DLSS without frame generation is at least equivalent (sometimes superior) to a native image though.

It really isn’t though. DLSS produces artifacts, especially for quick camera movements as well as things like hair and vegetation. Those artifacts get heavier the smaller the native rendering resolution is. It also differs quite a lot between implementations. In some games it looks better, in others worse (e.g. Dragon’s Dogma 2 and Stalker 2).

But my point wasn’t to bash DLSS anyway. It’s a good technology, especially for lower powered devices. I use it in many games on my 2070s. But Nvidia using this technology to claim “4090 performance” on a card that really has far less power than a 4090 is dishonest and misleading. To make an honest comparison, you’d use the same settings and parameters on both cards.

*With heavy DLSS and frame generation. Total bullshit and false marketing by Nvidia IMO.

Does it have a proper suspend/resume function for games? For me, that’s pretty much the benchmark for reaching a “Steam Deck-level” experience. But I think none of the other handhelds have it.

Tablet

Great for watching videos, reading the newspaper and drawing (with a digital pen).

I actually don’t have a laptop anymore, because I found that a tablet could do everything I needed on the go with less bulk, longer lasting battery and no fan noise.

Smartwatch

Tracks my heartrate (had some issues with elevated heart rate before), guilt-trips me into doing more excercise, shows me notifications without having to get my phone out, displays the time with a customizable watch face.

Let’s hope they’ll introduce some solid competition into the GPU market.

I have a perfectly capable gaming PC but more often than not, I choose to play on the Steam Deck instead. I already sit at my desk for work most of the day, so it’s nice having a dedicated gaming device that I can take with me and sit in the garden or on my sofa. And of course I can take it with me when travelling.

That won’t do much. Each of the spam accounts I’ve seen is on a different instance.

There was a lot of panic about “killer games” in the 90s-00s. Politicians and parents blamed video games for school shootings. Nowadays nobody cares about the topic at all, but the strict rules remain. Steam just kind of ignored the local laws so far, but now decided to actually adhere to them.

That depends… many games blocked in Germany on Steam also can’t be activated in Germany.

Technically yes, but they didn’t actually require it in the beginning and they even sold it in regions without PSN.

Steam refunds are easy and convenient. I wouldn’t personally bother doing that just to post a “protest review” either, but it’s definitely possible to do without losing any money.

No, that’s incorrect. None of the previous games required it, except for multiplayer. For example you could play the Ghost of Tsushima campaign just fine without an account. This one seems to be entirely singleplayer and yet requires an account for no reason.

so… I take the multiplayer parts are going to be going away soon-ish, as offline mode is incoming and 1€ pricetag atm? Is this a last squeeze for the game?

Maybe, but it’s worth noting that Ubi gave away the Crew 1 for free back in 2016, 7 years before it shut down. So I wouldn’t necessarily take this sale as an indication of a shutdown coming soon (though it definitely could happen).

FWIW, they’ve announced they’ll add an offline mode to this game. Personally I liked this game less that The Crew 1 when I played it during a free weekend though.

I’d love to get another singleplayer game as well, but I’ve accepted that Valve is just unpredictable. I’m sure they haven’t given up on Singleplayer and we’ll get another singleplayer game… at some point. Their previous game was the fantastic Half-life Alyx after all.

That is very much not their official website. Looks pretty sketchy in fact, with that “GTA V Download APK” link on the bottom.

It’ll likely be like 2020, you can play offline but it’ll be a much less detailed version of the planet. They pretty much have to use streaming for the high-detail environments, as nobody would have the disk space for it otherwise.

My post was talking specifically about peoples’ reactions to the World of Goo 2 launch though, including the part you quoted.

That’s not the point, because that’s not the situation here. The game isn’t exclusive, wasn’t pulled from any stores and was funded by Epic games. You don’t see Valve-published or funded games on EGS either.

There are games where the criticism against Epic was completely valid. This isn’t one of those.

Yeah, with a launcher- and DRM-free version, I think the hate is quite misplaced here. It’s especially extreme on reddit. There is an irony of people who are supposedly against exclusivity writing things like “No steam no purchase.”. I guarantee those people never complain about a Steam-exclusive game not being on GoG or EGS.

Should be very easy to install it on the Steam Deck from the website, especially as it even has a native Linux version.

I’ve spent a total of $5 on the game and FWIW, I think I got my money’s worth. The game’s development is severely mismanaged and I don’t think it’ll ever realize its vision, but I think it’s worth checking it out even if it’s just for looking at some of its technological achievements.

You get ten ships to fly for the free fly event.

I hope they’ll improve the management side of things. Planet Coaster has great building tools, but without good economy and progression systems, I quickly lost interest in my parks.

That much is a given. Nintendo never goes for top-performance (well, not since the 90s) and it wouldn’t make sense for them either.

I’m not impressed by this. Doesn’t seem like much of an RPG anymore, but like a generic action game with thin slices of RPG elements at best. I don’t mind the game not being open world, but the levels shown seem to effectively be linear corridors without any variety in how to approach a situation.

This game was announced in January 2023, and its name is the name of the book from 1905 it’s based on. Don’t really see any malicious intent here.

Just an account.

I think they then accepted an exclusivity deal with epic🤮 and that’s when they lost me completely.

That didn’t happen. Heck, the game shut down before the Epic Games Store even existed.

Some of the better ones have removable cables. You’ll usually just yank them out or worst case if the cable is damaged you can easily replace it.

Ah, indeed I did.

The thing about wired earbuds and headphones is that they’re already pretty sustainable. A good pair can last you decades, while wireless buds are usually throwaway products. So I think it’s pretty cool that they’re doing something about that for those that want wireless earbuds.

The workers literally get paid bonuses for each phone that gets made. The phone’s parts all get certified for sustainability. They need to find manufacturers willing to fulfill their requirements, for which they will obviously charge more.

I’m not saying that they’re for everyone or should be free from criticism. I personally decided against buying one due to the size, performance and camera. But if you’re complaining about a sustainable product costing more than a regular one, you’re missing the point and were never in the target audience in the first place.

The high prices at least should be obvious, a product using fairly sourced components will always be more expensive.

Putting in a generic screen with similar measurements is generally almost impossible. Looks like replacement screens for that particular phone are still available on Aliexpress though, so you could use one of those.

That’s great, but you can get weapons for Cyberpunk through Amazon Prime Gaming. That’s pretty much microtransactions with extra steps.

Again, the character would still be written and defined by a human writer, pouring their soul into it just like they would a “dumb” NPC. I don’t see how that “soul” is lost by giving that human-written character the capability to naturally respond to language.

These NPCs would have to be written by people too. Otherwise you’d just get ChatGPT. Depending on complexity, it might even require more writing work.

The way it works right now is usually over the cloud. I’ve already tried out a bit of “Convai” as a developer, which is a platform where you can create LLM NPCs and put them in Unreal Engine. It’s pretty neat, not perfect, but you can definitely give characters thousands of lines of backstory if you want and they will act in character. They will also remember any conversations a player had with them previously and can refer to them in later convos. Can still be fairly obvious that you’re talking to an LLM though, if you know what to ask and what to look for. Due to its cloud-based nature, there is also some delay between the player input and the response. But it has a lot of potential for dialog systems where you can do way more than just choose between 4 predefined sentences. Especially once running these things locally won’t be a performance-issue.

Normal NPCs don’t have souls either TBF.