What's that? It's the weekend? It can't be already can it? Yes. It's time for the weekend chat about what we've been playing and what you've been playing.
There's been so many good Linux supported releases lately I've been a bit spoilt for choice including these just in the last week: DemonCrawl, UnderMine, The Battle of Polytopia, Littlewood, Monster Crown, Core Defense and Hellpoint (plus plenty more I've missed).
Recently though, I've been having masses of fun in Orcs Must Die! 3 on Stadia with a co-op partner. Getting to test out all the different trap combinations, it's genuinely good fun. It was fun enough by myself but now with a partner, it's far more amusing especially trying the later difficulties. Good manic entertainment.
As for actual Linux-desktop games, Jupiter Hell sucked me right in once more. Jupiter Hell is the spritual successor to DRL (D**m, the Roguelike) and it's one of the most furious roguelikes I've ever played. While turn-based, it's so streamlined and fluid it feels almost realtime. It's also quite gorgeous in places. Jupiter Hell has evolved quite nicely during Early Access and it's easily worth a look.
I also spoke to the developer of Haque, a rather fantastic glitch fantasy roguelike from 2017. As great as it is, the Steam build had a bug where a file was named "Haque_Text.zip" but the game was looking for "haque_text.zip". Linux case-sensitivity strikes again. They mentioned they will fix it as soon as possible.
Additionally: it appears that there's another big CPU security issue, this time not just affecting Intel. According to the paper it should affect Intel, ARM, IBM, and AMD CPUs.
Lastly, NVIDIA put up a new Vulkan Beta Driver 450.56.06 with the sole change listed as new support for the VK_EXT_4444_formats extension that landed with Vulkan API spec 1.2.149 that we reported on here.
Deals Reminder:
- F1 2018 is free on Humble Store
- Humble Choice giving away all 12 games this month for the Premium/Classic subs
- Valve's QuakeCon Sale has plenty of games that work with Proton - GOG also has a QuakeCon Sale
- Humble Raw Fury 2020 Bundle - 3 days left
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Humble Double Fine 20th Anniversary Bundle - 5 days left
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Humble also has a Game Design & Animation book bundle for anyone interested in that side of things
Over to you in the comments: what have you been gaming on Linux lately and what are you looking forward to the most across this year?
Last edited by emphy on 8 August 2020 at 4:00 pm UTC
Quoting: XpanderBorderlands 3, because free weekend. Honestly, i have to say, this game is pretty bad. Runs okaish, looks ok, if blurs and TAA are turned off, but combat is so boring and dull. not enough feedback from guns or hits on the enemy or yourself, feels quite bland. Just cant enjoy it because of that. Lucky that it was free this weekend, so now i know i wont buy this game.
Ok adding more games:
Warhammer Online (Return of Reckoning) ... My go to PvP/RvR MMORPG fix.
Destroy All Humans Quite fun game, not that great gameplay but its funny a bit and works pretty well with wine. needs media foundation installed into prefix.
The game seems to work fine in the latest Proton-GE at high-ish settings, although I've had a couple of crashes.
In short, worth the time for the freebie weekend, but not worth $30.
Other gaming -
Finished A Plague Tale: Innocence -really wonderful adventure/story game. Played it on the couch via SteamLink and it really was nice.
Also finished Black Mesa. Other than the soldiers having rediculously fast alert and aggro times and the gonarch being a huge damage sponge, it was a great experience and wonderful homage to the original.
Last edited by yokem55 on 8 August 2020 at 4:57 pm UTC
Now, I'll start on free maps!
CS:GO - I just play with bots. I have found AI players to be much friendlier than RL players.
Shotgun Farmers - Working towards getting my "Prestige 1" achievement. Still have quite a ways to go though
Have also been enjoying:
Undermine - Undermine came out of Early Access this week and the improvements are fantastic! Liam's article on the 1.0 update is here
Monster Sanctuary - I participated in the Kickstarter campaign and have enjoyed this "gotta catch em all" game. I am enjoying it, but have to admit that I am sorely tempted to purchase another game of this genre, Monster Crown. So far I have resisted the temptation, but I feel my resolve weakening. Liam's article on the Early Access release is here
Thanks to GoL and the entire Linux community I've been quite happy with my Ubuntu 20.04 (Gnome!) install and haven't pined for a dual boot for anything in months. Thank you all!
Also recently finished A Short Hike, which is a great little indie gem, really enjoyed it and wished it had lasted longer.
Started playing Divinity Original Sin II in co-op with my daughter a couple of weeks ago. So far so good, hopefully we'll finish this one, unlike the first one where we sort of just stopped playing around the midgame DOSII seems more accessible and actually a bit easier, enjoying it so far though my daughter really wants to sneak around and steal everything...
Finally, just started Batman Arkham Knight today, I've always been a big fan of the Arkham games and this looks fun as well. I don't much mind the much-maligned batmobile so far but I guess it's too early to tell.
Last edited by seamoose on 8 August 2020 at 6:42 pm UTC
Bought the game for PS3 to test out the movement difference to PC and then im gonna grind it to dust and throw it in toilet.
Last edited by TheLinuxPleb on 8 August 2020 at 6:40 pm UTC
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