Over the years, there've been various red flags in gaming, for me at least. Multi-media. Full-Motion Video. Day-One DLC. Microtransactions. The latest one is Live Service Game. I find the idea repulsive because it immediately tells me this is an online-required affair, even if it doesn't warrant it. There's no reason for some games to require an internet connection when the vast majority of activities they provide can be done in a single-player fashion. So I suspect Live Service Game to be less of a commitment to truly providing updated worthwhile content and more about DRM. Instead of imposing Denuvo or some other loathed 3rd party layer on your software, why not just require internet regardless of whether it brings value to customer?

What do you think about Live Service Games? Do you prefer them to traditional games that ship finished, with potential expansions and DLC to follow later?

Celebrating deep strategy games of all kinds with discounts, demos, and upcoming releases August 28 - September 4.

I want to switch back to a traditional 16:9 and looking for opinions on the best 27 inch monitor currently available. A lot of folks on Amazon seem to dig this one from AOC, but I've never bought anything other than Dell or LG over the years. It's inexpensive, that's for sure.

The controversy around Jason Aldean’s “Try that in a Small Town” got me thinking. What are some things that you wish you could do in a small town that you just can’t?

I was in the mountains, Hendersonville NC I think, trying to find a place to eat after 7 pm on a week day. Was impossible.

This would be great while on vacation.

Like most of the other best Samsung TVs, the new 98-inch QN900C has Samsung's Gaming Hub and Motion Xcelerator Pro. That delivers 4K at up to 120Hz, rising to 144Hz with compatible PCs. There's also support for AMD FreeSync Premium Pro as well as NVIDIA G-Sync like most of the best gaming TVs have.

Never mind Windows 365, I’ve yet to move on to Windows 11. Tried a few times and never liked it.

This seems like a really bad idea. Are there any examples of this that Lemmians are familiar with? Certainly can’t play games on it. Right?

Cosplay at anime conventions has gotten so much better than 10-15 years ago. I think the last con I made it to was Otakon in Baltimore during the late aughts. There were maybe a handful of people that brought the level of quality to the costumes compared to many of the cosplayers these days.

THR's report also comes on the heels of rumors that Ben Affleck himself would be returning as Daredevil for the movie, as well as rumors earlier this spring that James Marsden, Famke Janssen, and Halle Barry would return as Cyclops, Jean Grey, and Storm, respectively. These rumors are strictly that--rumors--but Garner's return seems to lend some credence to them potentially being true.

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FTA:

Microsoft has brought back everyone's favorite deal: $1 for a month of PC Game Pass or Game Pass Ultimate. If you're purely interested in PC, that's 100-some very high quality games available on a windows PC for a month, and then a bunch of EA games as well, since PC Game Pass also includes an EA Play membership.

You can find PC Game Pass for $1, for a limited time, on Microsoft's store. PC Game Pass is $10 a month after the $1 promotion, while Game Pass Ultimate is $17.

I have Game Pass Ultimate and it's been a wonderful way to try all kinds of games console and PC that I wouldn't otherwise play. I discovered Hardspace: Shipbreaker this way, and have sunk dozens of hours into it.

Kudos to Ars Technica to interviewing the Devil. The comments section of that post is *not *kind.

This doesn’t sound great.