It turns out it was incorrect to think an update to Firefox was a problem with ICS. It may just be ICS itself. Because turning it on stops *all* internet activity for the PC. And considering that ICS is like a vestigial tail that nobody thinks about anymore, MS will be unlikely to put any effort into fixing it. I mean, who would expend effort to fix something that maybe affects 0.003% of all use cases?
Maybe I should try having faster internet.
I'm sure we've been over this... but why exactly are you forced into using ICS? (I assume it's not by choice!) Can you not have more than one device "officially" using your connection at once?
I used ICS briefly back in... 2002/3 or so and I remember it being a pain in the ass even then.
It turns out it was incorrect to think an update to Firefox was a problem with ICS. It may just be ICS itself. Because turning it on stops *all* internet activity for the PC. And considering that ICS is like a vestigial tail that nobody thinks about anymore, MS will be unlikely to put any effort into fixing it. I mean, who would expend effort to fix something that maybe affects 0.003% of all use cases?
Maybe I should try having faster internet.
I'm sure we've been over this... but why exactly are you forced into using ICS? (I assume it's not by choice!) Can you not have more than one device "officially" using your connection at once?
I used ICS briefly back in... 2002/3 or so and I remember it being a pain in the ass even then.
One a month I must register for continued internet access. For example, I registered yesterday, so on July 24 it will shutdown (but due to my VPN, it's the day I'll have 20Mbps instead of 2Mbps). I cannot just use the monthly passcode to log in via WiFI for my console(s) and thus must share the internet connection I get via PC WiFi with the onboard ethernet which connects to the Xboxes.
At some point within the last two or three weeks there was a Windows update that apparently broke ICS, but due to the sometimes spotty nature of when I play Xbox I didn't notice it until shortly after the recent Firefox update.
Anyway, I've been using ICS variously for the last twenty years. And while it was never especially awesome, it used to work far, far better than it did even a month ago. I used to just be able to turn in on and never think about it. But four or five years ago it suddenly requires that I turn it off either before shutting down or after rebooting because it no longer understood it was enabled.
On top of all that fun, I can no longer get my phone to connect to the local internet. It keeps returning an error about a bad or incompatible SSL or whatever. So for about three months my phone keeps reminding me there is a system update that I am not allowed to fucking download over 4G LTE for some goddamned reason.
I really, really, really want to move from this extended stay (a place I chose simply because affording week-to-week was, but no longer is, a struggle). However, there is a nifty little high-pressure system just anchored over Texas and the temps have been near, at, or over 100 for the last two weeks (with a slight reprieve and then right back to 'Oh, hey! This is ten degrees above normal for this time of year! Don't go outside and don't drive so much even though your entire job is being outside and driving around from place to place and leaving the engine running so as not to boil to death in the only worthwhile shade...).
Ahem...
So I kind of don't want to move somewhere where I would have to pay some bullshit rates for electricity due to other Texas-inspired fuckery (look it up, it's just so fucking awful here). I've just rather settled that I'll be here for at least the next four or so months until the weather cools down again.
Anyway, the TLDR is that ICS is the only thing that allows me to use my Xbox connected to XBL for those sweet, sweet timestamps and now my PC can no longer open webpages for tips and tricks on a difficult game.
I guess they really under-printed Xbox copies for the AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES sequel because I can’t find it anywhere but the other versions remain in stock. Might just buy it digitally.
I really, really, really want to move from this extended stay (a place I chose simply because affording week-to-week was, but no longer is, a struggle). However, there is a nifty little high-pressure system just anchored over Texas and the temps have been near, at, or over 100 for the last two weeks (with a slight reprieve and then right back to 'Oh, hey! This is ten degrees above normal for this time of year! Don't go outside and don't drive so much even though your entire job is being outside and driving around from place to place and leaving the engine running so as not to boil to death in the only worthwhile shade...).
I think anyone who's spent a lot of years in college, university and/or graduate or professional level education can probably relate to this very stupid but apparently necessary tendency to move in the summer. I've done it multiple times (though ironically, not my last two times); Georgia doesn't get as hot as Texas, but it gets hot enough that in June and July, when most people move apartments, you will want to kill yourself just to escape it. Contrary to what people say, it's not the humidity, it's the heat. Last week, we were comfortably in the zone of coming up to 90 degrees Fahrenheit after sunset and 105 degrees during the day. I was born in a subtropical climate, but even I find it extremely disturbing to walk outside at 9 PM, only to wonder why it's still more than eighty degrees outside at night.
(My last two times I managed to avoid this--I moved to my last apartment in December after finishing graduate school, which was smart, and I lived there for over nine years before moving out to my house in February.)
You've got my sympathy. I have to assume it's worse in Texas.
but even I find it extremely disturbing to walk outside at 9 PM, only to wonder why it's still more than eighty degrees outside at night.
It's the on-shore from the Gulf/Caribbean. The extremely warm water only serves to add to any humidity already in the air and insulate the heat islands that cities become. It isn't until later in the year when the winds shift generally to come from the north that any real cooling happens. I grew up in Southern California and the Pacific at that latitude is quite cold. (All my Texas relatives have at some point in my life mentioned how cold the ocean is compared to Gulf temps.) The Southeast US is warm and muggy because of the same natural phenomena that cools the West Coast US. Nature and weather = fun shit.
And now I wonder if a weather forecast/prediction game could do any business. I did a vague look and it appears various weather sites have *something* along those lines. But I expect they're very simplistic.
Oh, hey... I think the on board Ethernet could be dying. Which could explain the sudden shitty ICS response.
It worked fine all day yesterday. But then after I connect my external HDD to move the finished game off the X1 the ethernet decides to bounce between connected and not connected.
Goong to try and swap the ethernet cable just in case, but, yeah. We'll see.
As in the past (Xbox Series consoles outsold PS5 last month in Japan), I'll repeat that this has a lot more to do with supply and availability (as far as I can tell) than any sort of big change in brand preference, which Playstation obviously holds. Xbox consoles outsold Playstation in some regions of Latin America for similar reasons (albeit in much smaller markets), because Sony happened to be historically weak in those market and sometimes charged more. Some of this is probably up to availability--we've had a lot of speculation that, even in cases with both consoles being sold out, Microsoft has paid for bigger share of output out of AMD's chipset foundries, and they have much more money to spend on manufacturing output than Sony simply by virtue of being a vastly larger corporation. Add to that the PS5 being chronically sold-out in most markets since launch. The Switch numbers also hint at this, as Nintendo doesn't depend on the same chips from AMD and isn't subject to the same shortages (the Switch Lite also sells better in Japan than it did here it seems, where people much prefer the other models). Some of this may reflect that Japan's home console market is only so large, and they've had better access to PS5 retail than most, so you're seeing a natural tapping off (then again, Switch numbers are still excellent). Some of that is probably cost; the Series S is cheaper than either model of Playstation 5, and sold better.
Still, I find it interesting that the discless PS5 sold barely a forth what the full PS5 did; I'm not sure if this reflects what inventory Sony has on hand (Sony obviously makes a better return, or at least loses less money, on the more expensive SKU--the cheaper one has always been rarer in the United States, but in higher demand too), but I suspect it does.
No dude, Xbox is making big gains in Japan. Paul Thurrot, the MS insider, said so in a podcast and outlets like VGC picked up the story. Phil is da man! Spread the hype!
jk :P
There are more Series S produced out there. But I wonder if people in Japan are getting an Xbox either through an energy drink promo or a bundle from Amazon Japan.
A few thousands there do move the needle to the people reporting numbers.
Archsorcerer on
XBL - ArchSilversmith
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA
Really makes me wonder what Microsoft did to be able to secure the componants to make more consoles like that?
Unless Sony is just concentrating on Western locations for now.
Going by Moore's Law is Dead commentary, besides what could be more money to buy production time at the fab and spend on expensive cargo transportation during the pandemic, the Series S' GPU is a lower end chip and likely requires a cheaper cooling solution.
They used old GPUs. :P
EDIT: I'd imagine they are concentrating on the USA.
Archsorcerer on
XBL - ArchSilversmith
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA
Oh, hey... I think the on board Ethernet could be dying. Which could explain the sudden shitty ICS response.
It worked fine all day yesterday. But then after I connect my external HDD to move the finished game off the X1 the ethernet decides to bounce between connected and not connected.
Goong to try and swap the ethernet cable just in case, but, yeah. We'll see.
So, not the cable. And, not the on-board ethernet port. Same cable and port allowed the 360 to connect (briefly).
Which leads only to the on-board X1X port. Which isn't a pretty conclusion.
I did a network reset, then started looking into advanced settings on the ethernet NIC itself. When I remembered something:
What was happening was when the X1 was turned on, the Ethernet setup under Network Connections would basically bounce between 'Network cable unplugged' and 'Identifying/Unnamed Network'. And I recall that something like this happened before. (But I don't recall if it was X1 related or not.) And scrolling through the advanced settings I see 'Speed and Duplex'. This triggers a search and up pops a thing that some connections struggle with the default Auto Negotiation, especially if the speed is basically lower than 100Mbps. So the suggestion is set it to one of the Half Duplex options.
And that seems to have settled it. It stopped bouncing around.
The weird thing is that I didn't do anything with the NIC settings yesterday, so I don't know why it stopped working. Sharing ICS still fucks up the PC side of things. Half steps, I suppose.
Here's a question. Sometimes the X1 doesn't connect to XBL even if ICS has been turned on prior to boot. Is there an easy way to try and force it to recheck and login without needing to restart the console? Because that shit gets old.
As in the past (Xbox Series consoles outsold PS5 last month in Japan), I'll repeat that this has a lot more to do with supply and availability (as far as I can tell) than any sort of big change in brand preference, which Playstation obviously holds. Xbox consoles outsold Playstation in some regions of Latin America for similar reasons (albeit in much smaller markets), because Sony happened to be historically weak in those market and sometimes charged more. Some of this is probably up to availability--we've had a lot of speculation that, even in cases with both consoles being sold out, Microsoft has paid for bigger share of output out of AMD's chipset foundries, and they have much more money to spend on manufacturing output than Sony simply by virtue of being a vastly larger corporation. Add to that the PS5 being chronically sold-out in most markets since launch. The Switch numbers also hint at this, as Nintendo doesn't depend on the same chips from AMD and isn't subject to the same shortages (the Switch Lite also sells better in Japan than it did here it seems, where people much prefer the other models). Some of this may reflect that Japan's home console market is only so large, and they've had better access to PS5 retail than most, so you're seeing a natural tapping off (then again, Switch numbers are still excellent). Some of that is probably cost; the Series S is cheaper than either model of Playstation 5, and sold better.
Still, I find it interesting that the discless PS5 sold barely a forth what the full PS5 did; I'm not sure if this reflects what inventory Sony has on hand (Sony obviously makes a better return, or at least loses less money, on the more expensive SKU--the cheaper one has always been rarer in the United States, but in higher demand too), but I suspect it does.
Someone on a different forum did a graph of the year-to-date sales for both (credit to Hiska-kun).
PS5 has much bigger shipments to Japan in 2021, and then they're mostly the same in 2022; slightly down, but could easily get back to the same level. Xbox's shipments start very low in 2021, pick up, and now on pace to more than double in 2022. Xbox is about 10% of PS5 in 2021 and >25% in 2022. And both are dwarfed by the gargantuan Switch numbers.
Oh, hey... I think the on board Ethernet could be dying. Which could explain the sudden shitty ICS response.
It worked fine all day yesterday. But then after I connect my external HDD to move the finished game off the X1 the ethernet decides to bounce between connected and not connected.
Goong to try and swap the ethernet cable just in case, but, yeah. We'll see.
So, not the cable. And, not the on-board ethernet port. Same cable and port allowed the 360 to connect (briefly).
Which leads only to the on-board X1X port. Which isn't a pretty conclusion.
I did a network reset, then started looking into advanced settings on the ethernet NIC itself. When I remembered something:
What was happening was when the X1 was turned on, the Ethernet setup under Network Connections would basically bounce between 'Network cable unplugged' and 'Identifying/Unnamed Network'. And I recall that something like this happened before. (But I don't recall if it was X1 related or not.) And scrolling through the advanced settings I see 'Speed and Duplex'. This triggers a search and up pops a thing that some connections struggle with the default Auto Negotiation, especially if the speed is basically lower than 100Mbps. So the suggestion is set it to one of the Half Duplex options.
And that seems to have settled it. It stopped bouncing around.
The weird thing is that I didn't do anything with the NIC settings yesterday, so I don't know why it stopped working. Sharing ICS still fucks up the PC side of things. Half steps, I suppose.
Here's a question. Sometimes the X1 doesn't connect to XBL even if ICS has been turned on prior to boot. Is there an easy way to try and force it to recheck and login without needing to restart the console? Because that shit gets old.
You can run a network test/ troubleshoot but in my experience, it works less reliably.
Recently, I've been playing Children of Morta, which is an older Rogue-lite on Gamepass. You're playing as the family from What Remains of Edith Finch... not really, but their propensity for all dying horribly holds true, at least. The family of Player Characters are descendants of a group meant to protect a certain magic mountain. When the story starts, the mountain is beginning to spew out plagued monsters and dead villagers. As you make runs into the mountain dungeon to try to figure out what's happening and succeed (or more likely at the start, die horribly, part of the perks of being a Guardian of the mountain is a rescue from certain death), you unlock powers for your active heroes, all family buffs (example, attack damage, crit chance, health increases), or new family members to play as as the plot proceeds. The roll out of new stuff is Hades-esque, but not done as well due to lower budget and lesser skill of the dev team (they're not bad, it's just Hades is a hard thing to compete against). I think the game starts off kind of poorly, the initial two heroes are WEAK at their starting point and you're missing a lot of the basic gameplay elements until you get a run rolling a little bit. However, once you unlock some of those starting features, active abilities for the starting heroes, buffs for the family, and especially some of the more fun heroes (I like the Rogue and Monk more than the starting Knight or Archer), it comes into its own as a compelling game. The game's writing takes a lot of advantage of the PCs all being this cute extended family unit, my only complaint to that part is that it doesn't have nearly the writing volume of Hades, so the cute asides take lengthy breaks if you stop progressing (something Hades is renowned for pretty much not doing). The difficulty is also very swingy so far. I died horribly on the first dungeon like 6 times in a row, then when I beat it, I beat the second dungeon on my first try (with the same character who cleared the first). Then, the third dungeon slapped me around for a while until I suddenly got a powerful run that utterly destroyed the boss the first time I even encountered it. Unless I get super bored of a lack of interesting progression or plot, I'll probably be marathoning this until I'm through.
Thanks for the writeup! I made it past the tutorial but decided the pixel graphics just weren't working for me on the big TV. I like pixel art generally, but a lot of games end up too visually busy, because the floors and scenery are detailed but blocky. It's hard to parse. I think a lot of these indie pixel art games were developed for the PC first. When they're ported over, high-quality, super detailed pixel graphics that look good on a monitor don't always translate so well to a 75" screen. This sounds good enough that maybe I should give it another chance, though.
Yeah I usually really like Rogue-lite games but CoM didn't hold my attention for very long. I don't really know if I could articulate why but it just wasn't nearly as fun for me.
I really liked it it. I started playing it co-op with a buddy and then rolled through it on my own. My biggest complaint was that you can't (or couldn't, it's been a while) increase the difficulty/drops of the earlier biomes so towards the endgame when you're trying to grind out a new upgrade you're stuck doing runs in whatever the newest biome is.
Man I remember seeing the trailer and such for Morta and being so excited to play it and even did EA purchase. And yeah... dont know what it was just didnt play it after the first session.
Is there any news as to whether Microsoft are going to add to the backwards compatible catalog or are we done and I'm never getting to play Tenchu again?
I think they said they've kinda hit the point where they can't get any more licenses. The last batch was like 70+ games so it was kinda the last hurrah
I thought they said they were done adding backward compatible titles but I feel like they've said that a few times and then resumed it occasionally.
Never say never, but I think the list of remaining titles they could possibly add is ludicrously small. Particularly since OG Xbox and 360 were a wild cavalcade of licensed music and voice work that is all governed by expired contracts signed by companies that no longer exist.
Some amusing incidents and anecdotes from Children of Morta:
-The Dad of the family (Knight) forbids the younger son (Rogue) from joining the dungeon team. He's too inexperienced, his mom will be too worried. After a certain run, the son goes into the dungeon anyway, to prove his competence. Dad panics and rushes into the dungeon to find him. That run ends in an incident that involves around 12 goblins and himself painting the wall after a particularly harsh melee, nowhere near the dungeon exit. Upon return, it turns out the son made a completely safe run, killed a bunch of goblins, and brought back a bunch of treasure. Dad THOUGHT he's never felt so rebuked, that is, until his son clears the dungeon that he's been trying against, almost immediately. Then the second one also, first try. I think Dad spends a lot of time outside, sighing, these days.
-The younger daughter (Fire Mage) proves herself and joins the dungeon team. On a run through the tier 2 dungeon, she discovers a family of travelers slaughtered, except for a small child that hid. The child asks for protection to find their Mom, who is apparently hanging out deeper on the same floor. Daughter agrees and then immediately regrets it as the most enemies ever seen in this dungeon greet them in a brutal struggle right outside the door. Daughter violently fights through the exit door and then realizes the child has a brain with the potency of a kumquat, they simply walked in a straight line through the melee and are about 3/4ths dead and completely out of sight. Daughter rushes to save the child and gets in an even bigger fight within eyesight of a door to safety, but the child walks directly into an enemy summoning spell and perishes. Daughter is devastated (not too devastated to loot Mom's room without speaking to her before leaving) and heads deeper into the dungeon with a heavy heart. On the final floor of the dungeon, she discovers a terrible scene. Travelers slaughtered except for... a child... who asks to be escorted to their Mother. This trip is comparatively uneventful, the enemies on the floor seem much less prepared. Daughter is deeply suspicious and returns home after easily wiping out the floor boss. She no longer believes that the Travelers are... human per se.
-Dad finds an item that lets you do a one-time exchange of run currency (gems) to long-term upgrade currency (gold). "That isn't great, I need this run currency to make this run successful," he thinks as he goes deeper into the dungeon. Later, during a massive scrum, he activates the item and collects the spoils while fighting deeper into what is obviously going to be his doom. He feels the dungeon is mocking him at this point.
I guess that's one way to get around having major recruitment problems: just buy your way into replacement employees!
I'm sure everyone at that studio is just thrilled.
Added irony that a company named "Proletariat" just got bought by one of the biggest game publishers, who in turn is getting out by one of the console manufacturors.
Development on Spellbreak began to slow down in late 2021. The game's website shows that the last patch released for the game was in September of last year.
This likely isn't the last we'll see of Proletariat. The company has not announced any shutdowns or layoffs, and is still riding off of a $20 million round of investment led by Take-Two Interactive from 2019.
Hopefully the team will be able to take the lessons learned from developing Spellbreak into wherever their next project takes them.
Don't know how the investment works but I can imagine Take-Two getting some cash.
XBL - ArchSilversmith
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA
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Spellbreak was a cool concept that I wanted to see in a story based game.
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I'm sure we've been over this... but why exactly are you forced into using ICS? (I assume it's not by choice!) Can you not have more than one device "officially" using your connection at once?
I used ICS briefly back in... 2002/3 or so and I remember it being a pain in the ass even then.
Steam | XBL
One a month I must register for continued internet access. For example, I registered yesterday, so on July 24 it will shutdown (but due to my VPN, it's the day I'll have 20Mbps instead of 2Mbps). I cannot just use the monthly passcode to log in via WiFI for my console(s) and thus must share the internet connection I get via PC WiFi with the onboard ethernet which connects to the Xboxes.
At some point within the last two or three weeks there was a Windows update that apparently broke ICS, but due to the sometimes spotty nature of when I play Xbox I didn't notice it until shortly after the recent Firefox update.
Anyway, I've been using ICS variously for the last twenty years. And while it was never especially awesome, it used to work far, far better than it did even a month ago. I used to just be able to turn in on and never think about it. But four or five years ago it suddenly requires that I turn it off either before shutting down or after rebooting because it no longer understood it was enabled.
On top of all that fun, I can no longer get my phone to connect to the local internet. It keeps returning an error about a bad or incompatible SSL or whatever. So for about three months my phone keeps reminding me there is a system update that I am not allowed to fucking download over 4G LTE for some goddamned reason.
I really, really, really want to move from this extended stay (a place I chose simply because affording week-to-week was, but no longer is, a struggle). However, there is a nifty little high-pressure system just anchored over Texas and the temps have been near, at, or over 100 for the last two weeks (with a slight reprieve and then right back to 'Oh, hey! This is ten degrees above normal for this time of year! Don't go outside and don't drive so much even though your entire job is being outside and driving around from place to place and leaving the engine running so as not to boil to death in the only worthwhile shade...).
Ahem...
So I kind of don't want to move somewhere where I would have to pay some bullshit rates for electricity due to other Texas-inspired fuckery (look it up, it's just so fucking awful here). I've just rather settled that I'll be here for at least the next four or so months until the weather cools down again.
Anyway, the TLDR is that ICS is the only thing that allows me to use my Xbox connected to XBL for those sweet, sweet timestamps and now my PC can no longer open webpages for tips and tricks on a difficult game.
Steam | XBL
I think anyone who's spent a lot of years in college, university and/or graduate or professional level education can probably relate to this very stupid but apparently necessary tendency to move in the summer. I've done it multiple times (though ironically, not my last two times); Georgia doesn't get as hot as Texas, but it gets hot enough that in June and July, when most people move apartments, you will want to kill yourself just to escape it. Contrary to what people say, it's not the humidity, it's the heat. Last week, we were comfortably in the zone of coming up to 90 degrees Fahrenheit after sunset and 105 degrees during the day. I was born in a subtropical climate, but even I find it extremely disturbing to walk outside at 9 PM, only to wonder why it's still more than eighty degrees outside at night.
(My last two times I managed to avoid this--I moved to my last apartment in December after finishing graduate school, which was smart, and I lived there for over nine years before moving out to my house in February.)
You've got my sympathy. I have to assume it's worse in Texas.
It's the on-shore from the Gulf/Caribbean. The extremely warm water only serves to add to any humidity already in the air and insulate the heat islands that cities become. It isn't until later in the year when the winds shift generally to come from the north that any real cooling happens. I grew up in Southern California and the Pacific at that latitude is quite cold. (All my Texas relatives have at some point in my life mentioned how cold the ocean is compared to Gulf temps.) The Southeast US is warm and muggy because of the same natural phenomena that cools the West Coast US. Nature and weather = fun shit.
Everything is bigger in Texas.
And now I wonder if a weather forecast/prediction game could do any business. I did a vague look and it appears various weather sites have *something* along those lines. But I expect they're very simplistic.
It worked fine all day yesterday. But then after I connect my external HDD to move the finished game off the X1 the ethernet decides to bounce between connected and not connected.
Goong to try and swap the ethernet cable just in case, but, yeah. We'll see.
Famitsu's reported sales for the week of 13 - 19 June show that the Series S and Series X outsold the versions of the Playstation 5 console combined. The Playstation 5 sold 2371 units, the PS5-Discless sold 664 units (a massive disparity that I find interesting), the Series X sold 3272 units and the Series S slightly edged it out with 3423 units.
As in the past (Xbox Series consoles outsold PS5 last month in Japan), I'll repeat that this has a lot more to do with supply and availability (as far as I can tell) than any sort of big change in brand preference, which Playstation obviously holds. Xbox consoles outsold Playstation in some regions of Latin America for similar reasons (albeit in much smaller markets), because Sony happened to be historically weak in those market and sometimes charged more. Some of this is probably up to availability--we've had a lot of speculation that, even in cases with both consoles being sold out, Microsoft has paid for bigger share of output out of AMD's chipset foundries, and they have much more money to spend on manufacturing output than Sony simply by virtue of being a vastly larger corporation. Add to that the PS5 being chronically sold-out in most markets since launch. The Switch numbers also hint at this, as Nintendo doesn't depend on the same chips from AMD and isn't subject to the same shortages (the Switch Lite also sells better in Japan than it did here it seems, where people much prefer the other models). Some of this may reflect that Japan's home console market is only so large, and they've had better access to PS5 retail than most, so you're seeing a natural tapping off (then again, Switch numbers are still excellent). Some of that is probably cost; the Series S is cheaper than either model of Playstation 5, and sold better.
Still, I find it interesting that the discless PS5 sold barely a forth what the full PS5 did; I'm not sure if this reflects what inventory Sony has on hand (Sony obviously makes a better return, or at least loses less money, on the more expensive SKU--the cheaper one has always been rarer in the United States, but in higher demand too), but I suspect it does.
jk :P
There are more Series S produced out there. But I wonder if people in Japan are getting an Xbox either through an energy drink promo or a bundle from Amazon Japan.
A few thousands there do move the needle to the people reporting numbers.
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA
Or is it produced at a different plant?
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA
Unless Sony is just concentrating on Western locations for now.
Going by Moore's Law is Dead commentary, besides what could be more money to buy production time at the fab and spend on expensive cargo transportation during the pandemic, the Series S' GPU is a lower end chip and likely requires a cheaper cooling solution.
They used old GPUs. :P
EDIT: I'd imagine they are concentrating on the USA.
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA
IIRC it was "pre-bought a whole shitload of fab time/capacity". Giant check, well in advance.
Sony did this in past generations too, based on projected demand. Pretty normal thing to do if you think you'll need it.
So, not the cable. And, not the on-board ethernet port. Same cable and port allowed the 360 to connect (briefly).
Which leads only to the on-board X1X port. Which isn't a pretty conclusion.
I did a network reset, then started looking into advanced settings on the ethernet NIC itself. When I remembered something:
What was happening was when the X1 was turned on, the Ethernet setup under Network Connections would basically bounce between 'Network cable unplugged' and 'Identifying/Unnamed Network'. And I recall that something like this happened before. (But I don't recall if it was X1 related or not.) And scrolling through the advanced settings I see 'Speed and Duplex'. This triggers a search and up pops a thing that some connections struggle with the default Auto Negotiation, especially if the speed is basically lower than 100Mbps. So the suggestion is set it to one of the Half Duplex options.
And that seems to have settled it. It stopped bouncing around.
The weird thing is that I didn't do anything with the NIC settings yesterday, so I don't know why it stopped working. Sharing ICS still fucks up the PC side of things. Half steps, I suppose.
Here's a question. Sometimes the X1 doesn't connect to XBL even if ICS has been turned on prior to boot. Is there an easy way to try and force it to recheck and login without needing to restart the console? Because that shit gets old.
Someone on a different forum did a graph of the year-to-date sales for both (credit to Hiska-kun).
PS5 has much bigger shipments to Japan in 2021, and then they're mostly the same in 2022; slightly down, but could easily get back to the same level. Xbox's shipments start very low in 2021, pick up, and now on pace to more than double in 2022. Xbox is about 10% of PS5 in 2021 and >25% in 2022. And both are dwarfed by the gargantuan Switch numbers.
You can run a network test/ troubleshoot but in my experience, it works less reliably.
Never say never, but I think the list of remaining titles they could possibly add is ludicrously small. Particularly since OG Xbox and 360 were a wild cavalcade of licensed music and voice work that is all governed by expired contracts signed by companies that no longer exist.
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-The Dad of the family (Knight) forbids the younger son (Rogue) from joining the dungeon team. He's too inexperienced, his mom will be too worried. After a certain run, the son goes into the dungeon anyway, to prove his competence. Dad panics and rushes into the dungeon to find him. That run ends in an incident that involves around 12 goblins and himself painting the wall after a particularly harsh melee, nowhere near the dungeon exit. Upon return, it turns out the son made a completely safe run, killed a bunch of goblins, and brought back a bunch of treasure. Dad THOUGHT he's never felt so rebuked, that is, until his son clears the dungeon that he's been trying against, almost immediately. Then the second one also, first try. I think Dad spends a lot of time outside, sighing, these days.
-The younger daughter (Fire Mage) proves herself and joins the dungeon team. On a run through the tier 2 dungeon, she discovers a family of travelers slaughtered, except for a small child that hid. The child asks for protection to find their Mom, who is apparently hanging out deeper on the same floor. Daughter agrees and then immediately regrets it as the most enemies ever seen in this dungeon greet them in a brutal struggle right outside the door. Daughter violently fights through the exit door and then realizes the child has a brain with the potency of a kumquat, they simply walked in a straight line through the melee and are about 3/4ths dead and completely out of sight. Daughter rushes to save the child and gets in an even bigger fight within eyesight of a door to safety, but the child walks directly into an enemy summoning spell and perishes. Daughter is devastated (not too devastated to loot Mom's room without speaking to her before leaving) and heads deeper into the dungeon with a heavy heart. On the final floor of the dungeon, she discovers a terrible scene. Travelers slaughtered except for... a child... who asks to be escorted to their Mother. This trip is comparatively uneventful, the enemies on the floor seem much less prepared. Daughter is deeply suspicious and returns home after easily wiping out the floor boss. She no longer believes that the Travelers are... human per se.
-Dad finds an item that lets you do a one-time exchange of run currency (gems) to long-term upgrade currency (gold). "That isn't great, I need this run currency to make this run successful," he thinks as he goes deeper into the dungeon. Later, during a massive scrum, he activates the item and collects the spoils while fighting deeper into what is obviously going to be his doom. He feels the dungeon is mocking him at this point.
This is a thing as of today and apparently we're not getting it and that makes me unhappy. =(
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Important part:
A team that made a Battle Royale game. 🤔
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA
I'm sure everyone at that studio is just thrilled.
Added irony that a company named "Proletariat" just got bought by one of the biggest game publishers, who in turn is getting out by one of the console manufacturors.
Don't know how the investment works but I can imagine Take-Two getting some cash.
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA