for that game. Which Valve created the standalone game Team Fortress Classic a few years later. And Team Fortress 2 came out 2007 (it wasn't Free to Play back then).

Or do he refer to some ideas written on paper, but was not able to create a game with it back in the 80s? Or it's just a typo and I over analyze this. I need help. Medic!

thingsiplay,
thingsiplay avatar

I didn't consider this to be intentional. But given that part and context (Valve loves to make jokes), this could be it. Either it is a typo or an intentional joke, which is also likely.

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • Leos
  • rosin
  • InstantRegret
  • ethstaker
  • DreamBathrooms
  • mdbf
  • magazineikmin
  • thenastyranch
  • Youngstown
  • tacticalgear
  • slotface
  • Durango
  • khanakhh
  • kavyap
  • megavids
  • everett
  • vwfavf
  • normalnudes
  • osvaldo12
  • cubers
  • GTA5RPClips
  • cisconetworking
  • ngwrru68w68
  • anitta
  • provamag3
  • tester
  • modclub
  • JUstTest
  • All magazines