Not impressed with it sadly. They went really far afield from the winning formula with it, replacing different control schemes with different characters who behave differently to navigate the same micro-games with. It's a neat idea in theory but it isn't as enjoyable as a quick-fire game format getting random games and characters. It sounds like it should be comparable but doesn't end up being so.

I'm sure the full game will have varied modes where you can fix that side of it but it just isn't very fun compared to past entries.

@sexypoot: Indeed, I also remember when Gamespot was a games news website and not a mix of tabloid rag and QVC.

@Jaxith: Only maybe slightly. I mean, look at this.

I call BS, that looked like an early PS2 cutscene.

@DIYNoise: Definitely. Some of my all-time favorite games are the Phantasy Star Online/Universe/Portable games, all of which were dependent on central servers for online. You can get SOME of them online with custom servers but it's a massive pain with mixed results. I'm always upset when a good game gets tied to dedicated servers being that they're always terminal on a short to medium timeline.

@NBKNAS: It's more a case that this removes the option to play in LAN without an internet connection, it also removes the option for mods and, more importantly, the ability to play multiplayer if their servers ever get taken offline.

And considering the fact that Blizzard seems to be speedrunning corporate collapse currently, that latter point is a real possibility MUCH sooner than it ought to be.

@jenovaschilld: I really can't tell if you really think you know what you're talking about or you're just pretending to be this ignorant of the subject but I see my time is wasted either way.

@jenovaschilld:

You misunderstand, the USB-c port on the Steam Deck has Display Port 1.4 support and right here on the tech specs page of the device itself outright say it is capable of 8k60 or 4k120 output, I'm talking about outputting to an external display.

I don't think it's feasible at all to be doing 8k or 4k120 with the thing, at least unless you're playing something from no more recently than 2005, but I can say that a significantly weaker PC can play Serious Sam 3 for example at 4k60 without any trouble, it all comes down to what you're playing.

My main thrust though is that looking over the average user's PC hardware based on Steam's hardware survey results, this article is painting a much poorer picture of the hardware than it should, that it would run poorly no matter what it was running because the hardware is underpowered, which is definitely not true. I was saying that the power exists on it to run almost anything released 5+ years ago at native 800x1280 resolution and at high to even max settings, 60fps, without any real trouble, definitely with exceptions.

Looking at the Steam Hardware Survey, at least in raw numbers, the Steam Deck is a median PC, most of these numbers in the article about resolution and framerate seem to be based on modern, VERY recent releases, i.e., the ones they keep demoing like Jedi Fallen Order and Doom Eternal. Chances are good that if you're playing things even a few years old you're going to have little trouble getting high settings and 60fps, go back 10 years and the thing wouldn't struggle a whole lot outputting 4k in a lot of stuff, not that you'd want to.

Everyone reading these articles.