Mechanical complexity as in the amount of stuff to learn to “actually play” Minecraft, aside from the controls. For example, which resources are which, what crafts into what, and how to find and gather everything. Its easy enough to punch wood, but trying to figure out (and then remember) how to craft tools or farm food while also trying to remember how to position your fingers on the keyboard is a much bigger ask.

Its going to be a lot harder to play Deep Rock Galactic or Portal 2 together if she sticks with her current perfered movement method: click and drag with the mouse.

Physical copies are kinda besides the point in terms of ownership and preservation. Just because you own the disk, doesn’t mean you have access to the software on it. DRM, as well as the laws that make it viable, have been around since well before media was sold digitally. Physical copies of the Crew are no more playable now than digital. If you want to be able to keep your games, you need to buy DRM-free, whether that limits you to digital-only or not.

On the other hand, if you want to actually own your games, we need to massively rework copyright law. The fact that a company can sell you a software licence, but add dozens of arbitrary restrictions on when, how and why you can use it is absurd, nonetheless the fact that its always non-transferable and revokable by the company for any reason. None of that should be legal.

Isn’t StartPage just Google’s results, but less personalized?

Is the US really that central to PC component manufacturing, or is this (mostly) just a US thing? Like, don’t get me wrong, I know a lot of these companies are US-based, but isn’t basically all the manufacturing and most of the distribution handled elsewhere?

The main thing is post more. Lack of content is the main reason people don’t use Lemmy more, and the only way to fix this is to share/produce more.

Its a bit of an unpopular opinion, but I think even (transparent, community-relevant) bots are a good idea at this point, given that 99% of interests have little to no activity currently. For example, if we had bots that post game update changelogs to their relevant communities, it would at least provide a baseline amount of content and make it easier to discuss for fans of those games.

Honestly, I’m not a big fan of the current previews. In particular, the reflections feel too extreme (esspecially off the grass) and the colour feels a bit off. That said, Mojang has been shifting towards more customizability and if this is included in that, I’m sure modders and artists will do great work with the tech.

Nothing you’ve said leads me to believe its a Microsoft account ban, but if it is, it’d be because of Microsoft’s chat moderation - nothing to do with account or game setup. Microsoft has a chat moderation system that is enabled by default. Its possible, albiet very unlikely, he was banned due to something like saying something controversial, automated mass reports, or falsified reports.

That said, if he’s a smart and friendly kid as it sounds like you’re saying, its most likely a server ban - IE he got banned from the specific multiplayer server he had been playing on. In this case, you’d have to find the website for that server (if there is one) and try to appeal the ban, or just switch to another server or a single player world. I’d guess that he unintentionally damaged another player’s work, and that’s why he got banned. Its an easy mistake to make for an inexperienced player.

The article doesn’t add anything, so here’s the direct link: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-play-on-the-go-bundle

It wouldn’t be an anti-cheat issue as the only anti-cheats out there are run by (unofficial) servers and are purely server-side.

That leaves either a Microsoft account issue (in which case God help you), a server specific issue such as a ban from that specific server or a server reset, or a singleplayer issue like him deleting his save, or getting lost in-game.

From what I’ve heard, its mostly people expecting the game to be more dynamic - more akin to Skyrim’s varied gameplay systems or Fallout: NV’s story and quests. They’re going in expecting something with heavy RPG focus and getting something more action focused.

The trailer for Warhammer 40k: Space Marine 2

“Aged poorly” was a bad choice of words. My point was more that the industry has moved on from them, and while some of the conventions are the same, its largely stuff that predates them. If you go back to retro RPGs when you’re used to Skyrim, Dark Souls, Final Fantasy, ect. you’ll be unfamiliar with much of how the game plays. Not much was carried over from these games specifically. I’d argue that the influential RPG, that would be the genre’s equivalent to Doom, would be D&D. While not a video game, thats the model everything referenced, and still references, moreso than even Doom. It’s what codified core mechanics like HP, classes, character stats, and more, in the same way Doom codified modern first-person mechanics, ammo management, and exploding barrels.

While they’re important, I think they’ve also aged poorly in many ways something like Doom has not. I’d compare their importance more to something like Pong or Galiga. Good games, that pushed the limits of the medium for their time, and are foundational, but more acted as a steping stone rather than something other games were widely inpired by or modeled after.

I can’t think of anything that really competes overall. It could be argued games like Pong, Pac-Man, Quake, Half-Life, WoW, ect. all were pivotal points in gaming, but I don’t think anything has had as direct and widespread influence as Doom.

Unfortunately, this is only the Travelers Tale-style games. None of the classic, unlicensed ones like Lego Island, Lego Racers, Legoland, Bionicle, ect.

Shouldn’t this be BFSDS instead?

That and its addition to gamepass. They’re just free, themed reskins. Nothing major, buts its extra free content for an already good game.

Honestly, I like the look of the leader/civilization changing and mixing. Looks like a lot of fun, in the “late-game rogue-like”, “Break the game by amassing synergies” type way. Its a different appreal than 5, but that just means I can enjoy both rather than picking one. That said, given the price, the DRM, and the reported buggyness, I’ll probably still be waiting a few years at least. At least that gives modders time to get to work.

I saw this posted a couple days ago which pretty succinctly summarizes the current state of the market.

Commented this a year ago, and its just as relevant today.