The OpenAL issue was actually pretty easy to diagnose and fix. The crash comes with a pretty detailed log indicating the game encountered an issue when OpenAL was trying to load. And, lo and behold, staring at me was a checkbox in Prism Launcher’s options to “Use System OpenAL.” I ticked it and haven’t had a single issue since, my guess is that the launchers bundled version of OpenAL just didn’t play nice with my system.

I’ve even manually added a few mods since installing, still no issues.

I do understand where you’re coming from though, I personally enjoy tinkering and problem solving almost as much as actually using my computer. It’s a learning experience for me and makes my computer really feel like my own at the end of the day. However I totally get that not being everyones cup of tea.

Yes of course this is a huge factor, but modding games in general tends to be a sticking point. The fact that I immediately had a heavily modded game up and running via a third party launcher with only one minor issue, which was fixed via a single checkbox, was just a really nice experience.

72% platinum and gold, 86% plat, gold and silver. I’m honestly surprised that this isn’t higher because almost everything I play just works (I do have a lot of random games in my account from humble bundles and such, so I don’t even play a good amount of them).

Funny enough what I’ve been playing recently is Minecraft. Downloaded the Prism launcher, linked my account, installed the game and the BetterMC modpack which includes pretty heavy lighting shaders, get an easy 120fps with absolutely zero tinkering besides telling the game to use my systems OpenAL rather than the bundled one, as that was causing a crash. I do have a relatively beefy system so the performance isn’t what I’m impressed by, moreso the fact that this was all up and running in 5 minutes.

You can configure your OS to boot directly into Steam Big Picture mode, then add lutris/heroic as non steam games.

Same boat here. RaspberryPi running LibreElec, which is okay but can be unstable and lacks power. Been looking at an AMD 4x4 pc to boost performance and run some form of full Linux distro.

Ground Branch for me. Love the old Rainbow Six games, and I find that newer tactical shooters in general just don’t hit the mark for me. GB still has a long way to go but actually has some original R6 devs at the helm and has an excellent core experience so far, and it’s only getting better.

I know, I know. Just making a point. They could be doing better things that actually build good faith.

Early access definitely has its place. I’ve bought several EA games I really enjoy, and it’s kind of rewarding seeing something go from basic and threadbare to a more complete picture, and knowing I was a part of that is satisfying. I’ve also been burned by EA too, so it’s a double sided coin.

Them issuing C&D after C&D costs their legal team time and money they could be using to, idk, trademark new IPs or license third parties for libraries and music. It also hurts their PR.

I think platforms like patreon are the real way forward. If you have a product or service that people want, you can even offer it for free, but people will support you financially if they believe in what you’re doing. The added beauty of this is that there really is no upper limit. You could add an “ultra platinum” tier for $150 a month and one wealthy investor could make a huge difference in your project.

Also, I don’t even think ads are the devil. I get why they exist, and I understand why they make so much money. I’m fine being advertised to, because I know what I’m interested in and am very skeptical. I think I’ve had one ad sway me into buying a product I’d never heard of until that point. What I do hate is when the actual advertised product takes a backseat to the massive amounts of data harvesting/brokerage that comes with the advertising industry.

I would rather pay an upfront fee, or even a subscription of some kind than have this crap shoved in my nose. I’m firmly in the camp of believing there’s nothing wrong with closed software that the devs want to earn money from, but this modern method is so fucking annoying I’ll use basically anything else

You make good points. I’ve worked on a couple cars before but bikes require much less space, time and money.

Also, just keep in mind the process of making batteries for electric cars. Lithium mines are by no means clean and cause lots of deforestation.

Personally I’m really hoping we see a bigger uptick in Hydrogen powered vehicles, seeing as in theory, any gasoline car can be converted, plus our current repair facilities and methods will mostly carry over. It makes a lot more sense to me to adapt what we have than to uproot and start over from scratch.

I’m blanking on specifics but I know I’ve seen a few examples of “dark web” criminals being narrowed in on by means of analyzing their writing styles and comparing them to other accounts. I want to say this played into Robert Ulbricht (the main guy behind the original Silk Road) being arrested

Same here with my 84 KZ550. I just started work on a partial rebuild after it had sat for 2 years. I’ve learned a tremendous amount about engines, suspension, electrical, etc, and had tons of fun doing it (and of course also had many cursing fits).

I definitely could have gotten a different bike for the amount I’ve put into it, one that I actually could have ridden from day one, but this one is my bike. Practically every bolt has been looked over by me, I can’t say that about basically anything else I own.

I’ve looked into multiple modded camera apps and was disappointed with all options.

OpenCamera is the best alternate camera app I’ve tried so far. This is just my 2 cents.

Out of the box experience is valuable though. No every user wants to tinker for an afternoon to make a system suit their needs. Some want to install and go, nothing wrong with that.

Bethesda had absolutely nothing to do with “ruining skyrim mods”. Bethesda built the game for Windows, not Linux, it’s not their fault the game has issues running mods on a platform it wasn’t intended to run on. This is like saying “fuck toyota” because your gasoline car won’t run on diesel.

As an aside, you absolutely can mod Skyrim on Linux, with USSEP and SKSE. With one quick google search I found multiple guides.

Succumb to your temptations… skip dual booting and vms… nuke your Windows partition with Gentoo… you know you want to

Honestly, take away the PR blunders, bloatware, privacy nightmares, and ads, and I really just dislike how Windows works.

The file structure is the main one that really made me feel like Roddy Piper putting on the glasses. I was perfectly happy shambling around between Program Files this and LocalAppData that. As soon as I understood how logical and elegant the file structures that Linux uses is, there’s no way I could ever go back.

Also, things like Settings, Device Manager, Control panel, and 2 or 3 other separate GUIs all containing A, the same settings 6 times over, or B, all containing different settings that should be consolidated. It’s almost as if Microsoft can’t stick with a design language or feature scope to save their lives, but they also can’t get away with completely removing these old GUIs, so they just bury them and add another on top.

However, I can’t say I actually hate Windows. I cut my teeth in computing on XP, and I see XPs DNA all over modern Windows (the aforementioned Control Panel being a remnant). I think without all the added garbage, Windows is actually an incredibly powerful, albiet obtuse and frustrating, piece of software.

Case on his Ono-Sendai