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Cake day: June 30th, 2023

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  • I’m using Windows as my daily driver due to prioritising gaming over everything else. But I also have a 8-year old laptop which is stuck with Win 7, and I’ve been wondering if I should just install Linux on it to try things out. In the past, I’ve only ever tried Linux for short times, never used Linux as my main OS or longer than a week.

    With this context, I’ve had the “which distro should I choose?” on my mind a few times. There’s some obvious and some non-obvious issues with this questionnaire. I’ll just go over my thoughts step by step:

    • “I want anonymous web browsing” and “distro which is supported by game publishers” can’t be selected at the same time. Is this really true? I’m doubting my understanding of what “anonymous web browsing” actually means.

    • “I often need help from others” and “I have already used Linux for some purposes” can’t both be selected. Why? The logic behind this is “You have used Linux at some point, so you can clearly solve some problems without asking anyone”. Makes no sense, and/or the questionnaire’s creator thinks that Linux is impossible for newcomers. I have used Linux in the past and I’m generally good in troubleshooting, but anyway.

    • “I want to use the default preset values in the installation assistant” is impossible to answer if I don’t know which values are given as the default. My general answer would be “give me a default value for everything, but also let me change the things which I have an opinion about”. An answer equal to this doesn’t exist.

    • Pre-installed programs: this does feel like it lacks the answer of “let me choose what to install during installation of OS”, but I guess I can just skip this question without answering since I don’t care.

    • “There are many way to administrate a linux distribution” -> “I want to avoid systemd”. I’ve never heard about systemd, and the explanation give on the page doesn’t really help. For what reasons would I want to avoid it? My actual answer for this is “I really don’t care”, so I just skipped it.


    About the result of the questionnaire: I did answer that “I’m fine with paying something”, but it’s not really something I aim for. The suggestions seem to tag “There is a non-free version available” as a plus for the distros, which really isn’t what I answered - there’s a difference between “I’m fine with something” and “I want something”.

    I also marked “supported by game publishers” with a star, because gaming is what I’m aiming to do on it. I have no idea if this even matters in practice, but it made sense as an answer when asked about. The smoothness of gaming experience will always be the primary reason for any choice of OS I’ll make.

    The first EIGHT answers on the list have either “Programs versions may not be up-to-date enough for gaming” or “May require additional configuration for gaming” as a downside/warning. The game publisher question is the only answer which I marked as important.

    The first distro from the suggestions that included “supported by game publishers” is Linux Mint - which does match what I already had in mind, but I really feel like the ordering of the suggested distros feel off.


    Short “review” about this: it really didn’t help much. The list of suggestions is practically full of equally good distros, and I’m still stuck with the question “which one of these should I choose?”. I only learned about more distros that I had never heard about before.

    As for actually choosing the distro at some point later: I think that I’ll just find out the top 5 most popular distros, and select from those. My reasoning for this is that it’s much easier to find answers if/when I run into issues. Using a niche distro wouldn’t really work for me - Linux isn’t my hobby, I think OS is just a tool to run whatever programs/games I want to.

    But this questionnaire doesn’t have any data about popularity, so for my usecase, it lacks some information. I feel like it could use an additional question about “Are you fine with using a niche distro, or do you want to use a popular one?” - this question does have the issue of not being objective though, as there’s no clear answer of what can be counted as “popular”.

    TL;DR good idea, but execution could be better.




  • I’m specifically talking about the experience of installing and playing games, not installing the OS. I haven’t had any issues with installing Windows either, but apparently we have a different experience with that part - but even then, installation/configuration of OS happens like once per 5 years so I don’t really care if it takes 15 or 90 minutes. I do agree that Linux is quite easy to set up too, no issues there either.

    I have no idea what you’re talking about when you say “constantly having to un-fuck Windows”. I just open my PC and open whatever program/game that I was planning to?

    But: if installing a new game requires more than pressing install from the service I bought it from due to the choice of my OS, that is the issue that I’m trying to minimize. If one OS is more likely to give me a smoother purchase-to-gameplay experience, I’ll prefer that one.

    Basically if 90% of games work equally well on both platforms but 10% require extra tweaking (or literally don’t work) on Linux, I’ll just stick to Windows. Proton is great, but not a perfect answer for everything - but I’m not sure what you mean by “easier than Windows” since I don’t know what could be easier than pressing install.

    I guess I’ve just been lucky with my experience overall.


    I obviously do use the PC for other stuff too (video editing, browser, music, the usual), but those would work equally fine on Linux - it’s just the gaming part that’s keeping me on Windows, and it’s also the main thing I do on a daily basis.


  • I guess I pay for the convenience that I get when I buy a new game, simply press Install and start playing. I spend most of my free time playing games on PC, I have no other reasons to stick to Windows. I’ll happily switch to Linux on the day when every new release works with no extra problems, tinkering, waiting or searching caused by my choice of OS.

    This is going to sound selfish, but I don’t have the “energy” of fighting against whatever the current meta is - I just have to appreciate the more invested people that drive Linux forward. I’ll just follow and use the OS where I get the smoothest overall experience for gaming (including thing like mouse/kb driver support). Windows is the current answer for this, one day it’ll be something else - hopefully Linux.

    Shit’s been progressing really fast recently - I guess Steam Deck is doing some heavy lifting when it comes to motivating developers to keep Linux in mind. Direct support will always give the best results for everyone.


  • I do like Nioh, it’s always on my list of suggestions for people interested in that type of games. But I feel like it’s also quite a different game from Dark Souls - there’s room for both in the market, and I enjoy both for different reasons. While similar, Nioh’s combat feels more like a fast-paced arcade-y brawler, while DS feels slower and more methodical. Personally I can’t really say one is better than the other, since I just enjoy both of them - but they’re different enough that it’s clear that some players will prefer one over the other.

    Outside of combat, I again feel like DS is a bit “slower”, I spend more time just exploring and wondering where to go next, etc. Nioh areas and levels are (usually) a bit more straightforward and faster to progress due to its mission structure. Storytelling format is also really different. But again, I just enjoy both of them for different reasons.

    Especially during New Game+ rounds 2 to 5, Nioh also gets much deeper in the gear minmaxing department compared to DS - I’ve 100%d all DLCs in both Niohs. The gearing system in Nioh is also made in such a way that sometimes it’s useful to just go farm the same bosses over and over - this is something that doesn’t really exist in DS. Then there’s even the infinite boss arena mode. I personally often think about Nioh as “a game with DS-style combat design, Diablo-style progression”. I love the end result.

    As far as I know, they’re planning to do similar DLC content in Wo Long too (new round of NG+ per DLC), and I’m waiting until they release all DLCs so I can go complete those too.

    Blade of Darkness has been on my to-do list for quite a long time now, I really should get into it some day. :D


    I was originally about to mention Fromsoft also creating Sekiro and Bloodborne in between Dark Souls sequels, but I guess it can be argued they’re all just the same with different skin. AC is at least completely different. Personally I have no issues with game devs finding what they do best and just keep doing it with only minor improvements - as a player, I can just choose to play games from different devs anyway.


  • I often describe Elden Ring with the following sentence: “If you gave me this game with no title and told me it’s Dark Souls 4, I would have no reason to doubt you”.

    It’s great for everyone that wanted more Dark Souls, and ER is arguably a good starting point for anyone that hasn’t played any of the Dark Souls, but it’s still Dark Souls. If someone had tried Dark Souls in the past and realized that they don’t like the game, I really wouldn’t expect Elden Ring changing that.

    For me personally: Elden Ring is pretty much my favourite game of all time. I feel like it’s the “culmination of Dark Souls design”, and just happens to be exactly what I was personally looking for in DS games - but even with this in mind, I don’t feel the need of getting more of the same.

    But hey, as for Fromsoft just doing the same thing over and over - Armored Core VI coming out next week, and that’s quite different. :D


  • Before opening this thread, I didn’t even know Ratchet & Clank came to PC. I generally follow gaming news and tend to hear about most of this sort of things even if it’s a game that I don’t personally care about, but I just haven’t seen any advertising about this one. None of the “weekly gaming news”-youtubers which I follow mentioned it, etc. Even the title of this thread doesn’t mention the game lmao.

    My only history with the series is that back when the PS4 R&C was added to PS+, I played it for maybe 1 hour and thought “this could be a fun game if I could use a mouse”. I generally don’t like playing shooters with controller.

    I’ve always been interested in the game otherwise, it’s just that due to being PS exclusive controller-only game, I didn’t really care. But I just now bought the game due to this thread - and I almost skipped opening this thread.


  • A console just works, and if PC gaming can’t offer that same experience than it’s got negative value in my book.

    I primarily play on PC, but I’ve always understood this part as the reason why so many people just prefer consoles - and there’s nothing wrong with that. No hassle, just open the console and start playing. While PC does give more customizability and a much bigger library of games accessible through the same machine, it’s also more likely to run into some platform-related issues here and there.

    It’s all about finding the balance between negatives and positives: personally I’ll rather just deal with the occasional random problems since the reward is the huge library of games and (usually) better end result.

    But I do understand why someone else might go for consoles - as long as it has enough games which you can enjoy, the limited library isn’t really a problem anyway.

    I’ve rarely had any real problems, but I’ve also been using windows PC as my main platform for like 30 years at this point - many fixes/workarounds are just intuitive for me at this point (“oh just press alt+enter”), while they might be a confusing dealbreaker for a newcomer. Anyone arguing that “using PC is just as easy!” probably doesn’t realize how many different small things they’ve learned over time while using the platform, or they’ve just been lucky and never ran into a persistent issue (like the one that you described). Or they’re just more interested in the platform as a whole, and happily spend some time learning to use it.


    I feel like the main problem with your previous comment is just that you stated “bad experiences with Steam”, while you’re talking about PC issues in general. What you described there (probably) isn’t caused by Steam. But this, again, comes back to just not understanding the platform, which is an understandable reason to just go play on a console instead - less hassle and all that.


  • I really think this thread is a great example of why the average person doesn’t care that much.

    The whole thread is full of comments like “the issues caused by giving away all your data are too abstract, too far away, or too difficult to understand”. This is true by the way, I completely agree.

    But I haven’t seen a single comment trying to explain those possible issues in an easily understandable way. The average person (or, at least me) reading threads like this won’t learn anything new. Give me a practical issue that I might face, and if I agree that it’s an issue, I’ll focus more on avoiding that issue.

    In other words, an example:

    • Let’s say I’m a person using lemmy/mastodon, only using privacy-focused search engines etc.
    • If I would now change to using facebook/threads, started using Chrome as my browser, etc the usual mainstream tracking stuff - what problems can this cause for me in the future?

    PS. I do agree with the notion of “minimize the data you give away”, which is one reason I’m here, but I really don’t have an answer for these questions. I’m like “I understand the point of privacy, but can’t explain the reasons”.



  • In both D3 and PoE, I’ve always played one character per season. I don’t really do “alts”.

    Knowing this, I’m planning to do the same in D4. I’ve only leveled Rogue to lvl 100 since launch, but haven’t even created other characters. I’ll just spend the first few seasons trying out the different classes. Probably going Sorc for S1, likely starting out with Lightning but time will tell if I stick to it or just try out multiple different builds.


    1. Googled “Lemmy” to see what it even is
    2. “wtf is an instance”
    3. Checked some of the most used instances. At this point I wasn’t sure if it matters much, but I just figured it’s best to just pick a popular instance.
    4. found lemmy.world, and the description goes “The World’s Internet Frontpage - Lemmy.world is a general-purpose Lemmy instance of various topics, for the entire world to use.”
    5. “sounds good enough”, created account