Yeah, more games need to be like Amazon’s New World, where they kneecap their own game in an effort to appeal to the masses like you and the shareholders.

Tennis would also have wider appeal if you didn’t have to run back and forth so much. They should look into that.

The PvP is the majority of the challenge of the game. If you remove that, for the PvE players it becomes Cookie Clicker and they’re done in a week. And it also reduces the participation in the PvP side and damages that part of the game as well.

The cat & mouse mechanic is integral to the game’s success. If that doesn’t work, this isn’t a game.

PopOS with Cosmic did handle my odd 4 monitor configuration better than Ubuntu did.

I wonder how good AI is at deobfuscating code. It seems like the kind of thing it might be good at.

The game would have been appropriately hyped if it weren’t for a few massive fuckups.

1. Resource gathering was supposed to be a cat & mouse game. But the potential PvP while gathering resources doesn’t appeal to the masses, so marketing added a “you can’t touch me” PvE flag.

2. Item duplication. There were exploits that allowed item duping. They didn’t reset the economy after those exploits were addressed, and they didn’t catch everyone.

3. They decided the content was too easy (especially given the duped gear above) and made everything much harder after a couple weeks. Again, no server reset. So if you didn’t get in in the first couple weeks and duplicate some items in that time, you were forever behind.

Except the title (if you don’t read the subtitle).

Diablo 2 really was a great game.

Where is Raft in these lists?

You’re running closed source software that has permissions to read your keyboard input to other applications (other than apps running as admin), they can access your files, and and they can communicate over the Internet.

You’re inherently trusting these publishers if you’re gaming on Windows. Who is the publisher of Darkest Dungeon or Deep Rock Galactic or Lethal Company?

If you really want to be secure, you can’t do gaming on the same machine as your security sensitive stuff. It’s not limited to these anti-cheats.

Tell me how any other app uploading your entire documents directory is okay then. “Into the kernel” is largely fear mongering. Other, less trustworthy apps can do plenty of damage, and you don’t seem to care about those.

If you really want to be secure, you can’t do gaming on the same machine as your security sensitive stuff. It’s not limited to these anti-cheats.

These games won’t run on Linux.

They do this to prevent cheaters, and it is effective. Some people who have no problems running any other executable that can do just as much damage believe this load on boot style is too invasive.

I wouldn’t mind this feature dying so I could play on Linux though.

I had to VPN back home to get around the email verification.

Curious

Either way, the money grab is why I didn’t get back into MtG recently.

I considered sticking my toe in and was told “oh yeah, just buy a $90 commander precon and hop right in.”

Yeah, no thanks.

What’s a tw3?

Lemmy came through (below). Things are getting better here. I feel like we’re reaching critical mass, if only we could stop the infighting.

I haven’t played it on mobile, but it does seem made for it. And everything is turn based with absolutely no timers.

I avoided the game after hearing the addiction rumors. A friend bought it as a steam gift.

It didn’t get me as good as Slay the Spire did, but it’s pretty good.

Yeah, and fuck that. If I perform well on the job, I’m sure as hell not being there for mandated bullshit. Fire me if you want.

Guess what those policies do? They drive your good employees away, and you keep those who can’t find somewhere better.

Why do they need to work these two weekends on a project that has been ongoing for years?

They’ll ship something, just to head off fraud claims.

https://sell.amazon.com/pricing#referral-fees

I guess, according to you, it costs more to host files than it does to ship you a physical USB.

Maybe all these apps stores need to look into physical delivery in order to bring their costs down.

Epic can only compete because they’ve few users and are willing to operate at a near loss

Bullshit. Epic’s loses are in paying for exclusives and giving away games while ruining their PR.

Steam could operate at 15% if they wanted to. But… why would they do that?

It certainly isn’t when you’re spending more than that just to get exclusives.

You’re right. Hosting files is more difficult than creating art for the game. Steam deserves a bigger cut than artists.

Game files and updates need to be distributed

You also recognize that 30% of each game sale applies to each game sale, right?

Do you really think 30% of developing a game is hosting not just the original game, but also the updates and the save files? CDNs only make it cheaper.

Steam is able to charge 30% because they effectively have a walled garden on PC games. Very few publishers are well known enough to successfully sell their game outside of Steam.

It’s not as egregious as the Apple or Google stores, but they’re basically all in this together. It’s like the old mob families where they split territory.

most are quite happy with the services they get back from that 30% cut.

I agree with most of that, but this part just isn’t true. 30% is highway robbery. It’s a scam. But PC gamers are trained that Steam is where the games are, with few exceptions. If you don’t pay steam their cut, your game doesn’t sell at all.

Consider all that goes into development of a game and compare that to the effort/infrastructure to host a download and display a webpage. Is Steam really providing 30% of the game experience?

I think Steam could be profitable at less than a 10% cut.

Reminds me of this old Digital Blasphemy wallpaper from 2000.

https://beta.digitalblasphemy.com/sec/skysong2/

Do you know what a “strawman” argument is?

I guess you’re right as long as you don’t mind sharing your entire My Documents folder to the world.

a very limited set of folders my user has write permissions

On Windows?

files I keep under root user

On Windows? That’s not common practice.

a game can’t break my system

Is this like how you can’t get viruses without granting root?

Yeah, I trust Riot and Valve more than I trust Sony or the developers of Lethal Company or Among Us. Even with higher privs than those other companies get.

Because if PubG is compromised, I’m just as vulnerable as I am if Riot is compromised.

I get the technical difference, but when you combine it with practicality, it doesn’t make much difference on one hand. On the other, it does remove cheaters from my games.

If I cared that much I’d have ALL my games on a separate OS anyway. Maybe I will at some point.

I don’t think you understand how code works. What are you worried about it doing, and why does it need admin permissions to do that?

“Kernel” anticheat isn’t really any more dangerous than any other executable you run on Windows. Code from untrusted devs isn’t safe whether it has admin or not. Games made by small devs are much more dangerous than anything put out directly by Riot or Valve.

There’s a lot of hullabaloo that’s seeded and encouraged by those who make money on botting and cheats. It’s kind of valid, but it’s not a larger risk than installing pubg or among us or any other small game.

If you really want to be secure, you have to separate your gaming and personal machines, at least the OS and drives.

The Windows limitation might even make it more secure in that way, if you’re willing to limit Windows to games and use Linux for personal stuff. Even then, keeping drives isolated is difficult.

Can you not?

Steam would be profitable at 12%.

30% is the standard. And it’s absurd. They all do it because they all have their own walled garden territory, and it doesn’t benefit any of them to lower prices.

You’re telling me that Steam does 30% of the effort to create and publish a game?

With Gyroscope aiming you use the stick for large, broad movements, but for small adjustments you move the controller itself. It’s new as of about 2016ish.

The explanation and video here is good.

https://www.digitec.ch/en/page/aiming-with-sticks-so-yesterday-gyro-aiming-is-the-future-24968

PC gaming is much cheaper. A desktop, while being more expensive initially, will last much longer than a console. And the games on PC are much, much cheaper.

Judges are smarter than that. So are juries.