LadyCrimson

I never have vsync enabled and I haven't updated the game, so no, I haven't noticed. Haha. I've seen posts (pre and post patches) of all kinds of weird stuff re: cpu/gpu usage, frame pacing, other, under certain conditions, although usually related to frame generation/PT on. Which is why I don't want to update because it's running ok for me (and I haven't run into that whip/camera bug) so why risk it. Only thing I've noticed (no patch) is I get slightly lower overall CPU usage and higher overall GPU usage with DLSS OFF/TAA, maybe that's normal, dunno. But I think this is the first game that is likely CPU bound at my 4k (dlss or not) settings. eg, gpu sits around 40-50% most of the time vs. maxed out/cpu overall always says 100% (and almost all cores including H-threads are very high graph use in Performance Monitor, not just 2-4). Dunno if it's because of something re: poor/odd game coding or not tho. I've seen people with better PC's (and running full RT) report the same sort of thing. Edit: could be because of using Vulkan too I suppose.

She got in my way while trying to get on ladders/use whip icons, by suddenly rushing to stand exactly in front of the ladder or a ledge blocking my view/ability to use icon. But the worst was the verbal in a few cases. I want to glance around a large room before "moving on" and the entire time she is repeating the same "maybe we should do this, Dr. Jones" line every 3 seconds, for 5 minutes, until I finally did what she wanted so she shut up and I went back to exploring the room. Her character is fine, but good lord.

That's California for you. Wood smoke has too many larger particulates. Or something. If you buy a house here with a nice original wood burning fireplace still in existence, never ever do any renov. that would tear it down. You'd probably only get a permit for a gas-insert type thing. Not that I'm a building contractor. Just what I've read here and there. May even still vary county to county for all I know. ========= Haven't slept well in a few days (short cycles, early-waking etc). Crashed/slept 12 hours yesterday. So here I sit, wide awake again, twiddling my thumbs, wondering "What Will I Do Today?" At least it's not raining. Maybe a bundled-up walk is in order.

I live in California, hence those are probably illegal, like wood burning fireplaces. ...or at least, illegal to burn actual wood logs in - of course, they'd have to catch you/someone would have to report you. I'm sure such doesn't get enforced a lot. But in terms of permits to put one in a house now - not likely/full of restrictions etc. Edit: As always - if I was really into cooking I might want certain appliances. But I'm not, so I'd rather spend 5k-10k on ... computers/games/TV's etc. Priorities!

^ Cost is one part of the "can't be bothered" aspect - not in the sense of cleaning but in the sense of wanting super fancy cookware or appliances, which often come with more care and consideration to deal with. I like no fuss and I don't spend enough time cooking to care. Edit: and cheap-ish. For that matter, we've only bought/purchased two new large appliances in our 35+ years together, and one was only because we kind of had to to rent the other house. Did buy an ancient used fridge once, too. I think at this point in my life my rangetop preference would go like this: Gas > exposed coil > glass covered coil Ovens I like electric/convection, anything but gas, basically.

I reached the next area in Indy game and while it is a bit more involved ala Vatican/Egypt sections in terms of gameplay loops, my motivation to continue shrinks every minute. It's not that anything has changed/grown worse per se - the loops have just become too repetitive/not engaging enough. I may eventually get around to it but I'm in no rush. Based on my time and forum posts I think the 25-35 hours to finish the game (not completionist) and maybe 45-50ish (completionist) are fairly accurate. I've maybe done 60-75% vs. 100% in all areas. It's not a very long game I think. My favorite things in this game are the long Indy story scenes (some of them are very entertaining in that Indy campy way), some of the area designs/artwork (lots of details in some ways). Gizeh/Egypt was the highlight. But in the end, I would definitely recommend either trying it on Gamepass if you have that, or waiting for at least a moderate sale. Indiana Jones vibe/nostalgia - 9/10 Gameplay, AI/mechanics/loops - 5/10 "tomb-ing/exploring/puzzling satisfaction" - 3/10 (because there was not enough of it)

I use water sitting on the surface for while, maybe 409 or windex after, paper towels or sponge or the "nonstick scrubber" plastic side sponges. I've used the Easy-Off type oven spray oven cleaner to remove the black glue. I have never shaken/shake-slide a pan because I cook nothing that requires it (also, full pans are rather heavy for me these days). I use a wooden spoon to stir/move pan contents around and like I said, if the pan bottom is not perfectly flat/has become a bit warped, this action alone will cause the pan to "walk" across the surface eventually so it's no longer centered over the burner coils and then I pick it up and move it again. Over and over. I did recently buy a new "wok" type pan and it's flat/more stable. Most (cheaper) pans also have all that texturing on the underside/outside bottom for some reason - machined circle lines and logos, whatever. The surface was already damaged but it's grown worse since we took over, possibly due to my wobbly pans (that didn't feel wobbly on coil burners, cause you don't notice as much I guess). I can't be bothered to take a pic of my actual stovetop but this picture from reddit shows what I mean. I see videos of "do these many steps to clean or polish" and frankly I can't be bothered. It annoys me because exposed coil burners I didn't have to think/notice about such at all - but it doesn't annoy me enough and I don't care enough to fiddle with powders, polishes, razor blades or multi-steps. It is what it is. Edit: to be clear, ours is not induction. Just glass over burner coils.

This house came with a glass top electric stove. I dislike it. It works fine, but the "this is the burner area design lines" on the glass is easily scratched and if your pot/pan isn't perfectly perfectly flat, it will wobble at the lightest handle touch and slide all over the surface so I have to keep readjusting where it's sitting. If you spill anything, it burns into black glue onto the glass surface and oven cleaner may be needed to remove it (vs. those pan things under a burner you can just replace). Can't complain tho, it was "free" (minus the cost of the house, ahem). I'm still miffed that the fridge (also "free" with the house) has two giant double doors that are apparently made of aluminum or something, meaning magnets will not stick to it. Only a little strip of the side of the fridge - because the fridge is housed within a kitchen cabinet-hole - can hold magnet-notes. Boo. Edit: my mistake, it's not the lines on the stovetop that etch, it's the glass itself. So you get unpolished look scuffs all over.

^ I was playing Path of Exile (1) before Pillars was even announced. Then when Ob's PoE came out I was, for a while, constantly confused in forums/posts. These days I try to see context before applying a name to an acronym. There are way too many of them these days, since most of us seem to be afflicted with lazy typing fingers. Sideways: the other day I was contemplating how long it had been since I had written anything but a shopping list or quick game-note by hand. I used to write journals, poems, stories, entire game walkthru/notebooks etc by hand up to about late-20's (I did also use manual electric typewriter a lot back then, too). I barely know what a pen is, anymore.

"Red One" - brain at your door (or maybe as far as your neighbor's door) Xmas movie. I thought it might be the Jingle all the way type of silly/"stupid" - but fantasy/cgi/some action stuff. It reminded me more of Xmas Men In Black (in a non-direct comparison way) mixed with some darkish (well, vs. singing elves/snowmen and dancing reindeer) fantasy tones here and there, and typical Santa nice/naughty/redemption moralizing. Or something. Anyway, it's not a good movie, but maybe because I had zero expectations and wasn't looking for any depth whatsoever, I still found some stuff hilarious. *shrug*

Indy - from a gameplay perspective, the areas right after Gizeh sucked, far as I'm concerned. Cinematic story lovers will like it tho. I would actually like a YT cut of this game where it's mostly all the "movies", in-game cutscenes, and the bare minimum amount of gameplay shown needed (the intro RotLA re-do need not be included, for example), to create a sort of 4-6 hour movie. Versus the 12+ hr "entire main game" fast run through videos where you have to watch someone playing for 8+ hours of it.

Indy - apparently if you've upped your health bars and food-health bars enough, when you fall down a pit, you don't die. Just a sliver of health remaining, so no game-over/auto-reload screen. When it 1st happened, I thought maybe there was some way out of the pitch black pit that even a torch barely helped at all, but no. Result is same, restart checkpoint, so it doesn't matter, but it's hilarious they let you boost health so much/didn't account for that so it happens.

Requirements for FF7-Rebirth are RTX-2060/RX-6600. eg, no GTX. Also, 12gb VRAM for 4k, possibly even for lower resolutions depending on settings, who bloody knows.It's not about RT - theory from some is need a gpu that will support DX12-Ultimate mesh shaders and other other features. https://fullcleared.com/news/here-are-the-pc-requirements-for-final-fantasy-vii-rebirth/ ...it's just that time where gpu tech/game dev tech standards is finally changing over. Had that long period of "my gpu/pc is 8-10+ years old and still does everything!" - but that's going, going, gone. Well, outside of indie games. And eventually that'll go to, for more graphic indies/A/AA, I would bet on it. At least the vram req. part. My 2080ti purchase, for time period I bought it, looks better all the time. If only I could hold out for the 60xx/whatever period.... Edit: at least that Arc B580 looks like a good budget 1080p card. Maybe Intel really will light a little fire under Nvidia's butt ... probably not. Nvidia obviously doesn't care about low budget gpu's.

Oh, also, if you'd like to not see all those logo intros starting the Indy game steamapps\common\The Great Circle\base\video\boot_sequence Rename the file in there. Depending on your PC you may see the loading shaders text line (those logos are like load screens, these days) for 1/4 of a second but then you're in game manu. I don't care about the time saved, it's more my ears saved. Can we please make the game volume control slider ALSO affect the crashing logos "TADAAAA" audio?

Indy game: I believe I'm near the end of Gizeh. I think my game save says around 16 hours. This region has somewhat worn out my liking for sneaking around, because the enemies change it up a little. Also, they do eventually respawn. By that I mean, the region is more fun to randomly explore, but enemies/stealth/combat becomes more tiresome. I have something like 900 "cash" collected for the region and have only had to spend ... 75. I collected 1000's of adventure points doing Adventure/Fieldwork and picking up all the notes, medicine, and relics ( a few) I saw along the way. Meaning I've "read" almost all the books I've found. I can now hold twice as much bread!

Yeah, I know about that. I don't really care about combat stuff, since I'm not looking for the hardest combat difficulty, and I like stealthiness or avoidance vs. leroy tactics. it is nice that you can mix and match the options vs. the defaults if one wants it. Guns imo are last resort/boss only, imo .... there's reasons, but I don't want to spoil. And maybe some would like it anyway. The adventure menu (puzzling) changes nothing. There is no "puzzle difficulty=full", it's just moderate/off/off, which is what the "overall adventure exp" Moderate settings does by default. If you picked Puzzle-Light at the start, you could change it to Moderate, but it doesn't get any better than that.

Ok, Gizeh more engaging in some ways. Perhaps I simply like "outdoors" locations than "cramped historical city" locations. All issues/nitpicks I personally have with the game overall are still there, mind, but the "map/location" design improves it. There seem to be more secrets and tiny cavern holes and brief surprises to stumble on to. Nothing expansive re: exploration/tomb-ing, but at least it's more interesting to navigate. Also, my advice: unless you're a mega-completionist type (which is fine if you are, I mean no offense!), I would maybe stick to mostly the main quest (Adventure) and the larger sidequests (Fieldwork). The rest are largely busy/filler/collection work. That said, the occasional Mystery was interesting, and if you trigger anything/can do it right then, why not. The game loop (largely the same format/cycle as Vatican) gets repetitive fast, but Gizeh is definitely better as a map. Plus one of the cutscenes/story was ... hilarious. Voss is a good Indiana Jones villain.

^ Oh, as usual, to be clear, I am not saying "Indy game sucks." There's fun to be had, it is what it is. Certain audience types will love it to death I'm sure. But it's main draw is nostalgia for Indiana, his character and original films. Just don't expect interesting/deep gameplay, mechanics, AI, reward-motivation, action, etc. I suppose I was hoping for at least a little more old school tombraider-ing feeling perhaps. The answer to that is no. I'm not sure I'll finish it, really. Depends what Gizeh offers.

@Sven_ ROFL at that bioshock video. Using a Sherlock montage was hilarious. And yeah, that's how a couple of puzzles felt like to me. Note that I am definitely in a category of one who doesn't like super hard puzzling games, but even I find the ones in Indy brain dead. There are a number of locked chests/safes in the game with a number code to open - I didn't bother with them all but there would be clues scattered about to figure out the right numbers to input. I am not sure but I think the game considers those puzzles. I would not, since it's just random number odds and the only way to figure out would be to input a zillion combos for 20 hours, or ... find the notes easily found (because they glow) that tell you. The bigger issue is that reward for some things is not worth it. I have collected/stolen "money" but nothing to spend it on, outside of one thing, at least nothing worthwhile. No weapons/gear. You get enough adventure points (to increase some combat/skill stuff a tiny bit) even w/out getting sidequest finished rewards etc. The enemy AI is abysmal, the YT videos on that are accurate. The one time I thought "aha, here's a Tombraider like dungeon traversal difficulty spike", in the end it was ... no. And most big "action" moments are very scripted/QTE-like things, hard to really fail etc. eg, vicarious fun but not much else. I think Gizeh will have a bit more tomb adventuring so we'll see. Could still improve a little.

Hiding the evidence. I have fun with this part. (had to lighten the pics some, it's dark in there)

Don't know about the medicine (I think I only bothered to find 11/15 while wandering/questing/sneaking) and I also did not bother to find most/all the Relics, but I can say that re: the latter (location concept spoiler, but not direct/specific). I have reached Gizeh (this is how it's spelled in the game): ---RIP Tony Todd, you were great, and will be missed ---I would enjoy this game without Gina a lot more. I don't like that she gets in my way at times while being largely an AI-chat bot. They did however give some simple 2-person task excuses for her to be there. She fits the themes of the films, also. But in the game - I could do without. Just me ofc. ---There are times when Indy's face looks more like Troy Baker's face. Just for micro seconds. This is because I know what Troy Baker looks like, tho. And I know it was motion capture tech. But it's funny. ---I still feel like there's very little actual gameplay, as in player involvement/brain-engagement/things to do. This is not necessarily bad. I totally understand the perspective of others wanting that from an adventure game. It's just not what I personally get tons of joy out of. That said, because it's Indy, I've chuckled some times and it really does feel like a new movie in a way.

I remember in the original Tombraider, you'd enter a room, look about, and start hitting the jump key to see what ledges you could grab onto. Or you'd try jumping a chasm from different spots until you found the right "spot". eg, there were no icon prompts, you had to trial and error quite often. I miss those days. In other words, this Indy game - I am reminded of the cat Stray game, where you were not allowed to do anything if there was no icon prompt. It's not quite as severe as that, but it's the feeling I have while roaming the tightly designed/linear areas/dungeons. Glance all around looking for prompts to tell you where you can go. In Stray it bothered me not because of the very simple type of game that was. Plus, y'know, cute kitty. In this Indy game, where it's supposed to be a grand adventure or something, it's a bit deflating. edit: I see no option to turn icon prompts totally off EDITEDIT: oh, also, constant unasked for chr. voice hints, even with the puzzle setting not on easy. I would like a "shut up" option. The main things about the Indy game seem to be: story/cutscene factor, lore, the occasional simple puzzle (so far, occasionally a little pattern recognition or clue brain work needed but nothing major) filling out all the collectable lists (which often are part of some sidequest), and if you so desire, purposely aggroing lots of fascist Nazi's (vs. 1-3 at a time via stealthy) to see if you can not die. The "tomb exploring" is at least starting to be more vicariously enjoyable tho. Atmosphere, graphically, hoping one doesn't miss a collectable etc. EDIT: I have been half ignoring most sidequests. I keep picking up stuff that triggers them, and/or finding collectables related to them, but I haven't been purposely tracking them. Focusing on main story and general map exploration.Some areas are locked initially etc.

Oh, afterthought - I would guess one reason Indy game is so "optimized" (outside of game engine and dev skill/choices maybe) is the areas are generally small/tightly designed. Sure some look more vista heavy, and there's room to roam/explore, but it's no open world, is all. And ofc, not much environment interactivity. RT-GI based games that are seriously open world/no loading screens et - I shudder to think what one would need there. probably 24v vram minimum, but who knows.

According to this guy, you chose wisely. The vid's not about Indy, but asking "more powah, more vram?" 3060/12 seems to beat 4060/8 in that regard. Not just in fps but in "movement/pacing smoothness". It's not that one cannot use 8gb still, but that on these types of games, it's going to mean lower settings, less smooth, sometimes a lot less fps, if the vram isn't enough. 8gb vs 12+gb really just depends on what kind of games one plays. If you're interested at all in some now or future AAA sorts of games tho, and getting something new/upgrading, better get 12gb min. 16 would be better if buying new/can afford. Edit: not relevant to 1080 perhaps, but at my DLSS-4k/Low Textures, I had upped a lot of other settings to High/it kept 60ish for a while, but when I hit the Vatican area my FPS plummeted and I had to put them back to Medium. eg, global illumination, shadows, some others. I don't think the vram went much higher (maybe .5gb) but the fps seriously tanked at High vs. Medium's lol.

I just had a bug. I found another guide page for photo-ing that had pics of the looking thru camera view vs. just a "this is the spot/object in the garden", and you're supposed to get a "Take picture/hotkey" text when you're aiming right. I was not getting that prompt, no matter where I stood/aimed etc. I tried the Restart Checkpoint vs. Continue option and that seemed to get rid of the bug. Text prompt appeared, I had to repeat-run around again, it worked.