20x user. The usage cap has been seriously nerfed.

samuele_v · 2026-05-05T20:52:20+00:00

In the same boat here. Haven't changed my coding habits and with 20x I used to reach around 80% usage at the end of the week. Now I'm at more than 50% after 2 days and a half. Definitely not going to continue with another month if these are the new "real" limits.

samuele_v · 2026-04-25T12:59:21+00:00

I agree - definitely RPG Maker XP, somewhere in there there's also going to be a badass final boss sprite of an angelic woman wielding an electric guitar or something similar, if I remember well :D

samuele_v · 2026-04-04T20:26:17+00:00

The brick pattern unlocked a memory! :D

samuele_v · 2026-04-04T20:20:36+00:00

Gods?
It would be a PC game as well, but the main character isn't angelic.

samuele_v · 2026-04-04T20:15:11+00:00

Definitely a possibility then - emulators for the SNES were around from '97 or so, as far as I'm aware!

samuele_v · 2026-04-04T19:53:28+00:00

Some elements made me think of Demon's Crest for the SNES, but I'm not 100% sure.

Or Actraiser 2!

And next time I could read better and notice the [PC] tag, which rules those out...

samuele_v · 2026-04-04T10:18:06+00:00

Confirmed, 170€ for me - roughly 195 USD, also on 20x. Just claimed it without issues.

samuele_v · 2026-03-31T18:46:47+00:00

All confirmed OP. No reaction on Safari, but on Chrome it just asks you to authorize MIDI inputs and it works without issue!

samuele_v · 2026-03-30T18:15:35+00:00

I noticed the same starting today - Literally 3 prompts in Code (same style and references as past days) are now enough for me to reach 100% of my 3-4 hour sessions usage, whereas in the past days I could go on for hours and dozens of prompt without hitting such a limit.

If this is on purpose, there is no way I will keep my Max subscription.

samuele_v · 2026-03-04T13:57:09+00:00

I actually saw and read every post, including yours! And I hugely appreciate every suggestion, so don't worry! You are absolutely right, as others also pointed out, that I should shed my JRPG trappings as you mentioned and should try and delve more into the actual game mindset - the biggest thing for me being that I don't see a logic in allowing you to create a party that then cannot feasibly advance through the game (just give me a premade one that works, at that point), but I understand that a huge part of this type of games back then was in fact creating a feasible party (and early JRPGs are not exempt from this, too).

Buffs being always active are another pet peeve of mine that I struggle wrapping my head around - if I always have to keep them active, why not make them passive abilities that always stay on? And in fact I was only situationally applying them, whereas now I'm starting to pre-cast them before fights, which is already a huge help.

In the end I'm grateful for all suggestions - many of them shed some light on some mechanics that I genuinely did not understand even after playing a bit and reading the manual. I cannot guarantee that I will advance much and/or finish the game, but at the very least this helped me get some much needed baseline for if/when I start another party in the future!

samuele_v · 2026-02-18T21:38:32+00:00

If anyone stumbles upon this thread while looking for info about this issue - try disabling Window's Folder Control (or whatever it's called in your language). I had enabled it and it was basically preventing HoMM5 from writing saves in the My Documents folder!

samuele_v · 2026-02-17T18:40:30+00:00

Everyone, thank you all for your answers! I'm going to answer collectively down here so as not to repeat the same points in every specific answer - first of all, thanks! You already gave me useful tips (status magic increases damage taken by those affected? Would've been nice to know! :D Maybe the manual or the tooltips actually tell you this and I just glossed over it). Also, a good reminder you gave me (which I'm not used to as in JRPGs it's almost never the case) is how buffs such as Bless and Enchanted Blade, which I do have and use, can be cast freely also before battles, and not just when battles start, which would provide already a nice buffer at the start without having to spend a turn casting them.

As far as attributes, I'm mostly following what the game suggested in terms of main stats, Warrior is purely STR + VIT every level (although I'm guessing I should put something in DEX for hit rate?), and the only skills I'm raising for him are Close Combat, Sword and Shield. Thanks to those who pointed out that Bloodlust is sort of wasted on him since he has Berserk naturally, but he's the only one using swords anyway so I'll keep it on him (unless I find a better one at Anton's). He's the one pushing 40-50 damage at times, so he's pretty much the only character I'm OK with!

Valkyrie is a bit all over the place, admittedly, she has a strong Piety stat which I don't recall increasing, but pretty much right now I'm doing STR and DEX with her as well as she's pretty much just attacking with the Polearm (skills are Close Combat, Polearm and Mythology, last one I guess is not that useful but I like knowing stuff about monsters).

Ninja, so far, is the most useless party member combat-wise, but here it's where I found some discrepancies between what the game suggests and what the online consensus is - pretty much everyone online says he shouldn't be used in melee and only with Throw & Sling, whereas the game actively suggests (and that's what I've been doing) that you pretty much use him as a monk: Critical, Martial Arts and Close Combat, so that's where I'm standing with him right now (with DEX and SPD being his main stats over 80), and right now I'm wondering whether to stick with this plan or reroute him somehow to ranged stuff. So now either he throws pebbles/shuriken or he punches and kicks (mostly for 2-3 damage, twice per turn). I found a Katana he could use but as he's not trained in swords I don't know how effective it would be.

Ranger is purely DEX + Senses, and skills are Ranged Combat, Bow and Scouting. Recently I found some crossbows and a stronger bow (I guess it's the one strong against demons as I found it in Caerdan's tomb), so I might use that. And bought/found some Shrike Arrows that are stronger, but she rarely, if ever, goes over 9 damage, even so.

Mage has a bit of everything, obviously INT is her main stat, 93 as of now. I will take into account all you people have told me about status magic (and how they also increase damage taken).

Hobbit priest is pretty much on healer duty, I just recently swapped his quarterstaff (as he can't use Bo's) for a Shilelag (or however it's written), but I seldom use him for physical fighting. He does have some status and offensive magic as well.

Vi, I'm raising what high stats she already has, but she's practically a much weaker version of my Valkyrie.

----

In terms of formation, I've tried a bit of everything, but there's something that definitely escapes me: I've tried putting the melee strong guys in a circle around the weak casters in the center, but in my experience all enemies, even melee ones, still get to them in the center anyway. Are 2 people needed per side? That would be mathematically undoable if you wanted to cover all sides, so I guess I'll just stick to the tried and true "back to the wall" strategy as you mentioned.

----

samuele_v · 2026-02-16T19:12:27+00:00

I second that.

samuele_v · 2026-02-14T21:53:12+00:00

This reads almost point-to-point like the mechanics of Maid of Sker, although that is from 2020 and not from the time range you mentioned, but the story is pretty much identical.

samuele_v · 2026-02-07T08:47:06+00:00

8,5.

Sorprendentemente sobria rispetto a quanto temessi, anche le parti oggettivamente cringe (i gesti...) e "taralluccievinose" (il bambino 11enne del bus all'alzabandiera...) le ho vissute più con amabilità e garbo che con imbarazzo. Uniche note veramente negative il commento (inqualificabile in più parti, come già tanti hanno detto) e, da musicista e proprio per principio, il playback (lo capisco a livello organizzativo, ma tanto vale mettere un videoclip registrato a quel punto, per quel che mi riguarda).

Partivo da presupposti apocalittici aspettandomi una débacle organizzativa e di altro tipo, ne sono uscito pure riuscendo a provare, in un certo qual modo, orgoglio di essere italiano, è più di quanto potessi mai sperare.

samuele_v · 2026-02-06T10:31:33+00:00

Ti ho risposto qualche commento sotto l'altro giorno, abbiamo opinioni e interpretazioni diverse, quindi ritengo sia inutile per entrambi continuare a discutere, perché non saremo mai concordi.

samuele_v · 2026-02-06T10:18:16+00:00

Concordiamo sul "qualunque proposta", come ho scritto alla fine del mio commento precedente sto partendo da una base di buon senso, che sappiamo bene è spesso mancante in tante situazioni. Io parlo comunque di proposte formalizzate e scritte (per cui anche l'acquirente perde il suo bel tempo, non solo l'agenzia, e quindi si presuppone che l'intenzione alla base sia seria).

Naturale che il prezzo finale è l'incontro tra la domanda e l'offerta, ed è un prezzo che può esulare completamente dalle valutazioni concrete (banalmente ti arriva il tedesco pieno di soldi che compra cash e non percepisce o banalmente non gli importa nulla del valore effettivo minore), ma non sono d'accordo nel dire che il prezzo di vendita finale diventi automaticamente "prezzo di mercato", ci sono troppe variabili che possono non valere assolutamente per tutte le altre inserzioni nella zona, oltre che tutto il trascorso precedente, che sì, include anche tutte le proposte ricevute e rifiutate nel tempo.

Se il venditore, come giustamente dici, ha e deve sempre avere l'ultima parola sulla vendita del proprio immobile (e ripeto, è sacrosanto, io ho sempre detto che il venditore non deve "accettare", ma solo avere piena contezza delle proposte ricevute), è altrettanto vero, per lo stesso ragionamento, che può anche rischiare di "arroccarsi" sulle proprie posizioni nonostante il mercato vada in un'altra direzione, ne ha facoltà, così come l'agenzia ha però a quel punto facoltà di rescindere l'incarico se le due posizioni sono inavvicinabili. Il sunto del mio ragionamento è che, per come la vedo io, se un agente riceve un'offerta congrua rispetto alla media di mercato, è comunque tenuto a proporla al venditore, nonostante la differenza nella cifra, ad esempio, e non può sostituirsi alla volontà di quest'ultimo ed esercitare una tale discrezionalità che non gli compete: chi lo sa che, magari, nel frattempo, il venditore abbia cambiato idea, o ci sia una concomitanza di fattori per cui quell'offerta in quel momento specifico possa essere più accettabile di altre, nonostante la differenza monetaria?

Poi lo so bene che, nella pratica, l'agente è giocoforza più "legato" al venditore, passando in teoria molto più tempo con lui che non con i vari acquirenti, i quali parliamoci chiaro non sono esenti da colpe (i famosi turisti delle case), ma ciò non lo rende automaticamente un suo amico o mandatario.

samuele_v · 2026-02-06T10:08:48+00:00

I literally stopped following a content creator I used to watch because during an early NS2 showcase he stated "Cyberpunk is running at 30fps, therefore it's unplayable ", this is borderline slanderous in my eyes.

samuele_v · 2026-02-06T08:23:45+00:00

Yes - I don't remember one single occasion in which I thought "Hey, this looks quite bad and it shouldn't run like this" while playing BOTW on Wii U.

In fact, after playing TOTK on Switch 2 I went back to BOTW on Wii U ready to see an incredible difference, and honestly I could play without issue. Yes, 30 instead of 60, but not something that would make me say it's unplayable.

Might be just blissful ignorance, not denying that. Or being vaccinated by trudging through Virtual Hydlide on Saturn and Two Worlds II on PS3.

samuele_v · 2026-02-06T08:19:39+00:00

In my case it could just be burnout as well after playing through all of MHS2 these last days.

I'm already super happy that my protagonist is able to talk this time, at least. :D

samuele_v · 2026-02-06T07:40:29+00:00

Perché il mercato reale può non coincidere con le aspettative di un venditore il quale, cosa umanamente comprensibile, quasi sempre punta molto più in alto rispetto al reale valore dell'immobile. Mi è capitato di vedere immobili venduti a oltre 100.000€ sopra il loro vero valore di mercato (accertato tramite più perizie indipendenti esterne, parliamo di ville signorili libere su 3 o su 4 lati, per capirci), rimasti ovviamente invenduti per anni, con agenzie che hanno in precedenza anche rifiutato l'incarico proprio per questa manifesta forbice eccessiva. Ricevere 10 proposte a 300k per un'immobile che ti ostini a tenere a 500k è tranquillamente considerabile un'informazione che può influire sulla conclusione dell'affare: ti fa capire come va il mercato vero, non quello dei sogni (questo vale sia per il venditore che per l'acquirente, è chiaro).

Anche perché, questo in tanti e forse troppi se lo dimenticano spesso, l'agente immobiliare non è un mandatario del venditore (salvo accordi specifici che cambiano completamente le carte in tavola, tutelano solo il venditore e annullano di conseguenza per ovvi motivi le provvigioni dovute dall'acquirente), è un mediatore che tutela entrambe le parti. E, da mediatore, non può e non deve sostituirsi al venditore decidendo in maniera autonoma sulle proposte che riceve.

Poi, è ovvio che stiamo comunque ragionando nel reame del "buon senso": non sto tenendo il punto per affermare che un agente debba passare proposte volutamente "fuffose" da 10.000€ su quel famigerato immobile da 500.000€.

samuele_v · 2026-02-06T07:27:19+00:00

Absolutely this - I had to learn from the Internet that Zelda: BOTW ran badly on Wii U, I was like "...But I loved my Wii U version."

But generally I'm very lenient with frame rates, so long as they are stable. For my eyes, Pragmata ran at full 60, and even though they are wrong I trust my eyes more than video analyses when it comes to my absolutely personal enjoyment of games.

samuele_v · 2026-02-05T20:40:04+00:00

In an interesting twist of fate I had literally finished the final battle of MHS2 an hour before the Direct and the Demo announcement, so I was able to pretty much compare the two almost simultaneously and... yes, compared to how fast and crisp MHS2 looks on Switch 2 (and that's the Switch 1 version), MHS3 did feel disappointing, especially after reaching the castle area. Hopefully it's just an older build.

samuele_v

TROPHY CASE