Gaming BS of the week

This is not surprising to me at all. Every year we are slipping more and more into an Orwellian society. And "democracy"has nothing to do with it. Or,wait...
I mean, even Plato said "Tyranny naturally arises out of democracy." And he should have known a few things about it in the day...not much has changed since then.

So,yes, there will be more and more of this. And it is called the "totalitarian tiptoe"

Ah, if only Tiny Tim weren't dead, we could Tiptoe through the totalitarian Tulips!!

Sorry guys but… Unlike (I hope) all previous posts this one is personal BS of the week, not general as for all I see, there is a trend on the site to move into MMO waters just as EA wished ages ago.

http://www.pcgamer.com/mass-effect-...-will-be-more-fluid-responsive-and-aggresive/

campaign tie-ins
…
Speaking to Game Informer, Bioware's Ian Frazier suggests it'll fall somewhere in the middle of the two extremes, and that the missions funds you obtain in multiplayer have "tendrils going out into the rest of the game."
"You will have possibilities to send teams to complete kind of side missions, or to do it yourself in multiplayer. That’s the idea"

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After idiotic MMO theater percentage allowing the best singleplayer end without touching campaign, this feels even worse. Noone can make me believe it won't be as bad as MGS5 MMO Narnia rubbish. This whole idea is punishing solo players for avoiding MMO.

http://www.pcgamesn.com/mass-effect-andromeda/mass-effect-andromeda-multiplayer-changes

Compared with Mass Effect 3, the shop has seen an encouraging change in that, as well as card packs containing random loot, some cards will be sold individually on a rotating basis. What loot comes on sale each time the stock refreshes is random, but at least you'll know what you're purchasing.

"If you don't want to be at the mercy of the random number generator for the cards, you're still at the mercy of what's in the store right now, but it's like, 'Oh, that's the Black Widow and I really want it!'" says lead designer Ian Frazier. "You can buy them with real-world money if you want to, but again, nothing requires that."

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It's still early and I'm waiting the official word that ME4 is actually MMO with gambling where a few solo missions exist just because the recent trend to add a few hours of campaign in MMOs.

Right… Another one.
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016...ing-pc-kaby-lake-cpu-windows-10-edge-browser/

Netflix will move to 4K streaming on PC. But not just any PC. Requirements:
- Windows 10
- Edge which is integrated in win10 so perhaps it shouldn't be separate… And most important:
Unbloodybelievable.
Not that I care about 4K, it's some console hipster thing, but this is retarded.

I guess Intel paid them for that.. hopefully it is a timed exclusive, why let the processor struggle to do something that would be a piece of cake for the GPU otherwise ?

GothicGothicness said:

I guess Intel paid them for that.. hopefully it is a timed exclusive, why let the processor struggle to do something that would be a piece of cake for the GPU otherwise ?

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It's probably using HEVC video, which is not accelerated by most GPUs. Kabylake will be the first platform to include full HEVC hardware decode as standard. I'm waiting for Kabylake to upgrade my HTPC for HEVC playback.

Ripper said:

It's probably using HEVC video, which is not accelerated by most GPUs. Kabylake will be the first platform to include full HEVC hardware decode as standard. I'm waiting for Kabylake to upgrade my HTPC for HEVC playback.

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Still Pascal as well as several AMD GPU's has full support for that, so to say only Kabylake is still strange, the way I see it.

Besides VLC already supports it on Skylake and several AMD processors aswell.

GothicGothicness said:

Still Pascal as well as several AMD GPU's has full support for that, so to say only Kabylake is still strange, the way I see it.

Besides VLC already supports it on Skylake and several AMD processors aswell.

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Skylake and current AMD platforms don't support it at 10bit 4k, which is the new standard they're talking about. I don't think there's any funny business going on. If anything, it'll be about them feeling secure that this combination provides a strong DRM protection.

Ripper said:

Skylake and current AMD platforms don't support it at 10bit 4k, which is the new standard they're talking about. I don't think there's any funny business going on. If anything, it'll be about them feeling secure that this combination provides a strong DRM protection.

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You are right about that, it still does not explain why you can't play it on a GPU with pascal though ?

Ripper said:

Skylake and current AMD platforms don't support it at 10bit 4k, which is the new standard they're talking about. I don't think there's any funny business going on. If anything, it'll be about them feeling secure that this combination provides a strong DRM protection.

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They shouldn't feel anything, but think before deciding something like this.

The decision is an obvious countereffect path.
Will someone invest into new CPU architecture just to watch Netflix' 4K streams? No. Instead they'll just wait till the stream is pirated and then watch it over pirated stream or download from some rapidshare clone. Instead of preventing piracy this decision will just make bigger numbers of pirated "copies".

There is another gigantic pile of shit problem here as GG suggested, and it's - exclusivity.
PC is a platform where it's user chooses between manufacturers. There is ongoing competition on all existing PC parts, thanks to that the industry is pushing forward like crazy, if there was a monopol we'd still be using (good old though) WooDoo or TNT2 with Cyrix CPU.
In a few months AMD's Zen CPUs will be out, why would anyone in their right mind, assuming Zen is a sort of musthave for that one, why would anyone just because of Netflix' bullshit ditch Zen and buy Kaby Lake?

Edge over other browsers is IMO also not okay but is still borderline acceptable as edge is built-in browser in win10 so a user can take it as just a 4K stream service and use another browser for other stuff. Besides, edge is not hardware so noone says updated Chrome, Firefox or Opera will also become another possibility in near future.

I'm sick and tired of pushing phone/console corporate control on user's choices on PC. I'll buy what I want, I'll use what I want and not something companies insist on. I won't go pirate 4K as I don't care for it, but also won't shed a tear for money lost by Netflix just because of the bullshit decision based on not understanding the platform.

A linked example. India. Censorship. Dragon Age Inquisition banned. Wrote before. The stupid government forbids legal selling of a videogame just because, if I was living in that country I'd become the biggest pirate ever and sell illicit copies of DA:I and become a millionaire. What could happen to me except another thing India is known for - mass rape?
It's both loss for EA and for that country taxes? Why should I care? Their problem. By their idiotic moves they encourage piracy themselves. It's like they don't want $. If they don't want it, I sure do.

The only thing I care about Netflix for are the 3 Dave Chappelle comedy specials that they will be airing next year.

As for 4K, I guess I'll stick to YouTube video content and Xfinity 4K options that will be coming eventually.

What I'm saying is that this is driven by DRM concerns, rather than favouring particular a platform. The movie industry is trying to use 4k as a clean start to get their DRM right this time.

Protections are becoming much stronger than they have been in the past. 4k blurays still have not been cracked, and the industry is trying to ensure they don't leave a security hole in PC playback by insisting on the new PlayReady 3.0 DRM chips.

I'm not saying it's a good thing, or that they will succeed, I'm just saying that's the motivation in these decisions.

GTA 4 (not 5!) got a patch on PC. After 6 years.
Ain't that awsome?!
https://support.rockstargames.com/hc/en-us/articles/235650888

Well, a patch, even after such a long time shouldn't be in this thread, right? I mean, isn't this an awsome thing:
"Fixed a bug which made completing “Out of Commission” mission impossible when frame rate exceeds 60fps."

Wait… That means… You had to play the game on a rubbish hardware that can't reach 61fps by any means to be safe till today? Ah, yeah, Rockstar. Logical.

Did per any chance Bethesda buy Rockstar lately?

6 years?

Yesterday I found a game-stopping bug in a 30-years-old financial software for mainframes ... by accident. And guess what, it will be patched for all customers.

I bet that software isn't bundled with GFWL.

Of course not. It's bundled with other IBM stuff from the pleistocene.

It took the community outcry to fix this BS:
http://www.pcgamer.com/vr-shooter-arizona-sunshine-has-features-locked-behind-timed-cpu-exclusivity/
http://www.vg247.com/2016/12/08/vr-...to-i7-cpus-flips-the-switch-following-outcry/

You may have seen Arizona Sunshine placing favourably on Steam’s top sellers list these past couple of days. The game is a VR zombie shooter that supports single-player and online multiplayer.

Unfortunately, it was quickly discovered that the single-player horde mode is only available to players running 5th, 6th, and 7th generation Intel Core i7 CPUs. Though it’s common in the world of PC gaming for games to only work on PCs that meet or exceed certain requirements, locking specific modes to certain CPUs when the game itself has no problem running on a wider range of specs, is particularly weird.

What compounded this issue further is that Steam users have had to realise this on their own, since developer Vertigo Games never actually announced this limitation.

The studio later revealed it wanted to give 5th, 6th and 7th gen Core i7 users “first glimpse into these additional modes,” thanks to a partnership it had with Intel. The plan was to make horde mode available March 6, 2017 for everyone.

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This developer just entered my "not to buy anything from" list.

Windows Store aka GFWL 2.0 is planning to become even worse than it is:
http://www.pcgamesn.com/microsoft/windows-store-forced-driver-updates

Windows Store is going to enforce a graphics driver update on you if you’re downloading from their store. I can understand why it’s happening; they want to make things easier for gamers by taking the onus off them to keep their drivers updated. In practice though it could mean day one game ready drivers getting forcibly installed onto your machine if you want to play a particular game whether you like it or not.

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The problem? Both nVidia and AMD drivers upon release tend not to "behave" for some titles or generally. Then we solve it by reverting to previous version or grab a hotfix released a day or two later - a hotfix that doesn't pass Microsoft's whatnot signing process!

I still just can't believe this. Microsoft is either playing dumb or thinks we all got dumb out of a sudden. It's bloody PC, it's not iOS nor android for god's sakes! Wasn't windows8 fail a lesson good enough?
If any of you sold your soul to this new GWFL because of "irresistible" title, shame on you. Let them know you don't want that travesty on your machine, don't use it. Please.

Long time no entry… The new year didn't even start properly and we got one.

Every year there are games top lists on different sites, sometimes good, sometimes bad and sometimes just silly.
These lists are usually top 3, top 5 or top 10. Because of not much titles, it can happen a game doesn't make an entry even if good. Or the author states that some games they didn't play.

And now we got top50 games in 2016 by Eurogamer. No, it's not top 50 per audience vote, it's that games coverage site's staff creme of the year list:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-01-02-eurogamers-top-50-games-of-2016

I'm not saying everyone should share my taste and I'm not saying I can't understand others' taste. That site loves Pokemon Go so much they've put it on 5th spot. Okay, they didn't like XCom2 as much so it's at 11th place. Etc, it's fine, everyone has their favorite horse. It's like Oscars sometimes, a nomination is already a win if your material is not politically attractive as only such stuff wins. Means, as long as all great games are mentioned on top 50 list(s), it's fine, right?

Well Eurogamer's list of 50 best games in 2016 is WITHOUT DX:MD. Not even on 50th spot.

Gimme a break.

That has to be the laziest list article I've ever seen. It's literally few introductory paragraphs plus the list. No game descriptions, no explanations as to why the game is on the list, nothing. DX:MD's absence from the list is the least of its problems.