It's so cute! Nice to see something with a look that isn't bleak and dark and depressing. I mean, I have nothing against cynicism and post-apocalyptic angst, but sometimes it seems like that's all there is any more.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: fagnerln

Quoting: Liam Dawe

Quoting: fagnerlnHERE WE GO AGAIN...

We don't need the government controlling even more our lives, the parents should moderate what their children are using.

Except many don't and that's without getting into the issues that the report brings up, with bullying when some kids don't have what others do due to the microtransactions and so on. There's an absolute ton of reasons why this sort of legislation is necessary and it's not just for kids too, you do realise this kind of gambling and blowing money on loot boxes/micro happens very regularly to adults too right?

Don't be so naive.

I know that microtransactions are bad, but the parent should be closer to their kid and show what is bad, explain the things and ban the game. That simple.

So you're saying children with bad parents don't deserve not to be fleeced by con artists? I guess it's their fault for not picking their parents carefully.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: razing32

Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: NeverthelessVive la résistance

My wife actually has that tattooed on her shoulder.

Curios to know the signficance of that ....

Nothing too big. My wife has an instinctive hatred of bullies since young, and does a lot of reading about the French resistance in WW II. One of her metrics to judge people is "If there were a fascist takeover and you were resisting, smuggling refugees or whatever, could you trust this person?" (The answer is very often "They're nice enough but no, probably not")
She'd been thinking for ages of getting just one small tattoo, just a little personal wildness rebellion against getting older, and that's what seemed most meaningful to her.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

I actually don't have this (only have the base game, which I will get around to playing sometime when I have lots of time for the expected addiction) so might pick it up.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Interesting effect. I get the feeling that it looks better but makes my eyes work harder somehow.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: vector

Quoting: elmapuli'm worried about DRM and censorship too, but lets take it easy for now.

It is not my intent to offend, I am not singling you out, just addressing the expressed sentiment, as it is eerily similar to what many people I talked with said when microtransactions were gaining a foothold (i.e. "wait and see"). I felt the writing on the wall was clear then, and I feel, in this instance, the writing on the wall is clear now.

Given consumer passivity, I believe streaming will become the norm in time (a few decades)

Ah, well. Civilization may well have fallen by then, so no worries.
Short of that, the same principle applies: It's really hard to extrapolate trends long term, especially these days, because there are so many other forces at work. Given current trends of consolidation, one might expect that within a few decades one elderly white man will be at the top of a single huge megacorporation which controls all the world's wealth. But in fact that is unlikely to happen; in one way or another, many current trends will be interrupted by other trends and events pushing in other directions.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

I like the lithoid thing though. Might go for that. If I can survive the puns on the Steam page--Liam, have you been helping them with their writing?

View this comment - View article - View full comments

In broad terms I like expanded diplomacy and stuff, but in specific . . . am I the only one to find Federations really annoying?

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: YoRHa-2B

Quoting: 1xokWhat are the advantages of DX12 over Vulkan for developers? I can only think of the Xbox support.

Well, for starters, D3D12 works on all Windows 10 systems and has excellent driver support from all vendors.

Windows drivers shipping with Windows Update sometimes don't come with Vulkan support -> games straigt-up don't work. Driver quality is also way worse (AMD is pretty bad, Intel seems to be especially bad, only Nvidia is acceptable these days - and that also was a whole different story ~2 years ago).

On the other hand, for Windows systems that aren't Windows 10, I remember hearing that DX12 wasn't available at all. I believe that still represents quite a few dollars left on the table, although of course it's gradually shifting.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: NeverthelessVive la résistance

My wife actually has that tattooed on her shoulder.

View this comment - View article - View full comments