What are you playing nowadays? Share yo' thoughts.

[igor_kavinski]

This is gaming relevant so FYI, I saw on Reddit that the BIOS setting Hardware Prefetcher Disabled helps AMD with smoother fps and Adjacent Cache Line Prefetch Disabled helps Intel CPUs. Tested the latter on an i3-1115G4. Saw increased performance in multicore scores of Geekbench 6 and Passmark. MaxxMem showed that hyperthreading has a RAM bandwidth impact that is ameliorated by disabling the cache line prefetch.

Maybe one of you AMD gamers may wanna try playing with Hardware Prefetcher Disabled to confirm the hypothesis.

 

[GodisanAtheist]

looks like Neverwinter Nights is also getting a remaster, along with Temple of Elemental Evil.

-Damn they're remastering everything out here. NWN ok, but Jesus ToEE is a deeeeeeep cut.

Doubt more than 1000 living people know about it.

 

[DigDog]

-Damn they're remastering everything out here. NWN ok, but Jesus ToEE is a deeeeeeep cut.

Doubt more than 1000 living people know about it.

eh, you'd be surprised. Because ToEE is "proper" D&D. None of that real time nonsense, amirite? So the people who play the P&P version of the game will like ToEE over anything NWN.

The way the quests are structured also are closer to what a D&D session is like. It's got a rather fanatical following, just, i'm not sure it really needs a remaster.

 

[DigDog]

-Damn they're remastering

and, by the way - i'm cool with that. Because games 10/20/30 years ago used to be generally better. more unique, more thoughtful, more creative - and no hand-holding.

You know .. i've never played Torment. I know i know, but if they remaster it, i'll get the chance to play it for the first time.

Of the games of my youth, many of them have aged gracefully, mostly because they didn't rely on visual beauty .. because we couldn't do that stuff back then.

 

[Regs]

and, by the way - i'm cool with that. Because games 10/20/30 years ago used to be generally better. more unique, more thoughtful, more creative - and no hand-holding.

You know .. i've never played Torment. I know i know, but if they remaster it, i'll get the chance to play it for the first time.

Of the games of my youth, many of them have aged gracefully, mostly because they didn't rely on visual beauty .. because we couldn't do that stuff back then.

In general I agree. Not all remakes end up as successful, RE3 to me was not as good as the original and felt like I skipped 3 hours of game time of FMVs. Silent Hill 2 was amazingly done by the blobber team and looking forward to SH1 remake from them. The Unreal Engine is allowing many mid sized dev teams to accomplish a lot in a decent amount of time.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I used to game so much that it was unhealthy 15 years ago - but after I ended up with some kind of undiagnosed vision defect it became basically impossible to play 1st person games without suffering crippling headaches, and eventually I even became tired of console emulators and the RPGs like Diablo that I used to play for hours on end 😭

ngl I used to laugh at the thought of ennui, but it's real for me these days.

May I suggest:

Uplink
Catherine
Incredible Machine series
Games made by the Quantic Dream studio

None of these should cause vision-related headaches.

 

[soresu]

None of these should cause vision-related headaches.

These days I tend to just read a lot more than anything else - though I do still watch TV/film depending on mood.

Mostly it's fiction books and research papers in multiple fields (both in and out of ICT related subject matter).

Though I tend to mostly just skim the research papers, I haven't the brains nor the education to fully understand the meaning of the text in most cases.

One of these days I should just start a vlog to document my favourite papers of the week, Two Minute Papers style.

With Unreal Engine finally allowing ordinary webcam type footage for facial mocap I can just substitute my ugly mug for a MetaHuman character rig 😆

 

[igor_kavinski]

Though I tend to mostly just skim the research papers, I haven't the brains nor the education to fully understand the meaning of the text in most cases.

You can set up an LLM with your GPU and feed it the research paper and ask it whatever you want.

Especially the latest gpt-oss-20B model is excellent.

 

[soresu]

You can set up an LLM with your GPU and feed it the research paper and ask it whatever you want.

Over my dead body is what I said about MS using my GPU for AI, and (FSR + other gfx/animation related ML aside) I have yet to see any significant use case worth running up an electric bill for with it in personal computers.

(especially as the electric bill is not currently being paid be myself)

There's some AI/ML stuff out there really beneficial to science like AlphaFold, but the actual use of tools like that are waaaayyyy over my head short of a brain transplant, and/or a trip back in time to make my younger self study biochemistry instead of 3D animation in uni.

When they come out with an AI conversationalist using Jennifer Connelly's voice a la Scarlett Johansson in the sci fi film Her then maybe I'll reconsider my options.....

.....for science sake of course 😂

 

[igor_kavinski]

When they come out with an AI conversationalist using Jennifer Connelly's voice a la Scarlett Johansson in the sci fi film Her then maybe I'll reconsider my options.....

You can start with this: https://anyvoicelab.com/voices/jennifer-connelly-actress-voice/

You will have to delve deeper into the voice cloning rabbit hole to make your own voice generator with python and some AI libraries.

Over my dead body is what I said about MS using my GPU for AI, and (FSR + other gfx/animation related ML aside) I have yet to see any significant use case worth running up an electric bill for with it in personal computers.

I think you haven't tried offline LLMs. They respond almost immediately (usually less than a minute) and token generation will take about five minutes. Even faster on a GPU. It works without a network connection (you can do it offline to alleviate your paranoia that someone over the internet is using your GPU for compute).

An example: https://www.amd.com/en/developer/re...ing-llms-locally-on-amd-gpus-with-ollama.html

You can also do image generation: https://www.amd.com/en/ecosystem/isv/consumer-partners/amuse.html

 

[DigDog]

You can start with this: https://anyvoicelab.com/voices/jennifer-connelly-actress-voice/

that sounds absolutely nothing like JC's voice. (i tried)

 

[DigDog]

I have a few more games installed than i normally do,

I played 4 times over Tainted Grail, which was fun, but also broken - but also fun. But also broken. I guess if you're not bothered by the combat mechanics being fundamentally broken, then it's a fun RPG adventure with a good story, good dialogue and pretty good art.

FTL - because it's simple and fun.

Roboquest - fantastic pure shooter with some rogeulike mechanics that keep it interesting even though i've played it 30+ times.

Witchfire - another shooter, less Quake-style than Roboquest, but still good in the weapons department, which serves as the core of a horror-mystery-exploration game, with tons of hidden mechanics, no handholding, and a fairly solid difficulty curve. Amazing art style.

Angband (4.1.3) because it's eternal.

Ziggurat 2 - another roguelike shooter, less hardcore than Roboquest, fun progression, strange weapons, lots of randomness, fun but Roboquest is better.

Ballistic NG which is essentially WipeOut in rebooted form.

 

[quikah]

Started playing Wuchang Fallen Feathers. Hard as hell soulslike. Very pretty looking game. Has a pretty extensive talent tree (almost PoE like) with completely free respecs which is a nice addition to the genre. One annoying thing though is they hide the tree until you put enough points into it which IMO is kind of pointless.

Some poor reviews due to performance issues, but I haven't seen any. I am running on a 4070 + 9800x3d, get ~80fps at 1440p maxed settings with DLSS balanced, no frame gen.

There was some controversy over the latest patch which prevents you from killing historical figures, haven't hit that yet, though I am stuck on a named human boss who I am guessing would be impacted. Personally don't really care about it that much.

 

[Fenixgoon]

I have had almost no time to play games. fuck me.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I have had almost no time to play games. fuck me.

I know exactly how that feels

 

[GodisanAtheist]

Still trucking through Jedi Survivor and Mass Effect Legandary edition.

Both are fun games, Jedi is solid action adventure fun, and I really enjoy the collectibles mentality of the game: it's almost all cosmetic, need need to grind out levels for hidden skill points etc (there are a few locations that hide extra health/force/skill point upgrades, but if you miss them it doesn't really make a difference in the grand scheme of things).

Running on my Steambox and I'm seeing no signs of ye olde UE4 traversal stutter either.

ME: Legandary Edition is just pure nostalgia bait for me. I've beaten each of the ME games probably a half dozen times way back when, but never got the DLC because hommie don't play that.

Going back through with all the DLC freshens up the experience a bit. Some of the DLC (like Overlord for ME2 and Javik for ME 3) are superb. Others... I can't believe people paid money for them (Kasumi and Arrival for example).

Also using the Trilogy save editor to max my paragon renegade scores, skill points, and money so I can just blast through the game on pseudo story mode making whatever dialogue choices I want.

 

[EXCellR8]

Started playing Wuchang Fallen Feathers. Hard as hell soulslike. Very pretty looking game. Has a pretty extensive talent tree (almost PoE like) with completely free respecs which is a nice addition to the genre. One annoying thing though is they hide the tree until you put enough points into it which IMO is kind of pointless.

Some poor reviews due to performance issues, but I haven't seen any. I am running on a 4070 + 9800x3d, get ~80fps at 1440p maxed settings with DLSS balanced, no frame gen.

There was some controversy over the latest patch which prevents you from killing historical figures, haven't hit that yet, though I am stuck on a named human boss who I am guessing would be impacted. Personally don't really care about it that much.

I tried getting into this one, and for the most part I do like it. It is unfortunate that they drastically changed the way the game works, but honestly at the end of the day I ended up just going back and playing Sekiro. That's one of the few Fromsoft games that never really clicked with me, and therefore I never really ventured too far. In the process of getting through it on PC. Grabbed a PS4 copy and what a mistake... runs like slop and the timing is off. Making a hard game even harder-er.

I have had almost no time to play games. fuck me.

This was my issue around the start of the summer... but thankfully, less weekend plans, stockpiling PTO, and generally more interest has me mostly back on track. For now, at least.

 

[sze5003]

For me Wuchang is a cakewalk after playing Khazan the first Beseker. I can't believe I beat that game on Expert difficulty because the devs changed the difficulty mid game to add easier options and apparently they made normal which is what I had started the game on, into expert.

Perhaps I should try Sekiro on PC because I have it on the series X but it also never clicked with me. Learning to parry super tight timings in Khazan I'm sure will help with Sekiro.

Right now on vacation but I brought my steam deck for the flights and I'm trying to play through metal gear solid 1 so I can play the new delta remake that just came out.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I'm trying to play through metal gear solid 1 so I can play the new delta remake that just came out.

Trying because the graphics are so dated?

 

[igor_kavinski]

Funny thing: MGS1 has nothing to do with MGS Delta other than Delta being a prequel remake. The actual walking nuclear armed tank called Metal Gear isn't even in Delta as far as I can remember from my time playing MGS3. It's mostly surviving in a jungle environment and doing close quarters combat. The two games couldn't be more different.

Playing MGS1 would make more sense if MGS4 would be remastered or remade. Those two games have a lot more in common. One could even say that MGS4 is the MGS3 we got a few years late.

 

[sze5003]

Trying because the graphics are so dated?

I don't mind the graphics it's the controls that I have a difficult time with. I never had a chance to play the metal gear games when I was a kid as my parents didn't believe in video games and I only ever had a super Nintendo and an N64 up until I was old enough to work and buy my own stuff. But metal gear games were something I always thought were so cool due to the action adventure and stealth mechanics which is still something I enjoy today.

I guess I should stop listening to the fanboys about playing through 1&2 since in 3 you aren't even snake but Big Boss.

I will probably finish 1 and just play delta when I get home.

But then there's also too many games coming out that have my interest and not enough time. Will have to finish Wuchang, then there's Hell is Us, chronos new dawn, ghost of yotei too.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I don't mind the graphics it's the controls that I have a difficult time with. I never had a chance to play the metal gear games when I was a kid as my parents didn't believe in video games and I only ever had a super Nintendo and an N64 up until I was old enough to work and buy my own stuff. But metal gear games were something I always thought were so cool due to the action adventure and stealth mechanics which is still something I enjoy today.

I'm in the same boat but I am pretty rebellious and only dad was against gaming so I would play when he wasn't around. My mom was kind enough to let me buy my first 3D card (Voodoo3 3000 AGP) without him knowing. Moms really are the only souls who care about your true happiness. She knew it was a waste of my time but she could tell that it made me immensely happy. It sucks that I can't do anything for her in return because all she still wants is my happiness and I can't be happy because of the life path my dad forced me into (being a slave to some rich shmuck).

Anyway, MGS1 was made for the playstation controller and it only feels natural with that, plus the vibration effects (there are two helicopter scenes in there which you really FEEL due to the vibrations). Playing with anything else, it will feel awful. I tried to play MGS2 with keyboard and while I managed to get to the end, there was a sword fight with the boss and only way to make the sword work is with the controller so it was years until I played the remastered version on PS4 to finally beat it properly.

My favorites, in order of preference:

MGS4
MGS Ground Zeroes
MGS Ghost Babel (surprisingly good)
MGS Twin Snakes (remake of MGS1)
MGS1
MGS2
MGS3
MGS VR Missions

 

[DigDog]

MGS4
MGS Ground Zeroes
MGS Ghost Babel (surprisingly good)
MGS Twin Snakes (remake of MGS1)
MGS1
MGS2
MGS3
MGS VR Missions

i find it difficult to accept that there's better stealth games than MGS1.

 

[EXCellR8]

I am so not versed in the MGS universe. I do remember enjoying Guns of The Patriots on PS3 wayyyyy back when the slimmed down console launched. When V came out later in 2015 I wanted to get into and like it, but I just didn't. I think it was just way over my head in terms of mechanics and the level of depth in combat. I guess I'm just more of a Hitman or Splinter Cell pleb when it comes to stealth games lol

 

[igor_kavinski]

i find it difficult to accept that there's better stealth games than MGS1.

Gotta play them all to find out for yourself