Was thinking about this earlier today, but lately I’ve gotten burnt out on Final Fantasy XVI whether that be due to the tone, design or combat I am not too sure. Had a slow weekend for once and decided to pop in Atelier Ryza 2 as I recently picked up Ryza 3 due to it having a small print run. Spent most of the day playing it off and on, but the brighter and more positive tone was a boon compared to the drudgery of FFXVI.

Atelier isn’t always my comfort food, but that was a nice change. That distinction would have to either go to rhythm games or to stuff like Trackmania or Minecraft where you can “shut off your brain” and just play. TM has a certain “flow” to the tracks that isn’t like anything else out there and Minecraft just throws you into the world and lets you go. (Albeit on Peaceful.)

I give it three months after launch before we hear it is closing. These games just don’t take off like they want.

In fact, since I posted that comment another 4k scaler has entered the ring, this time by the creators of HDMI mods such as the PS1Digital, DCDigital and such. Called the Morph 4k, will have an HDMI-only one for $400 and one with an analog connectors for $500: https://www.pixelfx.co/morph4k

While it has an upfront cost, I’d say the best way to play old consoles is by using flashcarts/ODEs/softmods and a proper scaler like the Retrotink 5x Pro or the Open Source Scan Converter. Those scalers take a multitude of inputs, scale and digitize them for output over HDMI. The RT5X can even do crazy stuff with filters to emulate CRTs and other effects.

That said, doing all of that comes at a cost. SCART cables for each console are about $40 each and the scalers run ~$325 for the RT5x or $120 for the OSSC. Then if you want to get a way to switch inputs, thats another $50-200 there too. Worth it if you like your old consoles, but to just revisit that’d be an expensive proposition. Is a great way to futureproof them, even moreso with the upcoming Retrotink 4k but that thing won’t be cheap. (Estimated price is ~$1000)

If you want to do it on the “cheap” but get as close to the originals, I’d highly suggest getting /making a MiSTer setup. This uses a FPGA to do emulation via hardware, which is about as close as you can to the originals providing the code is up to par. That’ll run about $300 all said and done, but gets you a crapton of systems all outputting over HDMI.

I believe it is sarcasm, but with the death of E3 anything is possible.

That said, I’d say it is more likely to see Nintendo announce it at the Tokyo Game Show instead. (This would put it at late September, which is right around when the Switch was revealed back in 2016.)

Listing != Actual.

We’ve seen fakes before in the database. That said, I hope it is true as I’ve heard a lot of good things about it.

I can’t wait for the Early Access release to come out.

I remember the Minecraft casino. While I never spent any money, it taught me that I should never gamble. For a few years after that the Minecraft exp collection sound would trigger a dopamine rush. Is the main reason I stopped playing MC too.

(They gave “play” money to use on top of letting users also use real BTC.)

Currently trying to get through FFXVI, but there are times it feels like a slog. Am in the midst of one if these low points right now.

As for what I’ll be playing, my StepmaniaX compact machine shows up tomorrow, so I’ll have that to assemble and play.

You might want to check Zenius-i-Vanisher’s arcade map to see if anyone has a StepmaniaX cabinet near you! Its made by the same people as the old In The Groove and there are a number of revivals within this new game.

Stepmania will work well on the Steam Deck! I’ve used both ITGMania and Project Outfox on it without issues. See my giant comment on this thread for links and other information.

The easiest way to get started with DDR at home is to download Stepmania on your computer, then plug in a dance pad to your computer. Here are some simplified instructions on how to get started:

Step 1. Get Stepmania

Stepmania is a free DDR simulator.

There are two main forks of Stepmania:

• ITGMania
  • Is the recommended one from me as it comes with the Simply Love theme right out of the box along with some other nice features such as the ability to upload scores to GrooveStats
• Project Outfox
  • Does a lot more than just DDR-esque charts

After that, you have to download the songs for it. You can do that from a site called zenius-i-vanisher:

• Browse all song packs from official DanceDanceRevolution releases
• DanceDanceRevolution EXTREME song pack
• DanceDanceRevolution A20PLUS song pack

• There are also a lot of custom charts for Stepmania as well! Here is the main thread from FlashFlashRevolution’s forum compiling a lot of the major songpacks.

Once you’ve downloaded the songs you want, here are brief instructions on how to add the songs to Stepmania. For other Stepmania-related questions, visit the Stepmania subreddit. (There isn’t a good/active Fediverse community yet.)

Step 2. Buy a dance pad

Comprehensive pad buying guide

The above link is a detailed guide which reviews the most popular options for buying a home pad.

The summary is:

• If your budget is < $100 or you’re just starting out - Buy a soft pad and consider upgrading it (video tutorial) once you reach an intermediate level of play.

• If your budget is between $100 to $300 - Keep an eye out for a used Cobalt Flux pad or L-Tek pad on eBay, your local Craigslist, or on the Facebook BEMANI buy/sell/trade group. Deals within this price range are rare, but possible. Or if you’re handy, you can try to build your own.

• If your budget is > $300 - Same as above, but you’ll be able to buy a new pad immediately rather than waiting for a deal to pop up.

And that’s it! If you have any further questions, feel free to ask me as well.

NOTE: The above portion was mainly copied from this comment on the DanceDanceRevolution subreddit. I made some edits and additions here and there to add more information and links to things.

That said, I am getting back into DDR myself. Personally own and fairly like my L-Tek pad, but I am about to sell it here in the next week or two. I ended up buying a Compact Machine setup from StepmaniaX which is an entirely different game from the non-X version. (Basically a modern version of In The Groove from the same guys but with 5 panels (U/D/L/R/Center) and they not only sell the machines to arcades but to private owners too.) Their stage/pads are the end-game ones to get these days, but are not cheap.

That is where you just use Cheat Engine to hack in gold for yourself. Why go through the treadmill to unlock items from the well when you can just give it to yourself?

The game is entirely free too.

Relevant Links:

• Itch.io - Current main page
• Steam Page - Releases on Steam (for free) on August 18th. (The day after this update.)

Personally have avoided the hololive/vtuber rabbit hole, but heard good things about this game and figured I’d post about the update.

If you like music, there are a bunch of good free rhythm games:

• Osu
• Stepmania/DDR - Main modern versions are Project Outfox and ITGmania
• IIDX/BMS - Beatoraja, heres a good English guide to it
  • Neat thing about BMS is that all of the music is made or licensed/allowed for it. The community is strictly against charting copyrighted songs, partially due to them requiring keysounding.
• Sound Voltex - Untitled SDVX Clone
• Guitar Hero - Clone Hero

Note that some of these require or are improved by an additional controller, so they’re not entirely free but once you have what you need you’re set.

I still keep up with my old FC/Guild from Final Fantasy XIV via Discord even though I haven’t played the game in ages.

What about pre-ordering for pickup? That way you have a guaranteed copy, but don’t have to put anything down.

Probably less copyright and more-so that it is not feasible to continue to manufacture all video games forever.

My view on games and the “preservation” thereof is that I buy new when and as I can. That said, once the system is dead and gone from retailers, I treat it as fair game for flashcarts, mods and so on. Figure at that point it is like going to a library for a copy of an out of print book instead of paying top dollar to a collector for their copy.

Pretty much anything but competitive multiplayer stuff and the majority of rogue-esque titles. Just don’t have the time to dedicate to learning the ins and outs of one specific title.

My favorite genres include:

• JRPGs
• Rhythm Games
• Racing
• Platformers
• Metroidvanias
• Visual novels
• Action Adventure

Have you looked into trying Mabinogi? This is another MMORPG that is published by Nexon but it is still heavily rooted in the design of when it launched back in 2003, before WoW. The game is heavy on the social elements too.

You might be wondering why suggest such an old game? Well, a few weeks ago they announced that they’re working on porting the game to Unreal Engine such that they can future proof it and continue development all of these years later. Not sure if there is a Fediverse board/magazine/community for the game yet but there is an official Discord as well.

I’d say to jump right into the 124v124. At that level, one player is not going to change the tide too much. (Its more akin to the battles in Planetside 2 than your standard Battlefield due to the sheer scope.)