It might be an option that doesn’t come up much, but older/lower-spec consoles are an option: The Playstation 4 and Xbox Series S. They’re not available for recent big AAA games, but that’s less and less of the big trends. There have still been many games coming out this year for the PS4.

That’s, of course, if you’re really on a low budget for hardware. Otherwise, a PC is a great investment for games on Steam sales.

I’ve used it for Epic and GOG, Lutris for Ubi/EA, but can either play MS UWP games? That seemed to be the one huge hurdle for any third party launcher in general.

Does Proton even work on Macs? It seems pretty clear at this point Linux is a far better gaming OS.

The last few days, I haven’t run into any players fighting each other. There may in fact be some matchmaking effects deciding this, based on my past behavior.

It helps in my case that I have a lot of upgrades and don’t feel bothered about losing really good gear anymore. Interestingly, I’ve often felt the good gear helps against ARC, but not much against committed players. A well executed blindside ambush can take down even a player with a heavy shield.

The main defense is the psychology. Fostering a sense of communal protection by shooting the wasps that are attacking someone else, bringing one defibrillator in case you find downed players, and in some very rare cases, acting as protector for someone who was wrongly downed. Eventually, some PVP-heavy players decide they have more to fear from attacking others than being passive.

A weird tip to try; when seeking some objective and worried for ambushes, play the Recorder. Some attackers are looking for the thrill of combat, not loot, and are dissuaded by an open musician. Other players are just fearful you’ll shoot first, which is less likely when you’re announcing yourself and taking your hand off your gun for the instrument.

I could be wrong, I think it’s a rare case of a game releasing with zero levels. The idea there was to let people take it and make their own levels for it (which, I’m sure, many did)

I remember back when I was more excited about getting into gamedev, learning C and C++ were some significant obstacles. Even understanding that I had to be responsible and direct about memory, the way they flub through so many template interfaces and spew out paragraph-sized errors made it impossible to contend with. I haven’t followed Rust, but I hope for a time that low-level code modernizes just a bit so we can stop abstracting our calculator apps with 4 GB of Electron framework.

It is extremely rare - I do it when I have some form of dedication to the developer, or their rare variety of ambitious game. I may not have even done it once this year.

So I think that matches the OP’s feelings of buying early in support. Largely, it doesn’t matter.

Ark seems to fit into the same niche that enjoys Roblox, Fortnite, and Five Nights at Freddy’s. That might make a statement about how much money they have.

Again: This is not a cake. This is a recipe book and an oven. Scenario’s demo reel showcases models they have finished training, and vouch that you can make one from scratch. I am asking you for a finished AI model you have ready to use.

Really? Can you share your fully realized and operational generative AI that exists, and only created its model from artwork you personally made or retain full legal reproduction rights to?

Answers Yes, or Sorry, I Lied.

Does sound like laziness. I get the impression it’s because some things change in the game depending on difficulty, like number of items, etc. So, it can’t exactly go back and turn the 3-ammo pile you picked up into 8 ammo.

Same way you’d celebrate a studio for “No workplace abuse.” People would have to come forward to testify about it, as concept art generation is very likely to arise from hiring fewer artists.

It’s also pretty easy if the credits list an abnormally low, or zero, number of concept artists.

Okay but first, will you admit that if my cancer curing Unicorn only dispenses 100 doses of its miracle medicine from its butt when I kill a homeless man, you’d agree killing the homeless is a moral good, right?

Or, you know, we could throw away silly fantasy scenarios.

A DBD creator I like made a video about this topic, and the degradation of the term.

Between this and the Divinity controversy, I think the gaming world needs some kind of Responsible AI seal, like the old Nintendo Seal of Quality. While Microsoft is shoving Copilot into Notepad, it can be really hard to guarantee every team member has never used an AI for anything.

Standards like “No generative AI” are a good one, and it turns out we’re also under debate whether AI for concept art - something absent from the game files - is okay. Many say not.

In some ways, I think we have to accept the early years of “8 indie games for $2!!!” is over. Inflation has hit, and indie devs have to buy their coffee too. If you really want a near-freebie, keep an eye out for bundles on Fanatical, where they’re sometimes $3 each game.

In some ways, I try to acknowledge the original race to the voting on prices was sometimes bad for indies. The Factorio dev even saw the writing on the wall and decided to head it off, declaring “This is the game’s price floor. Buy it or don’t.”

Recently this channel came up in my feed. There’s a few like this, that will highlight interesting games on Steam that haven’t had much attention.

https://www.youtube.com/@IndirectGames

I’ve had an idea of making a visual novel with gen AI, but I’d want to attach “Placeholder: AI Artwork” in a visible location for each sprite. And I only even consider that because I’m not exactly a known game dev and don’t have ready access to artists.

Larian should likely expect if they’re taking shortcuts in their position, they’d get backlash. I can at least recognize that they’re trying to be moderate about it.

Emulation seems neat to me, but I know behind every comment on it there’s a whispered implication: Piracy. Very few people are imaging their own game discs. That unfortunately makes it less appealing to me, especially as trustworthiness shifts at many of those sites.

To me, it’s an indicator that the rest of the industry bankrupted its talent and innovation. There’s been some great indie games, but nothing overwhelmingly amazing, certainly not in the AAA space.

If HL3 was ever to get news, I don’t really think Valve would do it on someone else’s awards show. They tend to own their own announcements.

Something I tried to do earlier to help with it, in this very channel, was a “Downvote any game you’ve heard of before” thread. It was a nice exercise to help people post odd games no one had heard of.

I’m a sucker for Zenless Zone Zero. I recognize it’s often catering to male gaze, but I appreciate there’s some uniqueness and interesting themes to the designs.

Basic example, “Corin” being on first blush just a cute maid cut, but also following a Frankenstein design theme with the bolts/chainsaw and hair color.

They’ve also had a “bunny-girl”, Alice, who much like real bunnies is skittish and easily frightened (and is thankfully not nearly as sexualized as the theme often carries)

If you haven’t played games in a while, a subscription service like game pass or PS+ can be a good idea.

It’ll let you try out a lot of games that you might not try otherwise, and also try/discard some games that seemed cool but turn out to be unlikable.

Silly Poly Beast - 3 GB Another Crab’s Treasure - 7.7 GB

Rabbit and Steel - 376 MB, coop PVE game, plays a lot like FFXIV raids

The worst part is, I consider myself a bit of a gooner; I like alluring, attractive characters. But that was meant to be a story-based game, and yet it designed so many jokes around attractive women dressing in rags, being clueless, easily offended, and seemed to design the story around an intense contact between a shonen hero and a large-breasted woman.

At least in something like Stellar Blade, they evade the subject because they know there’s nothing constructive to say.

I wonder how they plan to cover the events. Normally, you’d bring gaming journalists, but Saudis are terrified of journalists.

Apollo is out there in Kuh’rain, wondering if Ace Attorney will ever pick up on an old story so his boss can tell him something important and he can say back “Yeah, Mr. Wright, I figured that out because I’m not an idiot.”

Huh. A long time ago I would’ve thought this purchase would’ve gone the other way around.

What’s sad is, I also had a silly web project like this, but had to abandon it since browsers (logically) decided to mute webpages on load until you interacted with them.

It was basically just user selection of image and audio, and then you pick a spot to forever zoom into. A little like YTMND.

I’m sure they will over time, but I would guess there’s a surprising number of potential issues with any font variance. That’s the kind of thing that can appear hardware-dependently, like certain high/low-res monitors showing fonts too big, too small, or even not at all. So any bug fixes that have come through on the subject will rely on user bug reports.

If it was as simple as the font swapping feature seen in Word, I’m sure it wouldn’t be a big deal.

Some of the Resident Evil games felt more natural on controller than mouse for me. Even though you’re aiming and shooting, the laser sight feels more intuitive on a thumbstick. Specifically thinking of 4 and 5.

Some of the Resident Evil games felt more natural on controller than mouse for me. Even though you’re aiming and shooting, the laser sight feels more intuitive on a thumbstick. Specifically thinking of 4 and 5.

Umbrella evil. There, that’s pretty much your catch-up on every game’s story.

I guess it gets confusing with recent remakes of 2, 3, 4; they’re meant as clear entry points, and the latest version of RE1 is still a bit old (though it too is a “remake” of an ancient PS1 edition)

7 is extremely different from the others - it was even thought to be a new/different IP when it was revealed. Village is a direct sequel to that, but could also be enjoyed alone; it’s a bit more action and less creepy.

Wonder if H4 will really continue off WOA’s ending; or if it’ll be some weird reboot.

I might even be interested in some form of main character switching for Hitman if they can invent someone that has most of 47’s capability with some interesting nuance. (No, the spoiler is not that 47 dies)

Take a look at Half-Life 2’s old Face Poser software. I feel like you don’t see that sort of action-level control much anymore.

Indie studios are evading the need for lipsync entirely, by making simple models, giving people masks, putting them on radio overlays, etc. AAA studios are overengineering it, putting a $4,000,000 actor in a motion capture suit for each of their cutscenes to capture every fine detail as they stare in wonder at the white ping-pong ball in the studio with the sign written; “LOOK HERE”.

Face Poser was a good median; it’s where the director gets control, but you don’t need a vast technical setup beyond animations, some vowel extraction, and some basic know-how. It means that if the director wants to add a criticism “No, character B should give a dubious, unsure look when character A says that”, it’s something they can apply directly rather than ask the animators to do by hand.

For some reference, old machinima like Clear Skies, or my own “AS” made use of Face Poser.

Don’t forget, “Turns out it was a losing bet to back DEI and Trans people”.

This is something scared, pathetic, loser, feral, spineless, sociopathic, moronic fascists come up with to try to win a crowd larger than an elevator; Assume the outcome as a foregone conclusion and try to talk around it, or claim it’s already happened.

Respond directly. “What? That’s ridiculous. I’ve never even seen ANY AI that I liked. Who told you it was going to pervade everything?”

I think the studies showing how certain minds can be targeted and manipulated by dark gambling patterns made me think differently about gambling. I’m less likely to blame the victims now - in many ways it can be difficult or near-impossible for them to control those impulses. I’d at least like lootbox gambling slop to be regulated the same as casinos.

Look how popular fantasy sports is now. It’s basically just the casino industry seeking out new avenues to cheat the definition of “Playing odds to win cash”.

Ooh, sorry, politics not allowed. /s

Sarcasm, but it’s sad that kind of hate gets wrapped into the definitions of “political opinions” these days.