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Latest Comments by Fakeman_Pretendname
Deep space colony sim Stardeus gets a massive overhaul in a new update
26 July 2024 at 1:12 pm UTC

Quoting: JarmerI think I used to have this on my wishlist a LONG time ago? Or am I thinking of something else similar?

There's quite a few superficially similar games - with either a top down Prison Architect/Rimworld visual style, or a Dwarf Fortress/Rimworld gameplay (or both):

Space Haven
The Last Starship
Cosmoteer
Starship Theory
Starfall Protocol
Starship Colony

They're a mix of "looks similar but isn't", "looks different but is similar", abandoned, unfinished or unreleased.

Stardeus is still in development, so technically unfinished, but it's certainly finished enough to be very playable. I've chucked over 100 hours into playing it (and I don't have the opportunity to do that with too many games these days) - and there's been a ton of updates since I last played it.

Anyway, there's a demo on the Steam page, so it's definitely worth trying.

Fallout: London mod for Fallout 4 has released today on GOG
26 July 2024 at 12:27 pm UTC Likes: 2

Quoting: Purple Library GuyI don't know why, but something about the tone of that quote makes it feel like the DLC was written by people who have never been to England. Hope I'm wrong.

The semi-Yorkshire (Northern) voiceover, using weird Cockney (Southern) dialect words and phrases made me feel a bit sick - but overall, it looks like there's been a lot of good work into the worldbuilding, so although it'll clearly be somewhat based on a tourist stereotype, I'm hopeful it won't be too much "Cor Bloimey Mary Poppins gavna, let's go ap the apples and pears gavna". Regardless it looks like they've done a phenomenal job of it, and I look forward to playing it at some point.

Steam Deck OLED initial quick-look and Q&A Part 1
13 November 2023 at 6:19 pm UTC Likes: 4

Can it still be used to snap an SD card in half?

Seriously though, looking forward to your coverage

Spaceship colony building sim Stardeus has a major upgrade out now
17 October 2023 at 12:13 pm UTC Likes: 3

According to my Steam "time played", I've played 102 hours of this - which puts it at my #21 most played Steam game ever - which puts it ahead of Rimworld, which I love. I did buy Rimworld before its Steam release though, so there's probably a chunk of unlogged hours - but anyway, it's pretty high up on a fairly exclusive list. It's turning into a great game, and I hope more people get the chance to play it.

Speaking of which, it's 35% off on Steam for the next few days, and it has a demo, so probably as good a time as any to give it a try.

The 8BitDo Retro Mechanical Keyboard looks awesome
3 August 2023 at 10:49 am UTC Likes: 1

Looks lovely, but I can't find any info on keyboard layouts - they're only showing it with an American layout. The FAQ doesn't say anything about other keyboard layouts, though does mention you can replace the keys, but doesn't say where you get those keys from.

Build your own racecar in Revhead, now with added Steam Deck support
28 March 2023 at 7:40 pm UTC

Also a fan of this one. I've put a good 80 hours into it over the years. I've not tried it on Steam Deck though - I tend to play it with Logitech G920 wheel, pedals and gears. It's quite a lot of fun turning various knackered old cars into specifically tuned vehicles for different surfaces and race styles, and sticking sports car engines in old trucks and so on. Part racing game and part mechanic simulator. Currently no force feedback, which is a bit of a shame, but it's a pretty solid and fairly forgiving driving game otherwise.

DXVK 1.9.3 is out supporting DLSS, D3D9 improvements and more
11 January 2022 at 9:58 pm UTC Likes: 1

In Wine, all the trees and obstacles used to disappear after about 1 minute - so you'd know they were there in the distance, then suddenly all the scenery would go. I was always confused why I was crashing into grass/nothing, until I watched a video of someone driving the same level, and realised it was full of invisible trees!

System76 tease their new 'Kudu' laptop with the AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX
11 January 2022 at 9:55 pm UTC

I'd be interested to know how well the Pangolin runs various games actually. Lower benchmark numbers on the GPU doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be worse overall, particularly considering the vast increase in processor speed. I think I'm just a bit scared of integrated graphics cards, probably based on how they were 15 years ago :)

Project Zomboid has big plans for 2022 and beyond, with NPCs on the way
11 January 2022 at 9:46 pm UTC Likes: 1

I'm really looking forward to this. It had NPCs in the far earlier versions about ten years ago - though I think they were a bit primitive (I can't quite remember, it's a really long time ago). I can't remember if they removed them for bug reasons, or because they were changing from sprite-based to 3D based, and wanted to basically remake half of the engine.

Anyway, I feel reasonably confident they're going to "do them right" and not ruin anything, though. They've kept delaying them over the years because they were determined to put them back in "properly", and not half-broken, and wanted all these different systems in place first. They're also probably a bit scared of doing it wrong, as people have been asking "When are you putting the NPCs back in?" every day for a decade :)

System76 tease their new 'Kudu' laptop with the AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX
8 January 2022 at 3:23 pm UTC Likes: 1

Quoting: Hamish
Quoting: sgtnasty369Why can't I get a pure AMD Ryzen/Radeon Linux laptop? They always have to throw in NVIDIA.
I'm so bummed.

System76 already sells this as the Pangolin:
https://system76.com/laptops/pangolin

That's still only an integrated CPU/GPU though - it's not that it uses an AMD Graphics card, it's that it doesn't have a graphics card.

Not to say the Ryzen Integrated GPU is useless by any means, but it's not as fast as the old Nvidia graphics card from my cheap, knackered 2015 laptop (though the processor is like 10x quicker, so perhaps it all balances out).

Separately, I'm still praying for someone to make a new laptop with proper physical mouse buttons under the touchpad.