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Latest Comments by Ananace
Steam 'Remote Play Together' is now in Beta, allowing local multiplayer games over the net
22 October 2019 at 6:49 pm UTC

Well, I did some tests with a Windows-using friend, and it turns out I'm the only one of us who can host, except for LEGO: Jurassic World, that one just resulted in a black screen. Audio doesn't transfer though, and silent gaming isn't all that fun.

I was able to get audio when testing a regular remote play stream to my phone, so I assume that it's something specific to Remote Play Together too. Added a comment to the existing issue about it.

A French court has ruled that Valve should allow people to re-sell their digital games
20 September 2019 at 6:29 am UTC Likes: 4

I think that the major issue with this ruling is that the digital goods in question have no degradation - or logistics costs - at all. There will be absolutely no difference between a "brand new" copy of a digital game, or a "second hand" one, unless introduced artificially through some kind of copy degradation mechanic to not support resale again after X times.

With no product degradation between sales, and no logistical cost (in time or money) you - as a developer - would literally have to compete with your own product in the market, as "used" copies would be bit-by-bit identical to the "new" ones which you need to sell in order to recoup development costs.
I can see this ending up much like the piracy argument which drives DRM, where games sales are going to be crucial in the first weeks of the game release, only this time backed by legal rulings. As you - again as a developer - will have to start competing with your own product - sold at a cheaper price at the exact same quality - the moment the first players finishes their copies and wants to get some money back by reselling it.

So really, the only way I could see this not causing a massive impact on game development - especially single-player and other games which are possible to "finish" - would be if artificial degradation or other resale restrictions (logistical cost) were introduced. Something to make "new" copies somehow different from "used" ones, to make sure that there's at least some reason for people to want to pay more for a "new" copy rather than a bit-perfect "used" one.

openblack is a FOSS game engine for Black & White currently under development
3 September 2019 at 9:10 am UTC

Happy to see that handsomematt has gotten quite a lot of progress done on this since I last heard about it, always great to see people keeping the old classics alive and modern.

What have you been playing this week and what are you clicking on this weekend?
24 August 2019 at 6:19 pm UTC

From seeing the teasing about a possible new Homeworld game coming, I just had to sit down and play through Deserts of Kharak as I've had it laying about in my games list for ages now. Mainly due to a general lack of time, but also slightly due to seeing wildly varying reports on ProtonDB - and not necessarily wanting to have to fiddle about with it due to the earlier mentioned lack of time.

Though as it turns out that was not a problem at all, I was able to just download, launch, and play through the entire campaign in a single sitting without a single gameplay affecting issue - on the defaulted settings of very high/ultra.
(I had an issue where aircraft would very rarely become invisible during their docking animation, but only when I had my camera in an extreme angle)

A great game, and a really well made entry to the Homeworld series. Though it was noticeable that they hadn't had a very big budget behind it, with a slightly rushed feeling to some of the campaign missions, and a lack of depth in the unit and research trees.

Steam Play arrived on Linux one year ago, some thoughts
21 August 2019 at 9:38 am UTC Likes: 2

My personal opinion is that both Stadia and Proton are promoting Linux, just in different ways. Stadia is encouraging developers to write Linux versions of their games, while not necessarily releasing said Linux versions except to Google - who are curating the platform and ensuring the stability of said releases.
So Stadia will most certainly create more native Linux versions of games, but Linux as a desktop/gaming OS might not see much improvement from that.

Proton on the other hand is promoting users to switch to Linux, while game studios don't have to worry about any porting efforts or cost concerns. Which might certainly reduce the number of native Linux versions that are released, but on the other hand you - as a Linux user - stand to benefit both from an increased market saturation as well as improvements in Linux's ability as a desktop/gaming OS.

Of course, since I have no interest in streamed games at home - and nowhere near good enough a connection while on the go, Stadia is just going to be one of those things that exists but that I won't use. Simply because it doesn't offer anything to me.

KDE has an unpatched security issue that's been made public
7 August 2019 at 12:06 pm UTC Likes: 8

It's really annoying to see people labelling themselves as security researchers, only to then go and do absolute asshole / blackhat stuff like publicly posting undisclosed issues or even actively attacking groups themselves.

No, if you attack people, or hand out undisclosed exploits to the people, then you're no longer a security researcher. At that point you've instead become a malicious actor, and a threat to the security community as a whole.
If people start thinking badly of security researchers because news sites and the like accept and propagate the labels idiots like this apply to themselves, then the entire security community is going to suffer.

Valve has launched "Steam Labs", a place where Valve will show off new experiments
11 July 2019 at 7:24 pm UTC Likes: 7



Ah yes, Dragons, that classical game genre.

Valve may be working on a new version of the Steam Controller
5 July 2019 at 5:08 am UTC Likes: 2

Quoting: MohandevirI didn't witness a situation where the left trackpad was really needed... In my personnal experience, it could be replaced with a standard d-pad, similar to what you get in a DS4... Unless there are some special use case that I don't know of? I'm just curious to know...

In my case, I use the left trackpad almost exclusively for touch menus, things that you want to have quick access to but don't necessarily need to access in the middle of action. Sometimes I tend to involve the grips as well to have multiple menus that I can switch between.

The only place where I've used the left trackpad as anything like a d-pad has been in games that were badly written, so that you could only use pure controller input. In that case you can't really map anything but the d-pad actions onto it.
In my experience in those games (AC: Odyssey, FO4, and some others) it really doesn't do well if you try to use it like a regular d-pad, it's a bit too large to be as quick on the access as games expect the d-pad to be.

Valve may be working on a new version of the Steam Controller
4 July 2019 at 8:43 pm UTC Likes: 1

The four paddles and pressure sensitivity sound frankly amazing.

As it is, the original is my favourite controller so far, even if there are things that I could see there being room for improvement on.
I love the fact that the Steam Controller runs off of regular batteries, though if they included a NiMh charging circuit that'd be cool. I love the trackpads on it, though I'm not perfectly sold on the patterning on the left one. I love the dual-stage triggers, though their travel is a bit too short. I love the high-precision linear actuators, though they could really do with better regular rumble emulation and support.

Most of all though, I love that I can easily flip it to BTLE for use when I'm out travelling, so I don't have to worry about losing the dongle.

Linux Mint doing a small-form-factor MintBox 3, they don't sound too happy about Snaps
2 July 2019 at 10:35 pm UTC Likes: 2

I personally wouldn't have as much against Snaps if Canonical were as good as they promised in ensuring it'd be a viable cross-distribution packaging method.

As it is, I don't have a choice as Flatpak's the only one that can be installed on any of the systems I use or administer.

Not that I can complain too much about that, Flatpak's custom installation system means I'm able to host a shared install between a roomful of computers. And the P2P install/update system means I'm even able to do the same with non-shared installations too.