Brett_E_Carlock

mcc, 13 days ago to random

Just watched "Prisoners" (2013)

Holy shit. I feel like I just found a lost fossil explaining Denis Villvenue

Denis, Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis and two separate Batman villains all in the same movie, and you've still somehow never heard of this

Denis shoots exurban Pennsylvania* like it's an alien planet and it is the right choice

• Spent the whole movie going… PA? Really? These freeways look like Texas to me. Whole thing looks like Texas but wetter. Yeah, they shot in Georgia

atomicpoet, 15 days ago to random

For what Treasure Adventure Game is, I like it quite a lot.

It’s a metroidvania with an 8-bit aesthetic. Back in 2012, when this was released, the indie boom hadn’t yet boomed. Games that use pixel art graphics were still kind of novel.

However, for me, there’s a bunch of things about this game that make this a rough experience. For one thing, there’s no graphical options – not even the option to go full screen. This means I’m stuck in windowed mode with a whole lot of other distractions going on.

The other thing that’s frustrating is that there’s no tutorial, and the game doesn’t show the button mapping. You just have to guess. Eventually, I figured out that “A” is the dialogue key, “S” is the inventory key, “Z” is action” and “X” is jump. Oh yeah, and movement is from the arrow keys.

And the intro is loooong! It takes quite some time to get into the action. If you lack patience, you may want to skip this one.

What people often forget about PC games is that, over the last decade, their usability has been vastly improved. Nowadays, most games I come across have an option for full screen mode. Most of them have decent onboarding. And when I do a survey of new Steam games, most of them have gamepad support.

This wasn’t the case 10 years ago. PC gaming was a free-for-all. Even great indie games like Treasure Adventure Game were haphazard in their usability. By no means am I saying Treasure Adventure Game is bad, but on that front, it’s definitely showing its age.

However, I love the pixel art style. It is rendered in an 8-bit style, but there’s just enough flourishes to set the graphics apart. For example, I’m a big fan of the lighting. The animation is also fluid, and it’s the nice touches with the fish jumping out of the water and the sea gulls flying off the shore that give me lots of appreciation.

The chiptune soundtrack is also excellent. It’s catchy, and gives a broad sense of whimsy.

Most of this game was made by one fellow, Stephen Orlando. He did get assistance, however. Robert Ellis did the music. And there were a few folks who helped out with graphics and play-testing.

Finally, I should mention that Treasure Adventure Game is free on GOG.com. If this game appeals to you, here’s the link:

https://www.gog.com/en/game/treasure_adventure_game

atomicpoet, 18 days ago to random

What do you think was the better motorcycle racing game?

black_intellect, 20 days ago to random

How Black Lives Became The Hidden Cost of Clean Energy: Black activists in the U.S. are fighting the exploitation of Black resources and workers in the Congo. https://capitalbnews.org/congo-clean-energy-us-workers/

jwildeboer, 24 days ago to random

With the ever sinking prices of solar panels, you can put them everywhere you need a vertical separation. Solar panels as fences. As cover for balconies. As walls for your shed. Just do it. Don't care too much about efficiency. Take every kWh as donation to your personal grid. And should you produce more than you need, who cares. You are already at net zero. For 20+ years. Enjoy it.

Brett_E_Carlock, 1 month ago to random

CO2 levels below 800ppm greatly increase the decay rate of aerosolized SARS-COV2 virus particles.

So, a portable CO2 meter can be a reliable proxy metric for exposure risk.

When compared to a typical atmospheric [CO2(g)] (~500 ppm), increasing the [CO2(g)] to just 800 ppm results in a significant increase in viral aerostability after 2 min (Delta VOC, Fig. 2a). No significant difference in infectivity is observed between 800 ppm and 6500 ppm.  

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-47777-5#Sec2

@sysop408

tuxdevices, 1 month ago (edited 1 month ago) to apple German

I just received my new work laptop (#Apple #Macbook Pro M3, ~€2000) just to discover that it does not support dual-monitor output despite having multiple video ports.

For a feature that even the cheapest laptops (and older MacBooks) have had for years, Apple now asks you to buy the MacBook Pro M3 Pro (€2500) or M3 Max (€4000).

This is essentially €2000 #ewaste. Not so "pro" after all.

Brett_E_Carlock, 1 month ago to random

@simplex, I am just learning about your app/protocol.

Is there a way to migrate chat histories from other apps, like say Threema, into Simplex so I can reduce switching costs for my family and friends?

PixelDroid, 2 months ago to random

We've released an offshoot of the PixelDroid project: Bunny!

It is a media (photo&video) editor for Android. It's very basic for now but the groundwork is there for bigger things!

I (@artectrex) have published a way-too-detailed blog post regarding the Bunny Media Editor, and how it came to be: https://artectrex.eu/bunny-media-editor/

Website: https://pixeldroid.org/bunny/

I hope you like this new little app, please send feedback this way until I have time to set up a separate presence for Bunny 🐇

Brett_E_Carlock, 2 months ago to random

Once again, thanks to everyone working on @alpinelinux and @musl for making possible the most low mental load distro ever.

Another day, another holy fuck tier CVE I do not need to stress over.

Much love.

atomicpoet, 2 months ago to random

Just got myself a nice haul on GOG.com:

• MegaRace 3 - C$0.39
• Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare - C$0.79
• Moto Racer - C$0.89
• Atlantis: The Lost Tales - C$0.89
• Dragon Lore: The Legend Begin - C$0.89
• Atlantis Evolution - C$1.19
• Hell Division - C$0.89
• Necronomicon: The Dawning of Darkness - C$0.59

Total Savings: C$58.70 (-90%)

TOTAL COST: C$6.51

bradsucks, 3 months ago to random

🎵 Hello darkness my old friend 🎵... guess who’s back in Windows XP resurrecting some old song projects

evan, 3 months ago (edited 3 months ago) to random

"An individual should be able to run an ActivityPub server for themself and their friends and family."

#EvanPoll #poll

Linux_Is_Best, 4 months ago to linux

1st time trying to configure Alpine Linux as a desktop.

A family member has this ancient and under powered laptop. Strong highlight on it being under powered.

• Aspire ES1-511-C59V (v1.06)
• Intel Celeron N2840
• 4 Gb Ram (less with shared video)
• Intel Atom GPU

I'd like to shoot this into space, but they really want to use this for a laptop.

#Alpine #AlpineLinux #Linux

darkedinburgh, 5 months ago to random

"Bleak, dark, and piercing cold, it was a night for the well-housed and fed to draw round the bright fire and thank God they were at home; and for the homeless, starving wretch to lay him down and die. Many hunger-worn outcasts close their eyes in our bare streets, at such times, who, let their crimes have been what they may, can hardly open them in a more bitter world."

• Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist

Nifflas, 5 months ago to random

With Affordable Space Adventures, it was very important that the tech felt real, like it's something that could actually exist.

In a sequence, we wanted the player to really feel that things have broken completely. So the game replays the glitched intro sequence.

This was not done through VFX. This was literally me inserting random data in the video file with a hex editor. Yep, the video is corrupted for real!

(I did re-compress it after tho & check for dangerous audio frequencies/levels)

briankrebs, 5 months ago to random

Why does Apple Music continue to suck at suggesting music I might actually want to listen to? Maybe I have enabled some setting to make it obtuse, but it has to know by now what I listen to and what I never even bother with, and yet every time I launch the app it's just tons of whatever is most popular right now. Am I alone in this experience?

atomicpoet, 5 months ago to random

There is nothing like the world of Russian-made video games. Nothing.

ophiocephalic, 5 months ago to FediPact

With the Zuckerberg takeover impending, there's a lot of confusion circulating about the use of user-level and instance-level blocks, and how our online expressions can be secured against Meta. Everyone who objects to their accounts being mined by the Zuckerberg entity for data collection, AI ingestion, monetization, and possible ghost-profile building needs to understand this problem. Here's information to clarify.

Neither a user-level block, or an instance-level block, will protect our posts from Meta data-mining by default on a Mastodon instance. Posts won't be delivered directly, but can be ingested by other means; if, for example, users on Meta-federated instances boost them.

However, both user and instance blocks will totally prevent post delivery in all cases IF your host instance has enabled the functionality called Authorized Fetch.

By default, Authorized Fetch is off on Mastodon instances and most haven't turned it on. If this concern is important to you, you might want to respectfully reach out to your admins and let them know. Remember that they are working hard to provide and sustain online community at no charge. It's likely they won't be very familiar with it and will need time to look into it.

For more information on Authorized Fetch, check out this blog post by @brook : https://hub.sunny.garden/2023/06/28/what-does-authorized_fetch-actually-do/ Please untag Brook from replies unless you specifically intend to address him

#FediPact #DefederateMeta #Meta #Facebook #Threads #Instagram #AuthorizedFetch

atomicpoet, 5 months ago (edited 5 months ago) to random

Released in 2009, Caster is a third person shooter (TPS). Imagine if Earth Defense Force was mashed with Megaman and Sonic the Hedgehog. Give it all a Nintendo 64 aesthetic and you have Caster.

You play a caster, and your job is to rid the world of insect-like creatures called “flanx”. Not much more is explained beyond that.

But really, to me, this is all about the gameplay. And Caster is bloody awesome!

Imagine running through a map at supersonic speeds, blasting bugs away, executing a big mega-jump that allows you to jump over mountains, and then changing the terrain entirely with your different weapons. And to boot, you have terraforming abilities. That’s Caster!

What I love about this game is you can you pretty much play as you like. For example, if you max out your running abilities, you can run on water and lava. You can decide to spend the whole level just collecting orbs, or you can destroy each and every flanx you come across. Don’t get me wrong, each stage has a goal, but how you accomplish that goal is entirely up to you.

Caster has both keyboard + mouse as well as controller support. But trust me, keyboard and mouse is much better since aiming and looking is so much better with it. I got the gamepad working with my Steam Deck, but I found using the right analog stick to be such a major pain in the ass that I just didn’t use it.

It’s funny, when this game was released in 2009 there were many complaints about the dated graphics. Little did those complainers know that many devs now aspire to those “dated graphics” nowadays. You see, just like the 2010s often fetished 8-bit and 16-bit sprites, you’re now seeing many games that try to mimic the low polygon PlayStation One and Nintendo 64 era of gaming.

What fascinates me, though, is how good the graphics are considering the resources Caster demands. This entire game was made by one guy, and he did quite a lot with very little. I’ve seen “retro” 16-bit-style games demand no less than 2GB of VRAM. How much VRAM does Caster ask for? 16MB. That’s right, not gigabytes but megabytes.

The sound is nice. The sound effects are vivid. In terms of music, it reminds me of some of the trance I’d hear at raves during the late 90s. And that is so on point for what Caster is.

While I might be singing Caster’s praises, I do have a big complaint: the game lacks polish, and is unfinished. Now that it’s almost 15 years since it was released on Steam, I don’t think Caster will ever be finished. This doesn’t stop me from playing the game because it is a lot of fun. And more to the point, it provides tremendous value.

Any modern PC can play Caster. You need a 800Mhz single core CPU, 64MB of memory, 16MB of VRAM, and 32MB of space. Caster has native compatibility with Windows and Mac, and can be run on Linux via Proton. I was able to play the game on Steam Deck, though I think it’s far better on a regular PC.

In addition to PC, Caster has been released for iPhone and iPad. It has never been ported to a console platform.

There’s no micro-transactions, nor is there any DLC.

Elecorn developed Caster. Elecorn is (or was) a one-man studio run by Michael D. Smith. While he no longer makes games as a solo developer, he’s worked on State of Decay 2, Crucible, and New World.

On Steam, Caster has a 79% positive rating based on 3,386 reviews. Universally, this game is described as “fun”. Sure it has detractors. Some describe it as a glorified tech demo. But even those folks say it’s perhaps the most fun tech demo they’ve ever played.

Another way to look at this game, though, is that if it were released in 1997, it would be seen as a classic. You can do so much with Caster, and the fact you can do it all with 32MB of space is impressive.

I mean, really, how many games let you kill insects like Earth Defense Force, acquire different gunning abilities like Megaman, run around like Sonic the Hedgehog – and let you do terraforming to boot?

Man, I wish the dev completed Caster. There was a community that cherished the game, and they would have loved a final episode. Hopefully, someone comes along to do a spiritual sequel because Caster simply has too many good ideas to be ignored forever.

Caster sells for C$1.99. Even unfinished, I definitely recommend the game. I have spent $5 on shareware titles with one episode. Therefore, I have no problems spending less money a game that has two episodes.