[samnite]

The former is already happening.  The latter is a line that some people won't cross for good reasons.

Regardless, I also like my deck.  I recently read that one of the favorite games I have on mine, Into the Breach, is getting a free update in July.  Will happily take that.

Yeah you're right but Sony is still holding on to a few properties (Ghost of Tsushima) for now. I guess they can be considered "timed-exclusives" for Playstation consoles. I agree with you about emulating active consoles still being sold. You should support those devs if there are legal means to buy the games so they can afford to make more games for you. I am more interested in games that are not easily-acquired due to eshop closures or Nintendo making you re-buy the same game on multiple digital shops for each console.

 

 

I want to fiddle, but I also just want to play.  Getting emulators going was a goal and playing my backlog.  I'll wait and see what pans out software-wise as that will only get better.  I don't really need the big AAA stuff, thus having a portable indie box with more features than the Switch is what I wanted all along.
 

EmuDeck seems to be your best bet

 

Some of the emulators are a pain to get up and running, others are pretty straight forward. Getting DOS-based games to run has been a mystery I haven’t overcome yet, but also haven’t dedicated much time to it.

A couple generals tips/observations -

1. If you plan to use desktop mode much, invest in a decent Bluetooth keyboard and mouse … Logitech has some nice small ones that work well.

2. Don’t bother with a dock for right now … using the deck on a tv is just a bad experience at the moment. It’s not a Switch, so don’t expect that you can just plug it in and it will look good.

3. Temper your gaming expectations … there are many games that run great, but there are also a number of games that should easily run that just don’t or require a ton of tweaking. Most of us have huge Steam libraries, so it’s not a big deal … but you will find games that just flat out crash or perform oddly.

I spent 2-3 solid weeks on GOG Dos games. I can help you. So far I have figured out ways to get most games to work at least in in Desktop mode. I know you can create dosbox scripts to get them to work in Gaming mode too. I found using the Dos-box-X in desktop mode allows you to mount the ".gog" CD image file (navigating the top of the screen menus) and then using the "quick launch exe" option to find the executable you want works to at least get things running. I think you could create a dosbox script to mount the image file and then run the executable. You should be able to execute that script by adding it as a non-steam game to your library to get it working in game mode. 

 

Money spent so far on Steam Summer sale: $0.

 

Money spent on Bath & Body Works Semi-Annual Sale:  Approximately $250.00.

 

It's all about relative price points, bros!

I will never understand how/why worthless candles are a reasonable way to spend $250 over a game collection that offers a much longer experience and enjoyment. If they can say games are boring then we can say the candles are boring lol.

[Insomniac_34]

Mooby right now:

 

[arsenalcrazy8]

Before my steam deck I spent a total of $7 on steam in 10 years. I only loaded up free games. Now with my steam deck I’ve already spent ~$100 on games. Valves probably making good money on it.

[MysterD]

Epic Store - Freebies:

 

This Week:

- Hood: Outlaws & Legends

- Iratus: Lord of the Dead.

- Geneforge 1: Mutagen.

 

Next Week:

- Ancient Enemy

- Killing Floor 2

[gospelman]

Fell Seal: Arbiter's Mark is one of the July prime gaming titles.  Glad to see more people get to access it and also at a time when the dlc is still on sale though the 7th.  Great on my steam deck.

[MysterD]

Be aware...

 

PC Gamer - Valve has quietly been downgrading some 256GB & 512GB SSD's models on the Steam Deck:

https://www.pcgamer....d-512gb-models/

 

There's ways to figure that out, that you've been downgraded, so check the link w/ instructions on how to do so.

[Nephilim_BC]

Be aware...

PC Gamer - Valve has quietly been downgrading some 256GB & 512GB SSD's models on the Steam Deck:
https://www.pcgamer....d-512gb-models/

There's ways to figure that out, that you've been downgraded, so check the link w/ instructions on how to do so.

coincidentally enough I just got my email for confirmation

[spoderman]

Pretty crazy that Valve still hasn't gotten through the first day of preorders, and it's been about a year

I've never seen it take this long to fulfill preorders

[MysterD]

9:50am:

Joined Xbox Game Pass Ultimate yesterday for $1.00 for 3 months (until October 1st, 2022).

 

Been playing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge (PC / Xbox for PC). Thoughts incoming on TMNT: SR, as I'm so far, some 1 hour 47 minutes into it or so. It's a blast, so far.

 

In many ways, feels like nostalgia galore - feels like a side-scrolling brawler/action game plucked right out of the late 80's and early 90's, from those TMNT & Final Fight arcade games, old-school 8-bit NES days & even Streets of Rage series from the Genesis days. This game looks like a pixel-perfect rendering of the old arcade games, all hand-drawn style and all - but of course w/ modern resolutions and whatnot. Sure, there's a bit more to it than that here in TMNT: SR - as you have small/lite type of leveling-up systems, character levels, and whatnot.

 

Combat feels like the old TMNT arcade games in particular and it feels great w/ a gamepad here. Super moves are often necessary to use on Bosses for big damage and in huge crowds, just to do a lot of crowd control and simmer things down a bit - until the game throws more at you. As you level-up, you'll extend your health bar, add more moves, and whatnot.

 

The over-world feels like it's right out of Super Mario Bros. 3 and the original TMNT: NES Game (Original). Each Episode/Level has its own spot on the over-land map. You can also find collectibles in each episode. On the map, you can meet those characters looking for Collectibles on the street/overworld map in their spots to add more points to level-up. There's also challenges per each level - don't take hits at all, defeat X enemies with a Super, defeat certain enemies, etc etc.

 

You can play with others online and there is Crossplay support here - but I've been playing alone.

 

It's a blast so far & a lot of fun.

 

EDIT - 2:51pm:

Finished-up Story Mode. Took about 2 hr. 58 sec. or so here in total on this 1st playthrough. Worth noting, that there might be other stuff to unlock (other characters, for example) by finishing game modes and whatnot - as it unlocked one of my fav. side-characters in TMNT franchise & made that character playable. It was a total blast; really dug it and enjoyed the entire game. 

 

And this isn't even checking out Story Mode on other Difficulties, didn't even check-out multi-player co-op/crossplay, Arcade Mode, and other things this game has on offer. Really enjoyed this throw-back.

[INMATEofARKHAM]

It's a blast so far & a lot of fun.

Awesome to hear. I think this might be the sale where I get Streets of Rage 4. It's from the same developer/publisher.

[MysterD]

Awesome to hear. I think this might be the sale where I get Streets of Rage 4. It's from the same developer/publisher.

Worth noting: I enjoyed SoR4 when I played that on GamePass a while ago too.

[Lithium Flower]

Streets of Rage 4 was/is amazing and can kick your butt if you're playing alone. Be sure to pick up the dlc if you want more. 

[Insomniac_34]

Streets of Rage 4 was/is amazing and can kick your butt if you're playing alone.

SoR4 had some weird difficulty spikes. I remember the early-to-mid game having some surprisingly brutal boss fights that made the later ones look like cakewalks.

[samnite]

Pretty crazy that Valve still hasn't gotten through the first day of preorders, and it's been about a year
I've never seen it take this long to fulfill preorders

Sadly, this system is the best we can do for popular electronics in the age of mass-scalpers.

[MysterD]

SoR4 had some weird difficulty spikes. I remember the early-to-mid game having some surprisingly brutal boss fights that made the later ones look like cakewalks.

On Chill difficulty in TMNT: SR, I died a few times and ran out of lives within an Episode - so when that happens, you can "Retry" when you run out of lives and restart an Episode over from the beginning of it...or go back to Overhead World Map to go do whatever (i.e. go do other Episodes you've completed already or turn in Collectibles you found). Yeah, some of the later levels in Story Mode aren't that easy, even on Chill. Chill difficulty didn't feel that Hard except for the last few levels, so...I'll be curious to see how much harder the other difficulties get and if there actually any hidden stuff that need to be Unlocked here. 

 

This feels like the type of game that could have a bunch of Unlockables to extend the game out, for fans and all.

[MysterD]

Denuvo's new SecureDLC.

 

Denuvo is back w/ a new DRM/anti-tamper specifically for DLC's.

It's called Denuvo SecureDLC & it's specifically for protecting any DLC's and MTX's.

 

SecureDLC webpage w/ details - https://irdeto.com/n...against-piracy/

 

PC Gamer on SecureDLC - https://www.pcgamer....-on-your-games/

[Souffrir]

Ooh, can't wait to see just how many big publishers want to get in on this new way to push even more people to start pirating just to avoid getting screwed over as legitimate paying consumers.

[Tibor]

Oh, I'm sure everything will be fine. Just make sure Steam is online and up to date and you aren't playing during Steam's Tuesday maintenence downtime. Along with the publisher's games launcher and the dev's own mini launcher has all of your dlc checked before you start the game. Oh, and always be online and never ever have your internet line drop packets of data along with hoping that the publisher's servers aren't hosted on the cheapest pieces of junk with the sketchiest internet connection their money can buy.

 

Oh, and require signing up to the dev's forum to get the codes to access the beta/experimental/past versions option in Steam and a special code from the publisher's site too, otherwise it won't work.

 

Oh, and that the publisher doesn't forget to pay denuvo for their services and all of a sudden you can't access what you paid for 5 years later.

 

Oh, and Denuvo itself forgets to pay for its domain site's SSL certs or even forgets to renew their website domains that control access to all of those games. (Hat tip to that pcgamer article above, I forgot about that one.)

[MysterD]

UbiSoft's pulling servers and some DLC's from games from working:

 

Comic Book - https://comicbook.co...-games-servers/

Metro - https://metro.co.uk/...on-pc-16931473/

UbiSoft (themselves) - https://www.ubisoft....-2022/000102396

 

07-05-2021 - EDIT:

ACG on this mess, in which this decommissioning of DLC's can effect Single-Player DLC's:

[Tibor]

And Ubisoft continues the trend of why I buy little to nothing from them unless its dirt cheap or free.

[Insomniac_34]

Cuphead was a good game. Studio MDHR released some new Cuphead DLC just the other day. Shockingly, it's also good. It's more Cuphead, and if you already liked Cuphead to begin with, this is a good thing. I recommend buying the Cuphead DLC.

 

And Ubisoft continues the trend of why I buy little to nothing from them unless its dirt cheap or free.

I've been boycotting Ubisoft for a while. Admittedly, this has less to do with their shitty tactics and more to do with the fact that I just don't like any of their games anymore.

[TheKbob]

I've been boycotting Ubisoft for a while. Admittedly, this has less to do with their shitty tactics and more to do with the fact that I just don't like any of their games anymore.

The first Ubisoft game I will buy not on deep, deep discount (or free) will be Mario & Rabbids Sparks of Hope.  But I bet Nintendo has a say on how toxic the game design can be in that series,.

[MysterD]

Hitman 3 (2021).

 

Just finished-up Story Mode for Hitman 3 (2021) from Xbox for PC Game Pass. It's basically more of their World of Assassination Trilogy games, basically - i.e. Hitman (2016), Hitman 2 (2018) & now obviously Hitman 3 (2021). So, you know mostly what you're walking into here, if you've played those games - and have a good idea of what your walking and stealth-ing your way into. More huge sandbox-y levels (mostly); more ways to kill enemies and targets; more unlocks; and/or more things of that sort - and if that sounds good to you, you're going to like this game.

 

Game looks stunning, provided you have RT-based hardware; no surprise. And at times, in some levels, it can be really stunning with how many NPC's they have packed all over the place, populating a level. I ran it mostly at Maxed-out settings with RT On & DLSS On at 1080p, often in the 60fps range. One level though, had to drop the RT down to Medium (Vineyard level) just to get it to 60fps, as it was easily splitting performance in half w/ so many NPC's in the world & with so much going on there.

 

As usual per modern Hitman games, you're scored per level against your Friends and also the Global Leaderboards - so, you'll likely want to try to play as Stealthy as possible, kill as few enemies as you can (best off killing namely your targets only); explore & find all of the areas; utilize cool and unique puzzle-style & puzzle-solving ways to kill targets in special ways; and/or things of that sort. It's up to you how to do this, of course, as combat still feels really good & very smooth here - so in some instances, when need be, you can shoot your way out of the level when necessary and then try to find an Exit ASAP. As usual, you can unlock new weapons, items, disguises, exits, and whatnot - once you actually finish levels...which is going to keep the replay value of this game going for fans of these games & this WoA Trilogy.

 

Though, unfortunately - like most Hitman games since Hitman (2016), you're going to need to be online to keep all of this progress, as you'll need to be tied into the IO Servers for this progress. I wish newer games would stop this trend, in case I want to play some of those offline in case something goes wrong on my end for Internet access, my ISP's end, or IO's servers on their end.

 

Though, taking a few cues from Hitman: Absolution here - there's a few though, there's not many of these missions or specific parts of missions - where there are very specific & special goals (i.e. missions you can kill enemies, for example and get points for that...if you want to); and they also do much more story elements even within levels that tie directly into the main story, besides just knocking off targets. Regardless, it feels like mostly all killer & no filler, like many of the earlier and great Hitman games, such as Hitman: Blood Money.

 

After almost 10 hours of so of spending time here, it feels like this epic World of Assassination Trilogy (WoA Trilogy) here that began since Hitman (2016) has finally concluded & is indeed nothing short of Hitman awesome-ness. Not only that, but this is a satisfying conclusion to the WoA Trilogy. Play this game; IO Interactive has yet again killed it here...with yet another really good Hitman game.

[Souffrir]

If anybody hasn’t been following the Fanatical summer sale flash deals, they’re all currently running to finish the sale up. There’s a couple decent picks in there if you don’t own them already, like the Oddboxx for $1.94.

[spoderman]

Finally got my steam deck email and decided to order it. Was originally on the fence but I think I'll get use out of it. Since I was able to order during the steam sale I also got 68 steam cards for the purchase lol

[MysterD]

Life Is Strange: True Colors.

 

Took me about 10 hours or so to finish it, but I played Life Is Strange: True Colors by Deck Nine over on Xbox for PC Game Pass. Per usual with the standards of other LiS-based games, the player here has another murder-mystery & conspiracy to solve, also while dealing w/ human issues & social issues. Love, relationships, fighting, depression, sadness, and grief are just some of the topics & themes that this game tackles...and yes, tackles well, I might add. For the most part here - the story, plot, characters, decisions, death, and other things are really handled well here - and yes, this is definitely one of the reasons to play this game. The writing & voice-acting also in here is pretty good too, I might add here. Is this sounds good to you, then...no doubt about it, you should check out LiS: True Colors.

 

This time around, you play as Alex Chen, who comes to a small community called Haven in Colorado. Haven feels very quaint, small-town, rustic, and home-like. In typical LiS fashion here for gameplay, you'll be making decisions that shape the journey of the game & maybe even the final outcome of the game. Without going to far & deep into the story and all into Spoiler Turf, here's the premise: you play as Alex Chen here who - of course, like most LiS lead protagonists - has a super-power: she is an Empath and that's her super-power, so she's able to sense a person's emotions, read their mind, see their memories, & even take away their emotion if need be (and if you opt to do that, in some instances). While still nothing has been say as cool as Max Caufield's time-rewinding & time-altering skills, this power is also pretty cool here and it's pretty cool what can be done w/ Alex's power.

 

The music here is great here, feeling like an alternative music fan's dream here. The art design still has that artistic touch and water-color feel here, which looks pretty Indie and also can be detailed, too. There's even support here to Ray-Tracing (RT), provided your PC can actually handle it - and it does look very nice for sure with RT On here on my desktop PC (which is loaded with i7 10700KF; 16 GB RAM; 8 GB VRAM on the RTX 3070; 1 TB SSD; 2 TB HDD; W10 x64). Had it mostly maxed-out at 1080p60fps here, even with RT turned on here.

 

When it's all said & done here, LiS here delivers yet again another good story & game here; it's another LiS murder-mystery & emotional drama, which can hit hard and heavy often...and often deliver the goods, if you're into Adventure Games of this cinematic sort & decision-making sort. Not only that, but it does kind of take a break from that for a bit and do a LARP, feeling right out of an old-school JRPG with its turn-based combat and whatnot; loved that section of the game. While most puzzles aren't difficult here by any means, it's not really about that. This game's all about the story; the characters; and the decisions & choices you make here to shape the game. This game is definitely worth playing IMHO, as after around my 10 hours or so, I can say that I really enjoyed my time with this game. Feeling like a typical LiS game, this one hits home & also feels just like home.

[Miker525]

Life Is Strange: True Colors.
...

I loved the game. I actually felt it was my favorite in the Life Is Strange franchise. I loved 1 and thought before the storm and 2 were okay, but I was stunned by how much I really loved this one. Definitely recommend it

[blueArcana]

Secret best Final Fantasy game

 

[MysterD]

Secret best Final Fantasy game

 

YES!!! Loved the LARP section of the game.

[Souffrir]

Can confirm Ninja Gaiden Master Collection will be in Humble Choice tomorrow, I broke down and bought it.