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Latest Comments by chrisq
User Editorial: Steam Machines & SteamOS after a year in the wild
11 Nov 2016 at 10:24 pm UTC Likes: 1

I disagree with the premise that steam machines are a failure.

This is only true if you narrow your visions for the platform to be exactly like consoles, while in reality it is far from the truth. Steam machines, from valves point of view, can easily just slowly gain value by gradually building a larger and larger library of games. This is exactly _because_ they do not invest hundreds of millions and prestige in the machines being released.
Sony and Microsoft are in a totally different world, where they basicaly bet the shop every time they release a new machine, they make huge investments and take all the risks. A failure is a risk for the platform as a whole.

In 6-10 years, when the next generation of ps/xb is getting long in the tooth, you could probably get a steam machine that can run thousands of games for $100. Maybe we'll have small steam machines that have external thunderbolt-connected gpus that can be easily upgraded. It is certainly impossible to predict the future, but valve is making an incredibly cheap and powerful bet with their current strategy. Dismissing this strategy requires far better arguments than I've heard so far.

Tyranny, the massive new RPG from Obsidian Entertainment releases today day-1 on Linux, our review
11 Nov 2016 at 9:51 pm UTC

In games, like in real world, people have a natural inclination to do good.

I think basing a whole game on being evil will give less enjoyment for that reason, especially if it is a long running game like rpgs usually are.

Cynics will disagree, and probably like playing evil, but this comes from the evolution of humans, where being evil just is extremely detrimental to your survival in a small group.

Wine allowed me to re-live a gaming experience I had from when I was a child on Linux
7 Nov 2016 at 3:01 pm UTC Likes: 4

@liamdawe
"One issue I would like to figure out, is why some fullscreen games break when I alt+tab. They become completely unresponsive after this is done forcing them to be stopped."

In my experience this is mostly fixed if you run wine in virtual desktop mode and set the "desktop" size to your actual resolution.

New user statistics refresh, come check out the new data from Linux gamers
1 Nov 2016 at 7:30 am UTC Likes: 4

Quoting: ElectricPrismHaving one left joystick is a huge disappointment for FPS gaming. It fails as a FPS console controller to provide equal utility to my 15 years of playing FPS skill. The bumpers are awesome. The indentation on the left track pad sucks. It should have been raised or left out to feel like a DPad at all.
We're all allowed our opinions, and when it comes to controllers it almost entirely ubjective, but you prefering joysticks to trackpads is just amazing to me.

In my opinion ftp with trackpads is the steam controllers greatest feature over legacy controllers besides the fact that you can actually possible to play mouse games.

Marek has sent in another Mesa commit to help improve OpenGL performance, using threading
31 Oct 2016 at 4:25 pm UTC

Quoting: LukeNukem
Quoting: tmtvlJust use an up-to-date distro, like Arch or OpenSUSE Tumbleweed.
These days I argue that openSUSE is better than Arch; it's well tested, uses openQA for verification, uses a much better packagemanager (which is very fast, and better than yum too), properly splits out debugging symbols/languages/source/includes, and is backed by a company and people that produce an enterprise grade Linux.

Arch is for ricers. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I've used all major linux distros for years, SUSE is the one I never miss anything about.
Never met anyone that actually uses it in person, maybe I'm just not in germany that much.

Haven't tried tumbleweed though, I guess that's like arch with 1% of the users/community.

Humble Day of the Devs Bundle 2016 has some nice Linux games going for cheap
31 Oct 2016 at 4:11 pm UTC

Quoting: manero666If you guys are dying to play both the 2 non-Native games on your Linux system,
well, they both run fine using Wine.

View video on youtube.com
View video on youtube.com

This is a great solution until the developer/publisher provide us the native versions

I hope I didn't triggered the LJW (Linux Justice Warriors) out there <3 :whistle:
As much as I've used wine in the past, I'll never consider it a good solution and much less a great solution. Too much hassle, much simpler to just play some of the thousands of games that actually working.

The 'SMACH Z' gaming handheld is back on Kickstarter, no longer using SteamOS but their own Linux version
20 Oct 2016 at 8:28 am UTC

Quoting: Mountain Man
Quoting: Purple Library Guy
Quoting: Mountain ManI won't be backing - I'm against "crowd funding" on general principle
I haven't really thought through my position on crowd funding, since I don't have a ton of spare funds to be part of a crowd with. So, genuinely wondering, not snarking--what general principle? And, against its existence or against getting involved?
Basically, crowd funding puts 100% of the risk on the customer while the customer gets nothing substantial in return. It's free money for the developer with zero accountability. We've seen this countless times with developers backing out of promises, releasing clearly unfinished games, or simply abandoning a project. It's a bad idea that needs to go away.
How exactly does the customer got nothing substantial in return?
I've participated in 6-7 crowd founder programs, and they've delivered every time (though not exactly on time), at a lower price than initial retail price.

What have you been playing recently, and what do you think?
18 Oct 2016 at 6:31 am UTC

Played Kingdom: Classic, fun but takes only an afternoon to figure out and win.

Trying to finish Wasteland 2: Director's Cut and Pillars of Eternity.

Steam VR will use Vulkan on Linux, demo shown off on Linux, new Vive controller being made
13 Oct 2016 at 6:17 am UTC Likes: 1

[quote=ElectricPrism][quote=MaCroX95]
Quoting: sarmadSteam Controller looks like a headcrab strapped on top of a Xbox Controller with big O eyes.

I've been on a controller quest trying every controller I can, PS4, PS3, X360, XBONE, Logitech, Steelseries, Afterglow hoping to find 4 controllers for my Steam Machine, It'll probably be X360 or PS4 if they don't announce Steam Controller v2 during Steam Dev Days this week.

I really want there to be a Steam Controller V2, the current iteration seems like it REALLY needs to be tuned IMO, also - I had the dongle in my laptop in a backpack and because it sticks out so far it nearly broke the USB port getting moved around in my backpad, a smaller Steam Dongle would be nice too, and that UBS mount accessory built into every controller.

Also - why haven't I seen controller mods, and 3d Printed Shells for alternative colors available on eBay, and so on? Stickers for Controller Skins is pretty pathetic. Also get rid of that D Pad imprint, it should have been raised up instead of sunk in or left out completely.
Nah.
The Steam controller is magnificent, the best and most versatile controller on the market.

Is it the best controller for all games?
Of course not, no controller is, but it is easily the controller that is the best for the most games and good/passable for a huge number of others.

It plays first person games better than any controller, it plays huge amounts of mouse based games that can't be played with other controllers, and it's everything from passable to fantastic on games that require a gamepad.

Did I forget that it is also the most configurable controller ever, letting you fix unfitting or bad control schemes easily? No more joy2key or similar.

I agree that a v2 would be great though, the only thing that can beat the steam controller is an updated version of itself.

'Enclave', the 2003 action RPG now has a Linux beta that uses Wine
9 Oct 2016 at 8:41 am UTC Likes: 5

Quoting: Enverex
Quoting: noinformationhereInteresting. I have this on GOG, where I think I bought it on impulse during some sale. I have never played it, so it would be great if the Linux version makes it there as well...
Well it's literally just a Wine port, so you're better off just getting the GoG Windows version and installing that in your existing Wine setup.
Why exactly is that better?
I much prefer it being already packaged and delivered by steam.