Game of the Week

Staudey

So after not really finding any time for gaming (because either the weather was too nice to spend time inside, or I was otherwise occupied) I've recently finally started playing Red Dead Redemption 2 (Cowboy game by the GTA makers). This has been on my list for a loooooong time. I've heard before that it's slow moving, and oh boy, the introductory chapter really is like molasses (the visuals are stunning though, even in 2023 IMO). But now I've arrived at the free-roaming part of the game and so far it's amazing. The world really feels alive, NPCs seem to react somewhat realistically to your behaviour, you can spend a few days hunting game (incl. skinning and tying the animal to your saddle) instead of following the story. A very nice sandbox. Let's see if it holds up with more hours spent on it.

synth-ruiner

I'm completely obsessed with Oxygen Not Included after picking it up a week ago. it's like Minecraft crossed with The Sims crossed with Factorio or something. you basically have to create a self-sustaining ecosystem, like a terrarium full of little guys...

Chaussettes

Cold Waters on 4.4 Harmony, runs great even on low end hardware. More arcadey than other subsims I'm used to like Silent Hunter, but the cold war setting makes up for it to me. Very fun.

Staudey

Chaussettes This reminds me of my teenage years when I would also from time to time check out these submarine simulations. Never really got into them, but they always had a strange fascination for me.

zmaint

Steam summer sale... Been playing Tom Clancy Ghost Recon Breakpoint. Not as good as Wildlands but fun and super cheap. The only thing they did better than Wildlands was add squad customization. Also snagged Far Cry 5.

Outside of that, a lot of ESO lately.

Staudey

The Isle

My friends and I have been playing a lot of The Isle over the years, a dinosaur survival game, and recently we've been checking out the new updates. Gameplay is simple, run around, eat (veggies if you're a herbivore, other dinos if you're a carnivore) and try not to get eaten. There are also breeding/nesting mechanics.
The game has strong horror elements. Nights are extremely dark, other dinos can jump out of dense vegetation without warning, while drinking at a river a gigantic Deinosuchus might suddenly breach the water and drag you under, etc.
The focus is mostly on realism, there are few fancy arcade mechanics/skills/etc., just you surviving and growing (which provides benefits to attack strength, but often makes it harder to hide and your food requirements increase with growth). It's great fun with friends, but I also had a great time roaming around alone or forming groups with strangers (there is an ingame chat but it's even more fun to only use the various calls, grunts and screams to communicate)
If you were to download the game make sure to use the EVRIMA beta branch. The stable/default branch (i.e. what will be downloaded if you don't change anything) is basically the "old" game, that sees no more development (AFAIK). EVRIMA is a much improved version, even though it doesn't have all the dinosaurs of the old version (but some new ones). The screenshots/videos on the Steam page are the old game, which doesn't really represent the current status. For a taste of what it actually looks like these days I'll include a video from one of the recent updates below.
They're also working on including humans and human settlements into the game, and I think there already is a testing branch available for that (which I haven't tried yet). I also have to mention that the latest update, which ported the game to the new Unreal Engine version, seems to have introduced some graphical issues (especially when it comes to water, which looks much worse now) and the networking code seems laggier than before. Hopefully that will be fixed soon.

edit: forgot to mention that I play it on Windows currently (because I first installed it there and disk space constraints keep me from moving games to my Linux partition atm), and protonDB only gives it a Silver rating

Staudey

In other news: Dungeon of the Endless is free (to keep) on Steam currently

infinitymdm

Sorry for my recent absence! I've been moving, and that's taken up most of my time for the last few weeks.

Recently some friends and I got back into Terraria. We've been playing the "Don't Dig Up" seed, which starts you off in what's usually one of the game's harshest environments. There are a variety of other tweaks that make the seed a lot of fun.

For the uninitiated, Terraria is a pixel-art survival-sanbox game with a heavy focus on crafting. You can build all sorts of incredible structures, fight bosses, and do a million other things. People have even used the game's wiring system to build working computers. Here's the most recent trailer:

infinitymdm

This week I returned to one of my favorite Metroidvanias, a little-known game called Blasphemous. Its sequel is expected to launch in a few weeks, so I figured it deserved another look.

You play as The Penitent One on a pilgrimage through the nightmarish land of Cvstodia, which is twisted and blessed in turn by The Miracle. The story is shockingly deep, and at least as dense as Dark Souls; this game will make you think. Speaking of Dark Souls, the combat has that same deliberate feel to it. Boss fights have that ol' Soulslike rhythm, too. This was one of my favorite games of the past few years, and I have high hopes for the sequel.

Content warning: blood, gore, mild pixel-art nudity

Staudey

infinitymdm Oh nice. Blasphemous has a prominent place on my ToPlay list, but haven't quite gotten to it yet

infinitymdm

Staudey Go play it! It's a worthwhile experience. It's one of those rare games that I still think about regularly, even though I first played it several years ago.

zmaint

Just finished up Saints Row IV (silly fun, use Proton native has issues). Been back on SWTOR heavy again (trying to finish up my last two class quest lines), with some ESO as I have time.

infinitymdm

This week's game is a bit of a change of pace, with a family-friendly puzzle game for two: Phogs! My SO and I have been playing this off and on over the past few weeks, and we've had a blast.

The central gimmick is that you're two dogs joined in the middle. Or maybe one dog with a head on each end? Uncertain. Either way, you have the physics of a spaghetti noodle and that makes for a good time. Each player controls one end of the dog(s). The gameplay itself is super casual - it never punishes you for making a mistake, and encourages you to explore and try new things to solve puzzles and find hidden collectibles.

kaktuspalme

infinitymdm
I played Xenoblade Chronicles 1 back then when it was not remastered in Dolphin. It's a very good game. I tried XC2 on the Switch, but somehow it didn't catch me. Maybe I should have given it more time.
Have you played XC2? For XC3 I only heard positive things so far, so will probably sooner or later also try it. Though I have a Switch I think I will also play it in Yuzu.

infinitymdm

kaktuspalme I have played XC2! Admittedly, 2 doesn't have the great hook that XC1 has. It takes a really long time to start getting good - not until 8+ hours in, which far exceeds the patience of most players. The main problem is that all the fun combat mechanics are locked behind story progression. There are also many controversial character designs, which I could definitely live without (though there is an argument to be made that they serve a purpose in the overarching story).

XC2 is definitely worth playing through, especially if you intend to play XC3. There are many, many callbacks to both prior games in the series. While you don't have to play the prior games to enjoy 3, you will have a fuller experience if you do.

zmaint

Anyone got Baldur's Gate 3 working? I tried the suggestions on Protondb.com but no go, it just sits on launching and spawns a ton of windows processes and never does anything. I have to kill steam and reboot.

Teggs

zmaint Yes. In fact it worked perfectly since the first time I installed it a few days after the game launched. None of the issues on ProtonDB occurred, the Vulkan renderer works fine, etc. That included Valve's Hotfix 1 before the first launch.

The only setting I changed from a fresh 4.4 install on new hardware was turning Linux Steam Integration off. I suspect the situation has reversed in the last few years and Valve is basically running rolling software that updates all the time, whereas a poor Linux distro, even a rolling one, can't keep up. Also 'Fix LSI' was listed as a goal for Solus 4.5, implying it's not working correctly right now. Other than that I don't know what could be causing you problems. 🙁

Harvey

For people that need step by step instructions. Here is what I did for BG3.

Baldur's Gate 3

Disable Linux Steam Integration (Found in the system menu its a separate application).

Any time you change options in LSI you need to restart steam for them to take effect.

Installing custom Proton versions:

For non native Linux games I always use GloriousEgroll's Proton which tends to get fixes sooner (At the time of writing I am using GE-Proton8-11).

mkdir -p ~/.steam/steam/compatibilitytools.d

Download the latest release and extract it to that directory (you want the GE-Proton8-11.tar.gz not the source code or shasum listings).
https://github.com/GloriousEggroll/proton-ge-custom/releases

Alternatively you can use a tool called ProtonUp-Qt for a graphical way of doing this. It is available as a flatpak.

You will now need to restart steam for it to be able to detect the new Proton version as a selectable option.

Right click the game in steam -> properties -> compatibility tab -> tick Force the use of a specific Steam Play compatibility tool -> Select the new Proton version e.g GE-Proton8-11

Force the use of DX11 and skip the launcher.

The Vulkan version never worked for me but I haven't tried since it was out of early access.

On the same properties window switch to the General tab -> In the Launch options box add this:
eval $( echo gamemoderun "%command%" | sed "s/Launcher\/LariLauncher.exe'.*/bin\/bg3_dx11.exe'/" )

zmaint

Harvey I got it working this morning finally.

After reading on the github, turns out that something Nvidia did, combined with something in proton 8, makes it impossible to build the prefix using Larian's release build of MS products. Had to install via proton 7, then essentially run with experimental. Supposedly Nvidia is aware and so is Valve.

infinitymdm

This week's game is Rounds, a multiplayer brawler that cleverly balances itself by giving insane perks to the losers!

If you've ever played a roguelike, you're probably familiar with the concept of combining synergistic perks to create an unstoppable build. Rounds brings that concept to a casual couch brawler, resulting in gameplay that's totally different every time. Throw in a few mods with r2modman (which I hope to provide a package for at some point), and your group is bound to have a good time.

At the time of writing, Rounds is 50% off on Steam (in my region, at least). If you pick it up, I highly recommend the RoundsWithFriends and SetRounds mods, both easily available via r2modman. (And @ me in one of the Solus Matrix channels if you want help setting r2modman up!)

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