• 9 Posts
  • 136 Comments
Joined 9 months ago
Cake day: December 9th, 2023
  • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyztoSteam Deck@sopuli.xyz•[Discussion] What games have you been playing on your deck? - September 2024
    2·
    3 days ago

    I have been playing a lot of games recently, but I think the one I want to highlight most is a game I have recommended in the past here.

    Beyond All Reason is a free and open source RTS game inspired by Total Annihilation. It is based on the Spring RTS Engine and collectively BAR represents probably almost two decades of community development over the years and the game is at a really polished fun state at this point with a diverse variety of units and strategies.

    The AI is good, it constantly probes your defenses, multiplayer is a blast with active lobbies, you can play PvP or PvE and there are a massive amount of maps. I know I am a weirdo but with gyro on I don’t find playing Beyond All Reason difficult at all. Am I going to out APM a mouse and keyboard player? Nope, but that isn’t really why I play RTS games anyways, and I can hold my own fine especially with the awesome action que system that BAR expanded on from Total Annihilation.

    Honestly, I don’t think you are going to find a 3D RTS game with better performance on the Deck for the insane amount of units that get thrown around in a typical BAR match than the Spring RTS Engine/BAR, it is a fairly old 3d RTS engine that by today’s standards has extremely low system requirements but at the same time, everything is simulated. When a tank shoots at another tank in the Spring Engine, the tank aims and then launches a projectile… that projectile is modeled as a physical object and it may or may not hit its target. It is VERY impressive that there can be hundreds of units blasting it out on the battlefield in BAR, and the game just keeps chugging along somehow without melting my steam deck.

    https://www.beyondallreason.info/

    p.s. check out the new BAR trailer, can you believe this game is a free and open source game??!?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8K_fSWfOC1w

  • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyztoSteam Deck@sopuli.xyz•Battlefield 1 will now include EA's kernel-level anti-cheat, making the game unplayable on Steam Deck
    2·
    4 days ago

    For big map vehicle and infantry shooters with vehicles that run decent on the Steam Deck I recommend

    Easy Red 2 https://store.steampowered.com/app/1324780/Easy_Red_2/

    ^ I am as tired of ww2 shooters as everybody else, but this game is just damn fun, the maps are very varied, there are lots of quality of life details but the core gameplay is actually very realistic in terms of bullet/gun/vehicle mechanics, the AI can receive basic orders and there is a small but active multiplayer scene. The planes are a blast and the variety of realistically behaving armor is great. I appreciate that you can control the cannons on tanks from the driver seat or just focus on driving and let the AI shoot (or have a friend shoot of course). Performance is superb on the deck, especially for the amount of bots you can get on screen at any time.

    For some reason Easy Red 2 is 9 bucks on steam??? Like why is it so cheap? I don’t know, but if you are upset at EA a great way to take out your anger is by buying this awesome game from an awesome indie dev who is the opposite of EA. Note this doesn’t play like Call Of Duty WW2, it plays like a realistic-ish shooter.

    Operation Harsh Doorstop https://store.steampowered.com/app/736590/Operation_Harsh_Doorstop/

    ^ A free moddable realistic tactical shooter on the unreal engine, it is still fairly limited and the playerbase isn’t huge yet but honestly it is really promising and is already a blast if you like realistic modern warfare tactical games, gunplay and movement feels tight and locked in, weapons feel chunky and the foundation is there for a lot of great mods. Vehicles and helicopters are very early stages but are being worked on. I think this is going to be a GREAT platform for big team shooter mods of all kinds of genres and it is nice that it runs decent on the steam deck so long as you are willing to turn everything down so you are basically playing ghost recon 1 but lol… I don’t really care. Check out the Star Wars mod on the workshop as an example of what kinds of different stuff can be done with modding on OHD.

    Both Easy Red 2 and Operation Harsh Doorstop are great games to keep your eye on even if the specific experience of either shooter doesn’t attract you right now, I could easily see a fan made spiritual successor to Battlefield 1 being made using Operation Harsh Doorstop as the basis for example so both games represent a lot more than Yet Another Boring WW2 shooter and Another Boring Modern Warfare shooter lol.

    Halo Infinite also plays well on the Steam Deck, though I wish performance was better and it sometimes just crashes.

    There is of course, always Xonotic available right on the linux distro app store a 30 second download away in desktop mode :P

    https://xonotic.org/

  • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyztoSteam Deck@sopuli.xyz•[Game] Sober is a new way to play Roblox on Linux from the Vinegar team
    3·
    28 days ago

    I know people are pretty dismissive of roblox (myself included), but it’s hugely popular and it’s always good to have the option.

    Yeah I mean, to be honest the first time I saw this post I scrolled past and was like “meh, I’d rather just play Wobbly Life”…

    …but then I saw this post again and thought… damn actually this is a pretty huge win for the Steam Deck and Linux gaming in general!!

    Even if the person buying the Steam Deck doesn’t give a shit about being able to play Roblox… if they have a kid who likes to play video games… then there is a decent chance that kid plays Roblox with their friends which for the parent/family member adds a huge amount of value to the Steam Deck, and for a non-zero amount of kids who will now inevitably play Roblox on their parent’s/family’s Steam Deck because of this, Roblox will be their first introduction to Linux… and those kids will think of Linux as a no bullshit way to play Roblix …which is objectively cool!

    Also, it is easy to dismiss Roblox and stereotype games built on its game engine platform as all being of a certain type… and fundamentally unpolished/amateur in design. There are some genuinely awesome games on Roblox though, he is a short list of some FPS games (because that is mostly what I look for in 3d games) but also I will include other types of games if I find any especially good ones:

    Phantom Forces - a Call Of Duty Modern Warfare clone, check it out before you judge

    https://www.roblox.com/games/292439477/Phantom-Forces

    Project Delta - open world multiplayer survival shooter set in post apocalyptic wasteland

    https://project-delta-a.fandom.com/wiki/Project_Delta_Roblox_Wiki

    https://www.roblox.com/games/7336302630/Project-Delta

    youtube tutorial/basic guide

    Do you know any good, mechanically polished games on the Roblox platform?

  • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyztoSteam Deck@sopuli.xyz•[Discussion] Double discussion this month, what games did you buy for your Deck during the Steam Sale, and what are you playing on Deck right now? - July 2024
    2·
    29 days ago

    Make sure to bind jump, grapple and other important movement buttons to rear buttons so you dont have to take your thumbs off the joysticks to use them (think bumper jumper control scheme from halo).

    I am perfectly comfortable playing multiplayer competitive shooters with joysticks and gyro, fine aim control is a breeze with gyro for me and really the disadvantage playing on the deck is a framerate and screen size issue, otherwise i can be competitive even in a game like Xonotic (possibly the most fast paced, aim heavy shooter period) with joysticks+gyro.

    I play battlebit, operation harsh doorstop, xonotic, halo infinite (with autoaim off), polygon, dayz deathmatch servers, easy red 2… etc and my aim is fine. Hipfire is a blast with gyro, actually just aiming in general is a blast with gyro and joysticks. Also in shooters with vehicles, using a controller to fly helicopters, planes and even just drive trucks and tanks absolutely CRUSHES mouse and keyboard, it isnt even close how I can fly circles around a mouse and keyboard player in a fighter plane in Easy Red 2. They just can’t manuever in the slight barrel rolls and smooth rotations that you can pull off in your sleep with a gamepad. Also if the vehicle has a non-binary throttle and brake gamepads just have a systematic advantage that mouse and keyboard can never truly compete with in that area. Of course most shooters are designed for mouse and keyboard so they don’t shrugs.

    I grew up playing halo 1-3 and cod4 type games on xbox, so I am very comfortable with playing shooters with a gamepad, and gyro is a dream come true because it eliminates the extremely frustrating issue of fine aim control with joysticks. So for me, I have already put in years and years getting familiar with playing fast paced shooters with controllers/gamepads, similarly I bet you have put in years and years getting familiar with mouse and keyboard!

    I say all of this not to say you are wrong, maybe joysticks+gyro isn’t your thing and that is fine, but it is a comfort and preference barrier limiting you here, not an inherent limitation to joysticks+gyro.

  • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyztoSteam Deck@sopuli.xyz•[Discussion] Double discussion this month, what games did you buy for your Deck during the Steam Sale, and what are you playing on Deck right now? - July 2024
    2·
    29 days ago

    In my opinion Deep Rock Galactic is easily the best co-op shooter of all time, hands down.

    Yes LFD 2 and Helldivers 2 are great, and if your preference is for those games or warhammer Vermintide or whatever, fair enough, but I think from a game mechanics standpoint Deep Rock Galactic is a nearly flawless game. The guns all feel chunky and great, the verticality is SUPERB, the movement mechanics for the scout class have a ridiculously high skill ceiling, the tunneling mechanics are mindblowing just by themselves in the way they deepend combat and tactics, the ambiance is KILLER especially given the relatively simple but still attractive graphics, the Devs are super chill and release cosmetic DLCs so everyone can get new content… the list just goes on and on

    I don’t think people are ever going to get sick of it, I am confident you are always going to be able to find co-op lobbies to hop onto far into the future.