Videogames: Spooktober Season

[Werthead]

FF7R remains good and I'm pleased at how the chaotic-seeming battle system eventually does evolve more into the strategic system from the original game with all the same options intact. A shame there isn't a proper turn-based mode. I could swear at one point they said there would be one included, but I can see an option for it.

However, the stringing out of the raid on Reactor 5 is pretty absurd. Between jumping off the train and getting into Reactor 5 in the OG game is maybe 10 minutes max? It's now about 2 hours, and includes a lengthy sequence running through very similar rooms fighting very similar rooms like it's OG Halo, then another bit crawling around the underbelly of the plate switching off power towers and then the Airbuster (a fairly moderate boss in the OG game) is now some kind of insane mega-boss-fight from hell. It's entertaining, but long-winded.

I could see why it made sense to add more content to areas of the game they had to recreate in a very expensive manner, like the 7th Heaven slums, and I assume the later towns in the wilderness, but this was just a bit weird.

Anyway, after falling through the church, I've now properly met Aerith. Massive nostalgia here, they've taken the church from the original game and completely rendered it faithfully in 3D. Extremely impressive. I hope it doesn't take 3 hours to get out of the Sector 5 Slums, I remember that could go on a bit in the original game as it was.

2 hours ago, Toth said:

Ah, fuck. So my expectation of not being able to run Red Dead Redemption got severely turned on its head: It just finished downloading GTA V and... it runs smooth as butter. Damn... Heads off to Rockstar, that's how you do a console port! Makes me wonder why Saints Row runs as shitty as it does with all the constant micro-stutters.

Also damn: I thought I get oddly disinhibited to cursing when writing in English, but that game's dialogue is in a whole different league. For some reason I immediately wondered how hilarious the game would be with BLEEP's instead. It would be all BLEEP all the BLEEEPing time!

What Saint's Row game is it? Several of them still have Denuvo (copy-protection system from hell) enabled and that causes a lot of microstuttering. Rockstar didn't use Denuvo or disabled it years ago.

Red Dead Redemption 2 was bugged to hell and gone when it was released on PC, but I believe it's been fixed since then.

[Kalbear]

I had real hopes for old world to do that better version of civ endgame and have the neat family and leader management, but it isn't there. The AI makes war almost immediately and is brutally hard and the UI is just trash. 

[Toth]

5 hours ago, Werthead said:

What Saint's Row game is it? Several of them still have Denuvo (copy-protection system from hell) enabled and that causes a lot of microstuttering. Rockstar didn't use Denuvo or disabled it years ago.

Red Dead Redemption 2 was bugged to hell and gone when it was released on PC, but I believe it's been fixed since then.

Saints Row 3 Remastered that was given away for free quite a while back. After my post I googled it and it seems I have quite a common problem (especially when everyone mentioned that it only stutters if you are moving, but it's fine when when you stand around). There is a distinct possibility it only hates AMD cards.

[Werthead]

11 hours ago, Toth said:

Saints Row 3 Remastered that was given away for free quite a while back. After my post I googled it and it seems I have quite a common problem (especially when everyone mentioned that it only stutters if you are moving, but it's fine when when you stand around). There is a distinct possibility it only hates AMD cards.

SR3R definitely has Denuvo present, so that's almost certainly the cause. They'll probably remove it at some point.

[Fez]

Less gaming than a general PC tech question (for the PC I game on), but I've been trying to upgrade to Windows 11 and the PC Health App doesn't seem to be working. At first it told me I wasn't eligible to upgrade because TPM 2.0 wasn't enabled, so I went into the BIOS and enabled it. But now when I run the app it just says 

"To see if this PC can run Windows 11, check the system specifications, or ask the company that manufactured your PC."

and the only button I can click on takes me to a Microsoft site that just says

"We’re doing some extra testing to make sure Windows 11 is ready for certain PCs—yours included."

Am I genuinely not able to upgrade yet or is this some sort of weird error that can be solved?

[Derfel Cadarn]

Completed Resident Evil 2 and 3 (the remakes).

Elite Dangerous: Got promoted to Earl in the Imperial Navy. Spent most of my 110 mill credits on an Alliance Chieftain, or more specifically, refitting it. Still need to trace a better power plant, and rework the weapons.

Tried my VR headset but the processor box isnt powering, so need to send to Sony for repair

[Gorn]

3 hours ago, Fez said:

Less gaming than a general PC tech question (for the PC I game on), but I've been trying to upgrade to Windows 11 and the PC Health App doesn't seem to be working. At first it told me I wasn't eligible to upgrade because TPM 2.0 wasn't enabled, so I went into the BIOS and enabled it. But now when I run the app it just says 

"To see if this PC can run Windows 11, check the system specifications, or ask the company that manufactured your PC."

and the only button I can click on takes me to a Microsoft site that just says

"We’re doing some extra testing to make sure Windows 11 is ready for certain PCs—yours included."

Am I genuinely not able to upgrade yet or is this some sort of weird error that can be solved?

No, this is just Microsoft intentionally slowing down their rollout while they are patching it and finishing it. You can wait until it's your PC's "turn" (sometime in the "early 2022"), or you can manually download it and install it from their website: https://www.microsoft.com/software-download/windows11

I did the manual install on my work laptop out of curiosity. I did get some weird bugs while using Outlook. With my home PC, I decided to wait, since I have no compelling reason to upgrade.

[Werthead]

Yeah, I'm not even thinking of Windows 11 until my next PC upgrade. Seems way too much of a headache for absolutely no gain at the moment.

[Rhom]

53 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Yeah, I'm not even thinking of Windows 11 until my next PC upgrade. Seems way too much of a headache for absolutely no gain at the moment.

Yeah... I went ahead and upgraded at home, but as far as I can tell all it did was move my pinned icons to the middle of the bottom task bar and pimped the Microsoft Gaming Service really hard. 

[Denvek]

4 minutes ago, Rhom said:

Yeah... I went ahead and upgraded at home, but as far as I can tell all it did was move my pinned icons to the middle of the bottom task bar and pimped the Microsoft Gaming Service really hard. 

There's an option somewhere to move all your icons back to the left where they belong - that's what I've done.

[Rhom]

26 minutes ago, Denvek said:

There's an option somewhere to move all your icons back to the left where they belong - that's what I've done.

Good to know!  I just now found out that I could move my search bar back from the bottom up to the top where it belongs after the last iOS update for my phone!

[Fez]

21 hours ago, Gorn said:

No, this is just Microsoft intentionally slowing down their rollout while they are patching it and finishing it. You can wait until it's your PC's "turn" (sometime in the "early 2022"), or you can manually download it and install it from their website: https://www.microsoft.com/software-download/windows11

I did the manual install on my work laptop out of curiosity. I did get some weird bugs while using Outlook. With my home PC, I decided to wait, since I have no compelling reason to upgrade.

Oh fun. I'm not in any rush to get W11 at least; I just reminded it existed and figured "why not?" I also wonder if the issue is that I have an OEM license of Windows (originally 7, which I upgraded to 10), which has caused problems before. When I had to swap out my CPU and motherboard two years ago I had to dig up my receipts from 2014 before they would remote activate Windows for me.

Back in actual gaming, the Steam sale is supposed to start today, and I'm off work the next 12 days so I might pick something up if anything on my wishlist actually gets a decent sale; I feel like 20% off is the most I see these days on the games I still want. I do have plenty to play already though, so it's not a huge loss if nothing catches my eye. There's also FF7 Remake, but $70 (or $60 with the Epic coupon) just seems like too much for a bad port of a game almost 2 years old.

[Gorn]

4 minutes ago, Fez said:

Oh fun. I'm not in any rush to get W11 at least; I just reminded it existed and figured "why not?" I also wonder if the issue is that I have an OEM license of Windows (originally 7, which I upgraded to 10), which has caused problems before. When I had to swap out my CPU and motherboard two years ago I had to dig up my receipts from 2014 before they would remote activate Windows for me.

Yeah, I'm not doing anything too exotic with my Windows 11 work laptop, but I had visual issues with Outlook and issues with Skype continuously crashing on me, neither of which happened before the OS upgrade. Considering that Outlook and Skype are both Microsoft programs that should be working smoothly with a Microsoft OS, I'm not too eager to try it with third-party videogames.

[IlyaP]

Can't handle large games at the moment. Revisiting the Wheel of Time fps from the late 90s. Such a gorgeous game.

[Argonath Diver]

The Steam sale has some really juicy deals! I definitely don't need to spend money on games I'll very likely play less than 20 hours of before returning to my grindy ARPG habits. Argh.

Finally grabbed Hades after all this time, just 16 bucks. I think there's a great chance I'm too weak a player to be very successful with it, but I damn sure will enjoy it.

[Kalbear]

I'm a total shit player and did fine with hades. 

[Derfel Cadarn]

9 hours ago, IlyaP said:

Can't handle large games at the moment. Revisiting the Wheel of Time fps from the late 90s. Such a gorgeous game.

Yes. Though weird that there was ao much terangreal just lying about

[Argonath Diver]

1 hour ago, Kalsandra said:

I'm a total shit player and did fine with hades. 

It's as fun as I knew it'd be, that's for sure. I don't think I'll get very far simply because I'm a terribly haphazard player with like 20,000 hours in mindless isometric ARPGs, so one where I have to actually worry about position instead of blowing up screens willy nilly is a tough go for me. I did manage to get Meg, who I imagine is the simplest of mini-bosses, down to like 75% health on my third try (? fourth? heck), though I haven't figured out any of her attack patterns at all.

As long as I'm hearing new dialogue in my short runs to slam my face into her weapon, it's fun enough. Maybe I can brute force my way through with enough gradual powerups plus a lucky run. I've seen some of the much harder bosses and frankly I don't stand a chance. What a gorgeous game, though.

[Ran]

18 minutes ago, Argonath Diver said:

As long as I'm hearing new dialogue in my short runs to slam my face into her weapon, it's fun enough. Maybe I can brute force my way through with enough gradual powerups plus a lucky run. I've seen some of the much harder bosses and frankly I don't stand a chance. What a gorgeous game, though.

You'll definitely find it easier as time goes by, the system is really clever that way.

[IlyaP]

1 hour ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

Yes. Though weird that there was ao much terangreal just lying about

Like children and Legos!