Technology

A Game Of Musical Hard Drives

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I’ve been playing with 8TB of disc space today. I’ve been transferring my primary Steam drive since early this morning in alphabetical segments. I have almost every single part of my library installed on Windows (which makes it equally handy to just copy games over for quick Proton tests, life’s good being your own Steam game repository for other computers on the network) and it takes awhile to move 2TB of shit into a 4TB space, currently on the letter T as I write this.

I’m going to do a little digital house keeping and rearrange my drive structure, take out two of my 1TB drives and replace them with two 4TB’s, and just use 1TB drives for hot swapping or OS tests, any other mad act of science I can think of…

The rest of my day has been pretty quiet and mundane, the weather has been keeping me indoors sipping tea poured from my flowering teapot. Been awhile since I’ve had a flowering tea, its creme brulee green tea, highly recommend it.

Also would like to mention that I think I’ve confirmed that my crashing issues are the power supply. We plugged my Vega into my Dad’s gaming setup and it ran with flying colors. Played for well over an hour without a single crash or screen tear. He was happy for more than that reason though. He’s still on an x58 chipset and my RX Vega64 ran in his system without choking, apparently it is possible depending on the motherboard and BIOS you’re using. He updated his BIOS recently and it gave him UEFI support, which I think made it possible to run my GPU in his system. Yesterday was a good day all around, and it’ll be better when that damned power supply shows up, here’s to tomorrow I guess.

I also got some more of my Christmas shopping done. I’m thinking all that’s left will be gifts of the digital variety…

 

Another Miniature “Console” Joins The Battle

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Ok, this trend of miniature game consoles was cute when it first launched… but now it’s getting ridiculous.

Yes, this is real. On launch it will cost $99 and come with at least 30 games according to their Q&A. I seriously don’t know where to begin; to this day I still play games from the MSDOS era (Wolf3D being one of the more recent ones), and have even installed DOSBOX on my Amazon Fire for my own small amusement. Why would you spend almost $100 to get a tiny box that plays some of the oldest old school games that ever did old school, when you can do the same thing on hardware you already own? Including smartphones? If you do a search on ebay for a raspberry pi kit you’ll immediately see cheaper options for building your own.

You could also argue that people might want to buy these because they don’t have the time to build their own, or don’t have the knowledge of using a raspberry pi and installing operating systems and then configuring them to start/run accordingly. Normally I would agree, but most of the people that I knew growing up who liked to play MSDOS games were already people who tinkered with their PC’s, whereas with consoles you just plugged them in and inserted a cartridge/disc… done like dinner.

Can’t I just buy a Raspberry Pi, an enclosure, gamepad, keyboard, and mouse, 3D print a faceplate, install Armbian, buy 30+ games, build the source for ARM or install/configure in DOSBox for each and every game, create a menu system with game art, and tell everyone about it at parties?

No.

Don’t tell me what I can and can’t do! :zorak: I’ve actually been reading up more on Raspberry Pi’s and have contemplated getting some sort of kit… possibly of the portable variety. I’m just not sure what I would use it for. Perhaps make my own tablet if my Kindle catches fire?

Happy 6th Anniversary to Steam On Linux

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It was six years ago today that Steam announced that they were working on a beta client for Linux. The beta was limited to only a little over 60,000, though later on in the month they would invite another 5,000, and I was among one of those that was honored to receive an invitation. I installed Ubuntu as that was the recommended Linux distro at the time, and began using Linux as a desktop alternative to Windows on the side much as I do now but with Mint instead, as well as Fedora and CentOS over the years.

I remember my library only having a couple of GoldSrc titles in it, but eventually that would expand and improve. Looking at back when I started, and then looking at my library today things have changed dramatically. I have more options for gaming under Linux thanks to certain developers keeping Linux in mind, the introduction to Vulkan (formerly AMD’s Mantle graphics api)and Proton as an added compatibility option to play Windows games under Linux. I can now look at my library and have access to a good chunk of it despite platforms, and depending on an older game it can sometimes run better under Proton instead.

This has also lead to other programs being developed under Linux, such as OBS Studio for making it easier for gamers to record their gameplay. There are also now more video editors for Linux (the video I released yesterday was entirely edited on the Linux version of Shotcut, as well as some others I have planned ahead).

These changes and improvements over the years may not have come at a fast pace, Windows may still hold the crown for PC Gaming, but people need to remember that Windows wasn’t always considered a gaming platform either. There were people like me back in the day having to exit Windows to use DOS which still had a larger game library at the time.

For some people who only play certain games, and having those games available on Linux could be a game changer for them. Me? As I’ve said many times before I still have certain things holding me back from switching completely… But I am using it now more than ever. If something becomes available under Linux, and it runs just as well if not better, that’s one less reason for me to use Windows.

The Stream Deck Be Mine, Yo.

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Nendoroid Not Included

The hardest part was trying to get it out of the mail box, the compartment my parcel was being stored in has a dirty or rusted lock. Had to use some WD40 and elbow grease to claim my new prized possession. I have it all set up for a future stream, those are my scenes and I also have a soundboard I put together. I’ll be adding more profiles and filling more buttons as the need rises. Unfortunately at this time there isn’t much support on the Linux side… But I have seen a toolkit developed for anyone else who has an interest in making this work in a Tux friendly environment. Until then this will have to be a Windows exclusive device. I would of liked to have done a stream today, but I was hella tired. I set this up, played Fallout 4 and at some point woke up in bed when I smelled dinner. Today was a rough day…

You can use this for more than just streaming too. I plan on programming it to use Shotcut keyboard shortcuts to make things a bit easier while editing, and perhaps make a default profile that launches programs. Between this and my G510 I’ll have macros for days. I’d like to do another stream soon, though tomorrow I won’t have much time. If I do stream it’ll definitely be a surprise to everyone including me.

Linux Continues To Make Big Headlines

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I know I’ve been talking about Linux lately, with the latest install, Steam’s Proton,, Vulkan among other things, but I’m not alone. Even someone at Forbes has been getting on the bandwagon. This is the second article I’ve seen there, and this time he interviewed the owner of Gaming On Linux, another website that I read quite frequently. They discuss the myths, pros and cons of using Linux vs Windows and its a really interesting read.

So how many games are actually available to play on Linux today? “That’s a little tricky, considering the amount of different stores that actually sell Linux games like Steam, GOG, itch.io, Humble Store and so on,” Dawe says. “Take Steam as an example, specifically looking at just games for Linux it shows me right now there’s 4,800 whereas Windows has 23,882. So on Steam specifically, we have about 20% of the library, which is incredible when a few years ago that was a big fat zero.”

In the last five years I too have seen a multitude of changes. I still remember when I made it into the Steam Linux Beta (I still wear my official TF2 Linux shirts with pride), I remember when there were only a few GoldSource games in my library and not much else, there was no way to really record your gameplay… but it was a starting point. As things progressed we soon found more and more games being ported, game recording programs such as SimpleScreenRecorder came onto the scene and eventually OBS started developing for more than just Windows; known back then as OBS Multi-platform before being known as OBS Studio as it is today, and now we have programs like PlayOnLinux and Lutris for us to play and use our non steam games. Wine has made great improvements over the years, we have DXVK now for running DirectX 11 and 12 via Vulkan, proper audio and video software to showcase our games just as we can under Windows. It isn’t perfect, and they even say that in the article, but Windows wasn’t always the godly OS for gaming. There was once a time when Direct X sucked, and eventually when it did improve they ignored PC users for several years in favor of their precious XBox.

The unofficial Steam Play Compatibility website has been tracking the testing of every Windows game now playable on Steam for Linux. To date, more than 3200 titles have been tested. Of those, nearly 1300 have received “Platinum” status, meaning they not only launch with the simple click of the “Install” button on Steam, but they also have Windows-level performance and framerates.

If you go with a distro like Mint, Ubuntu or a few others they make it really painless for you to get set up compared to how it used to be. This isn’t the case for everything under Linux, after all I did have to research what PPA to download my graphics drivers from, fortunately that information has become easier to find.

I’m seriously considering doing some video tutorials for people who might be interested in playing games on Linux, and Linux videos in general on top of the other videos I crank out. More people need to know that an alternative to Windows might be waiting for them, or at the very least to try dualbooting between Windows and your Linux distro of choice to see how you’ll fare under it. As I’ve stated quite a few times I’ve been staying more in Linux lately, in fact I only went into Windows once this week to do some Photoshop and play a couple games that don’t quite run well under Linux. Am I ready to ditch Windows 10? Not even close, but with the way things are going we may get there someday, or at least scare Microsoft enough to pull their heads out of their asses and make another Operating System that’s on par with WinXP or 7. :trollface:

Adobe narrows their OS scope

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This is one of the reasons why I don’t like subscription model software:

We want to give you advance notice that upcoming versions of the Adobe video and audio tools will require Windows 10 (version 1709, or higher) or macOS 10.12 (or higher) to run. This applies to the next major releases of Adobe Media Encoder, After Effects, Audition, Character Animator, Prelude, and Premiere Pro.

Performance and stability are top priorities for all of our users. Running our apps on current versions of the Mac and Windows operating systems helps provide an optimal experience with our tools.

So basically if you’re on an older operating system and you still want to use Adobe CC Services you’ll have to pay a monthly fee for out of date software… Not that it matters to me. There are other pay and Open Source options that will do the trick in most cases, especially if you’re looking for encoders and video editors. This isn’t the early 90’s/mid 2000’s where Adobe was king, programs like Shotcut, Sony Vegas, and a few others are good substitutes. In fact I’ve been using Shotcut for over a year now, and only had to delve into Premiere Pro once to keyframe something (though I used CS6 instead of CC). All that I really use that’s adobe these days is Photoshop CS6, which will probably be my last version.

SHINY BUTTONS!!!

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One of the things on my personal streaming wishlist has been an Elgato Streamdeck; a device with programmable LCD buttons that allows you to execute whatever you want with the press of a button AND giving it an icon of its own which can be helpful if you forget what your binds are. One of the nice things about these is the abillity to use it with your favorite software, you can use it with Elgato’s own capture software (assuming you own one of their capture devices) or you can use them with XSplit, OBS, etc.

They recently released a miniature version of their regular stream deck, with the difference being that it only comes with six buttons and it’ll cost only $100… or you could spend about another $40 to obtain all of the other buttons. Of course if you don’t want ALL OF THE BUTTONS and are living on the cheap I could see this as a tantalizing option.

Of course, I keep telling myself that I need to stream more before investing in such a device. :v:

How to fix your Steam Controller under Linux (Mint 18.3)

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Upon plugging in a Steam Controller into my system under Linux the other day I found that it didn’t recognize it no matter what way I plugged it in (different USB ports, Bluetooth, wired or wireless), then I did some research and found out that you have to add your own ruleset. Not something difficult to do, but if anyone is still looking for a guide you can read this:

First you’ll need to figure out where your udev folder is, under Mint and most Ubuntu based distro’s the path should be /lib/udev/ and on other distros it can also be /usr/lib/udev

Once you figure that out type:

sudo gedit /lib/udev/rules.d/99-steamcontroller.rules

Or on other distro’s type su and your root password, then type:

gedit /lib/udev/rules.d/99-steamcontroller.rule

You can replace gedit with whatever text editing program you want to use, it can be terminal based or GUI. Running this command will open up a text file called 99-steamcontroller.rule (or create one if it doesn’t exist), edit it to look like this:

# This rule is needed for basic functionality of the controller in Steam and keyboard/mouse emulation SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", MODE="0666"

# This rule is necessary for gamepad emulation; make sure you replace 'pgriffais' with a group that the user that runs Steam belongs to KERNEL=="uinput", MODE="0660", GROUP="REPLACEWITHYOURNAMEORGROUP", OPTIONS+="static_node=uinput"

# Valve HID devices over USB hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", MODE="0666"

# Valve HID devices over bluetooth hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", KERNELS=="*28DE:*", MODE="0666"

# DualShock 4 over USB hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="054c", ATTRS{idProduct}=="05c4", MODE="0666"

# DualShock 4 wireless adapter over USB hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="054c", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0ba0", MODE="0666"

# DualShock 4 Slim over USB hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="054c", ATTRS{idProduct}=="09cc", MODE="0666"

# DualShock 4 over bluetooth hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", KERNELS=="*054C:05C4*", MODE="0666"

# DualShock 4 Slim over bluetooth hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", KERNELS=="*054C:09CC*", MODE="0666"

# Nintendo Switch Pro Controller over USB hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="057e", ATTRS{idProduct}=="2009", MODE="0666"

# Nintendo Switch Pro Controller over bluetooth hidraw KERNEL=="hidraw*", KERNELS=="*057E:2009*", MODE="0666"

Save your file and close, then restart Linux and launch Steam. Your controller should now be in working order as long as you have Steam open. If you close Steam it will stop functioning, you can get it to work outside of Steam if you install the Open Source Steam Controller Drivers.

Everyone has their head in the ass shaped clouds

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Microsoft is coming up with new and inventive ways to confuse the hell out of the consumer base. Plans for two different XBoxes are being drawn up under the codename Scarlet; One being the XBox One type that most of us think of, and a slightly cheaper model that does nothing but stream games, known as Scarlett Cloud.

The cloud console will have a limited amount of compute locally for specific tasks like controller input, image processing, and importantly, collision detection. The downside of this is that it since more hardware is needed locally, it will raise the price of the streaming box but it will still cost significantly less than what we are accustomed to paying for a new-generation console which should help expand the platform’s reach.

As someone who is cursed to sell consoles and has to explain differences between platforms on a daily basis for people I can see this being a tad problematic. We already have people that buy games and automatically assume they can all be played without an internet connection. People are going to see the cheaper console, buy it, and then be pissed to find out it’s only used for their game streaming service which will also require a fee. I’m sure there are quite a few people that would have no problem going that route, but rainy days and internet outages are probably not something one would want to dwell on.

I even hate saying this, but NVidia’s streaming cloud platform makes slightly more sense because you can use it on pretty much any barebones laptop, plug it into HDMI and have your own console. But this in console form? I’m not so sure, then again I’m not the target audience. I like playing all of my games locally and being able to mod when applicable. :happy:

I would hate for there to be a future where everything has to be done through cloud computing. I can imagine certain game developers making games “Cloud Exclusive” just to either drum up business or as a means of anti-piracy. :zorak:

How to revert back to the old Steam Chat UI

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With some people disliking the new Steam Chat Interface and Buddies list I thought I’d share a way to revert the changes.

Windows users:

Go to your shortcut for Steam (or make one)
Right click and select properties
Under target add the two switches at the end of Steam.exe

-nochatui -nofriendsui

Your Target should look like this:

“C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\Steam.exe” -nochatui -nofriendsui

Now, if you’re under Linux:

Right click on your desktop and create a launcher
Name your launcher Steam or whatever you want
Under command type:

./steam.sh -nofriendsui -nochatui

Under working directory type your Steam install location, normally it’s:

/home/yournamehere/.steam

Then you’ll be back to old school chatting in no time. :melon: