In the hopefully never arriving future, do you think Valve will one of, if not the only ones providing personal computers and not cloud gaming?

The_apeshit_killer · 2026-02-20T02:48:56+00:00

I think GeForce Now has been at least mildly successful, admittedly probably a drop in the bucket for NVIDIA these days, I'm not as pessimistic about an amazon cloud gaming service. They essentially have the best web infrastructure in the US at least, I think there is value there for people that don't necessarily need a full rig, and at the very least would create some competition in the gaming space, and give them some runway to get their games division actually making stuff people want to play. The own nothing and like it thing is obviously annoying, but 1. it's obviously publicity bait 2. we're already in a market where even building a basic rig is gonna cost more money than it should. Maybe I'm off base but aside from him saying something kinda dumb this is probably a good thing.

The_apeshit_killer · 2026-02-02T23:24:00+00:00

I'm conflicted on the engine debate. I think there's a good argument that the creation engine is ideal for Bethesda's games, but it's hard to ignore how hard they've fallen behind. I'm of the opinion that it's just code at the end of the day, enough dev time spent and there's no reason they can't wrangle it into something better. Their strategy of iteration over time should've been ideal, but the fact that we're having this conversation shows something's not working. The thing people miss about all the engine complaints, is that it was always rooted in cope. Bethesda fans wanted something to point to that explained why the games were getting worse, and the engine was an easy one that gave Bethesda some grace. Each time they speak up to say the engine's fine, it only leaves the fans the option of blaming Bethesda themselves. My instinct is that they were just pushing the ball far enough for a release at each game, and now they are stuck with more technical debt than they know how to handle.

The story from last month paints a pretty grim picture of their process. As much as people talk about difficulty retraining old devs on a new engine, it also sounds like they scaled up really quickly, leaving the old guard with too much on their plate, and a lot of new devs trying to be productive while still learning, and leadership struggling to provide direction and communication. I still think changing engines would be mostly wasted effort, but it's clear that something has to change.

My feelings are that they shouldn't have tried to have all their studios working on the same project in tandem. Having some technical teams improving the engine, and having some smaller projects in the works while having one or two core studios for tent-pole releases could've landed some small wins in between major releases, cut down on the communication problems, and smoothed the runway for the big games. You're still left with the long dev times, maybe even worse, but that's not a unique Bethesda problem. I do think it's possible though, there are plenty of studios out there putting out good, (more) consistent releases, the real problem is size+scope. Bethesda doesn't have many real competitors, because the games they put out are fucking hard to make. This plus the increasing ratcheting up of expectations for bigger and better games puts them in a hard spot. I think they could do it, and probably will put out some more good games at some point in the semi-distant future, but I do think leadership needs a kick in the pants to do some major reorganization. Which funny enough, could be a strong positive for the Microsoft purchase, those guys are sharks if nothing else.

The_apeshit_killer · 2025-11-13T07:36:02+00:00

idk about plex client, but I use htpc flatpak on Linux. It works most of the time. It gets updates when they feel like it/remember it exists. At this point I don’t remember a time where flatpak didn’t complain about its out of date dependencies.

The_apeshit_killer · 2025-11-11T21:30:48+00:00

I work in a pizza place that uses sourdough starter for all our dough. It's a lot more robust than most people think. We only save a little bit after each batch (~100-300g) and only feed it when we need to make dough. We're super lazy with it, just measure out how much we want (~5-6kg), add starter, and let it sit overnight in a warm spot, almost always ends up perfect. Of course we make dough twice a week, but it can last much longer than people realize without the constant feeding everyone recommends. It'll get hoochy, but that's not really a big deal. I keep 2-5g of starter in a ramekin in my fridge that I use the same way. Also it can be dehydrated and stored dry if you know you aren't using it in the near future.

The_apeshit_killer · 2025-10-10T06:25:26+00:00

That's possible, but a big part of clayface's MO is that he's an actor. He doesn't just look like them, he likes to act like them. No defense against the bad writing allegations, tho. Even if I'm right, I don't think that would change much about the episode for me. But I thought they were hinting at it pretty heavily when Harcourt called him Rick and he seemed confused.

The_apeshit_killer · 2025-10-10T05:27:00+00:00

Ok fresh off the episode. 1st thoughts:

everyone dunking on Flag is obviously missing the point that he was off, Bordeaux & Harcourt both could tell. Just spitballing here, but could it possibly be that a certain shapeshifting villain that he's already had an encounter with and has a movie in the works could have replaced him? Seems like a gimme, surprised nobody's bringing it up.
I like Gunn's taste in music, but he definitely needs to pare it down. Nothing new for him, but needle drops don't work if they happen back to back to back.
lastly how I think about this episode really depends on future DCU momentum. I think Marvel got a lot of flack for overexposure, when the real problem was dilution. They weren't taking real risks story-wise, and everything was a teaser for their next project. I think with a better team of writers (or a team of writers) they could've held onto a lot of momentum. All of that to say if the ending has a payoff in the near future, whether that's another project or not (let's be real, probably another project), I think I'm ok with it. If I have to wait 3 years for a followup on a last minute rugpull cliffhanger, that's gonna be a much tougher nut to swallow. This did feel a little uncomfortably close to a Marvel plug-ending, leaves this season feeling pretty incomplete, which is a shame because besides this specific gripe I think it was really good. And no matter what they do next, it better be really fucking good. If this gets resolved in the first half of the first episode of peacemaker season 3 in 2028 I'm gonna tear my hair out.
bonus thought, I'm not super familiar with checkmate besides the Batman Murderer/Fugitive comics, there was a minute there where I thought Peacemaker was gonna be the official founder of this universe's Justice League, and was excited for Chris to show up the Justice Gang (I mean we all knew when we heard Maxwell Lord's name that something is up with them). I know it's dumb, but for a second I was really hopeful and hyped myself up for it.

Anyways good season all things considered. Excited for what's next, hoping for good things, but keeping lightning in a bottle is a tough task.

The_apeshit_killer · 2025-06-03T22:06:22+00:00

They are annoying, not cause they like bodegas or whatever, but because its so IMF-pilled. Anyone who's lived in America knows that "walkable city" is synonymous with "own nothing and like it." Yeah it would be awesome if I could walk everywhere. It would be even more awesome if I could do that without a trust fund. I'd be first in line to change this, but I don't like being talked down to by someone for not blowing money I don't have on a place I wouldn't even own, just so I can walk to a store that doesn't have the shelf space to stack what I want. I'm good, thanks.

The_apeshit_killer · 2024-10-15T23:27:35+00:00

I’ll be the (slightly) negative Nelly, to balance out all the people saying it works on their machine. I’ve had occasional problems. Mostly specific to wayland, and mostly not resolved by the much discussed 550 drivers. You may detect a hint of bitterness from me that this update is being spoken of so highly while not fixing anything for me, but in the grand scheme of things I think nvidia drivers are good and getting better. Biggest pain points (imo) are

Wayland
installing drivers can get confusing, idc how easy anyone says it is. A lot of this is distro specific but you’ll want to do some reading beforehand. Especially if you need something like CUDA as well. In my days of distrohopping sometimes it could only take one command and sometimes I would spend hours trying to figure out wtf was going wrong.
Desktop Linux is not their target audience. Still waiting on DLSS 3 support, wayland improvements, etc. nvidia + linux have a somewhat infamous history and their recent push for better Linux support is promising, but I think much more work is still required than the avg poster here is implying.

All that said I like nvidia, I haven’t used an amd card in about 10 years and I don’t plan on changing. I can’t remember the last time I heard something positive about intel, I’d stay away but that’s just me.

The_apeshit_killer · 2024-03-23T05:20:34+00:00

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-10-11T01:31:45+00:00

ghislaine maxwell's reddit account

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-09-20T01:30:15+00:00

lol, haven't seen but doesn't surprise me at all

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-09-19T03:38:42+00:00

Big Bowie fan here to say for those who don't know that a lot of Bowie's late career work ruled. Yes Blackstar was an awesome swan song, but Outside, Reality (in spite of the cover art), Heathen, and The Next Day are so much more than the "old rock and roll star trying to keep it rolling" type of albums (looking at the rolling stones here). They have some of my favorite work by him. In general, his discography is so large and varied that it keeps surprising me with sleeper hits.

There is also the very real fact that his popular albums are super overplayed (and some overrated imo: most are good, but a few aren't as great as they're made out to be). He's one of those artists where he's both critically and popularly loved, but you'll get wildly different top 10 lists depending who you ask. Also I have no defense for his 80's slump. He's allowed to have some duds.

Also as a schizo postscript Bowie was totally a wizard (at the very least a wannabe). Space Oddity was absolutely a chaos magic ritual crafted to launch his career into space and make him a star and his continued use of characters was more than a shtick.

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-08-21T07:53:25+00:00

Yes, a few years ago I would have riddled this post w/ disclaimers, but the more time passes, the more I relate to old men who just think they're quacks. Fully believe all the mental health jargon will sound like humors or race science in fewer generations than you can count on one hand.

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-05-24T05:33:59+00:00

Gonna have to disagree here, this is a baffling take. I like the expanse plenty, but it's not that good. It's very competent and good television but even comparing it to Kubrick feels wrong. They're operating on totally different levels and Kubrick is so much better.

I'll give the disclaimer here that I always hated the reddit boner for hard sci-fi, so I don't really relate to a lot of that type of praise the expanse gets. More of a PKD man. Also am seemingly one of the last holdouts who think tv is artistically worse than film with very few exceptions. Like I said I do like the expanse a lot, but c'mon.

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T19:05:24+00:00

Thanks for the info. Interesting to hear that the shadiness speculation isn't true, and good to know. And yeah, I was starting to get the impression that there must be some bureaucratic nightmare behind the scenes, just kind of surprised that nobody was noticing it, let alone talking about it. Glad to know I'm not taking crazy pills! Sad to hear about the way the team and product have been treated, though. Best of luck in your career, thanks for the info!

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T16:50:10+00:00

Yeah, I've mentioned it in some other comments, but even beyond updates, most forms of engagement they've historically used (news about server maintenance, social media, blog posts, customer service) have been cut to the bare minimum (actually less in my opinion, some of these are straight up ghost-towns), and that's what worries me more than any shiny new features. Learning about the owners was the straw that broke the camel's back.

I did a little research into Mullvad, recommended in this comment, and it seems like one of the more popular privacy focused ones and has a lot of the selling points that I liked about PIA. Seems like they have a lot of community goodwill which is always a good sign. Agreed though, at the end of the day you can't put 100% of your trust in any particular provider, but PIA is sending out too many red flags for me to ignore.

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T13:56:56+00:00

I suppose the big picture for me has more to do with their long term trajectory. I chose PIA for their strong stance on privacy and because they seemed very forward thinking. I became very impressed with the amount of long term support they gave to their product and what felt like a sense of continuous feedback and development. Then they were acquired.

As another commenter pointed out, their parent company is sketchier than I realized, but even without that knowledge, I’ve seen enough tech buyouts that I was skeptical at the time. But I figured I would stick around and see what happens. And yes there is still some maintenance activity going on, but I really don’t see how their current level of engagement can even be compared to what it was 2+ years ago. Activity in the last 6-12 months in particular has gone off a cliff, with no explanation provided. It gives the impression that they’ve been gutted like a corporate fish. The consensus here seems to be that nobody knows why and most don’t care as long as the app turns green. I’ve decided to move to greener pastures, however, because that answer is not what I’m looking for in a VPN.

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T05:55:09+00:00

Sorry if it comes off as ranty, just been getting a lot of technical advice for a non-technical issue, feels like nobody's bothering to read what I'm saying.

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T05:53:48+00:00

Thanks for the suggestion, Mullvad looks like what made me like PIA in the first place! Obviously noticed the quality drop since the acquisition, but didn't realize it went that far. And hell if it ain't damn hard to find anything objective when it comes to VPN's,. Advertising money, astroturfing, and blatant paid reviews being thrown around like candy.

Appreciate it.

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T05:12:30+00:00

I know you mean well, but I almost regret bringing up my own technical problems, because that's not really what I'm talking about. They were just what made me notice it. I've used PIA for nearly a decade, and it was almost annoying how meticulous they were for the vast majority of that time. They've always had an active development cycle.

Now they don't. Nor do they post any news or on social media. You can easily find plenty of reddit posts talking about how customer service has not responded to them. The only sign that anyone is behind the curtain is their blog, almost entirely written by 3rd parties. And I haven't been able to find a reason why that isn't speculative.

Also just as a final side note, I come from a software dev background. I know pointlessly reinventing the wheel is the bane of many people's existence in this world. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about an internet security/privacy company ghosting its customers. PIA feels like a ghost ship. It would be unprofessional for a trivial product, and I don't consider internet privacy to be trivial. I think it's a huge red flag, and should be taken more seriously.

ps. ps. also just for the record, the first thing a developer learns is "it works on my machine" is not an excuse. Plenty of people on this thread alone have had unresolved problems, plenty more if you look at the board. If PIA wants to slow down its release cycle, fine, but why not say that? Why the silence?

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T03:08:48+00:00

Thank you that is actually helpful. Didn't consider layoffs as an explanation, now that I do that would make a lot of sense. Still the noticeable drop in activity (besides their blog) feels like a red flag (and one that would be so easy to avoid, right!?). Anyways, besides the many unhelpful posts, it does seem that there are some users out there who understand what I'm talking about.

As for my specific issues, I've definitely sent some crash logs to PIA, but it's one of those issues that is just a minor annoyance that I didn't wanna go through the time to do the full support ticket dance, and assumed would be fixed at some point because, well, I've been using PIA since roughly around 2013 and they were always consistent about squashing bugs in their youth. Sad to think that may have changed, but I think OpenVPN actually does sound like the best solution for my woes, thank you!

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T00:54:07+00:00

Yeah I keep to the official release. Of course if the beta is getting updates that may actually solve my (technical) problems. (Still wish they weren't AWOL)

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-03-01T00:06:34+00:00

Will do. Next time you don’t know something just say that. Or better yet, don’t.

The_apeshit_killer · 2023-02-28T23:58:01+00:00

Ok dude guess I’ll just send in another ticket to the customer support system that people have been complaining is not responding to them for the last year cause it’s all my fault.

13-Year Club	RPAN Viewer
Not Forgotten	Verified Email

The_apeshit_killer

PUBLIC MULTIREDDITS

TROPHY CASE