Quoting: Purple Library GuyI'd say it certainly means that if all else is equal, pick the open source.

Basically what every argument boils down to.
And that's generally true, of course, but it's also a very strict requirement. The only reason you'd use an inferior product (as in, inferior for your use case) just because X is ideology - or you are on a shoestring budget, which I'd also consider fair enough.

Take Linux itself.
I realize the advantages it has from being open source, but the reason I'm using it is not that or privacy or the cost factor. All of these are welcome (or I don't care), but the major reason is that it simply works much better (or on par with Windows, e.g. for gaming) for everything I want to do with it.

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Quoting: mylkawhy should i use a closed source client, when there are 2 open source alternatives?

Because the closed-source store is better?
I'm not saying that it is in this case (last I checked, original EGS was not very good), but that would definitely be a very valid reason.

Using open source just because it is open source is pointless - it actually has be good software in order to improve your experience.

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Half-Life: Renegade?

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Quoting: LungDragoI was wondering whether you have your game installed on a SSD drive?

Of course.

Frankly, gaming on anything but SSD is insanity nowadays, at least for large diskspace games.
And SSDs aren't really that expensive anymore. I got my 2TB one for 200-300€. Not sure if the current shortage also affect those prices, though.

Either way, you are right that the loading times are still unacceptable, especially the fact that they unload everything on scene change.
So what happens is:
1. Load campaign - takes forever
2. Enter battle.
3. Unload campaign.
4. Load battle.
5. Finish battle.
6. Unload battle.
7. Load campaign (only necessary because 3. happens) - takes forever.

3. should never happen, the campaign should always remain in memory. That's just bad software architecture, leading to bad user experience. Other games with similarly large memory footprint manage just fine to keep both campaign and battle in memory, so that's not an argument.

I do expect that there will be a restart battle button in WH3, though. Mostly because Three Kingdoms has that feature.
Similarly, I had the impression that loading times were improved in Three Kingdoms as well - not sure if the game just didn't have as much to load, though...

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What's Italy doing in Finland in that screenshot? :grin:

As for you criticisms... yeah, that's just basic HoI4, I'm afraid.
There's a reason I barely play vanilla - mod makers (of larger mods, anyway) take great care that events may unfold in certain ways and are not afraid to cheat a little to make it so (or have extensive logic to check what the current status is and react to it). Wish it wasn't necessary, but HoI4 AI has never really been up to the task.

The Soviet changes actually weakening the USSR even further is basic Paradox: Make a change that sounds great on paper, don't playtest (or don't see the obvious implications), release, break the game a little.

Either way, I'm looking forward to mods like Kaiserreich, TNO, Old World Blues or Road To 56 catching up and integrate the changes to the systems (though that does tend to take a while).

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Quoting: MohandevirThe chip shortage is making cloud gaming attractive and there is no forseeable ending to it, yet.

Not really.
If a lot of people picked that up, the cloud gaming providers would themselves have to scale up and would be the ones facing the shortage.

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Honestly, that Nurgle/Slaanesh trailer is one of the best that CA have put forth so far.

The "narration" on the gameplay-related videos I find pretty cringy, tbh.
They are telling you about mechanics and improvements, but make it sound like they are narrating some dark grand dark adventure.
Wtf? Just have a normal person tell me normally about gameplay improvements. I don't know if it only triggers ME that much, but I find it really, REALLY odd.

When the game comes out, I don't know if I'll be playing the Linux native version much.
With WH2, you basically had only disadvantages from it. The ports were always weeks behind the Windows version (which also made mods unusable since those move with the Windows versions obviously), the communication from Feral was... not good, to put it mildly, and performance-wise I just don't see that much of a difference. Maybe 10% better on the Linux native version (and definitely faster loading, for some reason).

Cross-play is not something I personally care about a lot, but obviously going to be a dealbreaker for others if it won't be supported.

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Quoting: CatKillerYou've still made no argument that Valve's share is "excessive" other than that developers want more money.

I have, as have others, you just didn't read or understand it or chose not to.

I'm just going to quote myself:

Quoting: TheSHEEEPI actually work in this field and no, it isn't free. But you don't need 30% for that. Not even remotely.
15% would be much closer to cover maintenance and still have a small profit.

...
As a developer, if I sell something on a storefront, I'm fine paying the maintenance cost of what I actually use and a bit extra for the storefront's profit - but anything beyond that I'd not be okay with.

FFS, going back, you yourself quoted some source that Valve's breaking even point was 20% (which is bogus if you look at the costs they have just for hosting games and operating their storefront, but hey, even that number still proves the point).
That's a profit margin of 10%. Ten percent. That's not "a bit extra" that I wrote above.
Such a profit margin is unheard of in most fields on this planet.
Wholesale/retail is about 2-3%, services about 6-7%, online retail 1-5%. 10% puts you closer to Apple, and I don't think I need to elaborate how Apple is not exactly engaging in ethical business practice :wink:
Yet even Apple reduced their cut to 15% for smaller devs and are still in wild profit margin regions.

But somehow that's not supposed be "excessive"?!
How can you even arrive at that conclusion?

Quoting: LeopardDevelopers can go with other stores that takes a lower cut like Epic Store if they are not happy.

While I'm quoting myself since people do not read what has been written already, I might as well go on...

Quoting: TheSHEEEPAs others have pointed out, that's not a choice that especially small devs have.
Many gamers quite simply demand a Steam release or they won't buy a game. So, what choice does a developer have here, really?
Lose more money than you should on a sale or lose the entire sale. Hmm...

Big names can somewhat pull that off.
Small devs? I could maybe name a handful that have successfully sold a game outside of Steam.

I honestly find it shocking how people on a gaming forum are so blindly defending bad practices of a huge corporation while simultaneously being anti-developers (the ones providing games for them, usually not by working nicely paid and safe 8-5 jobs) by insisting they should just pay an excessive share and shut up about it just to get their game hosted where most people expect it.

Either way, I'm outta this thread, getting a bit tired of repeating what I or others have already explained.

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Quoting: micke1mI don't see a problem with valves fee, if you don't like it you don't have to release on Steam.

As others have pointed out, that's not a choice that especially small devs have.
Many gamers quite simply demand a Steam release or they won't buy a game. So, what choice does a developer have here, really?
Lose more money than you should on a sale or lose the entire sale. Hmm...

Big names can somewhat pull that off.
Small devs? I could maybe name a handful that have successfully sold a game outside of Steam.

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Quoting: CatKillerThey have millions of pairs of eyeballs they can put your game in front of, and they've invested heavily in putting it in front of the eyeballs of customers that are likely to buy your game, as well as providing detailed sales data about which regions are interested in your game and when interest is generated. If you have a better term for that than "marketing," please share.

That's not marketing, they do none of that for particular games (except their own).
That's just a storefront with useful filtering and suggestion mechanisms, and "ad space" to somehow deal with the flood of games.
And still good games often get drowned out - don't think Valve is to blame for this all that much, but just having a platform with reach and making it comparatively useful to browse is not marketing.
Valve don't do any marketing for games, they only offer a platform for devs & publishers to do it.

Let me see Valve hire some PR people and "community managers" to go into target-audience-relevant communities/contact streamers/etc. for one of the games that pay them a 30% cut and then we can talk about "marketing".
Hell, if they do that, let em ask for 40%!

Quoting: CatKillerYou can get similar services (although arguably not as good) from Sony - who take 30% or Microsoft (again, arguably not as good) - who take 30%. And Valve have invested the money that they've made into the PC gaming ecosystem. Would there be as much money made by developers as easily now if there had been only GameSpy working on only cost-covering margins since 2003?

You are again arguing the strawman that Valve makes better use of their excessive cuts than others do.
How nice. Not the point, not argued against by anyone. Stop it.

Quoting: CatKillerThe only argument ever presented is that developers want more money. And they'll always want more money, whatever the level were set at.

No, the argument is that developers deserve more money from their sales.
They are the ones creating the game, in case you forgot about that. They are the ones gamers should want to benefit as much as possible from their money.
Valve just offers the platform to sell them on - Steam is replaceable (in case competitors ever get their shit together... it's a cosmic joke that so far they don't), the games are not.
To quell the fanboy rage a bit, this is not an attack on Valve, Valve do good. But it is a fact nonetheless.

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