You can just search terms right within Element to find public “rooms” (like a Discord Server). There’s rooms for all kinds of things. There are private rooms, too, but someone in the room would have to send you a link to it.

I love the Element client for Matrix. I use it with my friends and I have joined a lot of communities on there. It’s Discord-like, but I personally find it much easier to navigate than Discord. It’s free, open source, decentralized, you can self-host if that’s your jam, it’s got some solid security and usability features, call quality is great, and I’ve found it to be very stable and reliable. I’m a little biased because I personally don’t like Discord, I find the UI clunky and unpleasant to use, but I love using Element. If you love Discord, you will find Element familiar, but you may or may not appreciate the differences.

I think this is the answer. It seems like Microsoft is laying the foundation to go all-in on cloud gaming and/or gamepass. I think their ultimate goal is to dip out of the console wars altogether and be at the forefront of what they think could be the next frontier in gaming.

Honestly, it’s kinda smart. Idk if cloud gaming could really be the future (at least in the US) until we have better infrastructure and access to fast/reliable internet without data caps is more ubiquitous, but carving out a niche for themselves instead of locking horns with the competition is pretty clever. It’s worked for Nintendo. Most PC and console gamers I know also own a Switch, in part because of the quality of the exclusives and in part because of the relatively accessible pricing of the console, but also because the Switch hardware offers a unique experience (well, it was a lot more unique pre-Steam Deck).

YouTube. I know it sounds goofy, but often you can search something like “Baldur’s Gate 3 gtx 1060 6gb i7-4790K” (or whatever your specs are) and you will get tons of videos of people running it on their systems. If you happen to have common parts, you will not normally have trouble finding a benchmark for a rig very similar to yours for most games, but even with more niche hardware, you can usually find something helpful, even of it’s just like a similar GPU or another laptop with the same chipset, or whatever your case may be.

Beyond that, Steam’s hardware requirements on the store pages of games and pcgamingwiki are great resources.

I’d also say you can look on protondb–it’s for Linux gamers, so the results may or may not be applicable if you have a Windows system, but in most cases, if there’s a report that something runs well on Linux machine with the same hardware as you, it’s going to be very similar on Windows. The other way isn’t so applicable, though–just because something runs poorly on a Linux rig doesn’t necessarily mean it will also run poorly on Windows, as the problem could be with the compatability layer and not the hardware.

None of these are a perfectly elegant solution, but they are typically reliable enough.

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There are some really awesome mods for it, too. It def sets a high bar for FOSS game quality.

These are all great games. I’m surprised not to see some of the heaviest hitters, like 0 A.D., Beyond All Reason, Xonotic, or Veloren.

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I suspect this is exactly why Battlebit Remastered blew up the way that it did this year even though it looks like a Roblox game. lol

I think people are starved for a good, clean FPS that isn’t mostly battling menus, cluttered UI, MTX, endless DLC, P2W, battle passes, lootboxes, daily login bonuses, timed events, grindfests, invasive anti-cheat (or an overwhelm of cheaters), constant updates that break the game, etc. I think there’s a lot of us that just want to shoot stuff and have fun with our friends, like the glory days of online FPS. I’d happily fork over $60 today for that kind of experience, but I don’t trust hardly any AAA publishers to keep their promises if they even did offer something like that.

You are right, I’m a pretty big fan of Bloons TD 6 myself. I’ve also played a lot of Osu!Lazer and some of the Netflix indies. It just kind of feels like the overwhelming majority of mobile games are predatory and obnoxious, but there are definitely some really well-done games between the premium options, console ports, and a handful of open source games.

I understand the frusteration–I know it feels like an unrealistic suggestion. But I think it’s important to question whether a more general understanding of ADHD could help? Like if people knew that, because you have ADHD, forgetting a date or something is not a sign that you don’t care about them as it’s out of your control. Maybe people in your life could learn how you express that they are important to you. They could learn to appreciate you for who you are and forgive you for who you are not. I know, for me, I greatly appreciate when someone remembers my birthday or an important date, but I don’t hold it against them when they don’t/can’t.

That’s what I mean. It’s not reasonable to expect us to conform to every societal expectation when we literally can’t, especially when others might have more flexibility to meet us where we are (or even in the middle) and don’t currently put in that effort a lot of the time. People could be more aware and compassionate of our condition, just as they won’t be mad of someone with a walker can’t help them move. It doesn’t mean they don’t want to help or that they don’t care, they just don’t have the mobility. People understand that, so why couldn’t they understand us, too?

So first off, on a personal note, I just wanna take a second and acknowledge that it sounds like you’re really “in it.” You’re feeling the familiar frustration, and the shame. That little voice in the back of your head that whispers, “I’m not enough” is loud and clear right now. It sounds like you’ve had a lot going on, maybe you’re burntout, and you’re sick of feeling like a failure? All of that is totally valid, and it makes sense why you’d feel that way given the lifetime of negative reinforcement you’ve received, the recent diagnosis, and all the pressure to just be able to do what others can. I think most of us here, especially those of us that were also diagnosed as adults, can relate to those feelings in a big way. I know I can. I’m really sorry that you’re going through that. :(

On a discussion-oriented note, generally speaking, I think it’s important to be able to see ADHD holistically. It is a debilitating disability and it is comorbid with some really awesome/interesting qualities. It is not a superpower, but it is also not all bad, either; it’s not just one thing, it’s a whole-ass neurotype that comes with all the quirks and kinks any other brain has.

Your experience might be that you don’t believe the trade-off is worth it, and you know, most days I would agree with you. I think most people here would. The truth is, though, it’s really no better or worse than any other brain in terms of being a good, functional brain. ADHD is not an illness. We are only disabled insofar as society is disabling to us. The world was not built for us, and until we make some more equitable, systemic changes, we will continue to struggle. Just as modern buildings need to include wheelchair ramps and wider doorframes for people with walking aids, the future of society needs to include us in its design. We need accommodation to be able to thrive, and under the right conditions, it would not at all be out of the question.

None of this is meant to absolve us of accountability or responsibility, and it’s not to say that nothing is really our fault, or that the pain we experience isn’t valid. I just mean to say that we spend a lot of time beating ourselves up and commiseratting getting beat down by the world, which is completely understandable, but is there a different conversation that might be more beneficial to us? How can we educate our bosses and teachers and parents about us? How do we make sure that kids are being appropriately diagnosed, and that girls and children of color get diagnosed, as well? What could an ADHD/Autism-friendly work environment look like? What about ADHD/Autism-friendly supermarkets? How can we change stigma, expectations, and our environments to be better? Don’t we deserve better? Yes, having ADHD sucks as it stands, but does it have to?

That’s just my 2¢, anyway.

I felt this in my soul. lol This has basically been my state of mind for the least couple of years. I used to game on mobile a fair amount, but these days, I just can’t handle mobile gaming anymore. I can’t deal with F2P games on PC, either, despite having loved some of them in the past (Apex Legends, Warframe, etc.).

Between F2P games, paid games with egregious F2P-style monetization, and soooo many AAA games coming out broken or just bad, I have been playing a lot of retro games, older JRPGs, and indies the last couple of years. I’m just so burnt out on the modern game industry.

It was really good! It expanded on the story in really interesting ways.

Over Halloween weekend, I beat the original Alan Wake for the first time. It was a blast. I got really engaged in the story and couldn’t put it down. I was shocked at how well it held up. The graphics were a tad dated, but they were still pretty good and everything else about the game felt like it could have come out last year. I think I bought the game in like 2014, so finally playing it was a real victory for my backlog. lol

Today shall be remembered as the day the rogue penises finally won.

Chris Pratt

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That’s fair. He also did the first couple Raimi Spider-Man flicks and the '97 X-Men cartoon. So he has worked on some solid projects. But looking through his IMDB credits is mostly not inspiring. He’s produced most of the worst superhero movies ever made and few of the best. lol

I was hyped until I saw that Avi “Compulsively Ruins Spider-Man Movies” Arad is producing. 😬

EDIT: Oh and it’s Sony. And the director choice… eeeeeeeehhh. Here’s hoping for a pleasant surprise, I guess?