Quoting: Jarmer

Quoting: KimyrielleNot sure why some devs think everybody loves first person games. I certainly don't.

I mean, you really need to ask that question? ................ Skyrim is one of the most popular and highest selling games .. EVER. In history.

Fallout games (like all of them) are incredibly popular.

Dragon Age series.

Deus Ex series.

Far Cry series.

Cyberpunk.

Borderlands.

I could keep going for a very long time.

The reason some devs think everyone loves first person games ........ is because everyone loves first person games. LOL.

Dragon Age isn't even optionally first-person, it is third-person and optionally top-down. Fallout and Skyrim can pick between first and third person.

But if you want to list incredibly popular games that use other perspectives, we sure can find some examples. Picking just RPGs from the 2010s afterwards, so it can be compared directly (don't even need to go to tetris or super mario or different genres), Baldur's Gate 3 is third-person with optional top-down, recent Zelda games are third-person

Want stuff that isn't even third-person? Recent Pokemon games are best-sellers and top down, Diablo 3 was top down, we have indies like Terraria (sidescrolling) and Stardew Valley (top-down) that aren't even 3d and still managed to make into lists of the best-selling games of all time.

Yeah first-person is popular, but there is a reason many of those games you mentioned offer multiple camera angles... it surely isn't everyone that prefers first-person, and honestly it isn't even clear whether it is a majority of people.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

This kind of thing pisses me off immensely for a few reasons.

1) This is the big one: when they made the game, Obsidian was an indie studio with limited resources, that had a very successful crowdfunding campaign but still a lot of risk. But they have since been bought by Microsoft, one of the biggest companies on the world. There is absolutely no excuse to not give proper support to some people, it is all greed and dishonesty. "Oh but it is not profitable" - yeah after-release support often is, you still have to do it. Didn't want to pay for Linux support, should not have bought a company with Linux games
2) Making the entire game work on Linux in the first place is a (potentially) huge task, and adding Linux as a new platform implies taking on a new responsibility, so sure if you want to focus on the main release and leave it as an extra it is understandable. But "porting" the updates is the opposite - it is something you already committed to.
3) They picked an engine with Linux support. Sure they built a lot on top of it (I think they did some pretty big extensions to the engine iirc), but it is not like they would have to port the entire engine again just for a few fixes. Sure it is still not trivial, but it is one less thing for them to blame.
4) I don't care if Linux players are few, every single player has a very reasonably expectation of good support. Even if a problem only affects one person, as a "paying customer" that person should be able to reach customer support and get it sorted out (if at all possible). "Sorry we won't fix our fabrication defect because there aren't enough people affected, so you'll have to cope with your defective product" is not acceptable. It is a Linux game, they need to support their Linux customers.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

QuoteIt's not exactly something new, or surprising, given that Steam's Subscriber Agreement clearly notes "You may not reveal, share or otherwise allow others to use your password or Account except as otherwise specifically authorized by Valve.".

[...]

It's also another reminder that on Steam, you don't own any games on it at all. Once again, as per the Subscriber Agreement, "Content and Services are licensed, not sold" and your "license confers no title or ownership in the Content and Services".

That is not necessarily true, as it depends on your jurisdiction and applicable laws, and possible court decisions against it. The Subscriber Agreement clearly says "in the event that any provision of this Agreement shall be held by an arbitrator, court, or other tribunal of competent jurisdiction to be illegal or unenforceable, such provision will be enforced to the maximum extent permissible and the remaining portions of this Agreement shall remain in full force and effect."

We need to stop treating those unilateral bullshit terms as if they automatically had the strength of law. Companies will try to get away with everything they can, no matter how ludicrous, and are hoping no one will challenge them.

QuoteReally, the only time this will change is when physical media properly dies off and people cause enough of a fuss that governments and legal bodies around the world put in new laws around digital ownership, which is not likely for a long time.

The physical media will have the same terms for anything they contain. You don't own the copyrights to movies you have on DVD, so you are granted a license to watch it. Installing software from disks you'll have to accept the same terms. Doesn't mean the courts will let them forbid you from re-selling or ban you from watching, and neither should they do it for digitally distributed media.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: dpanterWhat exactly do these people consider "quality", I wonder.

Yeah every time a AAA company says something like "quality over quantity", what I hear is "we are spending even more on a handful of big franchises in the most popular genres instead of doing anything new or creative or investing in more diverse games".

View this comment - View article - View full comments

What they describe sounds mostly fine, but also... quite unnecessary. They could just not do it in the middle of such a huge polemic.

This entire corporate push of AI is so overwhelmingly evil that I'd sacrifice all these minor "ethical" uses to get rid of it. I don't want examples of how it could be not terrible (it could, but in 99.999% of cases it is indeed terrible), I don't want people to shift responsibility to users instead of the people subsidizing it all and dictating the way it is developed, I don't want to have to figure out how exactly they are externalizing the costs.

"Generative AI" is the weapon of the enemy. We don't use it, we don't need it. Get rid of the ethical problems first, and only then we can discuss acceptable uses.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: Shmerl

Quoting: eldakingIt is far too early to release a Deck 2

Why? Desktop generation of CPUs and GPUs refresh around once per 2 years. Same happens with mobile phones. Why can't gaming handhelds refresh that way too?

Quoting: eldakinghe benefits of a standardized hardware target are negated by too frequent changes

That somehow doesn't bother desktop gaming.

Waste can be an issue, but you aren't forced to buy new hardware every time there is a generation update.

Why? Because the release frequency of those things is too high, and their support ends too soon, and that is something that should be actively avoided and not targeted. We should be glad when things last longer instead of asking for obsolescence.

And yeah I am not forced to buy new hardware, in fact I am not capable if I wanted. But are companies going to support all their back catalog? Are they going to sell replacement parts and patch bugs for all the previous generations? My phones certainly stop receiving updates much sooner than I'd want to replace them (if I could afford the high-end phones, they would get updates for a bit longer - still not enough - but it is expensive to be poor). About gaming in particular, are companies going to keep making games targeting earlier generations, or are minimum specs going to increase?

I am not worried about being "forced" to buy a new device. I am worried about my desktop not running games because everyone decided that instead of making games with more reasonable requirements they should up the specs of devices every two years. And I am worried about catastrophic floods and historic droughts in my country because people care more about a small boost to FPS than about climate catastrophe. I won't buy new devices every two years, but I share an atmosphere with the people that do.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Eh, I think the Nintendo Switch comparison highlights one big problem I have with the idea of a Deck 2: the Switch came out in 2017, and Switch 2 is being announced (not even coming out) in 2024. The Deck came out in 2022. It is far too early to release a Deck 2.

The benefits of a standardized hardware target are negated by too frequent changes. Being able to test for one configuration is important for devs, it is often cited as a benefit of consoles over PC, and the Deck was dealing with that nicely while also being a PC.

Sure every year we get new hardware (which is a problem: e-waste is getting out of hand, short-lived devices use more energy being manufactured than through their entire lifetime, we rely more and more on minerals that are environmentally and socially costly to extract, etc etc). The increases in performance are often marginal or come at a cost, such as lower battery life or bigger devices (phones have been steadily creeping in size, to the dismay of many people, to keep up with an artificial improvement in specs, and GPUs are ridiculously large). Costs of game development have also been increasing unreasonably. Following these frequent updates is a bad thing.

And honestly, it pisses me off immensely when people make new generations of a product that hasn't even made it into the whole world yet. Finish releasing it in all the other countries before thinking of replacing it.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

QuoteHalf of anti-cheat is making sure the environment hasn't been tampered with, and this is extremely hard on Linux by design. Any backdoors we leave open for it are ones developers will immediately leverage for cheats

Well if they are planning to "leave backdoors open", it becomes hard to justify running their shit.

This is a particular poor choice of word for a security-adjacent subject.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: a0kamiExclusively multiplayer games, MMO's, battle royales, moba's..
Wouldn't they'd immediately loose their appeal ? But sure, we should still always be able to host a private server and have some fun among friends.
But in the end, that's where preservation would end up the costliest, MMO publisher won't spend the slightest cent for the devs to either release a commercial customer solution or even open sourcing the whole thing.
As players we perceive games as art, they are merely cash machines to most publishers.
Indies will go the preservation route but indies are mostly able to fund offline single-players.

The FAQ to the project covers that. There have been MMO games that have been kept online, maybe you can't keep the same number of players or will lose some features but smaller server is still better than no server, etc etc.

QuoteFinally, I initially drafted huge pseudo philosophical paragraphs, but I'll just ask directly, what are your opinions about loss ?
It's somehow both the most tragic and beautiful thing. You might react virulently to that statement, I get it, loss is tough, that's why.
But have we collectively decided yet to archive and digitize every single bit of our existences from now on ?
As an example, I can barely play my most favourite game ever, maybe 'cause I'm depressed, but more specifically I think it's because I used to play it in a very specific setting that's long gone and forever lost.

I think this is something that people involved with actual preservation initiatives, archivists, curators, libraries and so on have dealt with for a long time. Because it is not possible to preserve everything, so everything that is preserved is what someone chose to put effort into preserving. The reasons for that can vary wildly, but the more meaningful something is and for more people, the more likely it becomes that someone will preserve it. And while computers and the internet make it seemingly very easy for a lot of people to make and distribute copies, over longer time scales digital media is just less durable, requires more maintenance, tech changes more often... and we might actually lose more than we did in terms of books and tapes and films (and that is even without DRM and planned obsolescence).

The problem in this case is who controls our shared cultural experiences. Because something can be extremely meaningful to a lot of people that would like to keep it, but it is entirely controlled by a company that won't do it - or might even hinder their independent efforts. The power imbalance means that the interests of a few matter while that of thousands does not. And people get understandably upset about their own powerlessness, about the control others have over their memory, over their culture, over their lives. And in particular regarding companies, the value of something as a commodity - as a product that can be sold - is rarely equal to its cultural significance.

It is the same as when a platform like yahoo answers decide to erase their entire archives. It is not that nothing should be lost... but that people can't choose what to keep, it is entirely up to the platform "owner". Even though the contents are the shared experiences and memories of many people, those people are not part of the decision process, and their desires are ignored.

But in this case worse, as the destruction can affect all extant copies even in personal archives! And the time scales involved are so short that it is not just memories.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Yeah this is a Very Good initiative. It goes for a particular point, with reasonable scope and feasible solutions. It has concrete plans with clear steps and goals. It has multiple alternatives and considers multiple nations' perspectives. The increased visibility and public debate of the issue are generally good as well. It is impressive.

It needs to gather enough interest and participants for anything to happen, so yeah let's share it a lot. And it needs to face the PR efforts of companies (that will no doubt try to spin it as being an unreasonable request and diminish the problem) and possibly actual lobbying... it will need to be answered while not letting the companies set the terms of the discussion.

View this comment - View article - View full comments