Interesting to see all replies! I’m curious to find new sources as well. I usually go through a set of bookmarks to sites such as eurogamer, kotaku, pcgamesN, ign (sorry for that), as well as checking reddit and lemmy.
I don’t think I’ve ever really liked the way Metacritic does it. GameRankings was my go-to for years (RIP), but I’ve preferred OpenCritic for review aggregating since they started up.
There’s a lot of churn in video games criticism right now, and this year in particular highlighted some issues I have with how some outlets are doing things with their reviews. Things like rushing to press without finishing games (even just 20 hours in some cases), and omitted technical performance/bug discussion. I was enjoying The Washington Post’s game section but that got shut down. Eurogamer and Gamespot were previous favorites of mine, but they seem to have changed their criticism style and I’m not a fan of what either are doing.
I do have some PC outlets I still like (PC Gamer and Rock, Paper, Shotgun for anyone else reading), but I can’t say I have an outstanding favorite otherwise at the moment. I pretty much just browse OpenCritic and pick out reviews at the extreme ends of the score spread and some random ones in the middle at this point.
I try to do the patient gamer thing too, as I’m always happier with games that have been polished (and they are cheaper). The threads in those communities are great for finding games. The Fediverse has one at !patientgamers although it’s still not super active yet.
I always look for let’s play series by 2-3 different YouTubers (1-2 episodes) before I decide if the game is for me. Scores are meaningless if I am not interested in that genre or specific gameplay mechanics
Just because a game says it won’t work on Deck doesn’t mean it is true. They just haven’t tested thousands of games to verify compatibility. Sometimes it is as easy as getting and selecting a very specific Proton version, but other more involved fixes may be necessary. When in doubt, search “[game] + Steam Deck” to see if someone else has tried and succeeded (or failed).
For Epic Games, I’d also recommend Heroic. You can download it from the Discover Software Center in Desktop Mode.
Some quick tips:
If you need to bring up a keyboard for whatever reason, you can hold the STEAM button, and press X.
Expect to tinker and play around with things, I think the software is still a bit new and rough around the edges.
Search the Discover Software Center for software in general; it’s a good place to download things like browsers and applications.
If you want to know if a game runs or not, you can check www.protondb.com , it’s a crowdsourced version of Valve’s “Steam Deck Verified”, where people say how well games work.
Some game recommendations, based on ones I’ve played. Not had a chance to try them all on the Steam deck, but they should work:
Stardew Valley
Baba is You
Celeste
Cuphead
Dicey Dungeons
Slay the Spire (Think you have to use the touch screen though)
Pretty much the 6800XT at a good price or a 6800. That is about it. A770 is good if you don’t play any older (like pre 2012) games and don’t mind some things breaking sometimes.
Maybe a 3070 16 gb version if you really really really need CUDA.
Been pretty happy with my month old Radeon RX 7800XT. 16GB VRAM, holds its own in Starfield and Cyberpunk (ooh the raytracing…), and haven’t had any issues with it.
Not my GPU but my friend’s. He has nothing but good things to say about it. $600 USD which translates to ~£540, but obviously buying it over there the price might be different .
Turns out to be £616 on UK Newegg but that isn’t so bad, will need to check it’s compatible with my system and power draw isn’t too much, but thanks will look into this one!
I did eventually kill Matka. I did it while frail and actually died at the end and had to run back to claim the v-blood. It took entirely too many tries over a number of hours. The only pointer I have for anyone else struggling is to analyze the fighting arena and utilize the extra space available to the west of the boss area. Two sets of trees in that direction make the arena seem much smaller. My game’s difficulty is just regular. Nothing additional, and nothing less.
isthereanydeal.com lists only legitimate retailers, no second hand/grey market sites. Not exclusively Steam though, so check on the site before purchasing (though usually every website will be selling Steam keys except like Epic Games Store, Microsoft Store, Ubisoft, EA Origin).
You can also link your Steam wishlist, set up alerts for when a game falls below a certain price, etc.
bin.pol.social
Aktywne