Quoting: MintedGamer

Quoting: MaCroX95

Quoting: AnxiousInfusionLooking forward most to Worst Practices talk. Vulkan leaves a lot of room for screw ups and I'm eager to see just how bad it can get.

It does, but also leaves a lot of room for great performance increases to squeeze most out of the availible hardware power. Now devs will show not only their story ideas but also their programming and coding skills and true optimizations, because when games are poor optimized people won't blame Nvidia and MS's dx and Khronos's Vulkan, but rather will blame the poor optimization from developer's side which in my opinion is very healthy for developers to take care about, so Nvidia/AMD can take more time developing best possible Vulkan drivers and less time optimizing and fixing poor developers' faults in their titles...

I'm in two minds about this. Would the low level graphics API devs not be best placed to squeeze the best performance out of the API rather than the game developers that I would expect would be more proficient in graphics, gameplay and storytelling? I think one of the reasons that DX12 seems to have stalled with so few games is that it seems to have moved some of the effort and costs onto the game developers rather than the OS/API/low level graphics developers that would have the in-house experience with low level API coding. Those guys don't come cheap.

Maybe, but I suspect the main reason is that there are still so many people on Windows versions that don't run DX12, so you either have to do both DX12 and (either DX11 or OpenGL or Vulkan), or you have to drop half your customers. But if you're going to do (DX11 or OpenGL or Vulkan) anyway, why bother doing DX12 on top of that? As MS manage to drag their customer base to Windows 10 over the next couple-few years, this will become less of an issue, but now today it still is one. I think MS, in trying to use DX12 as a pull factor to yank people onto the latest versions, accidentally messed it up bad and may well end up surrendering what could have been a strong lead over Vulkan. If they hadn't been so dead set on end-of-lifing old Windows versions and had made DX12 available across their ecosystem it might have been dominant by now. Overconfidence.

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Quoting: DolusUh... correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't "game streaming" basically the most potent form of DRM that currently exists? I can't really get behind this.

What makes it not DRM is that the people who control whether you have access to the game (the cloud providers) and the people who have Digital Rights over the game and might want to Manage them (the game company) are different people with no particular point of contact. So while there might be concerns (privacy, control, reliability) with cloud computing in general, which could apply to playing games on the cloud, those are distinct from concerns with DRM even if there are some similarities between the two problems.
So for instance, moving outside of games for a moment: Say you had bought Orwell's "1984" from Amazon on Kindle. If you had that Kindle copy of 1984 hosted on a cloud for some reason, you would be neither more nor less vulnerable to Amazon disappearing that copy of 1984 down the memory hole the way they did one time [External Link].
You would be vulnerable to the cloud company going out of business, sharing your taste in games with marketers, having their server hacked and losing all your saved games, or otherwise deleting your stuff or invading your privacy. But it wouldn't be DRM.

In general, this (and other cloud services, and for that matter given the choice streaming media services) don't grab me. Am I the only person left who has a preference for owning my own stuff and having it be under my personal control?

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Quoting: constHeck, Valve could create momentum with some collectible cards and hats alone. I don't understand it, but people seem to care about collectibles in steam a lot.
Regularly annoncing to drop some in this or that game on linux on a regular basis might just generate enough interest once the ecosystem is ready.

That's silly--nay, ridiculous--and yet probably true.
Heck, setting up a Linux dual boot and installing some games is probably way less effort than a lot of stuff people do just to get an achievement in a single game.

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Quoting: Leopard

Quoting: MohandevirI'm really curious to see what the desktop landscape will look like in 5 to 10 years from now.

For sure Win10S and Surface devices is the way of the future in Microsoft's mind. They are really stubborn about the Windows Store and the lock down that comes with it, but what's in it for us PC Gamers? Streaming devices for Xbox Scorpio? Is this what they are thinking? Is this Microsoft's vision of the post traditional desktop era?

If that's the case, Valve needs SteamOS more than ever.

Let me explain MS moves from my point of view.

1-) MS Store is an important figure to get things right for Xbox and Windows Mobile.

MS Store games are growing day-by-day and usually they have Play Anywhere feature. This means you can play your purchased games on Windows and Xbox. So that is not killing Xbox ; instead strenghtening that.

Let's think. You bought bunch of games when you're on Windows and after years you decided to become a console ( couch) player. If you choose Sony's Playstation you will start with zero games. But if you choose Xbox , you can immediately start enjoying your pre purchased games on Xbox.

That is for killing PS.

2-) Mobile side. Last year ; MS announced that Windows Phones will be able run x86 apps in the future. You can see that ; Whatsapp , Telegram , Vlc and other kind of stuff is moving into MS Store.

Plan is ; " we couldn't get attention for WP's from developers ; so if our phones can benefit from x86 apps there will be no need for another WP port effort. "

MS Store is a key element for rising of WP. In the mobile area ; rising = app variety and number. If they come head to head with Android and Ios at app basis ; rise will begin.

3-) Developer side. You know that all stuff about Linux subsystem in Windows.

Linux is better for developing languages and tools side than Windows. So they're moving to Linux. MS saw that and they offer developers to Linux based tools. Actually , there is no need for further explaining.

Just look at that Stackoverflow Developer Survey 2017.

https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2017 [External Link]

Look at the Technology sections ; Most Loved, Dreaded, and Wanted Platforms chart. That will tell so much thing.

4-) But you are probably asking ; how is this a threat for Steam? People invested for Steam so much ; they can't move to other store.

Answer is ; GOG Connect.

People are mostly deciding by their previous investments. And that causes a little lockdown - an example : Apple Store. People are so much invested to Apple Store , the thought of buying everything again on Windows is simply freaking them and they continue to use Apple ecosystem.Even if you are developing something for Apple Store , you must sent it to store via a Mac.- on Steam . But Steam is platform agnostic ; so you can move to another platform without buying your games again ; thanks to Steam Play. Ms Store is providing that cross play for only MS based solutions.

So why is the answer is GOG Connect. GOG saw that ; if we want people attraction , we must lighten their burden of previous purchases. So they invented it. If you are binding your Steam account to GOG , you can get free GOG versions of selected titles. GOG 's library is not that much big so they can offer limited games.

MS has the power for doing that GOG Connect solution on a much bigger basis. When MS Store was big enough to get provide much desired games to players with zero pay ; gamers will move to their store automaticially. That is at least 2-3 years job but it will eventually come to this.

That effort will kill the Steam.

5-) If all of that i wrote at previous happen ; that will mean that market was succesful and MS can enjoy with market incomes.

So what is the fifth step? Free Windows for everyone. Because that market incomes can afford that OS development.

That's an interesting set of moves/tactics/strategies. All seems fairly plausible. Of course, MS wanting things to go that way doesn't necessarily mean things WILL go that way. Linux and Free Software aside, in each of those areas they are up against big opposition. In phones they are up against Apple and Google and (various manufacturers such as Samsung who have bet on Android). Those are big guys who know them very, very well from battles past, and who on phones have up until now squashed them with extreme prejudice. Right now nearly all Microsoft's phone revenue comes from patent trolling everyone shipping Android. Microsoft can make moves, but we can expect there will be counter-strategies, and strong ones. Convergence can go in different directions--Google will probably leverage Android into a software ecosystem for ChromeOS, for instance.

In consoles they are up against Sony and I suppose to some extent Nintendo. Sony is not, as near as I can make out, terribly agile or imaginative in its strategies. But they are a gorilla with as much poundage as MS itself; their portfolio is wide. They are damned good at simply rolling out the hardware, making sure there's games, and marketing the **** out of everything at rollout. That is surprisingly effective; clever doesn't always win over hammering the basics real hard. Plus, one thing Sony are good at is monkeywrenching the corporate politics just like MS does; there's reasons DVD players went with Blu-ray. If they got annoyed they might use their multimedia muscle to cut the Xbox out of some stuff; imagine the Xbox suddenly not having a contract with Netflix or something. Plus, if pushed really hard they might just turn the next PS generation into something like de facto Steam Machines.

Your number 3 is a fallback move for MS; it creates vulnerability. Ol' chairthrowing Ballmer would be livid--handing the "developers, developers, developers" over to a rival platform. They may think they can manage this so that everyone develops on Linux but for Windows and remains dependent on Windows, but I don't see it. If the developers are all working with platform A, they are not going to retain loyalty to platform B, and if platform A has a software ecosystem, those developers will become accustomed to it. There will be a certain gravitational pull for developers to make products for the platform they use. As those developers become executives at tech companies . . . I can see why MS is finding they have to do this, but it's bad for them.

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Quoting: KelsIs "thick skin" really a great thing to have? Doesn't it just mean giving awful stuff a pass? I would imagine that's not a great trait for someone moderating, and trying to make the site welcoming for a broad range of people.

Aryvandaar didn't actually make a value claim about thick skin (let alone a claim about its utility for a moderator), just said that's what he had. Seems plausible. I'm generally willing to assume most people's self-descriptions are true unless they prove them otherwise in the next sentence (which happens surprisingly often).

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Quoting: artvandelay440

Does this affect your freedom of speech if I think you're being naughty and idiotic and force the queue to always be on for you? No.

XKCD said it best. https://xkcd.com/1357/ [External Link]

I am now bookmarking that XKCD.

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Price of success. Seems pretty cleverly handled, actually.

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Quoting: rea987Lastly, installing Linux to my friends' computers in order to play with them? Sure, I would do that 6 years ago but not any longer; that's how you become "free of charge IT guy". No thanks.

Ah, it seems I neglected to put smileys on my earlier post suggesting such installation, having forgotten the unfortunate scarcity of levity-detectors among internet users.

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There's a bunch in Caracas, capital of Venezuela. The shantytowns grew up in the hills around the city with no urban planning involved so when someone finally decided to pay attention to the poor folks, not only was there the hills issue but there weren't really any roads. Punching highways through everyone's homes would have been more intrusive than just putting up a big pillar every so often.
So in the game, I suppose potentially they could help with districts where you made some decisions that, in hindsight, were really rancid transportation-wise. ;)

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Quoting: numasanCable cars I'm not sure how practical they are.

Well, I dunno about in the game, but in real life they can be handy in very hilly areas where roads have to meander and grades are too steep for rail.

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