Stonehearth cancels their Linux port, Steamy data leaks, Minecraft Pocket launchers and $1,400 Smurfs. Then I Hate Running Backwards faces the CHAIRQASITION!
All this, plus your hate mail.
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Colour key – Venn Jordan Pedro
Steam: News
$1,400
https://pcgamesn.com/htc-vive-pro-full-kit-launch
- 1800 canuck bucks for the whole kit and kaboodle with the new fancy base stations
- 1400 CAD for the pro headset and the old base stations and controller’s
- Apparently if you want the largest space supported, you’ll need 2 additional base stations on top.of the base package
- Something tells me they are slinging the “professional-grade VR” so they can explain the wicked-low sales.
- $800 can be explained away as a big honking splurge but 1.4K is used car tetorry.
- Tracking up to a 10 x 10 metre square is neat but requires 4 base stations.
- Seriously, you can buy a car for that much money which will last you probably longer than you’d play any VR “experience” currently available.
Top tops
https://www.pcgamer.com/these-are-the-years-top-selling-steam-games-so-far/
- Say what you want but there is plenty of Linux on that list.
- Lots of games I want to be on linux too. I’m looking at you vermintide
- Speaking of games not on Linux, more people bought Elder Scrolls Online than Fallout 4.
Diiiiiiicks
https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-07-06-valve-quietly-blocks-new-method-to-estimate-steam-sales-figures
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2018/07/steam-data-leak-reveals-precise-player-count-for-thousands-of-games/
- Defaulting user profiles to private can be explained because GDPR.
- This, this is straight up u can not has.
- Yip, this is VALVe saying “We don’t want people to know our numbers”
- Which, considering they’re still the biggest completely private company in the gaming industry and possibly of the whole world, stands to reason they want to keep those digits to themselves.
- There’s a degree of reputation management going here.
- Claiming certain unverified sales numbers might have some unwanted blowback o steam, as devs are already pretty unsatisfied with the platform
Anniversary arena
https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-07-04-rocket-leagues-third-anniversary-event-starts-next-week
- Driving behind the goal? …monsters.
- Throwback Stadium will be made available for selection in Private Matches, Tournaments, and Local Matches as part of Rocket league’s next major update.
- Those detached goals should make things interesting!
Level Editor Phase 1
https://steamcommunity.com/games/431240/announcements/detail/1663398418942342952
- They warn that it’s terribly buggy.
- If you have ever played the game you might be wondering how you could tell.
- Updated unity to 2018
- Oh good. Enable those sadists
Team Update
https://store.steampowered.com/news/?appids=207140
- Teammates share their boost bars
- Teammates can swap their items
- It’s an interesting alteration to the core mechanic. I wonder how it’ll impact the gameplay
Desperados
https://steamcommunity.com/games/260730/announcements/detail/1681414719795322682
- 2001 called, it wants to know if you would fancy a THQ game.
- Wild West Commandos.
- This is what would call a dad game, mostly because my dad loves this and Commandos.
Baseketball
https://store.steampowered.com/app/661940/Regular_Human_Basketball/
- If lovers in a dangerous spacetime got wasted and accidentally used a snickers wrapper as a condom during a drunken tryst with hoops, this would be the baby
- There be online multiplayer though
- This could be some legitimate aftershowzen bait.
- QWOP-et Cars?
News:
What about the Linux Port?
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1590639245/stonehearth/posts/2231211
- Linux was a 200K goal and the project closed northward of 700K.
- A lot of the other stuff from additional goals will not be included.
- Unfortunately a whole new wave of Kickstarter backers will learn a hard lesson.
- Don’t back anything unless it has a functioning Linux demo.
- I have a different suggestion: Stop giving people money for NOT developing games.
- Do you want to see more games on Linux? Buy the ones which have shipped a Linux version.
- Don’t buy promises, buy products.
Master of Orion
https://kilgoretroutmaskreplicant.gitlab.io/plain-html/
- Needs both SDL1.2 or SDL2
- Works on haiku apparently
Pocket Craft
https://github.com/MCMrARM/mcpelauncher-linux
- Launch Minecraft pocket edition on regular ass linux
- Not sure what xbla support means though
- I guess this would be good for people who want to Minecraft on their calculators.
- I’m not entirely sure C# or .NET Minecraft is any lighter on resources than Java Minecraft.
- Besides, you can’t mod this one without paying Microsoft money.
- Pulls x86 Android version of Pocket Edition and runs that.
- I approve of this unofficial porting trend, but I think most companies won’t.
Godot example
https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/8usryk/open_sourced_my_wip_platformer_paper_trail/
- Dude opened up the game so you can take a look at his work.
- Googling for Paper Trail all I could find was inFamous Second Son stuff.
- Guy used a lot of open source friendly tools to produce it as well
- I think hobbyist programmers should open source more stuff. Improves accessibility for newer game devs
Easy UT
https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/8vyb4t/unreal_tournament_2018_with_a_single_command/
- The script works.
- The game? Not so much.
- Not entirely sure I like what the script is doing with setting that alias.
- I’d be more comfortable if it created a .sh which ran those commands instead.
oreos 0.0.5
https://xoreos.org/blog/2018/07/03/xoreos-0-dot-0-5-dawn-star-released/
- This project has made some decent progress in the past year.
- You can get through character creation in both KoTORs and even start the tutorial in the first one
- They’re also developing a number of support tools to help explore existing resource paks
- The team I’d also looking for a volunteer to help manage their use of SUSE’s OBS, otherwise they’ll stop using it for distribution
Station architect
https://n-body-solutions.itch.io/space-station-continuum
- Prison architect in spaaaaaaaaaaace.
- So says the marketing
- At first I thought the art was reminiscent of FTL until they zoomed in
CHAIRQUISITION:
– Nooope
– Not sure if want
– Check it out
– Shutupandtakemymonies
Game: I 💖 running backwards
Webzone: I_Hate_Running_Backwards
Devel: Binx Interactive / Croteam Incubator
Engine: Unity
Price: £10.99 / US$14.99 / CA$16.99
Wazzat: I Hate Running Backwards is a never-ending adrenaline packed shoot’em down roguelite that puts the emphasis on destruction and fighting never ending waves of enemies while time traveling through procedurally generated worlds!
Mandatory Disclosure: They sent keys
Venn:
Does It Launch
- Indeed.
Performance @ 1080
- 60 @ 1080 / 30 @ 2160.
Graphics
- The Voxels vox.
Control
- Latest update jacked up the Steam controlla.
Jordan:
Does It Launch
- The hang on the first launch had me worried for a few minutes
Performance @ 1080
- 60@1080 Ultra, 60 @ UHD Ultra
Graphics
- Yup, I can tell the enemies and the backgrounds apart. Good stuff
Control
- Gets some bonus points for having correct button prompts on the dual shock. Good jerb guy!
Pedro:
Does It Launch
- It took a while to load the first time, I had to stop myself from killing the transparent window it spawned.
- Doesn’t remember fullscreen setting.
Performance @ 1080
- Can’t push performance to ultra at 3840, lest I want to play the game at 45 FPS.
- Works fine on high at UHD.
Graphics
- It’s infinite backpedaling Sam in Minecraft
Control
- Mouse keyboard and controlla all work out of the box.
- With rebindable keys all around.
QA Score:
Fedora:
Soulless:
Ubuntu:
Fun section: (Catch all) Were the controls good, graphics pretty, nice sounds etc.
Fun?:
- Venn:
- My steamy batteries died right at the first boss.
- 53 minutes of me trying to nope that damn Scorpion.
- But, I keep coming back.
- Don’t you love it when a game reminds you of an abusive relationship?
- No online multi, really?
- Listen, the only thing new this game has going for it is running backwards.
- Outside of that it’s voxel guerilla war with a serious Sam skinpack and a side of bullet hell.
- Plenty of weapons & upgrades + you get extra damage by smashing the level to fill a meter.
- What it does it does well but without online multiplayer things get stale with a quickness.
- I’m not saying I hate running backwards, it’s just not my prefered method of locomotion.
- Jordan
- It’s reverse 1942.
- That said, I think the serious sam stuff is worked in there pretty well
- The werebulls were a nice example of that
- The scorpion took a few attempts, but that was more to do with getting used to the controls. I ended up perfecting him on my successful attempt. Is it just me or was the 2nd boss way easier
- Shmups don’t usually do it for me. This one’s a good attempt though.
- Apparently singing along to Donna Summer helps me get into something resembling a flow state
- I will say though, I do think online multiplayer would have easily netted this boy another chair
- Pedro
- My biggest complaint is how you can’t aim.
- You always shoot straight and all you can do is move your character.
- I have mentioned before how the simple inability to do something you expect to be able to do always feels so limiting in videogames.
- And while I can concede this is by design, I can’t see in what way not being able to aim helps this game.
- It certainly didn’t help me get past the general feeling of “Meh” I got from the rest of it.
- Sure, it’s an Incubator game, but it’s being sold for actual money now and the actual truth is that, while I can’t find any other major flaws, I still didn’t feel particularly compelled to play this one.
Fun Score:
Venn:
Jordan:
Pedro:
Hate Mail:
