Not just the Deck. Having these games work there also means I have an easier time transitioning my desktop to Linux.

To me, it’s an indicator that the rest of the industry bankrupted its talent and innovation. There’s been some great indie games, but nothing overwhelmingly amazing, certainly not in the AAA space.

Yeah, I admit I uninstalled it from my Deck after previous attempt. Maybe I’ll retry it.

I’m sure they will over time, but I would guess there’s a surprising number of potential issues with any font variance. That’s the kind of thing that can appear hardware-dependently, like certain high/low-res monitors showing fonts too big, too small, or even not at all. So any bug fixes that have come through on the subject will rely on user bug reports.

If it was as simple as the font swapping feature seen in Word, I’m sure it wouldn’t be a big deal.

Some of the Resident Evil games felt more natural on controller than mouse for me. Even though you’re aiming and shooting, the laser sight feels more intuitive on a thumbstick. Specifically thinking of 4 and 5.

Some of the Resident Evil games felt more natural on controller than mouse for me. Even though you’re aiming and shooting, the laser sight feels more intuitive on a thumbstick. Specifically thinking of 4 and 5.

Umbrella evil. There, that’s pretty much your catch-up on every game’s story.

I guess it gets confusing with recent remakes of 2, 3, 4; they’re meant as clear entry points, and the latest version of RE1 is still a bit old (though it too is a “remake” of an ancient PS1 edition)

7 is extremely different from the others - it was even thought to be a new/different IP when it was revealed. Village is a direct sequel to that, but could also be enjoyed alone; it’s a bit more action and less creepy.

I’ve mostly been playing this on desktop Linux. I think the only thing they were working on was handheld optimization and interface tweaks.

There’s still one annoying bug - on Windows, the game shows a notification if a match starts while the game is off focus. On Linux, at the moment this notification would show (if alt tabbed) the game freezes.

This argument would seem to make sense, but from what I gather Bezos and Zuckerberg have lots of control of their respective companies, and can push around the board - yet they do what they do.

Well, hold on, while that industry is indeed scummy, Valve doesn’t ever see a cut of it, do they?

Valve allows developers to print their own Steam keys, and takes a 0% cut of them. Game devs use that opportunity to sell the keys to legitimate key sites, which take less of a cut than Steam does, but offer no refund guarantees or other support. Then, credit card thieves buy those keys using stolen cards, and resell them on illegitimate key sites.

So in summary, as long as Valve doesn’t take a cut on that key generation, they don’t directly profit. They just keep allowing key generation to allow game devs a bit more freedom in sale.

The only handheld console that has achieved anywhere near that level of back compatibility has been the Steam Deck, and it had to release with hundreds of listed caveats about slowly adding compatibility, and many higher-fidelity games being unplayably slow. Even the PS Vita needed a lot of porting work to run PS2 games.

I seriously doubt the claims coming in.

While I think you’re ultimately right, 6 years ago I would have said the same thing about the Steam Deck idea, so I’m compelled to offer counterpoints.

Valve, very uniquely, does offer the best Linux-based digital games storefront to use on that Linux gaming PC you bought. So, they’re very much positioned to take advantage of the hardware purchase. Users aren’t “locked in”, but they are compelled in, and users may have a smoother time getting games on Steam than trying to set up controller-based launchers on Heroic or something.

It’s like when the pet isn’t literally fenced into the house, and is allowed to roam free, but is reminded that its fluffy toy and warm meals are all back at home, so it’ll never go far.

Valve also might just be more forward-thinking than most game companies most COMPANIES these days. They build goodwill this way and get people obsessed with their brand by having more wins like this.

What exactly do you see as a punishing death? Erasing someone’s save file? The only other thing I can think of besides permanently taking consumables that won’t be restocked is sending you back a long distance to redo a bunch of fights again - and DS does literally that. DS2 even lowers your max HP as an additional Fuck You.

You’re not the first person to say dying is “not so bad” in those games and I still can only view those as the ritualistic statement of an insane person. Every other action game I play, I rarely die, and when I do it just has me retry the singular thing I was attempting in that past minute. Even other hard games, like Super Meat Boy or Ori and the Blind Forest, don’t force large area repetition, or take away items as punishment. The mastery of completing 18 tasks perfectly in succession is for speedrunners - it’s not something I or most players are interested in, and it’s solely a source of stress, not excitement.

Heck, Tunic had the money-loss system during development. The dev took it away before release (you just lose a paltry amount and can still get it back) and the game was still great.

That is…ABSOLUTELY false.

People frequently point to the idea that if you collect an item like a Soul of Lost X, or a weapon, and then die, you get to keep the item. But the game also has consumable items used to make tons of options easier within the world. Things that enhance your weapon temporarily, give an extra health boost, or give you souls. Players that use these without making much use of them, or even misuse them due to nebulously archaic descriptions, will have nothing given back to them later on, making a venture even harder than the first few go’s.

Plus, you’re likely not to get as many level ups due to lost souls, meaning you’re going to get even more of a difficulty ramp than other players.

I’m sorry - it’s just juvenile the way people who obsess over this game will defend every issue with “it’s not for every person” - especially when indie devs that have TWEAKED the formula, and FIXED the issues, end up making for very fun games. No one is playing them and complaining “Man, I wish I’d accidentally spent an hour going the wrong way at the start!”

I’m not far in Silksong - have not actually been stopped by difficulty yet - but even the obstinately unguided exploration is getting to me. And I do worry about the reports of it being too hard by others.

I never actually beat the final boss of the first game. Gave it a few tries, decided something as hard as that being a two-phase where the second hits harder is bullshit, Just decided to YouTube the ending.

It’s funny that tastes diverge so much. I love artificial scarcity, as a way of rewarding my exploration. Spotting out a trove of batteries wouldn’t feel so rewarding if I already had 5 and they last an hour.

I ended up giving up at one of the clicker sequences.

The game lore says they’re blind and navigate by hearing. The game code does not.

This game was what pulled me into PC gaming, but when I’ve watched novices return to it even with all the time I spent listening to their commentaries on good teaching…players don’t learn the things they want well, and I can’t blame them on reflection. Even things like where to go are tough for reasons they shouldn’t be.

I’ve played many Soulslikes, and found pretty much all of them fun…EXCEPT for the ones by FromSoftware. All others branch out into a lot of exploration, they just don’t put 8 paths square at the beginning of the game and then slap you down for 5 of them.

If I looked up a getting started guide, I’d feel constrained by its arcane instructions. “Go this way, take the third door, but DON’T talk to that NPC yet…”

Fun games are open to the player exploring, without massively disproportionate punishment for it.