Quoting: XpanderPeople still pre-order games?

It really makes no sense anymore. There aren't logistics involved with manufacturing or delivery with digital games, obviously...and the companies offering pre-orders are all huge legacy publishers that have consistently burned their reputation over the course of decades now.

People get hyped, it's an IP they know, they saw a cool trailer, whatever.
Even if we ignored every previous outcome, the big publishers and studios have only continued to decline in working conditions, continued the mass-layoffs, and now chances are, they're doing AI stuff.

It's endlessly frustrating that all of that is just reinforced as everyone rushes out to throw their money at a game like this again.

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I think this really shows off how much long-term work Valve had to fund and wait for to make something like this possible. Without FEX, I imagine the Frame would have been x86-based to work as a "PC" and to play Steam games, but AFAIK most XR hardware is ARM-based. Without Proton, there wouldn't have even been a place to start. You can't make something like this while every game you distribute is stuck on Windows.

The tech industry likes talking about "magical experiences" whenever they do something particularly dystopian. I think Valve has actually created a "magical experience".

You can stuff x86 Windows games into an ARM Linux VR headset and expect them to run better than native.
How many years ago would each part of that sentence be utter madness?

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I left TwitX years ago, but I never managed to truly "switch to Mastodon" because I didn't end up engaging with the platform. I wish I could endorse it, but I just fell out of social media instead. I don't really condemn companies for having a TwitX presence, but I consider it a positive sign if they have a bsky or especially Mastodon.

I checked Hytale's website. They do have a Bluesky.

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I appreciate the linked article from UploadVR. Powerful ideas here, and they're amplifying my recent surge of interest in the Steam Frame. I'm believing that there's some really cool potential for "Personal Computing in VR".

"What I had trouble conveying is why openness and offline computing matter. I want an appliance that's both hard to break and easy to use, and I want a playground for everyone at least as big as the one I had to explore in 1995."

It's challenging to convey these ideas in words, though we try. I want to imagine that people will get a Steam Frame and feel it when they wouldn't have otherwise, because they already had a phone and computer and such that never gave them that experience.
I want to see those ideas the article covers, of blurred lines between "users" and "developers", of people creating lateral value, be proven in the real world.

Especially while Meta's VR program is, apparently, pulling back from expensive "creator competitions" that attempted to solve the same problem with the same "firehose of cash" approach that's worked so well for the likes of Amazon and Epic (with all of their freebies, etc.).

They're retreating, and Valve might show them up here in a way they can't pass off as "Steam is too big to compete with, we tried everything except launching our digital retailer with basic features like a shopping cart. Completely unfair."
No, Horizon-whatever has been established, the hardware was subsidized, they put their entire corporate identity into the "metaverse"...

...and Valve might still show them up. They might fail, but that can be said of any venture, and I think they have a shot at it.

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Instant wishlist + follow + please give it to me

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I mean, offhand, it sounds kind of like FakeSpot (one of Mozilla's unloved and abandoned acquisitions).
I think analyzing patterns in things like reviews is supposed to be something AI is actually good at. Though that's not to say I necessarily trust this implementation of it.
Actually reading reviews is also still important and I agree that summaries should not be placed over them.

Quoting: zerodoggI agree, though I get by with the "denuvo watch" curator, shows up as "Recommended against by Curators you follow" under "Is this game relevant to you?".

Sounds useful, I'm looking for that now!

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Having thought about it more, I would also add that the best way for an organization to become "more trustworthy" in the present is ironically by swearing off/minimizing AI and disclosing any contact with the technology in accessible detail.

Contemporary AI is a black box known to make ridiculous errors (there are more complex reasons to consider the technology untrustworthy, but I don't want to spend too long on this). Even if one was optimistic about the future of AI, it is presently experimental and unreliable.

Saying your company goes through the "extra effort" to do 100% human work is a way to differentiate trustworthiness.

Edit: "Thank you for your trust in me." from the new CEO may as well be the "Thank you for choosing Chrome." in the Google Play patch notes. I didn't "choose" Chrome, I get a system warning if I try to uninstall it. Similarly, I have not in any way put trust in this CEO. I don't appreciate being told I've chosen/trusted someone/something when I had no actual choice.

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Desperately hoping Servo-based (since, IIRC, Servo's browser is a "reference" implementation) browsers with an open and community-serving/supported ethos start rolling out.

"Trusted" software company is a low bar in 2025, and Mozilla is an excellent example of how low that bar is; I do not trust them in the slightest. They suck, and I am nearly as grateful for Waterfox insulating me from their latest whims as I am for Linux insulating me from Microsoft.

I remember Vivaldi's argument for not being open-source as being that they're just a Chromium skin, so someone could just "steal" all their front-end. I have absolutely no intention of using Chromium (where I can avoid it, I know many apps are Chromium-based).

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Kraft will presumably also end their consumer food business to focus on supplying hog farms. Drop the filthy poors to focus on profitable slop!

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Kernel Anti-Cheat is generally a sign of a game you'd be better off not buying/playing in the first place.
Linux users can't play Battlefield 6? Good for them!

The only difficulty is just that sense of exclusion, I think. "Everyone" plays yearly release shooters and the like.
It's like being excluded from TwitX. Yeah, it has a massive presence and you'll see people talking about a service you can't use. But you'll realistically avoid a lot of drama and misery that comes with using it.

Besides, remember why GOL doesn't promote games with AI content: There's an inexhaustible supply of excellent games without AI. The same goes for games without Kernel Anti-Cheat.

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