
There are valid reasons for some people to be stuck. For example, work computers they have no control over or niche software that will not work in WINE or Winboat. I know someone who still has Windows 98 because of a piece of ancient embroidering software that no longer exists, will not run on newer versions of Windows, and requires a hardware dongle that doesn’t work under Winboat or WINE. I tried. I spent weeks on it.
I’ve bought almost everything they’ve released. The one major exception is Stellar Blade, which they infected with Denuvo malware. By the time they remove the malware — if they ever remove the malware — the amount I will be willing to pay is far less than what they asked for. Maybe $20 if I’m bored. Fuck Sony.

When they released Stellar Blade with Denuvo, it was an easy decision to skip it. I will normally buy anything that even remotely souls-like, but they can go fuck themselves with that anti-consumer behavior. Then there is the fact that still haven’t released Ghost of Yotei on PC, so whenever they get around to that it will be too little, too late.

Which includes many of the wargaming, traditional art, and queer Discord servers my partner and I use. Never assume that when a bad actor says “adult content” they mean hardcore porn and snuff, they mean everything that doesn’t conform to their ideal christofascist ethnostate purity. And now they have a list of all the “dangerous” nonconformists while blocking everyone else from being exposed to “dangerous” ideas. This should chill people to the bone. Nobody should be okay with this anywhere, in any capacity, in any quantity, whatsoever.

It’s important to remind everyone that Tim Sweeney is a nazi pedophile.

I understand what you are saying, but it also assumes surrendering to AI. Many of us are planning to avoid, boycott, and fight that slop to our dying breath. AI needs to be unpopular and unprofitable. The technology isn’t going to disappear, but we can make sure it’s not socially acceptable to steal from or replace humans with expensive, inefficient, misanthropic, planet-killing software and hardware. Progress is being made and it’s important to understand that — just like crypto — this is a fight we can win.

Let’s get those numbers down. We all knew Tim Sweeney was a creep, but he also just announced that he’s a pedophile and a nazi.
I love Pi, but the price of the 5 is unreasonable. Since RPF spun hardware into publicly traded a for-profit business, I expect it will only continue to get worse.
Steam Deck is the answer for now. You may still be able to get one of the discontinued LCD models on the cheap, but GamePass is now as expensive as buying a game every month, so it’s better to buy than subscribe. They also make excellent PCs and homelab devices. We bought several LCD versions for the lab instead of Pi 5s, because they are such a good deal.

Star Citizen works well on Linux via a community-maintained tool called LUG. Getting other fancy peripherals like head tracking requires some creative use of a Windows VM, because those peripheral makers don’t support Linux. If Squadron 42 ever actually materializes, then the community will have it covered.

I backed it a lifetime ago and have gone back and forth between “it’s a scam” and “maybe it could happen” so many times that I just don’t care any more. As broken as it is and as slow as progress has been, there has never been anything like it. I check in a couple of times every year and usually have fun seeing the sights for a week or two. I think I’ve had enough enjoyment from it to justify my original cost.
Even though their goals are unreasonable, irrational, and completely mad, they have somehow managed to fund stable development for over a decade and have actually made meaningful progress. Will I live to see it realized? Who knows. I wish them luck for both their sakes and the people who spent big money on this ridiculous dream, but unlike many others, I have no hard feelings personally. I’d like to see it realized someday, but I have no more money to give them even if I wanted to.
AI is destroying everything.