There’s some optimization I’d like to see on both the project planning level, and the game visuals level. Planning level, because paying 10 level designers to put together interesting ideas for a year might be a better use of $1mil than enlisting a celebrity to voice one character in your game. On the visuals level, making a game with an eye-catching, unique art style that serves the style of gameplay might work better than developing a game that makes nice screenshots but can only run on a 5090 and requires highlighting to point players to obvious gameplay elements because of all the detailed objects. (There’s a reason Doom and Quake have fans even in 2026)

I am okay with a the_donald instance existing up until they say things that are belittling or violent towards innocent people. Which, by the standards of their policies, would cause it to either be permanently silent or be stuck with bans one week after creation. The doctrine is incompatible with a well moderated platform.

I guess in America, our current metric for conservative is worshipping Donald Trump and licking his boots with zero individual thought. So there’s not really any actual conservative insight remaining.

Right, but isn’t Lemmy itself a bit of a “less features” version of Reddit? I’m not here for features, I’m here to get away from toxic Reddit mods because fuck spez.

I’ll admit, I might have taken the bet that “reddit but not reddit” would hold at least some interest.

Don’t let perfect be the enemy of the good. You can cut a lot out of your life without even significantly harming your leisure.

Can Microsoft play its own games for me so I don’t have to play them?

I can see how it becomes difficult to implement for already-released games that already have boxed copies in stores.

I wonder if this loophole will make all games currently out MUCH more valuable to investors.

The only way to do this accurately would require the same game to release twice on two planet Earths. It gets harder when pirates are not the types to offer up their purchase data honestly and willingly, for somewhat expectable reasons.

BUT, the closest we got is an old version of FIFA (we’ll assume it was FIFA. This is an old article, and unfortunately I’m only recalling details from memory until I can locate a very old bookmark) Those games sell each year, generally just to update the roster. You’ll see many college dorms where people just stack up each year’s edition they bought because that trend doesn’t change. In the year that the publisher added Denuvo encryption, the PC sales jumped significantly. The only reasonable explanation most analysts could come to is that many PC gamers found they couldn’t pirate the game, and bought it.

It’s not perfect data, not least because I don’t have a link right now. The other murky point is that the people who need to be convinced are not gamers, but publishers. Whatever arguments we make in forums, Denuvo makes its own arguments to them behind closed doors. So far, their arguments have been convincing, enough for publishers to burn money on licenses, and it may be because they have some very valuable, and non-public, figures that make the case. The games industry is not always obligated to release full numbers to its fanbase.

I’m not trying to suggest anyone should shut up and accept Denuvo, I think a lot of the frustration is valid. But I do think it can be more nuanced than you reali3z

One thing that makes it contentious is that how much it affects performance can depend on how well it’s integrated. Some studios check every frame, to Denuvo’s disgust, and it’s a #1 issue on release. Other studios manage it a bit smarter; as you say, it’ll always affect performance at least a little. But I’ll be honest, usually my experience is fine.

For full disclosure, I remembered once someone claimed to me there are AI models that use much less power. But, to confirm that statement before replying, I looked up an investigation, and they say it’s much murkier, and that a company’s own claims are usually understating it. So, you’re on point.

To admit some context: My company has strongly encouraged some AI usage in our coding. They also encourage us to be honest about how helpful, or not, it is. Usually, I tell them it turns out a lot of garbage and once in a while helps make a lengthy task easier.

I can believe him about there being a sweet spot; where it’s not used for everything, only for processes that might have taken a night of manual checks. The very real, very reasonable backlash to it is how easily a poor management team or overconfident engineer will fall away from that sweet spot, and merge stuff that hasn’t had enough scrutiny.

Even Bernie Sanders acknowledged on the senate floor that in a perfect world, where AI is owned by people invested in world benefit, moderate AI use could improve many people’s lives. It’s just sad that in 99.9% of cases, we’re not anywhere near that perfect world.

I don’t totally blame the dev for defending his use of AI backed by industry experience, if he’s still careful about it. But I also don’t blame people who don’t trust it. It’s kind of his call, and if the avoidance of AI is important enough to you, I’d say fork it. I think it’s a small red flag, but not nearly enough of one for me to condemn the project.

AIPAC has some tacticians among them. They know the acronym itself is hated and mistrusted. But, it’s very common and possible for reasonable people to see a convincing political ad, and not ever realize it was funded by AIPAC indirectly.

That’s one of the main things to me. The argument jumps directly to drivers license / DOB collection, but makes no conclusions about how it would protect children. It is OVERTLY, 100%, about feeding lists of targets to the pedophiles that run the biggest tech companies.

Some distros’ discord servers and sites have actually set up AI assistants to handle that clippy concept of being able to ask questions without judgmental users responding.

I stayed with Windows largely because their guidance to those actions was generally good, and left when it started sucking - when a Start search for some normal desktop action instead gave a website article that got an automated “Try restarting” answer from an MS volunteer.

I still don’t think Linux guides people all that well (better or worse depending on the distro). These days, I think it does get better than Windows if only because Microsoft got so lazy with their own product.

The “suckyness carryover” isn’t as natural as you think when people can fork distros so easily.

I think this experience is possible, but it’s a bit lucky; requiring every piece of hardware to match, and no software needs to represent hurdles.

I’ve fought a few of those hurdles and they haven’t been so bad. I think your experience is great when it happens, but it’s hardly a guarantee.

I’m not a big fan of Valve’s use of loot boxes. But I’m also not happy about the proposed solution of “Just collect blood samples from all users”. That doesn’t protect kids, and risks harm and increased surveillance to many other users. It also means companies in similar situations to Valve are forced to safeguard data they didn’t want to be involved with.

I don’t buy that Valve is fully at fault on the concept of targeting children. I don’t see how parents are held at gunpoint to attach credit card data to Steam accounts, or to check the “remember my info” box. Valve has also attempted to add adequate parental account controls. The main reason I oppose Valve on loot boxes is those shouldn’t be used on anyone. I’d like the NYAG to equalize pressure on sports betting sites.

Case in point: Typing from a spare Surface Pro that I installed Ubuntu and some support drivers on for the touchscreen. Some update broke the touchscreen drivers, and I needed a keyboard and a lot of googling to repair them.

If this had happened on Windows, someone likely could’ve taken it to their repair shop or to Microsoft. Sadly, these days even Microsoft might’ve dropped any user aid.

As is the typical pattern.

“So you see, the lesson is that Gatsby’s pursuit of wealth only kept him further from-“
“Dude, that guy’s parties were AWESOME! He had like a freaking circus there and all! What minority group do I have to brutalize to be like him??”

Don’t believe anyone that says this website is sketchy. I use it all the time, and I don’t have any malware (that I know of).

I feel like the Lemmy description should retain the double quotation marks, since they often indicate “…so said a deceitful snake oil salesman.”