LadyCrimson

Note: the chr. creation felt generic vs. an ability to make a unique looking chr, but at least the creation screen wasn't a total lie vs. in-game result. This is the sorting hat thing, not an outfit, but I am looking forward to maybe finding silly wearables...

^ I think I've refunded maybe 5 games, I'm not sure. I usually just eat it, but because my track record re: interest in all media lately has been especially bad, plus I'm not a Potter-world/lore fan I was dubious of my interest, especially for the slightly more expensive early-access version. But if I was going to buy/play it, I'm going to have those extra flying mount options, darnit. So, minus my earlier testing, I would say it takes 40-60 minutes to first get to the castle, depending on your speed, get hat-sorted and dumped into a room, which is when you can start manually saving. The game seems to be a system ram hog, getting up to 18gb total and beyond so far. But I did see it "let go" of some during transitions so no memory leak. If you have it, it just likes to gobble it. Found turning a few settings down (shadows, effect particles ... uh, I forget) to medium seemed to get me the 50-60ish fps I wanted in native 4k. I expect there to be lots of ups and downs at times. Game itself: One of the few times I rather liked all the tutorial bits, the small combat, the story bits. Nothing fancy, but I wasn't bored, at least. Note: I am playing on Easy because I'm a casual nub these days. Although from the early taste I might bump it back to Normal. You can increase FoV but indoors it often still feels quite restricted and a bit annoying at times. Anyway, so far I'm impressed/interested enough to keep going/forget about any refund possibility. Off I go to find my inner wizard.

I would like to take a moment to gripe about Steam's 2-hour refund window when it comes to modern open world story rpg's, in that by the time you get past chr menu (even if you rush it/don't care), fancy game logos, long intro cutscenes, long tutorial bits (I can't even manually save yet), alter settings multiple times, restart game to make sure settings take, etc. it's going to 3+ hours or more and one sometimes gives up on the idea of a refund for that reason alone. The actual Hogwarts castle is likely going to be a performance drop for many and I think you don't reach that for a while. That gripe over...at the very start of the game, here's what I see, using 2080ti, 9900k, 32GB, no overlays except an fps counter: --during the pre-shader caching/setup whatever it is, which takes a few minutes, system ram went up to about 15GB for me, so not counting Windows maybe 12-13gb? I forgot to glance at task manager for ram usage after that. >.> ---4k, Ultra, no DLSS/scaling, no RT--- first cutscenes and area you can walk around in (not full open world yet), 35-45fps ----4k, Ultra, DLSS at Quality, no RT--- goes up to 50-60fps, DLSS to me looks noticeably softer but still all right ---1440, Ultra, no DLSS/scaling, no RT--- first cutscenes and area you can walk in, 50-60ish fps ---1440, Ultra, DLSS/Quality, no RT--- 90-110fps ...I tried reducing settings but I sort of felt like not everything was registering within game without a restart, would have spend an hour fiddling with that. But just changing one setting, like shadows, down a notch or two didn't seem to make much difference in 4k. I did try -all low- and graphically it's actually not the worst I've seen, although the fps increase didn't seem mega substantial for it. Debating whether to waste more refund window on testing.

Yeah, a lot of decent to good reviews of Hogwarts had me thinking I'd try to d/l and fire up the game for and hour, to at least see how it performs on my now "outdated" (haha) rig (in 4k I mean), as long as there wasn't a flood of PC-early-access reports of terrible performance issues etc. I was guessing/hoping with no RT/settings fiddling I'd still be in the realm of 50-60 fps most of the time. So I logged on a bit ago and apparently no one who bought the early-access pre-order can access. It won't unpack/start/play. Seems to be a general problem all over the world, not sure if it's 100% or 80% or whatever. Anyway ... it has nothing to do with gameplay itself but hahaha, that won't leave a good impression. Not sure what the problem/whose "fault" it is. Edit: looks like at least some people can access/play it fine. It could be mostly people who didn't buy directly from Steam, and/or something to do with preloading or not preloading.....hmm.. EditEdit: seems like unpacking is working for people now. I just started downloading because I was curious if it would start for me but I guess it will now. I'll test performance a bit on a few resolutions I guess, then wait for the Day1 patch.

I have a hard time tossing any book/magazine now, just because it starts to reach that "do you toss an unimportant but kind of a culture relic" or maybe it's just the memory, syndrome. Luckily I did toss enough away in previous years that I don't have too many left for me to fuss over. I think I still have a book re: HTML 3, as well few other such. As well as likely outdated stuff like oversized comprehensive state city/topographical map books. I used to love maps, books, pamphlets (National Geographic used to put a lot of goods ones inside), even the ones on tourism guides. They were to me what postcards were to others.

^ Yeah I saw most of those SNL clips. Most were pretty good. I haven't watched any SNL in ages, I only recognize one face in that troupe now, lol. Last of Us eps 4 started as more filler in the sense of a lot of slow relationship building. It was good tho and for those that like more direct momentum there's some of that too. I was hoping the Ellie dynamic was being done in part to make some stuff more impactful and I think that's working. By the end of the episode I was liking her more, like I did in the game. I am wondering tho, in all these post-apoc shows, how long *does* auto gas stay viable enough to actually work to make a car go vroom? Everything I've read indicates maybe a few months to a few years depending on various factors, and all these shows, even if they have a toss away line about the topic, having people siphoning/using gas 5, 10, 20+ years later. >.>

Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile via Netflix - family movie, cgi singing crocodile, live action otherwise, Javier Bardem (he's not the crocodile) The 10 minute opening was great, baby Lyle was adorable, I could watch that bit repeatedly. It's not really similar to it/wasn't comical, but that singing frog cartoon came to mind a couple times. The rest becomes a kid/family musical movie that is passable but nothing special. Young lonely teen+parents, + adult Lyle + some mean neighbor shenanigans. There's also a CGI cat. Anyway, Javier's performance as a singing magician was great/fun. Maybe 15 minutes too long for a "kids movie" with one of those overlong memories flashback montage sequences.

Big Picture in menus? I'm not sure what that means. I have anything Steam Overlay unchecked, I see nothing about Big Picture Mode anywhere. But today I noticed that for some reason Steam client had decided to duplicate all my game sorting categories. Two "RPG", two "RTS", and so on. Don't know how long it was like that before I noticed. I was a little afraid if I deleted one they would both delete, so I renamed one of them ... that registered fine, so I deleted the renamed one. Seemingly fixed. Weird tho. The last couple client updates I've noticed little weird things, like new boxes when games launch that didn't exist before, new reminders/popups re: "you can change launch options here via this gear icon!" and ... then they stopped again. Feels like they are having a personality crisis.

...think I'll pre-order that Hogwarts game, but won't download/play it until early reviews/performance assessments. ...hope the release is positive, I could use something to lose myself this month.

I'm now idly curious how you wrote out that long post, since it's the first time alternating sized text registered on my PC screen since not allowing sites to pick fonts etc.

To add, I also have that request is blocked thing going again occasionally. And it still, for me, feels random. I think it's been the quote marks again, or maybe parenthesis, but sometimes they go through, and sometimes it's "blocked". Edit: like that time, the word blocked in quotes triggered no error. Other times it will. Don't know what the difference is.

From some perspectives, we decided to drive on the wrong side of the road, too. ...the US is just a contrary, rebellious teenager.

I'm not sure. Everything I've seen focuses on Cherry MX Red/linear, at least from that company. I haven't seen anything else ever mentioned. Other companies do have their own low profile brown/blue and tactile/clicky options.

They make low profile Cherry switches these days. Plus I would guess that laptop's much thicker/higher back-end (vs. more common gaming laptops being more evenly bottomed), while needed for built-in mega cooling and other reasons I assume, could have a side benefit re: helping with a low-profile KB appearance. Llike this low profile Cherry KB on Amazon is less than an inch high. Maybe for laptops they've made them even shorter now. Edit: I might like one of those, except I tend to hover/rest hands lightly on the KB a lot, and user comments make it sound a little too sensitive for that.

Re: dates - people use what they're taught in grade school (well when I was a kid, dunno about now) to the point where you're as used to it as seeing a word and knowing what the definition is. I think the fault lies more in the human habit of wanting to always shorten/abbreviate stuff because we're all too lazy to write things out fully. At least I -almost- never write checks anymore. I do not miss those. My own PC - haven't had a spontaneous reboot for a week, generally or while playing a game, but Firefox tabs still crash occasionally etc. As long as it's not rebooting, it's all right I guess.

I bet it'll have a MSRP of ... $2499. I suppose it might be $1999 but I wouldn't cross my fingers on it. Well, at the least this is promising in terms of that whenever I maybe build totally new, whatever it is by then would be enough to last until I die or physically can't game anymore or whatever. And it'll probably only cost me $6k by then! For the GPU.... *does a little cheer for Intel to keep improving their lower range gpu's, instead*

I wonder if the Intel ARC - which supposedly has greatly improved with some driver updates and lowered their MSRP - would run that at 1080 ok. At any rate - yeah, here comes the upping of game req, at least fancy graphic titles. The game does look interesting, I'll be curious re: reviews etc. Other news: I cannot tell if the Amazon-buys-Tombraider is actually true (regardless how much it cost them) or just unconfirmed rumor. I am picturing them trying to make a new Tombraider TV series or film franchise, which makes me Well, who knows. Maybe they'd have more success with that IP. Edit: now I'm reading rumor that they rented use of the IP vs. outright bought it out.

Yeah, I can understand criticism from that viewpoint of where eps 3 seems like too much filler. While I'm familiar with the big plot beats/spoilers of the game, I do not have any details/lore or exact game moments in my head/memorized nor any large attachment to specific chr. beats. I wonder if this might be one of the more ideal places to watch the show from, heh. I did find ep3 a bit of a surprise as that relationship segment went on and on, but it was so well done I simply enjoyed it. Plus I understood the different tonal direction they wanted to take vs. the game, re: how the bottom line of how one chr. reaches a motivational place from influence of a minor chr. To me it kind of reminded me of how, in STTNG, after the exciting Picard/Borg episodes, there was that lull episode of Picard at his brother's farm. That could be seen as "filler" too but it was important re: Picard's character. It's not an exact parallel, I know, since the Picard on farm was still focused on ... well, Picard ... but it felt similar in concept. Edit: The one thing re: game vs. show that I've noticed is that Ellie feels a lot more - brash/bold, almost to the negative "stupid horror chr. actions" archetype - at times. They changed that dynamic a bit. It's made me not like Ellie as much, at least initially.

It was of decent quality, so I can understand some praise, but I was expecting more action from descriptions. I'm not someone who generally likes political or mobster/gang melodrama intrigue series if that's the top focus. Sometimes it's ok for a movie length but often not even then. I'm not sure why, I can like plenty of melodrama or drama or dialogue heavy films but ... I just find those settings/plots boring or something.

Grocery/household - it all amounts to maybe $700-$800 a month for us right now. That's food and non-food grocery together, mind, but still, two people, pffft. I'm used to less food per day already, maybe I'll go to the one meal a day. Edit: I think eggs are $7-$10 at the moment, depends. CostCo every couple months or so helps with some of the non-food to stock up on but they're dangerous to some of us in the sense that you always seem to find yourself walking out of there spending way more than necessary, even if you manage to avoid silly fluff items. Because it speaks to the lazy don't-want-to-come-back soul inside of you, so of course you need 4 giant packs of tons of paper towels right now, or 8 of those giant spice bottles, it's not like they go bad right?? Giant cheese packages, you like that brand right hon, gotta get couple of those! And oh! That's a new packaged food, very low carb, I have to try that at least once! >.> Yeah, don't go there often unless you have the self-discipline of a monk.

Watched a few episodes of Warrior via HBOMax. I guess it was a Cinemax series (inspired by something Bruce Lee wanted to do?) that was cancelled when they decided to halt original content or something, but it's become popular enough that HBO is going to make a 3rd season. My main motivation to try it was: martial arts (late 1800's/US period), and the actor who was playing the Father in Bullet Train had made a bit of an impression so I was curious. Anyway ... the first few minutes was a nice opening, making me hope for some fun hijinks. Then it would alternate between boring chr. drama, mildly interesting or amusing chr. drama, lotsa nekkid women, mobster/faction politics and conflict, 20 seconds of fun hijinks action, rinse and repeat etc. My issue was I kept waiting for the fun action hijinks but it was few and far between. Also, there were way way too many different characters introduced in those 3 episodes, sometimes just for one or two short scenes. There's a lead chr. but so far it's really more of an ensemble. Maybe it all comes together eventually but so far it's more Chinese gang/mobster/drama conflict (which I find dull) then the kung-fu-ey hijinks I was hoping for.

Well, since two episodes were stacked up and I had nothing better to do last night, I watched eps. 2 and 3 of Last of Us. Production quality held up. Acting (mostly) held up. Story held up - well, y'know, for a parasitic fungus post-apoc theme. I personally thought eps 3 was a very nice piece of story-telling, if a tad predictable - but very well done. I like the balance of chr, slower moments, action, emotion, small bits of humor. Anyway, I don't think I'd gush over it like some, but the time just flies by and I never have an urge to turn it off or even FFWD, which at least for me, these days, is something.

Physical ailments/issues make one feel so much older, not just physically but mentally. I should do more than 30 min. elliptical and arm exercises and occasional walks, but eh, it's hard enough to get my arse to keep even that up. These days, I see a chair, I (and my creaky joints) like to sits. The one thing I keep wanting to do is work on leg muscle mass again tho. After losing much muscle re: hospital, I have near chicken legs (well, for me, vs. what I had) and the elliptical, while toning/strengthening, has so far not done much of anything re: mass. Which means I should ... wait, what was that? "CHAIR!"

Annnd 20 minutes after I post that, it changes. The non-animated and darker version of the banner is much more tolerable on the eyes at least, and looks good design-wise. I'll leave this one alone for now. Thanks.

It's still annoying on my 10.5 tablet at horizontal viewing. The typical phone vertical mobile view is much less obtrusive feeling I agree. Maybe I should turn the 55" TV vertically? The dynamic desktop scaling of banner vs. forum-width also causes it to grow larger/taller when in actual thread view, vs. the "Home" view which has the right side-bar menus, especially if it's not full-screen, at least on the 1440 and tablet. That all said, it's probably more the animation factor that bugs me the most. It's an overall nice design actually (and the t-shirts look nice ) , but almost-blinking animation is very distracting. If it was static I might tolerate it.