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Latest Comments by Maki
A new Steam Client Beta is up and it looks like Valve may add better support for Soundtracks
26 Oct 2019 at 12:54 am UTC

Still no small mode. That's a massive breakage to me. If it doesn't make a return, I won't run a single game through the Steam client properly again, and will move away from it as a valid storefront.

Starbound's massive 1.4 "Bounty Hunter" update is out now
16 Jun 2019 at 7:49 am UTC

Quoting: Nanobang
Quoting: MakiProfiles are transferrable between computers...
Well that's good news. Where would those be stored?
Quoting: [email protected]Gah, this reminded me to install the new DRM-free version from humble and reminded me I didn't play 1.3.1 because I lost my data and having check it seems to be stored in <gamedir>/storage/* and I upgrade by rm -rfing the gamedir so it's long gone for me.

* I believe that is in steamapps/common/Starbound under steam.
hoolaparara already answered it, but yeah, the relevant data (player & worldfiles) are in:
GOG: <GOG installdir>/Starbound/game/storage/
Steam: <Steam install>/steamapps/common/Starbound/storage/

For my part I just rsync those files to a backup folder using $(date +%Y%m%d) as an append to the folder created in that fashion so I have backups of older data in case I ruin something important. Both GOG and Steam are backed up in this fashion and I use Syncthing to keep them synced between three computers, where each only draws from the relevant GOG or Steam version they have installed. Then local scripts make sure they grab the most current data and overwrite the game data locations before launch, then back up the new data after exit.
Should be easy enough for most people to hack together for their own usecase.

Starbound's massive 1.4 "Bounty Hunter" update is out now
15 Jun 2019 at 11:44 am UTC

Quoting: NanobangI got pretty sucked in to this game on vacation last summer, only to find out that my character wasn't cloud saved and was doomed to live on my laptop. So I started again on my desktop and when I got to the first boss ... let's just say I was no longer "Starbound" because I gave up after my umpteenth death.

Still, if any of this new update is available at the beginning then I might go back and play more "Planetbound." I have plenty of that first planet to hollow out, after all.
Profiles are transferrable between computers...

I actually wrote a rudimentary bash script to keep the same profile synced up between my computers all running an older GoG version with a select amount of mods which I'll never update... XD

Double Fine Productions acquired by Microsoft for Xbox Game Studios, Psychonauts 2 still for Linux
10 Jun 2019 at 7:17 am UTC

I don't much trust Microsoft, but they've made some surprising moves recently where Linux has not been the kicked dog for once, so I'm somewhat positive they may do some positive stuff for the PC-gaming market and actually include us as a userbase in future projects?

But Double Fine Productions dropped the ball on Spacebase DF-9 and other projects and they can take a flying leap over the moon for all I care.
I'm still waiting for that game to get some semblance of a 1.0 release that actually has working content in it. As it stands now it's unplayable and Double Fine doesn't respond to support requests on it.

Here's hoping the big M kicks them into fixing some of their older works as well as creating new content.

The dev of "Marble It Up!" had intriguing words to say about the native vs Steam Play argument for a Linux version
31 May 2019 at 8:45 am UTC

The last games I bought all had "native" Linux, even if that came through some emulation spiel surrounding the binaries. They advertised Linux on their (Steam) store pages, had Linux installers or just installed the game files through Steam without needing third party emulators, and the biggest bug was with a single game using an outdated Unity forcing the use of Windowed Mode to not get an unresponsive black screen in Fullscreen mode.

The basic choice I make is whether a developer gave a single thought to how they could make it available to our platform of choice or just make an offhanded "just emulate it" remark (Proton also being an emulation layer). If they advertise Linux on their store pages and make it easy for me to install their product and give it a go, then I won't mind tossing a few coins their way if I have some available.

Then there are developers and publishers who make it very difficult for us to even try their products. Any time I get wise about "anti-tampering software" being installed on the side, I just avoid such a product. Epic's hostile approach to locking games into their exclusivity contracts means I take a very wide berth around their store and anyone who decides to join them and will think extra hard about purchasing such a product within the coming 10 years or so, even if they have native Linux support available outside of the Epic store.

In a similar vein I abhor and avoid third party launchers as much as possible. If I can buy a DRM-free game, I will do so. Lutris has saved me from having to run everything from my Steam library, although the process of adding new games could be made easier (I often have to pop open Wikipedia to figure out the year of release for older games in my collection, for instance). I did try out the Paradox launcher for a bit, but it has nothing I can't go without.

Basic tl;dr; If a developer is open enough to port their game to our platform, I would buy even an emulation -- as long as proper support is given for that version.

Ethan Lee's MAGFest presentation video about Proton & Steam Play is up
8 Mar 2019 at 7:21 pm UTC

Quoting: Whitewolfe80You tried lutris its more user friendly than pol and the script runs everything you merely need to say whether you want to use dxvk or not
I knew I forgot one...
I'm still a bit unsure where it concerns Lutris: I've simply not booted it often enough to get a feel for it yet.

Thanks for reminding me.

Ethan Lee's MAGFest presentation video about Proton & Steam Play is up
8 Mar 2019 at 4:42 pm UTC Likes: 3

Quoting: Sir_DiealotWINE has always been about getting existing games to run and there is a huge catalog of over 20 years of Windows games out there. The only "funny" part is that people are constantly whining about the latest AAA game not working while there are thousands of games out there that do work just fine. Steamplay really doesn't change anything in that regard.
I've been using WINE for over a decade and I still don't know how to configure it for each and every game in my personal library. Games simply don't always work with it.

Play-On-Linux added some needed autoconfiguration through install scripts made by others, but I still can't get everything I need to run through it, nor can I easily figure out how to alter such a script and/or submit improvements to them.

Steam Play so far has been a far easier experience for me, and I have even managed to run Port Royale through it (which is NOT in the Steam library but had to be added by me), which I have been unable to do through WINE or POL.

In my personal humble opinion, that puts Proton/Steam Play firmly ahead of WINE and POL.

Descent: Underground is now just Descent and plans to release next year, new trailer up (updated)
5 Oct 2018 at 2:25 pm UTC Likes: 1

Quoting: scaine"PC". Sick of seeing that, honestly.
I keep calling people out on their Windows OS-exclusive use of the term Personal Computer (PC). It's a bad appropriation of established terminology.

Valve have now pushed out all the recent beta changes in Steam Play's Proton to everyone
14 Sep 2018 at 7:03 am UTC

I have pretty much been going through a backlog of windows games I used to play and have been reporting my findings to the community site; https://spcr.netlify.com/ [External Link]

The biggest problem right now are games relying on the .NET Framework 3.5 which doesn't seem to want to install in most cases, thereby breaking the games in question. Beyond that there are a lot of minor glitches which can be easily fixed, even for the less tech-savvy among us. A few hardcore problems just break the games or even the system in one way or another. It's interesting to note how many games run out-of-the-box, though.

What are you clicking on this weekend and what do you think about it?
9 Sep 2018 at 11:21 am UTC

Since Steam Play/Proton allowed me to play them again, I've been revisiting some of my old Windows-based games;
In recent days I've gone deep into Port Royale 2 & 3 (making spreadsheets to keep track of trade routes et al) and will revisit the Patrician series afterwards. I got to revisit Pandora in the original Borderlands (Still not released for Linux even if the sequel and pre-sequel are) as well, so I can finally connect it to the events in its sequels. I'm having some trouble with Fallout 3/New Vegas (but that's true for running it on Windows as well) and have to look if I can apply the unofficial patches to their Proton installations...

On the native side, Two Point Hospital has been a wonderful release recently, harkening back to Theme Hospital (which I never got working well through CorsixTH for some reason...) and the Early Access title Rise of Industry is making amazing progress.

So, lots to keep me busy this weekend, and probably through the next week.