Community Post-it Wall

So today it was discovered that EVGA's new 2060 KO is actually using "defective" 2080 chips. They've been cut to make them stable and 2060 level performance an in gaming works as advertised but an interesting side effect is it seems it can still reach near 2080 levels in some non-gaming gpu applications like Blender. According to the report, when EVGA was asked about it they had no idea. An Nvidia's response seemed they weren't aware of it either. I mean you'd have to assume they didn't know because no way marketing wouldn't be all over that if they did.

The 2060 KO itself is a bit cheapy, doesn't use the best quality components and the cooler is a bit weak but that all makes sense as this was suppose to be a $299 "spare parts" type RTX 2060 deal. So it's neat that it's actually an even better deal than intended if one uses the GPU outside of gaming. Though now availability might be a challenge.

 

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I am playing Fire Emblem Three Houses again, the expansion is due next month and hopefully that'll be pretty cool. The rest of the DLC has been a bit underwhelming so proceed with caution.

 

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Picked up Ace Combat 7, which is current on sale on Steam. Still a bit pricey but some Bandai Namco titles just don't drop much. It's been a fun experience an my first Ace Combat game, which is strange since I love flight games. If I had to nitpick one thing it'd be the game isn't as polished as it could be on a technical level.

For example on Xbox One X and Playstation 4 Pro, the game maxes out at 1080p, an it actually performs worse on Xbox, which shouldn't be a thing. On the PC side you can go much higher but the UI is locked to 1080p... it looks very fuzzy and is distracting next to the crisp amazing visuals the game has at high resolutions. I think the cutscenes are locked too but they are so well rendered they still look really good. PC also didn't get the VR mode that Playstation did but I read from someone it was a one year exclusive? Sooo maybe it's coming.

Beyond that, the game has been playing great on my PC. RX 5700 is running it at 3200x1800 and so far hasn't dipped below 60 but I hear more demanding missions are coming. 4k worked on medium but was dipping. 1440p looks to be a locked 60, haven't looked at uncapped rates.

 

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I hate this time of year in terms of gaming, the news is sooooo slow and game releases thin. As far as I can remember February isn't gonna be much better for releases. March is looking great though, included a bunch below, many of which are highly rated series.

Animal Crossing
DOOM Eternal
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon
Ori and the Will of the Wisps
Nioh 2
Trails of Cold Steel 3
Persona 5 Royal
One Piece Pirate Warriors 4
MLB The Show 20
Langrisser I & II
Fairy Tail
My Hero One's Justice 2

 

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Currently stuck in Ace Combat 7, failed the mission numerous times now... looking like it's gonna be a grind to get all the right setup. I'm so close but the plane is just too slow and the faster planes just don't have the weapons I need. A bit annoying as things have been reasonable to this point. It doesn't help in this particular mission it feels like the AI teammates are doing nothing.

Been a bit addicted to The Sims 4 the last couple days, a nice break in between Ace Combat attempts lol. I wouldn't say it's a great Sims game, I feels like past games, especially Sims 2 and 3 did a lot more but I do like some of what they've done. Some things are really broken though, which is a shame... thankfully mods can fix a lot of it. Like past games it's also VERY expensive once you get into expansions and they ripped a lot of the good stuff out to sell in said expansions, so honestly the whole thing is a bit of a sham... maybe even more than usual. It's sad but obviously it's worked for them over the years.

 

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Was gifted Deliver Us The Moon, an as someone who likes space stuff I'm really enjoying it so far. It's been more of an experience than a game so far but I kind of like that. Hopefully it all holds up through to the end of the game.

Nvidia's cloud streaming service, GeForce Now, launched yesterday after being in closed beta for years. They have a free plan with 1 hour cap on continuous playtime and no priority access. An they have a paid plan that includes priority access, 6 hour continuous play time and RTX. The paid plan currently includes 3 free months and then is $5 a month for the first 12 months after that. No word on pricing after the first year. It currently supports Mac, Windows, Shield Devices and Android.

GeForce Now unlike Stadia is not a new platform. You don't buy games on the service, you play games you already own via Steam an a few other places. Sadly due to licensing issues not every game is available and games can leave the service. It's kind of ridiculous but that's out of Nvidia's hands. The games list is pretty large though.

Find and Play Your Favorite Games on GeForce NOW

I've used the service for a while in the beta and when it works it's really good but for whatever reason it's pretty hit and miss on my connection. I don't have much issues with other game streaming services so dunno, just one of them things. I do really like not having to buy my games again, just play and with it being Steam, it's usually right where I left off too.

 

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Finished Deliver us the Moon. Took about 6 hours and still have stuff to collect if I wish. I really enjoyed it, didn't run into too much trouble. A few interesting puzzles. The story was pretty good, though I feel the ending is a bit rushed. It's definitely more a interactive experience than a full on game, but a few of the set pieces and puzzles offer a little bit of a challenge. At $25 I think it's a decent value.

 

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Phantasy Star Online 2 NA beta starts tonight exclusively on Xbox One. It will run until Sunday, Feb. 9th at 3AM Eastern. They have one event planned tonight and one for Sunday at midnight. Saturday will have events throughout the day. Prior to this beta Phantasy Star Online 2 has been exclusive to Japan since 2012!

 

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New screenshots of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 have been released and they look absolutely stunning. I'm really hoping this won't be one of them downgrade games, but at the same time it seems this level of detail is gonna take a lot of power. I've heard in the closed beta they are recommending 32GB of ram at the moment. I wonder how much storage it's gonna require. I don't know how the heck they are gonna get this running well on an Xbox One/S.

 

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Finally got to play around with a Switch Lite. It feels really solid in the hand and honestly a bit more premium than the Switch itself. The lack of weight is also very noticeable especially when going back to holding a Switch, which feels a bit like a brick after holding the Lite. On paper the weight difference isn't massive but I think it's balanced better than the Switch. Ergonomically I can't say the Lite fixes the issues that the Switch has in handheld mode, it's still crampy. The weight helps in the wrists through and I've found I can play longer before my hands really act up.

Also wanna add the buttons are a lot mushier, almost too mushy imo but along with the little bigger, flatter design I find them a lot more comfortable than the smaller, harder joycon buttons... which I find dig into my fingers on longer play sessions. One negative I have is while the extra portability is nice, the screen reduction is bigger than I really expected, and some games aren't suited for this at all... making things hard to read, especially if you don't have great eye sight. Hopefully that's not gonna be a thing going forward now that the system is out and selling well.

Overall it's pretty neat, feels like a bigger PSP or PSVITA. It's a slick device.

 

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