BombOmOm
- 5 Posts
- 127 Comments
There are entire genres that only work with mouse/keyboard, and thus only really exist on PC. Notably 4X, RTS, base-building, and simulation games. They are where I would start:
- 4X: Civilization VI and Stellaris
- RTS: (Someone else will have to recommend some, they aren’t my jam, but they are absolutely worth checking out now that you have a PC)
- Base Building: Oxygen Not Included, Factorio, and Surviving Mars
- Simulation: Kerbal Space Program and DCS (You will want a joystick for DCS)
- Other: FTL and Hearts of Iron IV
Also, make sure to check out Is There Any Deal to give you historical (and current) best prices on games. PC games go on deep discounts on the regular. You do not need to buy PC games at full price if they were released more than 6 months ago.
Seems like bullshit to me, but I’m not a lawyer.
The Japanese patent system is so, so much worse than the US one. Where things like what you just described are possible. Honestly, Palworld is probably hosed over there. Palworld made a system years ago, Nintendo then patented it, and Nintendo is going to beat them over the head with their Japanese patent.
In the US, a solid defense to a patent claim is to show prior art. In this case, Palworld’s dev can point to Palworld as the prior art if Nintendo sues them; Nintendo’s patent existed after Palworld did. Palworld’s dev can also point to a giant mountain of prior art of other games that allow one to throw an object to capture a monster.
Nintendo is attempting to bully other game developers. They can’t enforce this patent in the US, but they can wave the patent and a cease and desist letter menacingly at their competitors. Thing is, it’s generating bad will against Nintendo and the first time a company calls Nintendo on their shit, Nintendo is gunna lose. The patent is either so specific it won’t apply to another game or its broader and there is a mountain of prior art.
From my reading, it’s the latter. The patent seems to try to monopolize the idea of throwing an object to catch a monster. Which has been done so, so many times before.
And even then, the US patent office often will grant unenforceable patents, that then explode in the patent holder’s faces the first time they try to use them.
The granted one in this case is about “the process of aiming and capturing characters”, which they either had to make so specific as to not apply to anybody else, or general enough that there are piles of prior art out there.
It’s also right at the end of the prior generation. Let’s get Switch 2 release numbers in and compare to Switch 1 release numbers before we draw too many conclusions.
That said, the PC market has been overtaking consoles. Particularly since PC handhelds are a thing. Things like the Steam Deck are directly competing with Switch and (soon) Switch 2 sales.
The Pokemon games all being the same caused me to get bored of them years ago. And now with them suing Palworld for ‘capturing monsters with an object and summoning them in 3d space’, a patent made after Palworld released their trailer, I find the Nintendo brand actively harmful to the state of gaming.
I remember back when Halo 3 and 4 were out for one Microsoft gaming platform (Xbox), but not the other (Windows); and Halo 2 for Windows was a disaster area (Games for Windows Live, ugh). Went on like that for years and years. I just couldn’t figure out why even first party Microsoft games were not available on both Microsoft platforms.
I would have bought the Halos in a heartbeat from a Windows-locked store back then. Though, I’m glad that by the time they launched an official MS store (and much, much later released Halo 3+ for the PC, and Halo 2 in a way that didn’t suck), I was already souring on Microsoft as a company and didn’t want to lock myself into a platform-specific store.
Exactly, every time I say ‘I’m thinking of putting up a Factorio server, you want in?’, they are significantly less likely to be playing (or paying for) the newest game that has kernel-level access. Why, because we are playing Factorio for the next few weeks together and Factorio is fun.
Factorio isn’t the only game we play, but the point is to reinforce yours. If you are playing fun game x, your friends are more likely to play x instead of something else. Even if they have no care about Kernel-Level access, the fact you do affects their buying (and playing) patterns.
First of all, plenty of people would be happy to self-host a game for their friends, if they were still allowed the option.
Exactly! Me and my friends often play on modded Factorio servers that one of us hosts. This is only possible because the developer doesn’t lock things down to only the first-party (official) servers.
We don’t play with cheaters either (you aren’t getting invited to our server if you are). We play with our friends because it is fun, in a way no official server could hope to work.
The company also has a vested interest in keeping PC players on their OS, while simultaneously treating the platform like a second class citizen for years. Anybody remember the abortion that was Games for Windows Live? And it isn’t like Windows Mixed Reality or ‘this is now a tablet OS’ are doing them any favors either.
God am I happy I didn’t buy any software on the Microsoft store.
Some games that make for some fun coop and don’t require a ton of screen time. All of these are at least gold rated on ProtonDB so should be fine on the SteamDeck, though I’m not sure about crossplay with consoles on any:
- Sanctum - An interesting combo of first person shooter and tower defense (Sanctum 2 was also real good)
- Borderlands 1 - Looter shooter with some solid humor (Borderlands 2 was also real good, but goes downhill in later games)
- MechWarrior 5 - Who doesn’t want to be a giant mech riddled with guns?
- Left 4 Dead 2 - Fight together to escape zombies, or in multiplayer servers work together as the zombies to take out other humans
Now, less of a focus on shooters:
- Golf It and Golf With Your Friends - Put Put golf taken to extreme levels
- Magica 2 - Murder enemies together in a top-down wizard game
- BattleBlock Theater - Jump over obstacles and solve puzzles together
Highly, highly recommend using GOG. Buying is owning. There is no DRM and they even provide offline installers for the games you buy.
But they updated the terms of use and apparently now, stating that buying is not owning
This has always been the case for Steam and every other service that isn’t GOG.
Yep. The type of people buying the horse armor are not the people who are complaining about what it means for a full priced game to have such and and the direction that pointed the company in. Given this is what he is talking about now, and not how they have lost their way and are working on delivering solid experience for players, unlike their last games, is telling.
But, I lost all hope for TES6 to be good when Starfield came out. Maybe I’ll be wrong, hopefully I’ll be wrong, but I’m not holding my breath.
The article compares it to a well done page of text for Charles Dickens from a previous game. They want it more like that: “Fun facts! Good gags! Frikkin’ frequent paragraph breaks!”
It goes on to say: “I’d settle for the game bothering to clue me into who its major historical cameos actually are. Shadows is a huge game with a massive cast, and yet bizarrely you won’t find pages about any of the characters in your codex, fictional or otherwise. Who is Hattori Hanzō, and why doesn’t the game care to explain why I should be so impressed when he shows up?”