everybody.
Welcome to another episode of Off The Console.
It's your favorite, uh, show that's all about news and
gaming and everything nerdy.
My name is Garner, and I'm joined here today by my friends James from
Games Revealed and High Tech Low Life.
How are you guys doing today?
I'm quite all right.
How about you?
good
I'm doing great.
Doing great.
Um, we have a bunch of awesome stuff that we're gonna be talking about today.
We have some news from Gamescom.
Where are my notes?
We have, uh, we have, uh, NVIDIA's controversial DLSS 5, uh, stuff.
We have Xbox also joining the, uh, you'll own nothing and be
happy camp, and a whole lot more.
So, uh, yeah, I think, uh, don't know.
We like to start the show off with, uh, what we've been doing this week.
So, uh, Hi Tech, let's start with you.
What have you been up to this week?
Work, Steam Machine stuff, not a whole lot of video editing, but… Oh
yeah, I have, I have put some videos on Bilibili, 'cause I'm a filthy,
I'm a filthy China stan it seems.
So w- I think, we, I don't, I don't think we ta- I don't, I think you were,
uh, I think you were gone that week.
Were you?
When…
week, yeah.
Yeah, we talked about Bilibili going international
Yeah.
How's your experience been?
Or are you saving that?
Uh, I think we'll save that for another day since I'm still new.
I'm just uploading my, some, some of my back catalog there for the time being
James, how about you?
What have you been up to?
This week has been a crazy week.
Uh, we had a big hack at work, so patching a bunch of holes there, uh, related
to what I'm really, uh, what I have.
It's from an old system that they had that they didn't sunset, so I'm
not gonna go too deep into that.
But that's, uh, oh, pretty much work and, uh, I don't even know
if I played any games this week.
I'm sure I played something, but, um, no, I j- I just can't … I, I worked
on, uh, a game I'm working on, which doesn't help that we went over the
cost, like how much game developers on average make and median, uh, price on
their, uh, what they make in the bonus episode, so people can go watch that.
That was fascinating and a little sad.
And we kinda knew that people that release games a lot oftentimes, but I'm working
on, I, I, I work on like a game or two.
Every o- like, and I, I'm not like full-time on it, and that's
one of the reasons is because of this type of stuff where they just
don't … Like, it, it's discouraging.
So I do it for more of the passion side of things.
So I, I did work on some game development stuff for one of
my games, and it was, it's fun.
It's a really fun, practice that helps when you have stress at work
Mm-hmm.
absolutely.
The, the, you know, you've been doing your game development.
I've been working on a game too for The Bryant Review, um, because the ROI of
putting a year of development into a game on Steam just wasn't there for me.
Those, those numbers we talked about in the bonus episode were really
spooky accurate for, for my game, so,
Yeah
I'm working on, on this little game here, and I am really excited about it.
This isn't live yet.
This is just my testing area.
But, like, oh boy, it's basically hangman.
Um, but it's a lot of fun, and I'm, I'm working on, like, some power-ups
that you can get on a puzzle to, like, unlock the vowels that are available.
it's, it's pretty neat.
I have some other ideas on, on how I wanna, like, spice up the gameplay.
But Yeah
uh, I've put a lot of time into the game and also into the puzzle editor that I've
developed to let me, like, make puzzles.
Um, it's, it's very exciting.
but I… And because of that, I haven't been posting a ton to, uh, to the Review,
but we're, uh, we'll get back to that next week 'cause it is almost done, I
think, so… Or, or at least the beta is.
So yeah, With that said, if you guys enjoy the work that we're doing here,
you can follow us on, uh, on YouTube.
We have a YouTube channel.
You might be watching it here.
If you are, hit Subscribe.
That really helps us out.
We're really close to 1,000 subscribers right now, uh, and
with your help, we can get there.
also, uh, you can listen to the audio feed over at, uh, podcast.subscribe to.me.
we also have, uh, a Patreon where you can get access to the, uh, the
bonus show where we talk about stuff that's way too spicy for YouTube.
Uh,
honestly, if you go to offconsole.com you'll, you'll find everything there.
right, offtheconsole.com.
Yeah Yep, off the console.
And
we also have a Discord server too, so yeah, pretty neat stuff.
Um, let's, let's get into the first topic today.
We have, uh, we have Gamescom here.
Um, what, what's going on with Gamescom?
Oh shit, have I been muted this whole time?
I've been telling you to tell James to solve the puzzle
Oh.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Sorry.
Do you want
but that,
the puzzle?
uh, maybe, maybe we'll do that afterwards, but let's talk about Gamescom.
So Gamescom, for those that don't know, is the, uh, expo that happens in Europe.
It's, uh, I think it's held in Germany, if I'm not mistaken.
But essentially it's like E3 or Tokyo Game Show.
It's the European version of those two.
And there were a bunch of announcements and also trailers too.
Like for example, they're remastering The Witcher 3 again, and this time
it's free for anyone that already owns it on PC, which is nice.
Also includes Steam too.
Uh, they also announced, uh, they also showed off a new trailer
for Mega Man D- Dual Override.
I'm picking that game up day one.
I know you guys don't, I know you guys don't like Mega Man, but I do
I have no animosity towards Mega Man.
I've just never played a Mega Man game.
Not really my speed, I don't think
All right, let's take a vote right now, guys.
Should we get Gardner to try out Mega Man?
Yes
in the comments.
I'll hook you up with some good, I'll hook you up with some good recommendations.
Trust, trust me
Yeah.
I mean, th- I like 2D, 2D platformers, but, uh, know, it
seems like the tough-as-nails ones are not really my speed, but
I think you'd like Mega Man X on the Super Nintendo
Yeah.
I have a Super Nintendo, so maybe
Yeah.
Yeah, and then they announced, uh, hon- honestly, I'm not sure that
they really announced a whole lot new aside from just updates and shit.
Oh, there's the Indie Arena Booth.
There's just trailers.
What, what's, what effect are you talking about?
So when you mouse over the, the, uh, the key art, it's like, it like almost
has like a holographic look to it
like it
wob- like it wobbles a little bit?
Yeah, that is pretty cool
floating effect.
we, did you mention the Witcher 3 thing?
Sorry, I was doing your puzzle, and so
Oh, you, oh, he did it.
Did you, did you successfully do it?
I was doing really well and then I don't know if I've heard of Donkey K-
or of Conquest or whatever it's called.
So
Oh,
the,
Donkey
was the
Kong Quest
Quest got me off 'cause I just didn't know that.
But like I was doing well.
I did 100% up until I got to Quest.
I'm like, "I don't know what this is."
Then
the name of the second Donkey Kong Country.
Diddy's, Diddy's Conquest
Yeah, so I don't think I ever as a kid thought about the second part.
I I played it
Yeah.
So, I mean, there's a lot of games that seem, were seemingly announced here.
Some, a lot of indies are more towards the bottom.
Mm-hmm.
And Geoff Keighley hosted a live stream as well, uh, even though this
isn't one of his shows technically speaking But the general consensus
seems to be that it's Gamescom.
I mean, it is what it is
I'm excited about Thomas & Friends: Wonders of
What?
Sodor.
Thomas & Friends: Wonders of Sodor?
You
Dude
Thomas & Friends is like the original uncanny valley shit that goes on.
I, I can't do it.
My kid got into it forever and it was so creepy.
So I will say out of the Gamescom, I haven't watched all
the trailers for everything.
I just watched little snippets 'cause I was so busy this week with
Yeah, I'm, I'm not gonna lie, I didn't really d- I didn't really do that either
3 though, and, uh, Control: Resonant, mm, I'm gonna say it
right now, those both looked…
Like the remaster looks awesome for Witcher 3.
It's coming free, it's looking pretty good.
But Control: Resonant is looking so good, and it comes out in a couple weeks
Hmm.
I wanna get both.
Well, I wanna get Resi- I wanna get Control, Resi.
You know, I'm not super big on Witcher 3's gameplay.
This is gonna sound like a hot take.
It just feels like a worse Dark Soul
The worst Dark Souls is a harsh take, uh, but okay.
Dude, it's, it's true.
It, it feels worse.
Like, I'm sorry, I know the, I know the story and stuff is really what, why
people play, but like, if the gameplay is ass, then why should I even bother?
But it's not as…
with you more, High Tech.
I
Oh,
those kind of games, Witcher and, um, Dark Souls and all that stuff, where the, where
the, like, third person, like, control i- and it feels like you're walking through
mud most of the time, like, just slow,
whoa, hold on now
Dude, I can't.
I can't play those
games.
I'm, like, so
had me until you said Dark Souls.
Man, I like, I love Dark Souls
I agree with you.
Dark Souls controls like shit.
I'm just kidding
so… They all control like ass.
Like, move- It literally feels like the character is wading through mud.
I'm
They
me Mario 64 or give me death, man." Like, I
Well, you can't do that.
So
Wow
you can't do that with W- so Witcher and Dark Souls, they have that weighted
system for a reason to make it feel unique and a little bit more r- lifelike.
You can't be bouncing arou- around like a Italian plumber all day long,
but… Now, they're gonna improve the gameplay on Witcher 3 though.
Like, that's what, one of the things they're saying, which I hope so, 'cause
don't get me wrong, you get used to it after the first 10, 20 hours, but
it could be definitely much better
I think in terms of s-
hours.
in terms of CDPR's g- uh, games, I do think Cyberpunk has much
better gameplay than The Witcher 3
shooter.
It's really hard to get that wrong.
I, uh, you can, don't get me wrong, get that wrong, but it's, it's not
gonna run into the same issues as
mean,
will
have 15 years to get it right?
Did they make FPSs great again?
No.
That, that, oh no, that's gonna be one of our catchphrases.
been bad.
That's the stupid part, is that they've never been bad
Not according to, uh, Mr. Splitgate himself, but
yeah
he's wrong though.
Yeah, I agree.
Uh, they're still, like, some of the top-selling genres,
and we talked about that too.
Ooh, Dragon's Dogma II: Dark Arisen, the DLC's coming out.
I like that game too
Did
This…
did
Huh?
Control, HiTech?
Did you play Control and beat it?
Talking about Control Residence now, like, if you beat the original
I don't know if I have, but I didn't play it on PC though.
You didn't?
No, 'cause I didn't have a gaming PC
Yeah, yeah,
at around that time
that's fine.
Control Resonance is gonna… it's, they're so story heavy
it, it l- it's gonna be a different type of style, I think.
Uh, it's gonna be more of, um,
Like a hack and, like some, like a hack and slash.
I saw
yeah, uh, more so than what the original Control was.
But the story's probably gonna be important to, to at least get
through a good chunk of Control One
Well, the good news is I do have the Ultimate Edition on PC, so I can… I'm
g- probably gonna have to start over.
I'll do it.
I'll do it on my Steam Machine
l- I love Control, and it's in the same universe as Alan Wake.
Those are, like, top-tier games for me
Oh yeah, Metal Gear Solid, uh, the Master Collection 2 came out on PC and other pl-
platforms, and there are some references to like the PS5- the PS3's, uh, Blu-ray
discs, and they've updated that reference.
They had Otacon's, uh, voice actor re- con- re-record lines depending
on what platform you're on.
I haven't heard the PC line though
That's good.
At least they updated that 'cause
Yeah, 'cause imagine if they said, yeah, imagine if they, uh, said, "Oh, you're
playing on a PS3," and then you're playing, like, the Xbox version Oh, well.
That would've been kind of funny.
But, I mean, Gamescom is Gamescom.
There are some games that are interesting, but… What is that
this is Carpark Capital by MicroProse, dude This is actually, this,
the, m- you remember MicroProse?
I didn't know that they were still publishing
The ones that made Micro Machines?
No, MicroProse.
The, they, uh,
Oh
used to make, like, dude, they published, like, X-COM and, like,
Yeah
uh, a bunch of, like, those old, like, old PC games.
I think they did, uh… Was, did they do Rollercoaster Tycoon, or no?
That was just Atari.
I don't know.
But MicroProse, they were, like, some of my favorite games back in the day.
Theme Hospital they might have done.
But anyway, look at this.
This game actually looks like a little bit of, uh, satire and, uh,
political commentary about cars.
I would hope, anyway.
Gardner has a lot of opinions on cars, let's just say.
If you haven't watched the previous episodes,
Oh my
I would sug- I would suggest watching those
Dude,
We
you don't… Yeah, it does look… Oh, nothing, I was gonna make a stupid joke.
This looks, this does look pretty fun
yeah.
It does.
It,
fun It, but my pro- my problem with these styles, unless they really
upgrade the gameplay really well, I think I'd rather go back and
play the classics that look similar
I mean, they might have.
We, I mean, the game's not out yet, right?
But the whole point of the trailer is to showcase if it is different or not, right?
It d- it definitely looks like it, it's better gameplay, but it feels so similar
to that, it makes me just wanna go back and play, like, Rollercoaster Tycoon
Yeah.
Oh yeah, it's definitely, for the audio listeners, it's definitely
R- RCT inspired or like Transport Tycoon or something like that.
It kinda looks like Theme Hospital, like not gonna
Yeah
Just
Mm
This has
know, did you
gotta be a play on the oil industry, but yeah
look, there's a Ferris wheel for cars.
Like, that's amazing actually.
Ah, don't give him ideas, man
Uh, yeah
Damn
I
Sounds like you're th-
bonus one, but it reminds me of Buc-ee's.
Buc-ee's just announced that they're only gonna be in red states now, which is so
Bucky?
Good, they can keep
No.
Yep
Holy fuck
in my state, and my state's technically a blue state
Yeah, but that's now is what they're focusing on
Well, yeah, that's true.
That's true
So it's interesting,
Well, that sucks.
Uh, Buck- Buc-ee's is actually really nice.
Buc-ee's is really nice.
They have really nice bathrooms, and, like, the food there
is pretty good actually.
And it's not even just good for gas station food.
I mean, it's, like, actually pretty good food
Yeah.
but
it out when it comes here because, you know, Utah.
Yeah.
Whoa, what the hell?
What?
It says low frame rate detected
yeah, sorry, I just, it just started playing the audio for the trailer here.
I just added it to my Steam wishlist 'cause it actually looks pretty fun.
the more we talk about it, the more and more you wanna try it now?
well, I, I'm hoping that it's, uh, what I want it to be.
Oh my gosh.
Also MicroProse, what el- what was the game, like the big game that I remember?
But anyway, yeah.
Dude, so Gamescom, pretty cool.
Um, we, uh, also the other, the other thing we, we didn't add to the list, but,
uh, GTA VI trailer, um, did you, you guys
It came, yeah, I, I, I watched, I like skipped around.
I skipped to the part… I skipped all of the, like, life stuff, 'cause
I don't really care about that.
But I wanted to get to, like, the actual fun parts, the doing crime part
Yeah
Dude, no one plays… No one's playing GTA to, like, live a life sim.
That sounds stupid.
Right?
Like,
the only one.
Like,
I'm All right.
Well, you're stupid.
Just kidding.
Geez.
I use it the, I use it as a sandbox game more than anything.
I play around, I like go
and, and screw around.
I don't play the story
HiTech, if you're not playing it for the life sim, then why are
you even logging onto GTA Online?
Come on
To kill everyone else.
Exactly
Uh, dude,
not life
I, I might be crazy, but like GTA is one of those games that like I
don't feel like it… First of all, I don't feel like it has meaningfully
evolved since like San Andreas.
but also like it's one of those games that I put in the category of
like wading through mud simulator.
Like it's so slow.
Like just I want my character to move like, and have, uh, be fun.
I don't wanna… know, dude
on now.
When you put it in that category, you're also comparing to Dark Souls.
There's no way you just compared GTA VI to-
I'm talking like controls.
I'm comparing them.
Like Tomb Raider is like one of the only third person games that's come out within
the last like 10 years that controls well, and even then it's kinda slow.
Like I'm talking, like even, um, what's the one that everybody
loves from Naughty Dog?
The Last of Us?
That's so slow, dude.
Moving in that game feels so boring.
I don't
True that.
True that
Oh my gosh.
It's
Well
that way, and that's okay if that's not your type of game.
It's, it's fine, but it's meant to feel like there's weight to decisions, to what
you're doing, to… Like, you get, you get accustomed to it over time a- and
get used to it to where you can react.
It's just, it really comes down to you gotta get used to it, though.
It it's like
that's fair
They're, They're, the, I think they're more controller games, I should say.
'Cause I,
Yeah
I mean, you're probably playing these on controller, right, though?
I, Yeah, I only play with a controller.
I don't like playing on PC
Yeah, 'cause Dark Souls on PC, like keyboard and mouse is ass.
You should never be playing Dark S- you should never play Dark
Souls with a keyboard and mouse
Challenge accepted
I feel like d- if your character… The, I think the disconnect for me
is, like, you can move this, the, the s- the camera really quickly, but you
can't move your character as quickly.
So they can turn on a dime, but they can't, like, move at, like,
in a speed that that feels like it should necessitate, and that's,
that's the issue I have with it.
I
That's fair enough.
Ooh
I could, I could go on a diatribe about that, but yeah.
Ooh, dark.
Let's see
what, got here.
There's a lot, there are a lot of games I'm probably missing 'cause,
like, there's just so many games on this thing that I'm just kinda glazing
my eyes over every, all of them
Yeah, I just keep scrolling.
There's a ton of games on here, and, uh, as we talked about in the, um, in
the bonus show, lot of these games are only gonna make about a 3,000 bucks on
Steam, so, uh, that's, you know, that
these because of way that they were getting, um, advertised here, it
will probably help them, but yeah, they're not gonna make a whole lot
Yeah.
man.
I mean, it seems like it's just a matter of how much marketing you're willing to do
' Cause like all the big studio, all the big studios have a lot of marketing budget.
Probably because there's so many games on Steam
half of these are anime ones too, which is interesting.
there's a lot of anime based ones or at least a- like heavy
anime or animation influenced
Yeah.
styles
games or visual novels, they stand to make the most, uh, revenue on Steam.
But
There's at least one visual novel, so
Yeah.
that's gonna make, that's gonna make game be-
The Expanse
I've, uh, I've scrolled so much that it's starting to repeat.
Like, it's just an endless scroll, and it's repeating over and over
already out?
Is it?
Interesting.
Yeah, 007's already out.
It's been out for, like, two months
I think there's an update because they're coming out with
a new, like, story expansion.
It's supposed to feature Lenny Kravitz's character
Interesting
to… I, I'll play it one day.
Like, I've heard really good things about it.
I just, I
It is really good.
It
Yeah
uh, if it has, uh, DLSS 5, it could have Yassified, uh, DL- uh, Lenny Kravitz in it
It could have Yassified, Lennon Kravitz.
Look, there's, there's DLSS Cloud Strife.
Ugh.
God.
Yeah
know what, you know what Cloud Strife looks like.
He's like a traditional, like, kind of pretty boyish vibe.
This is just
This
Bro.
turning a
On
boy into a femboy
There, it, it's unsettling.
It doesn't, it doesn't even look like a femboy
to me.
He looks like, uh, I don't even know.
It just looks wrong.
Okay, I'll give you that.
there are comparison p- there are comparisons down below in that article.
me.
That's just me
A lot more comparisons.
There's
In the
this… So I will say this
Holy, look, it's Control.
Yeah
Dude, what is… Dude, no fucking way
that's a
they shut off, like, tress effects or something?
'Cause this hair looks like dog shit
I don't fucking know
Uh,
I
don't, I honestly… Here's my take on DLSS 5, is that it is, are u- doing the m-
like, you can crank it up all the way and you're gonna get the more yes-ified looks.
I've looked at a lot that don't crank it up that high.
So think these are kinda designed to, for outrage when, don't get me wrong,
there is outrage from it, but I don't… These are just cranked all the way up
I agree, man.
It's some bullshit.
So I ha- I think I've seen, uh, cases where they like will re- compare low…
All right, so I think I get the rationale.
They're trying to set the graphics to low and let DLSS do all the work,
'cause that's basic- Like, there's no point in running a game at a
high graphical detail when DLSS is just gonna do everything, right?
I
Yeah
Dude, what the fuck?
interesting, but like
So to be clear though, DLSS 5 is not officially released.
DLSS 5 was actually leaked as part of, uh, NBA 2K, uh, 2K27.
You know, slop- the slop machine inside the slop game
They had to add something new to the game.
They're like, "What could we do? Oh, we could just add, patch in DLSS 5 and
that's it. That's all we'll do to it."
Yeah, patching DLSS 5 to make the, uh, to make the basketball, uh, players
look more like their real-life selves
Heaven forbid they update a model one year
So the, the manual tweaking you have to do, there's an ungodly amount
of manual tweaking you have to do to make it look a certain way, and
it lo- it still looks really off.
It actually, yeah-
very strange.
I mean, it looks very much like, you know, those AI filter- like those AI
ads that you've probably seen on YouTube
Yes And there's
Stuff about what I don't like
like
the, the, the AI mocap weird combination.
Like I've always found motion capture to be like kind of strange
and off-putting and hard to watch.
And then you combine that with like the AI filter over top of
it and it's like, yikes dude.
It makes me feel like I'm watching The Backyardigans or something.
Like
Yeah, notice how none of these videos are like them in combat at all?
They're all just like walking around doing shit
Yeah
I'd be one to b- like, there's also an example of Monster Hunter Wilds, um,
Monster Hunter Rise down below in the article too, and it, it looks kinda
unsettling too, to, to say the least.
At
Where is that?
the very bottom
age restricted here
Well, no, there's one at the, like, bottom bottom.
It's a Twitter thread, but… Oh.
Oh, that's weird.
It's gone.
It's
I guess, yeah
I think I have an extension that blocks, um, em- Twitter embeds or something.
Where's the music?
So the…
Great
I think the results happened, like, toward… I don't know.
There, there's a lot of sh- the… I… That… Oh, no.
What the… No, no, don't do that.
People are saying this is a good thing, and, like, from what
I've seen, it looks terrible.
And from what I can gather, they don't even try this in, like, actual gameplay.
I'm willing to bet this breaks even harder when you're, like, fighting
Well, one
thing I
it pro- it, it probably can, but like you've noticed, like
they maximize everything.
So like this is really not showing a good picture of DLSS 5.
I don't like it whe- like we can have fun and like blow it out of proportion,
whatever, but it's not being honest though, like a lot of the stuff I've seen.
'Cause I've seen, I've seen before and after where I'm like it's much more
like base but still makes it look nicer.
It just helps with shadows and stuff like that, and it doesn't look uncanny.
So this is…
Dude,
I don't know.
We gotta be caref- I don't know.
Yeah.
Sorry
This comment, "It's crazy they're adding an art style remover."
Uh, what, w- which really begs the question though, what would happen
in like a photorealistic game if you were to enable DLSS 5 and then like
the game has like gore or some shit?
What would happen there?
Well, that's a good question.
' Cause like in Cyberpunk you can…
made… Yeah
Like in Cyberpunk you can like dismember and like blow
people's heads off and stuff.
So like
Mm-hmm
what would happen if it, you DLSS 5'd the gore?
Would it like pull trained images of like… That's
fucked up to think about really
Ja
Well, I just killed the
Whoa, which one?
Both?
That's a good one.
Um, yeah, I mean, so one thing I noticed here, like I wanna pull this one back up
'cause I think that this is important.
Um, when they walk through this, um, when they walk through the…
Oh, I think it's earlier here.
were walking through the, uh, like the f- water fountain area.
I think it's before this.
Where is it?
Gosh darn it.
I noticed
Okay, watch the butterfly as they walk through this area.
Come on.
Where is it?
I- it's showing a pretty low frame rate for us, so we may
Oh.
Yeah
there, there's a butterfly here that keeps, like, flickering in and out, and
it's like b- and it, there's like… It, it's like going one frame and then
the next, and there's, it's not, like, interpreting the motion of the butterfly.
Uh, like, that's the kind of stuff that I can't, like… I notice.
It jumps out at me immediately, takes me right out.
And there's probably ways that you can adjust that, but, like, that's
the kind of stuff that I just can't do, even with, like, normal DS- DLSS.
like, that kind of fine detail that gets lost just, I can't handle it
When it comes to that type of stuff, I've not had issues with missing assets
coming into play, even with FSR and DLSS.
But could, uh, well, frame gen can cause that, I'm sure.
I just haven't played a game where that's happened.
But I don't, I don't increase DLSS or FSR high enough to probably have that happen
Gardner, uh,
Hmm.
I just found another example that you can show.
It's probably the most egregious example I've seen
I mean, sorry, I'm being very, like, all these are just extreme examples of DLSS 5.
Like, this is not… Like, this, this is fun, but, like, this is not what
it's gonna probably end up being like
Dude, this
my girl Tifa
this reminds me of the Final Fantasy animated movie.
Like, just looks a little too real while also not looking real at all,
It
ugh.
W- which one are you talking about?
The, like, Spirits Within?
Within?
yeah
Oh, yeah, I agree.
That one is terrible
Bro, why would you do this?
this reminds me of?
It reminds me of, uh, like the guys that were like, I can't handle my anime at 20
frames a second, so I up-scaled it to 60." It's like… Or all the people who are
like, who leave the, um, the, like, TV's sharpening f- uh, like filters and, and
frame generation stuff on on their TV.
It's like, it's literally worse and ruining the experience.
Why?
are we doing this?
Ugh.
Like, I mean, y- if you leave this in the hands of, like, developers,
maybe they could, they could come up with some cool stuff.
Like, I'm not, like, just 100% opposed to this kind of thing.
It, it's just as long as it's trained ethically, which a lot of it isn't, and
as long as it's being used to augment the art and not destroy it, which to me, this
is, like, objectively destroyed art, um,
is, extreme cases.
This is what I keep on trying to say.
This is extreme ca-
Yeah.
it all the way up.
You're gonna have this with so many different fil- filters alone will do that.
Um, now the ethical side of things, that's a different, you know,
story, but like this is not what it's gonna look like unless you're
wanting to have a funny time.
But people believe this is what it's going, the end, the end
game's gonna look like, and I don't think that's what it's gonna be
Yeah.
The en- the, like
It's funny, but
fully maxed at
yeah.
That, that, that's my whole point is that people aren't under- Uh,
it's why I wanna really preface this 'cause I, I'm getting tired of like,
we have so much to rage about in, in the gaming world and everything.
This, we can rage a- We, we don- I don't… It should be more like we
should laugh at it because it's stupid.
And if they do do this, we can rage.
Like, if this is like the game was what this looks like bec- and
you enable, and you have no other options besides DLSS 5 to have it
run okay, we should start raging.
I don't think this is how it's gonna be, but this is pretty
S- so I will say this though.
I think my big problem with this is that they're bundling this in with a
DLSS instead of making its own thing
Yeah, but th- this is maxed out tech.
This is m- they all, I've seen so many DLSS 5 versions that are
not maxed out that look fine.
maxed out.
A lot of the rage ones I've seen are maxed out versions or they've
been tweaked to cause rage.
That's why I'm, I'm like, I've seen a lot of lower end ones where they
just help improve it a little bit.
No problems
I, I do agree that it's pretty funny
what you're saying, James, makes sense, right?
Like, is like if you go out of your way in Skyrim or f- or, or
even like The Sims 2 or whatever to like make your character look as
ugly as possible on purpose, right?
That's what this is.
But at the same time, like… A- and like, and like for what I was
saying, like if you leave this in the hands of developers and artists, you
might end up with something better, but then you're still left with
the question of how is it trained?
And I guess,
I agree.
I mean, I'm not doubting that.
My problem is, is that have you guys seen any low, um,
like low-effort DLSS 5 images?
They're way different than what we've been looking at.
That's all I'm trying to say.
Like,
Yeah
these are all rage bait, uh, um, to make clicks for a post, which
is fine-ish as long as you're ethical about calling it out.
I don't think most of them are.
They're always designed to be ragey, and it's like, okay, you can rage against it
for the reasons w- we have, but this is not what it's gonna look like, and people
are gonna be shocked once they see DLSS 5 in their games, and they're gonna probably
be upset too, 'cause it won't look like this unless you really tweak it heavy.
So that's what I'm just raging about.
Like, when it's lower end, you can't tell as much, so.
True, I am just agenda posting.
I just hate Nvidia
That's okay.
Like, that's, I, I just wanna put preface on that because I don't think it's,
like, don't think it's honest for, uh, for us to portray it like, "Oh, this
is what it's gonna look like. This is what it always looks like." This is not.
This is maxed out
Yeah.
Speaking of maxed out
industry is maxing out screwing you over, and Xbox is trying to
be your friend while doing it.
Or they're
So
into thinking they're your friend,
Yeah
Well, so basically for those who don't know, this is Xbox's disc to
digital program, something that's been teased for quite a bit now, but
now it's like officially a thing.
Essentially, if you have an Xbox One or an Xbox Series device, uh,
I get, I think most likely just the Series X has the disc drive, right?
Yeah
Ba- yeah, so basically if you have one of those devices, you can stick in your
d- you, you can stick in your physical games and it lets you claim a, quote,
"digital entitlement" that can then be subsequently revoked if you, like, sell
your game or something So like if you were, it's like if, so basically if you
were like to, if you were to claim digital entitlement for a game and then sell it
to someone else, they can claim digital entitlement for that key, for that, uh,
disc copy because I think all the discs are serialized, so they know exactly…
Yeah, I think they're all, I think they've all been serialized, truth be told.
But yeah, that way other- otherwise you'd have people, like d- they'd
like claim digital entitlement and then they'd sell the games, then you
could just, I don't know, whatever.
So I mean, that's pretty cool given how much, uh, physical stuff, even though
So- like it's pretty cool given, you know, the news that Sony's killing off
digital discs, but I think this is just Xbox preparing for that inevitability as
well, for the Project Helix or whatever
Yeah.
I mean, Xbox has been, been working to this moment since, uh,
you know, was it the Xbox One?
Don Mattrick,
Don Mattrick, yeah
they've been working to go fully digital.
They've even mentioned it.
We've talked about multiple times.
Yeah.
S- so this is just them some, trying to write a good press
Yes
Xbox
Yeah.
And I mean, like, uh, uh, the fact that you can… Can
you redeem like original Xbox
games?
I think so.
Um, I don't have an Xbox to test this out with, but I think so
Yeah.
digital entitlement by inserting a sup- a supported disc into an Xbox One Series X.
Most Xbox One and Series X titles support this new feature, and digital copies
do get… So original Xbox probably not
Well, I mean, there are probably some select ones, just not some
of the ones you may expect.
You know what I'm saying?
Uh
' Cause they do sell original X- Like if I had like Ninja Gaiden
Black, you could probably claim digital entitlement for that since
they sell that on the Xbox store
I'm
too
I just don't think they're…
Sorry,
Yeah, the, I was just gonna say, I just don't think they're
gonna support the original Xbox.
There could be a whole order of different reasons to that,
but I'm not seeing anything
were, were the original Xbox games, like, serialized?
I, I would be skeptical if they were, that they were.
I don't,
I
I don't know
I feel like if they supported select titles for this, they would, like,
mention it here because they're only mentioning Xbox One and Series X,
which is like, if you're an Xbox fan, you were not using these consoles.
Uh, I
don't know
I wasn't anyway
I could see the 360 being serialized
Maybe.
they went h- 'cause they definitely went hard on the anti-piracy during the 360 era
that's c- that doesn't mean sterilized.
But they y- I, I hope they are, but I just don't see anything about it
being related to 360, so we'll see
There's no instance of 360 i- uh, in this document here, so.
Yeah.
Uh, yeah.
Nothing to give me hope.
I, I would err on the side of probably not
Yeah.
Until they give reason otherwise
So I
mean, makes sense on the face of it, but at the same time though, I would
just move away from consoles altogether
Yeah.
Yep.
Which means Nintendo is the only reasonable choice now, even
though we're not the biggest fan of Nintendo's business practices
No.
But if you are moving to PC, Valve just celebrated a 30-year
birthday and they didn't mention it.
There wasn't a single peep about it from them
That's how you know they're locked in.
They're just too bus- they're just too busy making things
happen 'cause they don't even
Yeah.
own birthday, kind of like how some of us don't forget their,
are forgetting our own birthdays.
Yeah
Isn't it crazy that Valve… I've, I'm, I mean, it is sure is a Valve
thing, uh, but I would've expected a milestone as big as the 30th anniversary
to be, like, something, right?
You would h- you would've thought, but like, you know, at least they
celebrated the 25th anniversary of,
Half-Life
yeah, with a, with a documentary and with an updated, uh, client.
But
Th- they celebrate the products, but I don't know about the
company itself, which is fine.
It's
I mean
like, really underwhelming
I mean, I genuinely thought they would do something.
Like, I don't know.
I… Like, maybe not that much.
I, I would've thought they would've said like, "We turned 30 today," or something.
M- I, I mean, I didn't expect them to give us like a free cop- another free copy
of like Half-Life or whatever, but like
Guys, they did the 25th because that's two five.
They didn't do, they didn't do 30 because that's three zero.
Come on.
They have
Ah.
the 40th
Yeah.
you're right.
You're right.
You got-
maybe they'll even celebrate the 31st.
It just, it can't be, like, a even multiple of three for them to mention it.
Ah, shit.
You got a point there
Yeah.
That's funny.
But, uh, guys, I mean, I, I say happy birthday Valve though, 'cause like,
know, Valve has been one of the most influential gaming companies for
better or worse for 30 years, right?
Like, Half-Life changed the industry, um, way stories were
told in games even, right?
And, uh,
There's a lot of inno- yeah, and they also changed the face of PC gaming
forever, and PC gaming thrived under their stewardship 'cause, like, let's be honest,
what was PC gaming like before Steam?
Not super-duper popular like it is now.
Right.
while I'm, I'm sure Valve isn't the only one contributing to its
success, I would say a lot of it was from Valve's successful Steam
Well, I mean PC… So that's an interesting question HiTech, because
like PC was actually, uh, like on equal footing I would say with, uh, with
consoles for quite some time, right?
For maybe 10 years.
But then like right around Steam's like early dominance on PC,
that's when PC became the, the…
endangered I would say in terms of gaming, right?
'Cause, uh, most of it, like if there was a PC release of a game,
it was like garbage, you know?
Like the… I'm thinking like the original BioShock.
The original BioShock for PC sucked.
I don't know if you guys remember that, but it was not anywhere near what it
should've been for a game of that stature.
So, uh, and, and a lot of gamers, in- myself included, were playing on 360
or PlayStation 3, um, at the time.
Um, and it was also 'cause I was a Linux user at the time,
so I didn't really have Windows.
But like a lot of, I don't know, a lot of gaming happened on 360.
but yeah, I mean, the openness of the PC has meant that it
has remained a powerhouse.
and Valve has really done a lot to improve the ease of access
to gaming on PC, you know?
Oh yeah, man.
I mean, by the… Uh, companies used to not release on PC at
all, uh, sometimes too, 'cause they were worried about piracy.
But Valve, I guess, assured them that piracy was just a
service issue, and guess what?
Guess what?
I think they were proven right even after all these years
Yep.
Yeah, they definitely did help a lot with all that even though things are moving
back down into, like PlayStation not doing releases on PC anymore and all.
it's still the place where you can get the most variety and the best
bang for your buck, like hands down.
PC or, uh, PCs might be more expensive than consoles, but with sales and if
you just time everything right, you'll save so much more money than you
would with, um, with, uh, a console
Yeah.
Absolutely.
Um, yeah, speaking of money and online storefronts, US store commission
revenue's down 18% this year.
And I- correct me if I'm wrong, Hi-Tech, but this is the first time Apple's,
uh, App Store revenue has dropped
In like a decade, yes.
It's, it's a pretty big deal and a lot of it likely has to do with the fact
that, well, game com- I mean, the fact that, uh, everyone's got regulations.
Japan and Brazil recently introduced regulations in regards to sideloading.
The last major holdout I think is probably like the US and like, I
don't know, Australia or something
Yeah.
Well, I mean, I think regulations are good and we need, uh, consumer choice.
Customer choice, I should say.
I don't like the word consumer
True that, true that.
I mean, truth be told, I mean, you can see what result- you can see why
Apple wants to keep their, like, App Store monopoly because they, like, lose
out a sig- on a significant amount.
They don't have that same sort of loyalty that, like, gamers
have with, like, Valve, right?
Like, Valve has, like, a million different storefronts you can install on Windows
and Linux, and guess where, guess what?
They all, they all still buy all the games on Steam, right?
Yeah
But as soon as Apple introduced third-party app stores, a lot
of people just jumped ship
Yeah.
Oh, I mean, but the thing is too, it's like according to this article, Apple's
US commission revenue has fallen 18%.
So this isn't even like… They can't even, like, claim with a
straight face that, uh, this has to do with EU regulations or whatever
No, but Epic Games, if you read down further, Epic Games did, um, win their
lawsuit, and so I think they're, uh, like Epic and companies like that
can now start doing outside payments again without getting a cut hit
Good.
So that's why
like, Yeah, that's, it's good that they can do that, you know?
Yeah, I mean, that's good that App- that's good that Apple to Epic did
that 'cause sideloading, God, you know, there's, we, you know, there's only like
a few weeks left until Google implements their stupid sideloading bullshit.
You guys know that?
Yeah
And honestly, if Google like restricts sideloading to a certain
degree, then I may as well just go with an i- with an iPhone.
I'm gonna be honest with you
Well, is it still easy to jailbreak an iPhone?
Uh-huh.
guess.
I don't know.
As a developer, I could install pretty much anything I want off the
side, but it's not quite the same
Yeah, I mean, truth be told, you can just sideload applications on that.
Like, you can already sideload, um, though it requires a computer with iTunes
But I don't know, man.
still a thing?
I shouldn't s- it is still a thing
It's disgusting.
iTunes has not been worked on heavily in a long time but yeah
It's still the unoptimized buggy piece of shit you remember
from like a few decades ago
You don't,
on Windows
think you need iTunes to… I don't know.
Most…
'Cause
Wait, you,
anything I want on my iPhone if I wanted.
you don't need
I don't need iTunes.
for that, right?
No, I mean, I- To get it on their… That, that's a whole other thing.
I don't even think I have to pay for it.
I can just side load some… I ha- I side load some of my own, uh, projects
and play with them, and they're connected to the internet and everything
Interesting
Mm.
I have to get everything set up to do that, but I don't need iTunes for it
Yeah.
Mm. I
mean, haven't-- I haven't s- I haven't, uh, jailbroken an iPhone
in, like, many, many, many years.
In fact, I haven't even had an iPhone in many, many years either.
In fact, I've never had an iPhone.
I just did this for my brother 'cause he wanted to, he wanted to achieve
some microtransactions in video games, and that's how we found out the hard
way that microtransactions aren't fun
I just
So,
never had a reason to m- sideload
There's, there are no… Oh, there's a jailbreak for the iPhone 12,
13, 14 f- or 15 on iOS 17, but not for, like, iOS 26 or, or iOS 18
And I'm probably… I, I'm, I'd be willing to bet they're
still working on a jailbreak
Yeah
for, like, the newer iPhones
I used to jailbreak a decade plus ago.
I just don't care these days.
There's nothing on… Not saying that people shouldn't
be allowed to or anything, just
I mean, jailbreak used to, jailbreaking used to matter a lot more when they sold
iPhones before the App Store existed
Before the App Store existed or before they added certain functionality because
Apple's been behind on certain things.
Now, honestly, we've kinda hit this precipice where, like, Android and
iOS just have almost everything
Yeah, if, for all the youngins in the audience that didn't know this, they used
to sell iPhones without an app store.
It just used to be like your phone, but like touchscreen
Yeah.
And that was a better time because the apps that you could install were
progressive web apps, and that, like, that's how we should be doing everything.
But, uh,
I don't think…
should also have plugins
Did they have progressive web app- web apps?
'Cause I rememb- I don't think they had… Did they?
Yep, if you go back and, and people were asking Steve Jobs, like,
cr- uh, journalists were asking Steve Jobs, "What about apps?"
And he said, "If you, you can do anything you need to with a progressive web app."
I wonder which… Oh, well, I mean, you can still install
them today though, right?
Yeah.
Yeah
still install progressive web apps, but they're, they've never been
amazing, I'll be honest about it, depending on what you're trying to do.
They are, but they don't support enough pr- um, device, uh, and
systems and stuff like that.
Like, you're never gonna fully replace a native app at this point
and not have security issues.
But Yeah.
Yeah.
The, the other problem though with, with PWAs is that especially on
iOS, you're using Safari, which is the Internet Explorer of 2026.
Like Safari sucks in
not great.
It is not Internet Explorer bad though.
Oh my gosh
the reason I say that is
You've had to, yeah.
back the web
Yeah
that's what Safari is doing
Safari is doing it right now for sure
if you wanna use the temporal API in your app, you have to use Babel or
some, or some Webpack or something to compile it for, uh… It's just you
can't do, uh, like modern API stuff without using an insane amount of like,
polyfills or something, and it's, it's so nuts to me that that's we're at.
I don't know.
Safari.
So I have a lot of opinions about this 'cause I'm a web
developer first and foremost.
yeah.
No,
I, I, I,
ha- literally game I'm working on u- like needs the temporal API in order
Yep
a calendar that isn't 40,000 lines of, you know, craziness.
Um, and, and so I'm, have to use Babel, I
think, to, to like transpile this to like something that, uh, Safari
will actually be able to use.
You're gonna have to use a polyfill or you're probably gonna have to tap
into WebGL or something like that.
You're gonna… there's a lot of different thing, uh, ways around it.
It's not easy, but that's kind of my point.
Once you get into certain things, like it is better, uh, it's, Chrome
is better, but even the, uh, Chrome has its limitations when it comes to
that are exposed as opposed to native.
So
Yep
I've used to do a
Yeah
Uh, I've gone away from them because of part of that reason.
That being said, if it's like a news app, there's a lot of different reasons.
Like, yeah, I don't think… I think PWAs are fine Not saying
that the… Yeah, I indifferent
the reason that I like PWAs, and I prefer them for everything that I do,
is because with a PWA, especially if you're using a browser on mobile that
supports both PWAs and extensions, you have control over your experience,
Угу
ad blocks on, and you can do whatever you want with your experience, which you
cannot do, uh, without, like, root access.
Um, and even then, there's, like, no guarantees.
You have to, like, wait for other people to do-- you know, come up with
hacks or whatever to make an app.
I-
I've never even seen that kind of stuff before, but, like, it's just crazy.
I- apps are such a, a bad model, in my opinion.
Like or bust.
I,
I, don't know.
Hmm
You disagree?
I don't know.
I think getting the, uh, no, it's not a disagree, it's just I've just had
such bad ex- um, experiences with PWAs and, and not having enough support
for doing what I need to get done.
And part of it is, yeah, like on iOS with, uh, Safari.
Safari Web, when I'm making websites for Safari Web, it's not like
the, the, the true Safari browser.
Like, meh.
PWAs, man.
Like apps, i- if you're making really inter- integrated apps,
they n- they need more API control.
Yeah.
Well, Safari also, like, on mobile does not allow PWAs to
receive push notifications,
Yeah
like… And, and I don't think you can even do it with Chrome on iOS.
Like, if you want push notifications, you have to have an Android phone,
um, to get them, which it- that's an artificial limitation that
Apple puts there specifically to push t- people towards, uh, apps.
Um- and that sucks.
Like, that kind of stuff is anti-competitive, and it is,
it's wrong in my opinion.
Um,
curious if web… Well, yeah.
I'm curious on that one how, of what the limitations are when it co- if,
if it can do browser-based p- uh, notifications, push notifications.
But that's, we're getting really into the minutiae stuff.
It's-- my, my thing is there just, there has to be… You have to make it
easy for consumers or, and customers and people that want, and so there has
to be like a melding between the two.
PWAs are not easy for the, the average person.
They just don't understand installing a PWA and using it
That is a user experience problem and not the fault of PWAs.
Like, and I think it's intentional.
an inher- it's an inherent problem with, with PWAs, but I, I, I'm
not gonna disagree, thankfully.
Like, there's also, that.
Yeah.
I just, I've, I've, I, I just cannot… Like, I've had PWAs with companies where I
just could not get people to install them.
They just would not install them.
Even if we like, "Hey, you should install this.
You should…" They didn't.
No
Yeah.
It's, uh, it's annoying.
But, uh, yeah, speaking of something that's not annoying, dude,
now supports trophies
Hell yeah
That's awesome.
That's truly awesome
Yes.
So you can sign on to their RPCN network, which is like
their, like, PSN replacement,
Yeah
can get trophies that way, and these are the actual, like, official
trophies that these games came with.
Um, that's the PS3 didn't get trophies until after a s- a
specific update, I think, 'cause it didn't come with it at launch.
They saw what Xbox was doing and was like, "I gotta do it." But yeah.
Yeah, they saw what Xbox was doing and they decided to add trophies to it.
It's pretty cool.
Uh, but essentially, yeah, you, you sign on, you sign into RPCN, you
get trophies, and bam, PS3 trophies
PlayStation's not gonna be happy about this or Sony.
This will be interesting to see what happens from this, but this is really cool
Well, it's not like it's going to your actual PlayStation account.
It's not like I'm getting trophies on Demon Souls and
getting on my own PSN account
but I'm sure they have a lot of pri- uh, they ha- they wanna have
ownership of that whole thing.
So I'm-- That's what I'm saying.
I just don't think they're gonna be happy about this.
I'm not saying that they're
Mm-hmm.
That's true
RPCN is, uh, uh, AGPL licensed.
Hell
yeah.
that
mean?
Uh, it's free and open source
Oh
Which you never know with cloud stuff, right?
Like, sometimes a open source app will have, like, proprietary cloud
shit, and you're like, "Why?" But this seems … This is, this is really cool.
Uh
That is pretty cool.
That is pretty cool, I will say
Yep
will it work on real PS3s though?
Someone said no
That's, that, and that's to be expected.
I mean, this, this gives them control over, like, how the API, the RPCN API is
contr- is, uh, exposed to the emulator, which you don't, you wouldn't have that
kind of, uh, uh, over on, on, uh, 3
Yeah, that's fair.
Yo, this also, um, it sounds… I don't know if you guys are interested in, like,
other retro games having achievements, but there's the whole RetroAchievements thing
for those that aren't familiar with that.
They basically supported emulators now have achievement pop-ups for when
you achieve certain, uh, criteria.
I will say a lot of the, like, ones for older retro games are more for, they're
more for seasoned players, I will say.
Not, it's not like achievements on, like, a new game where like, oh, you
beat chapter one, you get an achievement.
It's not, not, not a whole lot of them are like that on RetroAchievements,
but they're still pretty cool.
You can log on to your, you can log on to it directly through
RetroArch, and it just works.
Well
Yeah.
I mean, this is cool.
Like, oh man, this just makes me happy, dude.
Like, I… Yeah.
I mean, the fact that, like, now, so there's RPCN, right?
Which gives PS3 emulators access to network games.
Uh, uh, there's also, what is it, Hor- is it Horizon?
W- what's the, um, Xbox 360, uh,
Insignia?
Ins- well, that's the original Xbox, Insignia?
That's
Ah
another one I was gonna list.
Insignia is cool.
But we're having, like, these re-implementations, right, of, of Xbox
Live and, uh, PlayStation Network.
And there's also, um, Loaded or, or whatever it is where, for the Wii.
I don't know.
if it's Wii Loaded, But, it's one of those, like, where it has, um,
you know, Wii Connect 24 support.
That, dude, that's just super cool.
I don't know, is there one for the, uh, 3DS?
'Cause that would be one I would wanna, uh, to mess around with.
but
Um, I don't know.
But, but it's ve- but this is like some next level game preservations stuff.
Like, 'cause this is the type of stuff that all the game
corporations would like to have you believe is not preservable, but
Right
managed to do it in a cave with a box of scraps
Yeah.
Dude, super cool.
You love to see it
Oh yeah, that reminds me though.
You mentioned Mario Kart, uh, Wii, but I d- wanted to mention that the,
uh, Wii com- the Wii compiled re- uh, version of Mario Kart Wii, it's out.
We talked about that a few months ago.
Yes.
That's awesome.
Can You play it on your Steam Deck?
Steam Machine?
Uh, let's find out.
Uh, there's a se- setup.exe.
I mean, probably.
It says it's Windows
Yeah.
Oh, well.
Well, you know what you can do with a Steam Deck is you
can control a Mars rover.
was, I was trying to segue.
I, I don't know if that worked, but
Yeah, it worked pretty well
Yeah.
Dude, what's, what's this about?
I saw this headline and I was like, "That's pretty neat," but the lag
would pr- probably be pretty intense
Well, they didn't test it in Ma- on Mars.
They tested it, uh, like locally
Okay.
All right
Like, I don't see the re- I don't see a re- I don't see needing… I don't
think you would need a Steam Deck control 'cause, like, it takes, like,
three business days to, like, reach fucking Mars, if I'm not mistaken
Mm, it's, uh, no, it's, it depends on, like, the, the, uh, distance
because we don't have the same orbit, but, uh, it can take up to
30 minutes, I believe, to reach Mars
Oh, right
There's delay.
I gotta look it up now.
Oh wait, no, I, wait, I, let's see, three minutes one way to 40 minutes round trip.
So yeah, I mean, three minutes is pretty good.
I don- I wonder what protocol they're using to transmit, uh,
signals all the way to fucking Mars
Mm-mm.
They use the deep space, uh, deep space radio array to do that Yeah
Yeah, but I mean, the Steam Deck has still proven to be a very
versatile piece of equipment.
They've used it to pilot, uh, Disney animatronics at Disney World,
Yeah
pilot drones and turrets.
Not submarines, though.
I, I feel like… But I mean, they've, th- then now they've got a whole, whole Mars
rover here, which is also really cool, too
It's semi-cheap affordable hardware that you can hack that has Linux and
you can put pretty much anything on it.
It's, uh, I
Well
just pretty hacker-friendly
I, I wouldn't know if I'd say it's affordable anymore
Compared to specialized equipment, it is affordable.
Ja ja.
Ja
So
That is true
st- have standards around it, make drivers or whatever it is, libraries
that you know are gonna function well across, and you can buy multiple
for, let's say this or drones,
it's much better than trying to get a specialized system or hardware,
Yeah.
at least
It is really, it is really cool what they're doing with this, uh, 'cause like
The Steam Deck One's gonna have a life of its own even after the
hardware inevitably becomes outdated.
Some, I mean, some would argue that it's outdated already, even though I still
play my Steam Deck fairly regularly
Yeah,
It's definitely close to outdated, but it's not, there's, you know, there's just,
there's not, it's not like the Legion Go 2 and these other ones are, are nice and
all, or the ones that are priced similar, but there's … And, and they do, like
price to performance they're a better deal, but it still is not that much w-
like it's not that much worse I would say.
Like it's still, it's a, it's a console-like experience in your hand for
PC games, so it's better than Windows
Yeah.
I-- see, the thing is, with Steam, like, there's always going
to be new games coming out that will be Steam Deck compatible.
You'll be able to play them on the Steam Deck, right?
And so from my opinion, as long as the Steam client works on the Steam Deck
hardware, it will never be obsolete.
You won't be able to play, like, modern, like, contemporary AAA games,
um, and you might not be able to play a lot of them right now on the Steam
Deck, but it's not obsolete until the s- the client d- no longer supports
Yeah.
I
mean,
my opinion
it- mine's more if it outdated.
It's, it, there's a difference between outdated and obsolete.
I don't think it's gonna be obsolete for a very long time.
Outdated, we're already hitting that.
We are, we, I think we've already been on there, on that, um, for a year or two.
Uh, it sh- what, what I'm just saying is, like, if it wasn't for the RAM crisis
and all these other things, I think that's gonna push things off even more.
I think it would be a good time for a Steam Deck Two soon, is
all I'm saying, as a PC gamer.
And that's just a PC gamer wanting it more than anything else, 'cause
I'm used to hardware upgrade cycles being faster than consoles
Yeah.
It's, uh… I don't know.
It's, I, I… Dude, it's cool to see the Steam Deck just pop up in random
places, and I think that does kinda, um, speak to how, uh, accessible
and open the platform is, right?
It's, it's just an x86 computer with, uh, built-in controls, and that makes
it, like, re- like, uh, to a lot of
trackpads, which might also help a lot with certain things too.
just, it, it makes it more versatile.
Yeah
Yep.
It's pretty neat
Yeah.
I can't wait to see it being used more and more.
We're gonna be like, "Oh, looks like the new shuttles are being
piloted by the Steam Deck Two."
Yeah, and it
And
too that, like, it has, it has very standard controls, right?
Like, you know, that everybody's familiar with pretty much, right?
Like, uh, it's why, like, drone, uh, the US Army uses, uh, Xbox
360 controllers to control drones.
You know, it's like everybody knows how to use that
Maybe, maybe they'll switch to Xbox, uh, maybe they'll switch to
Steam Controllers in the future
Yeah.
Uh, dude
Yeah.
Well, uh, I don't know how to segue to this one, but, uh, quantum computing
used… A con- quantum computing has been used in, in a first commercial game.
Um, what is going on with this?
So this is a game that's allegedly being developed making use of quantum
compu- computing for game assets, narrative, and procedural systems.
Um, at least that's what the article says.
I could not tell you what that actually translates to, because I
looked at the game page and it looks like you can just do this with like
a, a normal non-quantum computer.
You gotta go… Yeah, I also linked the Steam page as well for this game.
I figured I wanna talk about it 'cause I have… 'Cause like maybe you guys know
what's so quantum computery about it
I think the, the, the part that's impressive is that they're just able
to do it with quantum computing.
So quantum computing and programming quantum computing's drastically
different than regular programming.
So th- I think this is just a feat of like, see, we're already
catching up to what some regular computers can do, which is good.
But like quantum computing's gonna probably have a pretty different, use case
than what we think regular computers have.
So people don't understand the difference between quantum
computing and regular computing.
And so this is just a cool first step.
I think this is more of a showcase to see that like it can
do what normal computers can do
Yeah, I mean, so my understanding is, like, quantum computing
is all about probability.
Uh, and, like, uh, quantum computers can't do like, anything
like what normal computers can do
and vice versa.
Normal computers can't do anything like what quantum computers can do.
Um, uh, the, or at least they're optimized for many, for much different tasks,
It's, uh, well, one, it's, it's optimized that way, and also two,
we have decades of libraries of systems built on top of what our, um,
computers can do, regular computers.
Quantum, you're not wrong.
Like, uh, uh, probability, it, it, it can crunch probability and, um,
computational stuff really heavily, but it's gotta be programmed in such a way
Yeah.
So, uh, pull up the game page, Gardner.
Um, you should have that open, right?
I was, I was looking at it, but I didn't switch tabs.
Sorry.
All good.
So if you go, like, but so it, like you said, I, I mean, yeah, it seems like maybe
they just did it 'cause they could, but then the big question now is, uh, why?
Why a quantum computer and not just, like, a computer computer?
Because
it's
cool
yeah.
Their Steam page doesn't even mention the, have, have a reference
to the word Quantum on it.
Um-
That is true.
The, it says that Me Tail has worked with experts from IBM Quantum
Computing, so they're working with IBM to get this shit done
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
IBM's one of the big ones I mean, it, no, it, it's just, it, it's fine.
I think it's cool.
I think, honestly, I kinda miss this type of stuff of being like, "Look,
this is done this way even though we don't have to do it this way." Um,
it's just showcasing that quantum computing can potentially do more,
maybe be a part of this type of thing.
I think they're also having a hard time applying quantum computing to
more than just a few, um, applications, and so maybe this is something that
they're trying to do to, to promote it.
I think it's a good thing, though
My
understanding of
quantum computing is like quantum computing is good for like
cracking, uh, you know, encryption.
Um, quantum computing probably would be good for, uh, uh, like executing
machine learning models, right?
Like, you'd have… They might have to adapt them a little bit, but
like the, it's a, it's a completely probabilistic, uh, outcome for, for,
uh, AI versus like a deterministic outcome for most other computing.
So,
I feel like that they're trying to push quantum to like reduce overhead for AI.
I would imagine that's probably what, what's going on here.
uh, there's, there's no AI disclosure mentioned, so I don't
know for certain if this is being used to, like, run AI, but I know-
Well, it could be for AI in games, what we think of, not generative
Yeah, I'm thinking, I'm thinking more like, um, like,
you meant like more simulation aspects
Well, IBM's trying to, like, push quantum computing forward so that
they have something to sell to machine learning companies, right?
That, I think that might be what's going on here too
For sure.
I… It'll be interesting to see how this all plays out.
I, I like that they're doing this, and I, I, I, I don't think it's…
But then again, you know, what will quantum com- quantum computing's
gonna… That will potentially break the, uh, break things more than
AI will in the sense of security.
security-wise, quantum computing is just, once it becomes standardized,
it's a whole other fricking mess
Yeah.
I mean, we do have algor- like encryption algorithms that are
resistant to quantum cracking.
I mean, theoretically anyway, but we, like you said, we haven't even
standardized, uh, quantum computing
Yeah
they might not be
They, the, no, you're not wrong.
Like, we've, we've, we're preparing for it and all that, but, like, if, if you
get a strong enough quantum computer, can break about anything, depending
on how you set it up, of course.
Like, it depends on w- it, it really depends on what the
system is that you're breaking.
Yeah.
yeah, no, this is cool.
I w- I'd like to see more and more systems try to use quantum computing,
even if it's not the most optimal way, just to try to find ways to use it and
see if we have different applications, um, for it, and see what the outcomes
come out to be in the few years.
Yeah
It's expensive
Yeah, I mean, I mean, I'm not very imaginative, so I couldn't imagine what
quantum computing could do for gaming.
Like, especially not for a game like this where it appears to be, like, kind of
looks like a, like a TRPG almost, if you look at the, like, gameplay screenshots.
But I wonder what they would do for more advanced video games.
I wonder if there's something they could do that, like, regular computers
couldn't do for, like, I don't know, like an online game or something.
I don't see, I don't see houses getting quantum computers anytime soon
Yeah.
I
No, it's gonna be on,
like…
be at… Yeah.
Go ahead
No.
No, go ahead
was just gonna say, I don't think that there is, like, a wide,
um, market, like, reason for people, like regular people to have a quantum computer.
Like, the, the use case is so specific to, like, military, applications, like
cracking the, uh, you know, passwords and stuff, or encryption in general.
most people are not gonna have a use case for that, at least until they figure
out how to run machine learning models with, you know, a quantum computer.
And even then, A- OpenAI and Anthropic keep that for themselves.
You know, they wouldn't wanna have that distributed to anyone
Maybe Hideo Kojima has an idea for quantum computers.
with him.
I don't think quantum computers are gonna be standardized anytime soon.
I think it just--
No
That's a-- It, it's g- it's gonna be server or business-based or military
government-based systems for a long time, and it just might be-- remain that way.
Cloud quantum computing
Yeah, potentially where you can rent it out a little bit.
It's gonna be super expensive, um, until they can, um… There's a couple
of hurdles they have to get over.
It's just not-- You can't… It, it-- Think of it as rediscovering the, the
whole com- um, just… The, the dawn of computers used to be take up a whole
room or multiple rooms or a house, right?
That's what this is kind of like right now.
There's just no practicality to a regular person having one unless,
you know, you're really in security and you can program it or pay for
programming to have the security with it
Mm-hmm.
Yeah Yeah.
Some people can correct us if we're wrong in the comments, of course.
Like, this is interesting.
Yeah
there's probably a lot more use cases, a lot more of that, but
that's just what I've followed.
This is kinda what it is, and I agree with Gardner, like, uh, predictive
or pro- probability, that is.
So
it's, uh, it's, it's kinda… I mean, I don't know.
I'm not, like, super versed in it, but that's my take anyway.
So yeah, let us know in the comments if we're wrong.
Um, or right.
We could be right.
Who the hell knows?
Or,
I know
better yet, what more you can do with it or what they're probably doing with it.
I think that'd be… I wanna learn.
Yes,
If you're gonna tell me I'm
Yes.
at least tell me why.
Please, someone from IBM tell us what, tell us what quantum
computing can do for video games
Oh yeah.
Next episode's sponsored by IBM.
No
Maybe, maybe quantum computing can help solve the problem of tariffs.
Oh, no, not the tariffs
yeah.
We usually save the, the more political stuff for the bonus show, but, uh, we,
uh, we wanted to talk about this today.
Uh, Hi-Tech, tell, tell us what's happening here
El Presidente is threatening another tariff, but this time for video
game hardware That's the story
I… Is it because gamers need to get back to work and stop enjoying their lives?
Like, they're not wor- you know, already working 50 hours a week isn't enough
Yeah.
That's probably it.
they just want, uh, an excuse for, uh, uh, for, you know, Nintendo to
not return tariffs a- and just use that to keep it as profit, you know?
Just in time for GTA VI.
Now
Oh, w- that's right, we haven't even talked about that.
We should talk about that after this.
But tariffs, man, they're gonna get wor- they're not even … Oh,
I thought that it was struck down, that they're not even legal anymore,
like, to do these types of tariffs.
They have to run through Congress, but
You think that's ever stopped El Presidente before?
That's not…
I know, but that's not how the balances of power work.
This is, like, so unpre- like, so unprecedented and it's odd.
It's so stupid.
Yeah.
This is not how it works, guys.
Nope,
well
It's not, but yet here we are.
We live in a society
know what… How are people affording anything?
Like, this real- honestly, these tariffs really do hurt channels like, uh,
YouTube channels like ours and stuff, and it really does not help anyone.
'Cause w- like w- do you guys plan to spend less on
hardware in the next few years?
I do, though I just spent a ton of money.
I did it preemptively because it's just g- it
This will be the…
go up.
Dude, imagine if the Steam Machine goes up in price.
You know how horrible that would be and how fortunate we'd be to have gotten ours?
I agree, but it's at least a standard, meaning, like, even if it goes up to
$1,500, yeah, that sucks, but that $1,500 will last you a long time.
I mean, it's already the stan- it's already the standard right now, and people
are still pissed off even though, like, a similarly specced PC costs a similar price
Yeah.
No, you're, you're not wrong.
I, uh, y- and, and it's good to be pissed off.
I just sometimes, like when they first came out, people were like, "Well, this
is…" You know, even I was a little, "Wow, man, they're r- maybe overcharging
us." And I, I think they could subsidize if they wanted to, but I don't… I,
uh, that's a whole other argument.
At the end of the day, people need to get mad and start voting,
and I know that's more for the, the Patreon episode, but, like, I
don't think it's wrong to say vote.
If you don't like getting charged so much more, artificially by the way,
Yeah.
artificially, like for everything in your life
Yeah
It's generous, James, to say being charged more because we- everybody
is being screwed right now, not just by these big companies, but
by the federal government of the
Yeah
And not even Americans, it's everyone, right?
Like,
in the world, and
Yeah
honestly, it's, it's affecting prices everywhere.
Like, and these are ta- like especially tariffs are taxes.
If you don't like taxes, and needless taxes, where are these taxes going to?
They've been getting rebated, so this will probably get rebated back, like,
or returned back to the big- the companies, they'll just earn a profit.
Yes.
So
one who's paying them.
you're paying a tax to game companies now, which is crazy.
They're not a government, but they could just up prices I guess if they wanted to.
This sucks
Yeah
it does suck.
It does suck, and I think, I, I don't know.
Like I'm, I'm… At least games aren't being ta- uh, are be- aren't being
tariffed, uh, much if at all n- right now, so like pre- uh, the way… Technologies,
and I don't wanna say this, like DLSS 5 and stuff like might make your s- uh,
systems last longer is nice in that form or fashion if it's low enough effort.
Like, not the high-end version of DLSS.
I, I should just be more like FSR than DLSS is becoming nicer and nicer
to where like I can hold onto my hardware longer, let it, things still
look somewhat decent, and then games.
Let's get back to optimizing games and let's just kinda… I don't know
if we're ever gonna be able to screw these companies, say, "Hey, we're not
gonna buy from you for a long time." I think the only way you're gonna get
that is if you have competition to say, "Hey, I'll only buy from that
new competitor screw the old one."
I think that's the only way we're gonna get out of this, and that's regulations,
and that's not gonna come for a few years.
So let's weather it.
That's my take on this.
Let's just weather this.
right.
If, and honestly, if you vote right this next, uh, at the, in this midterm which,
um, i- just vote for the, the candidates that are going to lower your costs.
That's all you need to do.
I'm not gonna say vote for one side or the other.
Vote for the candidate that's gonna lower your costs, and if you get enough
people in there, it's, it's over I think.
Yeah
can then enact what they're supposed to do and that's block these, 'cause that's
who's really supposed to be handling this.
Yeah, I don't think I have much more to say on this top, truth be told.
I mean, the, what, what, what more can we, what more can we say that hasn't
already been said by multiple people, including us at multiple different points
in time back when we did have a tariff?
But if I recall correctly, last year we had the tariff, no Rampocalypse.
Now we have a tariff and a Rampocalypse, and the war that's still waging on.
Like,
that's, that's still happening, right?
I have-
by the way.
These are like,
Yeah
of the tariffs might have looked like they've gone away.
I don't know if they've ever fully gone away.
I don't
Well, I mean, they may have gone away for the corporations, but we certainly
will never see any of those savings
I never saw anything drop in price
Yeah
because of the tariffs
uh, didn't… Wasn't it Playdate or somebody?
One of some co- gaming company actually got the, a tariff refund
and then sent rebates back to their customers who paid the tariffs
Did you hear about that?
I did hear about that.
Playdate, uh, the guys that make like the hand-crank, uh, handheld
interesting
So
I did see that
Yeah, so Playdate, we've begun to receive refunds on the
tariffs we paid in last year.
On August 20- on August 25th, 2026, we refunded all tariffs
charged to, to our customers.
That is how it's done,
That's good publicity.
That's good PR.
Dude, absolutely.
That's
you know,
awesome
Yeah.
You love to see it.
It's rare.
It's, it's, this is sad.
It's so rare
Man, I like that
I want a chicken on a play date
Yeah.
I, I do wanna try one out, but… Tariffs were stopping until now?
Uh, no, I'm curious how much the tariff tax on top of this was.
'Cause obviously they weren't as high as what Trump wanted them to
be, 'cause he was, like, Trump and his administration were saying, like,
certain percentages, but they weren't that high, um, at the end of the day.
They were still high, they just weren't as high as they were saying.
But I'm curious
Yeah.
This is also depressing.
I, I don't know what
it, it, it is very depressing.
Can we talk about Grand Theft Auto, which is not depressing, or have we talked
about that already and I missed that?
I zoned
we
talked a, we talked a bit about it in the beginning.
We talked about how, I mean, the actual, like, combat kinda
look, looks improved, but
trailer though, but I don't know if we can actually now that
I wouldn't I
we can
I wouldn't risk, I wouldn't risk it.
Take-Two likes to be super litigious about this.
I, I edited a video for Fan the Deck, uh, that included a l- a, the
old, like, Red Dead Redemption 1 trailer, and that got copyrighted, so
show any of their trailers for Rockstar Games.
They,
You, you all
I don't think I've had issues with, um, with Remedy, but like
with Rockstar I've had issues.
Yeah
Like every time, every time.
So fuck, fuck
can
them.
just not forget, we, we cannot allow ourselves to forget that,
uh, Rockstar are a bunch of union-busting criminals and, um, if
you play, if you buy GTA are a scab.
We should remember that.
Well, if you see my Steam account playing Grand Theft Auto VI in a year
fr- uh, from the release date, it's n- I'm not, I, it wasn't me playing it
Okay.
All right.
Steam
you, but, uh, Goddammit.
We
will
this, right?
Like, if we want things to improve, we
I know.
workers power
I agree.
I, and I, the, my thing is the more and more I'm, I'm looking at it, the more and
more I don't f- I think the only way we're gonna do that is through regulations.
Well
gotta
I trust
and, uh, the, the, this endgame capitalism stuff where p- companies are
just self-destructing 'cause of profit.
make so much money, it's so bad.
We talk about it in the bonus episode, by the way, just to promote that again
Ugh, dude.
don't know.
I don't know.
I, I'm just gonna give Mad Props one more time to that's, that's,
Yeah.
amazing
They're the only company… 'Cause I think Costco might do it.
I don't know
if, if they are going to though.
They said they're going to.
I don't know if they will, but Playdate's done it
Yeah
Yeah.
Costco says that they want… But they've been fighting the Trump administration on
the tariffs stuff anyways, They said, I-- And they have a really good record of who
bought what, so they should be able to do refunds, and they have a good avenue
to do that through your check rebate.
So we'll see.
Maybe they will do it, and maybe when you're, um, renew your membership…
Well, by the time you get done with your membership, you get your rebate, which
mine was almost like $400 this last time.
And so maybe they'll bump it into there.
I don't know
Yeah, I mean, it's hard to know for certain what's gonna happen
Nintendo, I get it if you don't have an easy way to offer the, the refunds
and if the refunds aren't really big, it might cost just the same amount
of money to try to r- offer them.
Like with Nintendo, I don't know.
Like they're not… Like if they wanna be transparent that would help, but
give something away for free then.
Use that money, don't pocket that 'cause you're just
fucking stealing at that point.
Yeah.
In my opinion, it's theft.
And so d- bare minimum to save a little face, us something
So that's why Nintendo is fighting so hard against that lawsuit
where, you know, where they're currently getting sued right now
I won't, you know, give Bela to just die by the s- you know, live by the
sword, die by the sword, so, you know
Yep.
Ah, wouldn't it be some shit if Nintendo lost this lawsuit, huh?
TheBrink
Well, dude, there's going to be a reckoning.
Uh, and it's not gonna be… there has to be some kind of, like, justice
brought after, you know, the, the criminals that are in charge right
now ha- are taken to account.
Like, every- Like, and I'm not just talking about, like,
officials, I'm talking about, like, business leaders as well.
There has to be some kind of accountability Nintendo's chief among the
companies that need accountability too
We just need to figure out a good way for us to take back the power
Yeah
One that's a little less destructive than say, sawing down
an entire flagpole, but you know
Right, which we talked about in the bonus episode.
Uh, and so I think, uh, yeah, that's a good segue to the end.
If you guys haven't watched the bonus episode yet, it's available
for our patrons over on Patreon.
Uh, those are gonna be linked down below as well as to our
website, offtheconsole.com.
uh, yeah, thank you guys for being here.
Thank you James and Hi-Tech for, for the voices of reason with me this week.
I appreciate you
yeah,
You're welcome.
You're welcome
for me being the, uh, the doubting Thomas on stuff or n- uh, or being the opposite
of being agreeing of the DLSS stuff, but
No, thank you for putting up with my, like, ri- ridiculous,
uh, like, anti-tech extremist.
Yeah.
A tech YouTuber being
easy to go down that.
Yeah.
all the
Yeah.
One day tech will be cool again.
Yeah
tech outside of video games, that is.
Video games are still pretty cool
I, I like
I agree
I like the Playdate too.
But
Hey, maybe we should review one of these one day
Agreed.
I, I'll have Dash review, or maybe Dash did review the play date on the site.
Um, I gotta look it up now.
I think she might have.
Um, play date
What, so
yeah, yeah.
We have
Man
of ga- a game on there anyway, which is pretty cool.
But yeah, with that said, I don't know, is there anything else
we wanna talk about before we
sign
Yeah.
I think
Haven't got much else.
I think, I think we're good
If, if, if I- it sounds like I'm talking over people, it's because
my internet's been so crappy.
w- we're in the middle of some thunderstorms, some other storms.
I don't know what else is going on, but just as a
right like right now?
Oh, yeah, it's been raining and thundering the whole time
Yeah.
Cool.
Well, thank you guys.
We'll see you next week.
Okay, thanks.
Peace out.
Later
Later.