+1 for yt-dlp

jdownloader2 also works for this

The first game is already on steam

Over the years I have heard stories where Valve closes an account after the owners passing. This is usually because the poster said they had trouble with something and explained that the original owner passed. Valve then responds by closing the account and ignoring the issue.

With that said I don’t think large groups of people can effectively share a library/account because only one person can play at a time. Small groups like spouses, parents, siblings or a small friend group is doable because it is easier to coordinate who is gonna use the account at any given time. This is especially true if they live together.

With the Deck, I have issues where I boot up a game on my living room PC and my Deck closes it’s game making me lose progress on the Deck. Imagine that multiplied 20x. Getting kicked mid match, losing that boss fight, lose your high score, getting left on cliffhanger mid cutscene. The throw your controller rage stuff.

Yes, happens all the time on gog. They don’t have the same library of games but there is an overlap.

Kinda ironic that you didn’t cover your email address in a privacy community

Better options have already been mentioned. With that said another option might be torrenting.

Automation

They didn’t get rid of the “don’t.” They got rid of the whole motto.

That changes when GabeN passes.

Rolling out, yes. Everyone that is already covered in one of their locations doesn’t lose service because they’re no longer expanding to new neighborhoods. Likewise, moving into one of those neighborhoods makes you a potential customer.

$87 for grocery used to get you gourmet organic foods. In 2024 you get uncrustables. I hate this timeline.

Reolink cameras look like they check all of your boxes. They can be self contained systems with a “recorder box” (actual term is NVR) that you keep on your property out of harms way or it can be a DIY PC with a program called Blue Iris. There is a variety of cameras to choose from with different features like Wifi, POE, PTZ, solar powered, etc. Spend as little or as much as you want. As you mentioned in your post, this will be pricey up front but will be cheaper in the long run.

Most of what these devices do is fairly light compute-wise. There’s no real need to have the most powerful hardware when all it will really do is add to cost. Are there use cases for more powerful hardware, of course but for most people what we have is good enough. That said, I would love an updated Shield or competitor.

Streisand effect go!

The amount of times that this is the answer is honestly worrying.

I agree but the average person doesn’t even know what that means.

• the arr apps have entered the chat

Don’t forget to put the system on a separate VLAN

“Federated bypass failed, video not available in any region”

I agree on the maintenance costs and do believe that the costs were justified but I can’t sell my horse armor and map packs from the same era at a GameStop, now or then. Doesn’t matter if I have a digital or physical edition. We normalized this.

Xbox Gamepass and the Nintendo Switch online console collections are the future regardless of what we want. We are simply rehashing the launcher wars with individual titles at this point. We traded ownership for convenience and somewhere along the way we became comfortable with the same IP being remastered, re-released, remade or reimagined on a yearly basis.

Just look at overwatch and counter strike. New game comes out and the developers “erased” the old game/version. We are reaching peak games as a service where you pay for everything but own nothing. I was never interested in Stadia but wasn’t their whole business model a subscription service with individual game titles as microtransactions?

I had a CD collection back in the day, still do, but it’s getting harder to find somewhere to play those discs. Most new cars don’t even come with a CD player. So now I can either repurchase on some digital platform or pay indefinitely for a streaming service. Both give the content without ownership. Why would gaming be different?

Look at what Nintendo did with the switch. Every physical copy has a unique license built in. So if you buy a used game, there is a real possibility that it won’t play despite having it physically in your hand. We’ve had always-online-DRM for offline single player games for years now.

Again, I agree with you. Its just that this has been coming for a very long time.