Railroad Tycoon II

Post by cyberax » Tue, Jan 14, 2025, 6:55 AM UTC

int_19h wrote: post #117

wodenokoto wrote: post #85

The way the author talked about the feeling of if a sequel could live up to the original, and how it had been mostly forgotten, reminded me of Warlords, which together with civilization and rail road tycoon was the main turn based strategy games of my youth. I remember there was a sequel, but it would always freeze up on our computer. ... And I don't think I've stumbled on anyone on the internet talk its praise. Was…

Warlords - especially the second installment - is generally considered one of the 4X classics of the 90s. The Age of Wonders series was heavily inspired by Warlords (and Master of Magic), and is still around.

Post by cyberax » Tue, Jan 14, 2025, 7:05 AM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #133

cyberax wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Microsoft controls Windows and DirectX, Valve only gets to play until Windows landlord allows it. DirectX has to stay reasonably close to Vulkan. And Vulkan is not an afterthought for graphics card manufacturers, quite unlike OpenGL of yore. And Win32 (sans Vulkan/DX) is mostly feature-complete for gaming purposes. Manufacturers can just target the current state of Win32 for a decade more, if not even longer.

It certainly is, in what concerns NVidia, they keep innovating first with Microsoft on DirectX, and then eventually come up with Vulkan extensions. Last example, AI shaders announced at CEBIT. Vulkan has turned into the same extension spaghetti as OpenGL.

Post by wqaatwt » Tue, Jan 14, 2025, 8:00 AM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #13

ylee wrote: post #8

I played the Linux version the article mentions while at Goldman Sachs; a colleague on the Red Hat coverage team gave me a boxed copy of Corel Linux including the game. The port ran very well on my Red Hat Linux box at home. In retrospect it was part of a brief flurry of Linux ports of major games. I also got to play Return to Castle Wolfenstein and Neverwinter Nights ; in both cases the publishers made Linux clients…

I feel relying on WINE and Proton instead of building a proper GNU/Linux ecosystem will eventually backfire, it didn't happen already because thus far Microsoft chosen to ignore it. However as Steam vs XBox slowly escalates, Microsoft might eventually change their stance on the matter, forcing devs to rely on APIs not easier to copy, free licenses for handhelds, taking all Microsoft owned studios out of Steam, see wh…

Post by wqaatwt » Tue, Jan 14, 2025, 8:05 AM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #132

int_19h wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the API only has additions, then Microsoft would still need to convince game devs to actually use them (and Valve will point out that if they do, their game will not work on Steam Deck, so there's a clear downside). If some APIs are removed, it breaks older Windows games. I can't think of any historical API that has been completely removed in this way - even stuff like DirectDraw and DirectPlay is still there even…

See ABK deal, Microsoft has tolerated SteamDeck thus far, they own the platform.

Post by wqaatwt » Tue, Jan 14, 2025, 8:08 AM UTC

pxc wrote: post #68

Dalewyn wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget Windows finally made Year of the Linux Desktop(tm) a reality, Windows is the best desktop Linux distro (Android gets the mobile Linux distro crown).

Windows' desktop environment is much too lackluster for that. It's uniquely inconsistent (many distinct toolkits with irreconcilable look-and-feel, even in the base system), has poorly organized system configuration apps that are not very capable, takes a long time to start up so that the desktop becomes usable, is full of nasty dark patterns, suffers an infestation of ads in many versions. Besides the many issues wi…