1.11 UPDATE NEW FEATURES ZOMBIES HAS SPLIT SCREEN OFFLINE NOW!

1.11 update news

-Zombies now allows 2 player split-screen in offline, you can add a controller as well as start/boot the match fine, however the same issues persist with offline split-screen, visual/menu glitches/bugs just like the normal multiplayer split-screen
-Multiplayer offline split-screen is working again, it seems to have all the same issues it had prior to the 1.09 update where it got broken, rough menus, class selection not working in certain scenarios, I've also found Nuketown 84 in split-screen will crash every time it loads into the match...etc etc.
- RAID and PINES map are available offline now
-Prop hunt is available offline now, however no bot support.

1.10 update - literally nothing added for offline

1.09 update - literally nothing added for offline

KNOWN MAJOR OFFLINE ISSUES/BUGS all present in latest 1.08 'season one' version (tested on PS4/PS5) Please read these as it may answer some questions instead of posting a comment.

*NEW BUG/GLITCH as of V.08\*
- V1.08 you can no longer play split-screen offline, when adding player 2, it will attempt to add player 2 and just fail each time....
- when playing split-screen multiplayer (versus) player 2 can do create-a-class but only edit the main weapon, they can not edit any attachments
- when playing split-screen multiplayer (versus) often player 2 can not select a class when starting the match at all.

- offline zombies has no option for split-screen or adding a controller when playing offline period (unsure if this is a glitch or the fact zombies has no split-screen option offline at all
- online zombies, has the option to add a second player for split-screen, but even when you do this the game won't launch and will often come up with a error stating this mode has exceeded the maximum amount of players, (unsure if ths is a glitch or the fact zombies isn't supposed to be split-screen at all)
- Search and Destroy and VIP Escort modes, do not support offline bots at all
- the maps Armada and Crossroads do not support offline bots at all currently for any mode
- the maps Armada and Crossroads have a small variant for normal modes, however when playing VIP escort mode only, you get the full expanded large scale combined arms map (with vehicles) however again no offline bot support, unsure if this is a glitch or not.
- various interface/menu bugs within the menus/lobbys
- multiple instances of glitches when playing in split-screen, gunsights missing/notloading, hands dissappearing etc etc.
- multiple settings not working, loadout restrictions settings completely broken and not working right, guns misnamed, M82 is called the XM4 etc and turning off or enabling what is supposed to be the M82 turns off both or enables both the M82 and XM4, really broken.
- I have to do more testing but I've had two instances on PS5 where my campaign save will dissappear completely after playing split-screen multiplayer.
- unsure if a glitch or designed this way.
If you find any bugs/issues or fixes that I haven't do let me know in the comments or flick me a PM, Finding new stuff every time I play it.
I'll endeavour to keep this guide updated over the next couple of months, do be with me as I can't update EXACTLY on time every time a new update comes out..
All testing done with the PS4 and PS5 version of the game (v1.03) (now updated to V1.07)
I have updated the game now to V1.05, I can confirm nothing has changed for offline with this update, what is down below is still current including no OFFLINE split-screen option for Zombies and the Crossroads/Armada maps still do not support bots.
I now have the PS4 as well as the PS5 version of the game, It's exactly the same, nothing additional, no extra bots/maps/modes/features, exactly the same issues, exactly the same stuff.
Some people are asking about the Dualsense for it, it's neat, the guns all feel slightly different, so the resistive triggers have different 'pulls' for different weapons, big LMGs the aiming trigger is a slow steady pull where as a pistol is very lightweight and barely any resistance, the vibration stuff, pretty standard, although again every gun feels a little different, nothing mind blowing, but neat feature. Astros Playroom on the other hand is amazing for the dualsense.
All testing done on PS4 Pro and PS5, running in an offline environment, no internet on the console, boot from cold startup, booting up Black Ops Cold War OFFLINE and playing OFFLINE.
This guide is aimed at people who enjoy the offline part of Call of Duty (yes there are people like us) If you play online thats fine, no need to make a stupid comment like "why are you playing offline in 2020 what a loser etc etc"
I've done this for several years, this guide is for fans of offline play and aimed to get CORRECT information to people who need it

FAQ Starts here

What do you mean when you use the word OFFLINE?
To clear up any confusion as many people seem to confuse the terms OFFLINE and LOCAL PLAY, these are two VERY different things.
If I use the word OFFLINE in this guide at any point, I mean OFFLINE, no internet on the console, no WiFi, no Ethernet, Console as well as game has been cold booted with NO INTERNET WHATSOEVER.
Can you play Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War OFFLINE without an internet connection?
Yes once your game is at version 1.03 (latest current version at time of release) You can play the game fully offline.
Like Modern Warfare 2019, the game is quite large (100.4GB for PS4 at of time of writing) It also like Modern Wafare 2019 is divided into PACKS
The Base game has the following PACKS, which you need to have installed if you want to play every mode available.
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Single Player LicenseCall of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Multiplayer License
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Zombies License
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War - Campaign 1
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War - Campaign 2
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War - Campaign 3
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War - Multiplayer Base Install
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War - Zombies Base Install
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War - Dead Ops Arcade Pack
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Content 1 - 6 License (1 file for each) ( I believe this is just DLC stuff)
The console versions like WWII, Black Ops 4 and Modern Warfare 2019 will work OFFLINE after patching/updating, the PC version however due to Battlenet is ONLINE ONLY, even for Campaign/offline bots.
Can you install and play Black Ops Cold War from the disc without installing any updates/patches?
No you can not, like Call of Duty WWII, Black Ops 4, and Modern Warfare 2019 before it, the physical copies of the game do not contain all the files nor can you play the full experience OFFLINE via the disc only, you can only play a few multiplayer maps vs bots, thats it.
*A MANDATORY INSTALLATION/UPDATE IS REQUIRED FIRST\*
Can you play the Campaign OFFLINE?
Yes as mentioned before, as long as you have updated your game to the minimum version of 1.03 (latest current release) the games campaign will be playable OFFLINE.
Can you play the multiplayer (versus) OFFLINE?
Yes as mentioned before, as long as you have updated your game to the minimum version of 1.03 (latest current release) the games multiplayer will be playable OFFLINE.
Can you play the Zombies mode OFFLINE?
Yes as mentioned before, as long as you have updated your game to the minimum version of 1.03 (latest current release) the games multiplayer will be playable OFFLINE.
**Can you play the Zombies Onslaught mode OFFLINE? (exclusive to PS4/PS5 for 1 year)**yes
Is there Split-screen support in mutliplayer versus?
Versus Multiplayer has 2 players split-screen per console maximum
Is there split-screen support in Zombies?
EDIT: Version 1.11 has finally added the ability to play zombies OFFLINE split-screen, however its still rough, but it does work.
Is there co-op campaign or split-screen campaign?
Campaign is single player only.

What does the aspect ratio for split-screen look like? Is there any 'black bars' on the sides?
Split-screen for multiplayer versus has both Vertical and Horizontal options.
Horizontal split-screen (TOP and BOTTOM) has black bars on the left and right.Vertical split-screen (LEFT and RIGHT) has black bars on the top and bottom.
Is there OFFLINE LAN support, (2 or more systems connected offline for multiplayer) ?
You can play 2 players PER CONSOLE in multiplayer versus. Zombies is ONE PER CONSOLE currently, LAN is broken though unless you go online and download temporary hotfixes, so basically you need all consoles to be online, connected to servers, get hotfixes (so every game/console is on the same version and then it will work) this is the exact same issue Modern Warfare has. Its stupid. true proper OFFLINE LAN play is pretty much broken in the last two CODs.

OFFLINE BOT SUPPORT

Is there offline bot (AI Enemies/teammates) support?Which modes support them?How many Bots per mode?
Yes there are offline bots
you can have a total of 12 players in each core game mode, so if playing SOLO, you can have 11 bots.
I can confirm if playing split-screen you can still have 11 bots in the game total.Previous versions of the game only supported 7 bots in TDM and FFA game modes, this was fixed in V1.07. all modes support 11 bots.
you can not add bots to the Crossroads or Armada maps at all.
VIP Escort and Search and Destroy game modes do not support offline bots.
Can you make assymetrical/uneven teams?
Yes, however you can't go over the maximum of 6 players per each team,
So you can't for example do a team death match with you on one team vs 11 bots on the other team.
6 v 6 max
How many players can play each mode? (assume bots means players too here)
2 REAL players in split-screen and up to 11 bots (6 players/bots per team)
Edit: I didn't notice before as I mainly play objective modes not FFA or Team Deathmatch,
If you play Free-for-all or Team Deathmatch the bots cap at 7, not 11
What difficulties are there for the bots?
Recruit, Regular, Hardened, Veteran
are there loadout restrictions and can we force the bots to use certain loadouts?
There is an option for loadout restrictions in the menu, however It dosen't affect bots, you can turn off custom classes but sadly there again is no option to set what the DEFAULT classes are (like how Modern Warfare Remastered allows)
Right now the restrictions screen is VERY broken, half of the weapons are sharing the same name, for example the M82 Sniper rifle is incorrectly labelled as the XM4 (assault rifle) I turned off EVERYTHING but the M82 but it has the XM4 enabled (as its obviously broken) I have turned off everything but the XM4 and there are still weapons that are accessible.
So hard one to test right now, It's restricting some weapons but I can only tell from the player side no the bot side, Patches are needed to test this feature properly.
are there friendly/teammate bots for Zombies mode?
No there are no friendly AI/teammates/bots in Zombies mode.
What are the bots like, and how do they play?
I've had a quick go (I'll update this more later) but they feel like how they did in MW 2019.

Create-a-Class/Loadouts/Customisation

Is there an offline progression system? or is everything unlocked for offline play?
There is no offline progression system, everything is unlocked from the start, all attachments, gear, weapons etc is available offline from the start
What about customisation/camos etc?
Yes you can apply camos, change reticles offline, it looks like everything is unlocked here
What is available in offline create-a-class?
A ton, I'll add a video in the comments later with a showcase of everything, it's comparable to how MW was at launch.
How many custom classes can you have? can you save/rename them?
You can have 5 custom classes per player offline, yes you can rename/save them.
What Operators are available offline?
All launch Operators are available offline
NATO:
Mil-Sim:
HunterSong
Operators:
ParkAdlerBakerSimsWoods
Warsaw Pact
Mil-Sim:
VargasPowers
Operators:
PortnovaBeckGarciaStone

Multiplayer VERSUS

What game modes are available offline?
Team DeathmatchFree-For-AllSearch & DestoryDominationHardpointControlVIP Escort
What about the Larger Combined Arms modes?
Although the maps like Crossroads (which was the big snowy map in the beta with snowmobiles etc) are here, these are not the combined arms versions, these are smaller cut down versions of these maps, you can only do 6 v 6 in offline.
Is there a realism mode? or Hardcore Mode?
No realism mode, there is no hardcore 'mode' like MW2019, however there are Hardcore versions of TDM, FFA, SND, and DOM.
What multiplayer maps are available?
ArmadaCartelCheckmateCrossroadsGarrisonMiamiMoscowSatelliteNuketown 84 (added for offline in update V1.07)
What interesting custom game settings are there? anything different/new?
Nothing out of the ordinary, all pretty standard fare at launch.
Can I save custom game modes OFFLINE?
Yes you can save them.

Zombies

Is everything unlocked for create-a-class?
Yes, everything is unlocked, it's the same weapon selection from multiplayer versus, however you get 1 weapon, not 2, and a field upgrade which are zombies themed special powers.
Is there settings like in Black Ops 4, where you could adjust zombies/custom game settings?
Sadly no, it seems very scaled back more like the normal zombies modes from the older Black Ops games.
What modes are available for zombies offline?
Round based (standard zombies)Dead Ops arcade 3 (top down twin-stick shooter mini game mode)Onslaught (PS4/PS5 Exclusive for 1 year)
What maps/scenarios are available for offline zombies?
Round based (standard zombies)
Die Maschine
**Dead Ops Arcade 3 (mini game)**Rise of the Mamaback
Onslaught
Moscow (same as the multiplayer Moscow map....just with zombies)
What is onslaught mode anyway?
so its basically a VIP escort thing, you have a floating orb, that has a protective cirlce around it, you need to stay in the circle to live, zombies come at you, you shoot em, orb moves to a new location, rinse and repeat. Neat but you aren't missing much if you are a PC/Xbox player.

GME Tribe: A Story About How Ryan Cohen is About to Kick Down Sherman's Door and Drink His Milkshake 🚀🚀🚀

Come gather ‘round GME management wherever you roam. And admit that the waters around you have grown and accept it that soon you’ll be drenched to the bone. If your time to you is worth saving, then you better start swimming or you’ll sink like a stone, for the times they are a-changin’.
Story time for the GME crew. All those who are certain tHis iS bLoCkBusTer or the paper hands that sold yesterday can just keep scrolling. We wish you the best of luck in the best of all possible worlds: this one, dear Pangloss.
**I’ve tried to submit this three times now and the moderators keep rejecting it. Maybe because I use too many naughty words? I guess I’ll try to clean that up a bit, which runs counter to all my instincts.
Did we have a good day Wednesday after that Q3 call? No, we did not. Do you know who lost over $20M (at least on paper) yesterday? Mr. Ryan Cohen. How do you think he felt about that CC and that inexplicable shelf registration that is, as one stocktwits commentator put it, a “poor man’s poison pill” and as obvious of a FU to Cohen and shareholders that the Board could have possibly designed? Do you think he was happy to see that?
I think he was thrilled to see it.
And now I’m going to tell you why.
This is a long post, so I’m going to give the TL/DR sum up for you Paste Eating Rocket Kids, and this will serve as a warning that there are, in fact, a lot of words that you may choose to read or not. So if I still see one goddamn comment about this being a lot of words and where’s the rockets maaaaan, I might just transport myself through this internet connection and [removed to satisfy the delicate sensibilities of the robot moderators].
So here’s the TL/DR: I believe that Cohen is executing a plan to take out the GME Board. And I think that Sherman just walked right into Cohen’s trap because he’s a dumb, selfish Boomer with a huge ego and a Broken Brain. And Cohen is going to be a legend because of it after he executes this plan, triggers the MOASS, and takes control of GME to convert it to a tech-first gaming juggernaut.
Now, if you’re in on this GME shit, you likely know the outlines of the story here. But here’s a good link to refresh your memory about why we’re all here:
https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/k4csaa/the_real_greatest_short_burn_of_the_century_part/
And for further background, my recent post about the battle here between George Sherman, out-of-touch Hired Gun B&M Boomer CEO with the Boomer-est of all possible Boomer names, and Ryan Cohen, Boy Genius, Actual Good Guy, and Man With The Chewy-fication Plan: https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/k9apx5/gme_q3_call_thoughts_on_the_clash_between_cohen/
So: are we ready to start READING and THINKING, children? Good.
Now what were you doing in the summer of 2020? I don’t give a shit what you were doing. But I do give a shit about what Ryan Cohen was doing. And there is a decent amount of evidence that Ryan Cohen spent the summer of 2020 hiring a bad ass lawyer and crafting a pretty solid plan to wrest control of a struggling Mall-based gaming retailer from its out of touch Boomer Board and CEO so he can turn it into an ecommerce juggernaut like his baby Chewy. And I think we are about to enter the next phase of that plan here shortly.
But before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s first all get acquainted with Christopher P. Davis, Esquire, the attorney listed on each of the 13Ds filed by RC Ventures.
Chris Davis, Activist Attorney Extraordinaire and His Successful Use of the Consent Solicitation to Remove Dipshit Boards/CEOs
To cut to the chase, Chris Davis (who is definitely NOT the same dude playing first base for the Orioles) is a badass NYC attorney recently recognized as one of the nation’s premier shareholder activist lawyers. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/kleinberg-kaplan-partner-chris-davis-recognized-by-chambers-usa-as-leading-shareholder-activist-lawyer-301090571.html.
So what was Chris Davis doing in the summer of 2020? So glad you asked. He was celebrating a major win he helped engineer on behalf of a “first time activist Michael Gorzynski” for a wholesale replacement of the sitting Board at HC2 Holdings, Inc (sounds fancy). He helped engineer this takeover via a “high stakes consent solicitation rather than the more typical proxy contest.”
Learn more about this here: https://www.kkwc.com/insights/kleinberg-kaplan-advises-mg-capital-management-in-its-consent-solicitation-and-successful-settlement-with-hc2-holdings/
Here’s a few more links if you care to learn more about that and how it all went down (spoiler alert: the activists settled for two seats on the Board and then the new Board very quickly ousted the dipshit Boomer CEO, Phil Falcone)
http://www.shareholderforum.com/shfk/Library/20200611_II.htm
http://www.shareholderforum.com/access/Library/20200219_Deal.htm
In sum: if you look into Chris Davis, you can see that this guy is dialed the fuck in and knows how to get activist shareholders a win—even in very challenging circumstances.
The Summer of ’20 Out-of-the-Blue Boy Genius Media Campaign and Cohen’s 13D Filing in August
I’m going to return to the “consent solicitation” thing at the bottom and why I think it matters here, but I don’t want to lose momentum on the timeline and evidence. And the consent solicitation is Advanced Level Shit that I barely understand anyway. But I think it’s likely to be goddamn important so I’ll get to it.
Now, where were we? Oh yes, the inexplicable media campaign.
RC Ventures files its 13D on August 18th announcing that Ryan Cohen is now the proud owner of 5.8M shares or 9% (later increased to 9.8%) of That Cluttered Video Game Geekery You Used to Pass on Your Way to Jamba Juice or Wherever People Go in Malls. Uh, ok man. But then this is when the SP of this Future Blockbuster™ starts its real run as more catch on that Cohen has taken a huge stake and that is also part of the portfolio of Mr. Big Short himself and a bunch of institutions and they actually have cash and are definitely not going bankrupt and oh have you heard about the insane short percentage of float and the upcoming console cycle that invariably corresponds to a sharp spike in SP? Well have you? But to return to the point: RC was and is the largest shareholder.
But prior to the date Cohen filed his 13D, there is a renewed media campaign focused on Ryan Cohen, Ecommerce Billionaire Genius who built Chewy, kicked Amazon’s ass, and then sold it for $3.35B way back in the heady mask-free days of ‘17. Why the sudden re-emergence of Mr. Cohen in the summer of 2020 in such a prominent way with this glowing media campaign about a guy who sold a very successful pet supply business over three years ago? Fawning media exposure like that doesn’t just happen (or not usually). It’s engineered. Or, more charitably, helped along by people who know people and can introduce those people to Interesting Topics to Write About. And my guess is that Chris Davis, bad ass activist attorney based in New York City, Knows People and had a little something to do with it.
Here are the links to all of the glowing media pieces starting in the summer of 2020 (all absolutely worth a read to get to know who this guy is and what makes him tick):
June 5 (Bloomberg) https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-05/chewy-founder-cashes-out-bets-on-apple-wells-fargo
August 4 (CNBC) https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/04/chewy-co-founder-ryan-cohen-this-is-the-side-hustle-id-start-now.html
August 16 (Forbes) https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2020/08/16/entrepreneur-chewy-founder-ryan-cohen-shares-his-best-advice/?sh=41e1370e5840
October 15 (Business Insider) https://www.businessinsider.com/chewy-ryan-cohen-warren-buffett-lessons-apple-investment-2020-10
And a lot of the speculation I’m wheeling and dealing here was introduced by our man Justin Dopierala at Seeking Alpha way back in a September article not too long after the 13D filings: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4373819-gamestop-chewys-founder-ryan-cohen-finds-whats-next
But for now let’s “put a pin” on Mr. Dopierala, as George Sherman or some other Corporate Robot Dipshit might say, as he will be important to the story here again soon.
The November 16th “F U Old Man” Letter
If you haven’t read this ballsy letter Cohen wrote to the Board last month, you really should. We’ll wait for you. https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/RC_Ventures_Letter_to_GameStop.pdf
OK, ready again?
I don’t want to question Cohen’s possible writing abilities or give away too many tricks of the lawyer trade here (AI should take care of that in about a decade), but that letter was 100% written by Chris Davis. I’d literally bet my entire portfolio on that fact alone. That’s why you hire gunners like him. The letter has that has deliciously direct and aggressive lawyerly tone—the kind you use when you want to send a very clear message to some asshole without spelling it all out. I fucking love this letter. It was one of the main reasons I put the rest of my chips into the GME basket. I doubt I’m alone there.
And what did we learn from this letter? Well: a lot. But I’m going to focus on a few quick things. First, we learned that over the Summer, Cohen had “private conversations” with the Board and Sherman about the need to pivot toward becoming a technology-driven business with a new strategic vision. And he calls out Sherman and the Board directly for lacking this vision, using Mainstreet-Friendly pejoratives like “c-suite” and “boardroom.” He takes a direct shot at Hired Gun Sherman’s Boomer-Ass Business Record (Advanced Auto Parts! Cool!) and his obvious bent towards what he knows: Boring Ass Low Margin B&M Bullshit Companies and straight-up calls him a dumb-ass old man (“twentieth-century focus!”) who Just Doesn’t Fucking Get It. He alleges that he and the Board have presided over “massive value destruction” (almost makes it sound intentional, or at least grossly negligent) and have never taken “full accountability” for all their fuck-ups and intransigence.
Some folks have suggested that, sure, Cohen wants change and yeah he seemed like he had a bit of a bee in his bonnet, but if he doesn’t get some good movement in those areas, he’ll just sell his 6.5M shares to tank the stock and take his ball and go home to play with his dog, who loves him No Matter What. In this interpretation, the letter is just Cohen Asking To Speak To The Manager and then if the response is not to his liking, well then, He Will Just Take His Business Elsewhere, thankyouverymuch.
I do not think that is what is going on here. Not with Ryan Cohen and Chris Davis. This letter is Ryan Cohen Crossing The Fucking Rubicon.
He did the honorable thing and took his vision to the Board and Sherman. How genuine he was in that effort, I have no idea, as my thesis is that he has had a takeover plan in place since he hired Chris Davis. But whatever the initial motivations, it was the honorable thing to do to discuss his vision with Sherman and the Board before he and Chris Davis eventually rip their fucking hearts out (which, spoiler: I believe he is getting ready to do as we speak).
Reasonable minds can disagree here, but I do not think you write a letter like that unless you have a plan to handle all possible responses to it. He just torched his collegial relationship, such as there ever was or could have been, with that CEO and that Board. He flaunts Chewy’s world-class infrastructure and market cap versus their lame ass sub-$1B Dying Mall Store Bullshit. And he makes a very public rejection of a seat on the board (and the reason given: because you fuckheads would just ignore me and drive me nuts while you continue doing Dumb Boomer Shit with my money all goddamn day), which made it 100% clear to me that this is Cohen Serving Goddamn Notice that unless they get serious about the scope of their turnaround and start listening to him and convey this new direction to shareholders asap, that he’s coming for them. He even alludes to his own turnaround plan but then tells them to do their jobs like the Big Capable Adults they are.
And then Cohen attaches this letter to an amended 13D to ensure that all shareholders see it and also see that he still holds all of his shares. Within hours, the WSJ had an article on this: https://www.wsj.com/articles/gamestops-new-billionaire-investor-calls-for-tech-centric-makeover-11605565458?mod=hp_lista_pos5.
And guess what’s neat? If you are an interested shareholder or a habitual reader of the Wall Street Journal (I, sir, am not) and you saw that article, you might have wondered what this Cohen guy is all about? You know, Mortimer, the dog guy—made billions. And thanks to the recent out-of-the-blue marketing campaign that was definitely NOT engineered by Chris Davis as part of a takeover plan, your subsequent Google searches, and the recent articles they produced, likely made you think: this guy is a fucking whiz kid and I like the cut of his jib.
Cohen Quietly Meets With Funds/Investors
In the weeks leading up to earnings, sharp observers also notice something: Ryan Cohen is meeting with various large shareholders for some reason. There were several reports of this on stocktwits (links are lost to eternity in that cluttered hellhole unless some astute commentator can find and link in the comments), so some salt is a necessary accompaniment here (I like to cite my evidence), but we have at least one confirmed meeting with the head of DOMO Capital: Mr. Justin Dopierala. Now, Justin happens to be a pro-GME writer (and a sharp one at that) at Seeking Alpha. You know, that paywall website where people purporting to know what they’re talking about get paid peanuts to write purposefully inane articles for maximum clicks from other idiots? That one. Well Justin is one of the good ones there, and DOMO Capital is also a large shareholder of GME. (Conflict of interest, you say? Shut yo’ mouth!).
On November 30, at 9:19 AM (the payin’ for inanity crew can go see this – the comment is still there), Dopierala made the following comment on another SA article:
***
“I've recently had the pleasure of having a 1 on 1 video meeting with Ryan Cohen that lasted over an hour.
Going forward, I no longer feel comfortable commenting on the topic (of Ryan Cohen), so please understand when I do not respond to any of your questions on this specific topic.
Ryan is a very intelligent man, and I remain as bullish as ever on GameStop's future."
***
So what can we extrapolate from this?
Ryan Cohen likely reached out to DOMO Capital/Dopierala to discuss his strategic vision. I do not know if he announced his plans directly, or what the purpose of the call was (see the very below on how I think this all could relate to a consent solicitation to recall the board) but I’m sure, at the very least, the text, if not the subtext, was heavy as fuck on that Zoom call. And why do I think Cohen contacted him and not the other way around? Because Dopierala, a writer for SA that I’m sure would love to publish even an anodyne Q&A with Ryan Cohen to Get Him All the Clicks, didn’t get an on-the-record interview. Not even some softball about whether his dog prefers his Apple investment decision or his Wells Fargo one. No: he got the concession (assuming he did) to simply acknowledge that a discussion took place (buried in a comment on some other dude’s SA article), but he explicitly says he’s not going to talk about anything related to Cohen going forward. No sir, no how. But if Cohen is just a regular old fellow shareholder (Cue Ryan: “And Justin, please: the pleasure is all mine”), then why the fuck are you making a cagy comment and acting like you Have A Big Fucking Secret and Oh God I Wish I Could Tell You Something But I Just Cant! with that comment, Justin? The Man Doth Protesting and Shit, I say.
Here’s the article link for you Seeking Alpha Super Sleuths: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4380313-gamestop-likely-already-digital-revenue-sharing-sony-up-to-10
And even yesterday, Dopierala can’t help himself. In a discussion about Cohen’s tweet yesterday (you saw the tweet right? What kind of GME-to-da-moon! investor are you anyway? https://twitter.com/ryancohen/status/1336775515101949963), Dopierala gets all Jim Carey As The Riddler on us in a response to “EricinPDX,” (some dude living in the Portland Airport) who writes:
EricInPDX
I take his tweet as a total negative .. the Jim Cramer thing.
I have no position at the moment.
Our man Dopierala then responds “then you are wrong yet right.”
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4393394-gamestop-cohen-right-to-downplay-ps5-xbox-series-mistakes-core-digital-problem
So I think he’s having a little fun talking like a slightly less backwardsy Yoda saying: yeah, that Cohen tweet was obviously negative because he’s highlighting how fucked GME seems after that Q3 call (and also, check out how Chewy’s doin’ in that clip!). But it’s also not negative because it means Cohen is about to rip Sherman’s still-beating heart out and Shock And Awe our asses with a vote. And I, Justin Dopierala, head of DOMO Capital, can be a little wink winky about this because, oh I don’t know, on our hour long call Cohen maybe used puppetry to act out “Bryan Flohen’s” plan to call a vote and supplant the Bad Man “Gerald Shorman” while asking “Would You Theoretically Be With Bryan Flohen?” with a few well-timed arch of the eyebrows. Or he got his explicit consent to his plan (see below re consent solicitations). We just do not know.
In conclusion: We know that Cohen met with shareholders in the period between the day he sent that letter and the date of the Q3 call. We just do not know what was said. But we do know that Dopierella, either out of a sense of journalistic ethics (Stop laughing you guys! Seriously!) or out of concern about possible SEC lookie-loos, decides to be up-front about his inability to even utter the name Ryan Cohen from now on.
General George “Custard” Sherman’s Lame-Ass Empire Striking Back
Let’s recall the letter now. I’m guessing a rich, egotistical pampered-ass hired gun Boomer CEO named George goddamn Sherman didn’t like someone who reminds him of his asshole kids talking to him like that.
We all know what happened next: the Q3 “Say Omnichannel One More Time Motherfucker!” call. As I mentioned in my prior post on this (link above if you care), Sherman pulled the boomer-ist of boomer moves in an act of self-sabotage that is likely to be studied in business courses once this whole story plays out. You see, that letter that Cohen/Davis sent was a trap. And Sherman and the Board and their Big Fucking Corporate Brains clearly lack an inner Admiral Ackbar.
Cohen sent that letter three weeks before the earnings call. And demanded that they conduct *another* strategic review and present a plan to shareholders outlining how they are going to fully pivot into a new technology focused company. Cohen knows they have no intention of doing this. He’s apparently been hectoring them all summer about it. And I’m guessing he talked to Sherman enough to know that the dude is just not on the level (as all of us who listened to that fumbling bland-ass corporate caveat-speak on that call got to experience as well). So he knows, like we all did, that Q3 earnings are likely to be middling at best. But unlike me, who clearly thought that the one way out of this for Sherman and the Board was to give some exciting guidance on Q4, maybe even a share buyback (as they are authorized to do) and some more info on the Microsoft deal, likely revenue, other possible similar deals with Nintendo and Sony. I don’t know, but Something. No, Cohen and Davis are way smarter than me and know Sherman a bit better and probably assumed that Sherman is likely to whiff on a response to his letter. And lo and behold, whiff he does. Nothing. We get no response to the letter and no real plan to transform GME into a tech-driven gaming company (Sherman: “but, but…I said Omnichannel you guys! What do you want from me beyond bland corporate robot speak!?”).
But what else happens? Sherman and the Board inexplicably authorize a shelf registration for up to $100M worth of ATM shares. This from a company that just bought back shares, is authorized to buy back more, paid down debt early—and now is about to be flush with Sweet, Sweet New Console Cash. What in the everlasting fuck?
And in case you were inclined to give Sherman and the Board the benefit of the doubt here, the reason was simple and straightforward and included within the S3 filing itself. And that is: “Hey Cohen: Fuck Off. And if we have to dilute our shareholders to get you to fuck off, by God that’s the kind of shortsighted ME-first move that got George Sherman where he is today! So go find another company to hassle you ungrateful Millennial Start Up Dog Store Bro and let the adults handle this.”
Here is the provision in the S-3 (under the heading: Anti-Takeover Provisions):
Authorized But Unissued Shares
The authorized but unissued shares of common stock and preferred stock are available for future issuance without stockholder approval. These additional shares may be utilized for a variety of corporate purposes, including future public offerings to raise additional capital, corporate acquisitions and employee benefit plans. The existence of authorized but unissued shares of common stock and preferred stock could render more difficult or discourage an attempt to obtain control of us by means of a proxy contest, tender offer, merger or otherwise.
So instead of crushing the call and giving some dope guidance about Q4 and trigger the MOASS so we all revere the name George Sherman for All Eternity, Sherman and the Board make a lame-ass move to try to protect their jobs and--lo and behold!--THIS is the main takeaway of the report and call. And what drives the precipitous dive in SP AH and yesterday. A dive so steep that it removes well over $100M in market cap in value, the kinda-lame amount that you’re trying to stick Cohen with (and dilute all of us) so you can keep your Big Fancy-Man Job and the bonus you’re counting on so you and the misses can jet off to Sandals Jamaica like you always do. George: Whoops? Knew we should have gone with a higher number! A lame ass “poor man’s poison pill” as u/snowk88 on stocktwits put it (shout out because he also helped me flush out this thesis a bit and clued me in on Chris Davis’s work for MC).
So back to how I started this missive, back when we were all younger and maybe a bit more naïve, right? Anyway. Yesterday Ryan Cohen lost over $20M on paper because George Sherman thought the best way to handle that Punk-Ass Millennial was to use shareholders as a hostage in any possible fight over control of this company he’s been building his entire—oh, eh, the last 18 months because he’s just a hired gun that goes where the money is and waits for his ka-ching moment before splitting because who gives a fuck he’s George Sherman and You’re Not. But guess what happens when you do that? (Hand down, George: you’ve had your turn). You ENRAGE the shareholders who you want to have your back and vote for you in any possible proxy fight or takeover offer! What strategery! You must have been involved in planning the Iraq war, George.
But guess who was likely laughing their ass off yesterday at their colossal good fortune at this misstep? Ryan Cohen and Chris Davis. Because now Sherman has opened the door even wider than it was before and made it that much easier for Cohen to get the votes and kick down his fucking door.
And yesterday, to no one’s surprise, the SP falls almost 20% and even Jim Fucking Cramer piles on and tells all his braindead Boomer TV watchers that this is The Next Blockbuster like all the other Super Sophisticated Analysts out there.
And now we see the #WeWantCohen and #InstallCohen hashtags (which you all should consider using frequently if you dig all this and think Sherman needs to go).
What are you thinking if you’re Ryan Cohen? Take your ball and go home time? Or: maybe that it’s time to Show George Sherman that You Do Not Fuck With a Super Nice Guy With Really Good Ideas That Are Usually Respectfully Presented (Unless You Piss Me Off) Like Ryan Goddamn Cohen?
I’m thinking it’s the latter. Taking all of this, I think Cohen and Chris Davis have been planning some kind of takeover, possibly even via consent solicitation like Davis did in his MC matter, since the summer and that George Sherman’s ironic attempt to save his own skin is about to backfire stupendously to help Cohen lock in the votes he needs. And it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy—excuse me—I mean: Smug Asshole.
Epilogue: The Consent Solicitation
Ed: the consent solicitation is not likely in play here. But Cohen is definitely still coming for Sherman and Co - we just don't know exactly how yet.
Now, just what in the hell is a consent solicitation and why does it matter? I confess that I didn’t know shit about this until I started READING ALL THE WORDS, but our friends at theactivistinvestor.com have some useful information to help those of us with tiny little baby brains understand what it is and why it may be relevant here (relevant excerpts below, but it you really want to geek out on this shit, I would recommend clicking the link, reading the words and THINKING BIG THOUGHTS). And also, hoping that some folks can respond in comments to help flush this out further because it’s late and I’ve already written too many words.
But, before I drop some k-n-o knowledge from our friends at theactivistinvestor.com, just to remind you: GameStop is a Delaware Corporation.
Now imagine being magically whisked away to…Delaware! (Hi. I’m in Delaware).
*******
From: http://www.theactivistinvestor.com/The_Activist_InvestoConsent_Solicitations.html
[Ed: removed quoted text] *****
CPT Hubbard here again. I’ll release you momentarily. But study those steps a bit and ponder where Cohen might be in that process. And also recall that we know that Cohen had an “off the record” meeting with our man Dopierala from DOMO Capital and we have no idea what they talked about. Could Cohen have been getting shareholders consent? No idea. But it certainly seems possible. If that is the case, the 60 day clock is ticking. Which means that, assuming Dopierala was stop #1 (probably doubtful, but it’s the one data point we have), we should know something by at least late January if Cohen is actually initiating a consent solicitation on this incompetent Board and probably a lot closer to mid-January (Sorry Jan call holders) since I assume Cohen started reaching out around the time he sent that letter on Nov 16th.
To which I say to Cohen: Little old me and my 20,000 shares consent! We consent most emphatically, sir. And no one will ever accuse you, Mr. Cohen, of not seeking consent. You may retain this for your records.
To conclude, Cohen is Young, Scrappy and Hungry and He’s Not Throwing Away His Shot. And Fuck George Sherman.
“I’M FINISHED”
**To be clear: this missive is for information purposes only and I would advise against following my example in any way, shape or form, as this pandemic has quite plainly knocked a screw loose if I'm here writing novelas to a bunch of Paste-Eating Rocket Kids.

[900 Subscriber Special] (may) (allegedly) caused a system outage

In the Scam Home Warranty business, the people are represented by two separate but equally lazy groups: The Authorization agents, who deny claims and smoke like chimneys, and the technicians who lie through their teeth to snag a few extra bucks. These are their stories CLICK CLICK
(background) If you've worked in a call center, a tech company or do HVAC you probably know what a server room looks and feels like. For everyone else, do you own a gaming laptop, PC or console? You can usually hear the fan going. One of the most important issues in modern technology is heat, you can literally melt your electronics if they're not well ventilated. The fastest super computers on earth run with liquid nitrogen cooling, google server farms are hosted underwater in some places, corporate bitcoin miners have the finest HVAC money can buy, your XBox sounds like it's trying to take off from Cape Canaveral - I could go on.
(background cont) I don't know what's inside a server itself but I can tell you when I installed ductless AC units in a server room, we put far more than you would think were needed in a space about the size of a bathroom. I once did a repair on a server for a pharmaceutical company as they lost power when a pipe burst and it had priority over the freaking freezer where they stored samples, perhaps it was because their corporate HQ was in France or maybe because those pills were insured while the servers were not, I have no idea. Because we had millions of customers, our server room at SHW was the size of a kitchen and colder than the bottom level of hell in Dante's Inferno. That all changed when the fire auth guy attacked /s.
(background cont) At UPS the servers hosted data from across the world and we would be purged from time to time. You'd be sitting at your desk doing whatever and you'd be logged out against your will and there was no way to stop it from happening because installing anything on your stock workstation could get you fired on the spot due to corporate espionage fears. SHW wasn't as sophisticated and usually purged on the weekends, as they couldn't really do it at night as our over-night answering service was located in [South American Country] and needed to use the system at all hours.
(background cont) I have a bit of a quirk that you might not know about, I prefer Firefox to Chrome. The reason is I don't trust Chrome's "restore previous session" button due to too many times losing a bunch of homework in my teens when it first came out. I understand it's been improved over the years but that feeling of fear never left me.
(background cont) Consequently, the first thing I do at any new job is install Firefox and switch the defaults and import any needed bookmarks from my predecessor's Chrome over to save time. Firefox's "restore previous session" is a life saver and even if it crashes or the computer loses power or the internet goes out suddenly, it will prompt on restart "something went wrong, recover previous session" which I trust as it has saved me so much time and hassle in the past. If you want I can share a screenshot showing that on my laptop, my current session of Firefox has over 5,000 tabs open, by no exaggeration it takes 2 or so minutes to load because of this.
(End background)
There is a smell of ozone and burnt plastic in the air one morning, our server room door is wide open and our head of IT is sitting in there with a face redder than the cup of coffee from WAWA in his hand. I know what this is about and I run to my desk where a note is already pinned to my monitor....
[flashback 2 months earlier]
I've been told I am no longer new guy in auth by my boss who gave me a permanent seat in the shittiest part of the office right next to him around when I finally got my auth button. Not having to hot-desk was a lifesaver as it meant my snack drawer was 29% safer from random raids.
The first thing I did on my new workstation was install Firefox, explained above.
[fast-forward 1 month later]
We are having server issues, there's a lot of commotion with auth sups fighting with IT and CS over where the real issue lay.
Eventually, a compromise was reached: non-active off-line workers (supervisors, guys on break, very new people and so forth) would be kicked from the system after "x" minutes of inactivity.
This really didn't impact me as I usually worked lunch and split my breaks for smoking and restroom accordingly - this was before they changed the rules on that.
Then they started purging once a day, right after we "closed" and traffic was lightest. Then they started purging twice a day, the first purge right before the lines went live. For people like me who came in so early anyway, that was horsesh*t but what could I do about it but watch the clock and make sure I wasn't in the middle of something when it happened.
[fast-forward to the morning of the server room debacle]
Like a man reading his own warrant I plucked the sticky note.
"We reset your account, new login is #, password is your last name and the current year [how secure]. Log in using (guest username and password) until I get in the office, we need to talk." - boss
You could dissolve Captain America's shield in my stomach at that moment, I knew what was about to happen.
The iced caramel latte sitting on his desk with three napkins under it didn't earn even the barest of grins from my boss when he arrived exactly at 9:00 AM.
Off we went to the VP's office who was in painfully early and wearing a stone face.
VP: "We figured out the source of the server issues. IT says it was you."
Me: (silence)
Boss: "Are you f*cking kidding me bro? You knew this was going on. You could have said something back when it started."
Me: "It can't be just me."
VP: "IT said you had 500 instances running on the network at any given hour. On Firefox, company policy is Chrome and you learned that in training."
Me: "It was only a single window at any time, those were just tabs."
Boss: "So now you got a degree in IT too? Should I bring him in and you can explain how you singlehandedly running more instances of our dashboard than ANY OTHER DEPARTMENT wasn't straining the system?"
Me: "No."
VP: "I want to know why."
Me: "I trust Firefox more than Chrome."
VP: "No, why 500 tabs what the hell could you possibly be doing? We know everything already, and I am this close to walking you out the door."
Me: "Open claims with my name as the last update, VCBs where I might catch an auth on the way back, new dispatches in cities where I know the tech's pretty well or at least their guide prices, claims where a customer or tech swore they'd submit a complaint, claims where my tasks to CS or VR are unclosed, claims with 100+ notes that I want to read out of curiosity, claims for techs I suspect are dirty but can't prove yet, claims from very very early on in our company's history when (boss) was just an auth guy still, claims that resulted in AG complaints, cl-"
Boss: "Shut up right now."
Me: (silence)
VP: (running his hands through his increasingly thin hair and looking wearier than I've ever seen him) "They said the same thing. Boss said the same thing. I just had to hear it from you. Just....get out there and answer some calls. You install one more program without asking you're gone. You have more than 10 tabs open you're gone. We're installing a second monitor and tower to help."
Me: "Ok."
Boss: "NOW!"
In the time it took me to run out the office my phone rang and the eye of every single guy in the department and a few in VR was upon me as I picked it up instead of cleaning out my desk.
Very few auth guys walk into a meeting like that and walk out still employed.
Epilogue:
Maybe someone in IT themselves can shed some light on this whole thing, I might have been lied to on it. My role in the network outage might have been exaggerated or a scapegoat or something. If there's a relevant sub to ask, let me know I'm curious.

Stadia Controller packet-loss, command-drops, and/or Input soft-disconnects

SOLVED 02/03/2021

UPDATE: I may have fixed my issue by adding a secondary WiFi router (Apple AirPort Extreme) for the controller. Issue is no longer present and I'm positive this has to do with Google Fiber's Network Box WiFi radio interfering with something. This is unproven to help others yet but for fuck's sake I can game with the Stadia in my apartment finally!!! :')

Hardware:

Google Stadia Founders' Edition x2
1000mbps via Google Fiber Internet (Proprietary Network Box)
ChromeCast Ultra x2

Apologies for the word-salad below.. this issue has proven to be quite difficult to pin-point and solve. I'm hoping SOMEBODY out there will read this and post a fix, as Google Stadia and Google Fiber's customer support teams haven't been able to correct the issue and it's been multiple weeks of triaging.

The Issue:
Long-press commands like walking forward using the left stick, or holding down the boost button (A), will just stop sending after 5-15 seconds. The controller doesn't visibly disconnect and there are 0 error messages, and the game doesn't even freeze as I'm able to press other buttons. It just stops sending the walk-forward command (or any long-press command) which forces me to let go of the stick and press it back forward to get my character to start walking again.
What I've done to troubleshoot:

Thinking the issue was with the controller, I called Stadia support and went through EVERY troubleshooting step they advised. Hit a roadblock where the controller was still soft-disconnecting even when hardwired (looking back I think it was poor instructions from the agent as we never fully reset the controller after connecting to WIFI.)
1. Was advised to replace or purchase another controller to confirm, got another controller and issue was still present.
I've confirmed that this issue only happens at my apartment. I purchased Stadia for entertainment while looking after my elderly dad in Louisiana for a few weeks. After hitting issues in Texas I decided to take both controllers with me just in case.
1. Using his Cox Internet 150mbps, the issue was no longer present on either controller! It played like an absolute dream. No soft disconnects, no long-press drops. Streaming quality was as good as it was back home on my 1gbps.
After returning to Texas after two weeks of smooth sailing, was quickly reminded that the disconnect issue still persists. I guess taking it on a road trip DIDN'T fix it after all 📷I THEN DECIDED IT'S TIME TO SWAP OUT MY INTERNET BOX, mostly due to spending an hour on the phone with a google fiber tech explaining my conundrum, and doing even more troubleshooting steps until failure. He didn't see ANYTHING obvious nor telling on his end, and kept telling me that this situation of mine was quite unique for him. I reassured him that it was unique for the multiple people whom have tried to help me now, and to remember that I'm the customer suffering here lol.They couldn't mail me a replacement box or send a tech out, this issue doesn't fit their requirements. (Google Stadia is still a 3rd-party device and isn't in Google's umbrella apparently.) I'd have to drive downtown to their singular Google Space store and swap it out. I begrudgingly said, "screw it man I'll just don my PPE and face COVID head on."I trekked downtown, could not find anywhere to park, called their number on Google Maps to ask for parking instructions, was informed they aren't in Austin so can't help me and that they apologize... (the number on the Google Maps entry for Google Space is their Google Support number...) SO MOVING ON I ended up paying $20 for parking, took 10 minutes to swap my network box out, bought new cables on way home, got home and installed everything, fixed me a cocktail, confirmed internet was all good to go, fired up my stadia controllers and.............swapping network box did not fix the issue, though I did get a nice buzz from that cocktail.
I have replaced the ethernet cable from FiberJack to Network Box with new cables, replaced those cables with even newer cables. Replaced ethernet running from Network Box to my desktop. I turned off the TV, unplugged the coaxial cable, swapped out power supply for Network Box, swapped my underwear... Nothing seems to make a difference.
I have tried Port-Forwarding, I have tried switching between dual-band WIFI and single. I have turned off the TV Box's internet radio. I have factory reset my Stadia controllers multiple times, I have reset my phone and iPad (devices I used to set up the controller) multiple times. I even reset my TV a few times.. (yes resetting the TV unnecessary.. but I was resetting everything in my apartment and my microwave didn't have a button..)Perhaps this is just a wiring issue with Fiber underground?Perhaps this is some electrical interference only affecting a small area of Texas..Such a small area of Texas that the amount of Stadia users in that area are so small that... nobody else has ever complained about this to Stadia/Google before. IT'S BIZZARE THIS IS ONLY HAPPENING TO ME IN MY SMALL SLICE OF THE WORLD 📷:'(

As an added afterthought since I forgot to mention this clearly: **Stadia streams phenomenally on my all of my devices in my apartment.**This truly is a\*mazing technology! Having the controller + CCU work in Louisiana was fantastic!*
The workaround I currently use is an XBOX One controller + USB dongle.The input lag isn't bad at all and overall plays quite well..For example, I logged 15+ hours of cyberpunk2077, in 4k and on high frames mode, with that xbox controller without even batting an eye or noticing any issues.I only purchased the $100+ controller+CCU combo to add to my Stadia experience, instead it seems to have only taken away from it.

Sim racing in Linux 2020 an update

Welcome and hello from the Land of opensource goodness

First off it's been over a year since u/leillo1975 posted the first of these posts, and it's been a resource for several people myself included. His post can be found here for a comparison of the differences as time has gone on.
Also, First off before we even go down this road, sim racing itself is a niche within a niche. Linux's users according to steams hardware survey spend above and beyond on their rigs on average as it is. Some simple math on the numbers. Steam has 24 million active users in a day peak time not a total that's probably 100's on throughout a 24-hour period, but with just the 24 million number we can use the steam hardware survey to find out an estimation of how many are here on Linux with myself. .78% last month were on Linux according to the steam survey, so .8% of 24 million gamers is 192,000. around 200k of us. I believe a lot of people seem to forget because of the massive numbers but that's a dam city full of people, who spend a lot on their hardware on average.
So the market is there and works been done, sim racing and driving on Linux has been a great place to be over the last 2 years.

Opensource

Vdrift, The only game I will put here is VDrift as it is still actively developed you can find the GitHub here https://github.com/VDrift/vdrift still a fantastic thing to toy around with works on all platforms. Torcs and speed dreams are the other two, they are still great physic games, but mostly they are just used for research now from my understanding, and with a quick google I could not find any current updates. Some updates to this, Vdrift has only had minor tweaks to the code as has been mentioned below. Not currently developed
Speed Dreams is much more active and development has never stopped.... and not, this game is not for investigation, is a real simulator, and you can play and enjoy it as you can see on this videos.

Native Games

American and Europe Truck Simulator, Everything here is fine, Steam mods working great, many a hour spent just chilling to music and relaxing, FFB is working.
Dirt Rally, Everything works great, slam it to ultra, set your FFB, plug that USB handbrake in and gear box and let her rip.
Dirt 4, Same as Dirt Rally really but more arcade, works great
Drag, is an up and coming racing game, with some serious work on independent suspension physics they just implemented. Still in Early Access but from the demo I tried all works fine.
Gravel, now this game is arcade all the way really, and only the core game is on Linux native not the DLCS.
Grid Autosport, A very varied game with 5 different disciplines to choose from, such as Tourisms, Endurance, Single-Seaters, Tuning and Urban.
F1 2017: the last F1 game to get ported to Linux, all works well F1 2015 is also native

The power of Valve and Linux community Proton

Proton is the tool that in steam lets us Linux players just click install on Windows game and go to town. A pretty decent percentage of the time not only does the game work, but since Linux is a better performing OS anyways combined with Vulkan Graphics API, the right combination means we see better performance in Windows games that on windows example of this with Red Dead Redemption 2 https://www.pcgamer.com/red-dead-redemption-2-shown-running-faster-on-linux-than-windows-10/
Proton.db is a massive list of community reports on what games are working or what tweaks to get them to work
Project Cars 2 and Project Cars 1 (also 3 if you want to call it a sim), work 100% with proton, FFB, Graphics and performance are great. Proton.db Platinum rating
Rfactor 2, when I tested is working great, smooth performance and I had FFB. Proton.db Rating Gold
Assetto Corsa, Works great, no issues with the standard game, Mods are working I do not play this very often so unsure of the process for that, but can be installed via Lutris or Proton to get the mods working. Proton.db rating GOLD
Assetto Corsa Competizione, Same as the above working great, I play this more often as I love Gt Cars. Proton.db rating GOLD
AutoMobilista 1 and 2, Working great, I do not play 1, but on 2 I am same as PC2 getting amazing graphics and game play, all controls work fine Proton.db rating for AM2 is Platinum
NASCAR Heat 4, probably 5 as well, work great though more focused to the controller side, you will learn the art of drafting here much cheaper than Iracing. Proton.db rating Platinum
WRC 7, Working great really, no complaints I need to go back through and spend some more time in it, Dirt rally is just so good. Proton.db rating Silver Multiplayer might be borked I need to reinstall to test it
F1 2018-2020, Working great really not noticing any issues. Proton.db rating Platinum F12020
Dakar 18, working great really epic settings no issue here Proton.db rating GOLD
Dirt Rally 2.0, Just tested working great! Proton.db rating Platnium

WINE games

Below are games not installed through steam
Live for Speed: Another veteran, but still active and with a small but loyal group of followers. Works perfect in Linux, and much of the blame are their developers, who have made things much easier for the game to work properly with Wine. Live for Speed can also be easily installed on Linux thanks to a Snap package. I was just playing this with my DIY handbrake still working great , big thanks to the maintainer for keeping this awesome!!

Simracers or Racing Games not working or Unknown

Now in fairness here is some that are either borked, or unknown
Iracing, This one is kinda a hand toss, it did have a Linux client tell it went 64bit only, it can probably work again with some easy work between the communities as there are several full time employees at Valve and community working to get more games with anti cheat working, I do not have a subscription to this service so no way to test. If you do, and love to tinker, can you please install some Linux and give it a test? Proton.db Rating is Bronze and no updates in 2 years. the main problem is the Anticheat, that block the game when you try to ride a multiplayer race ( https://youtu.be/IENl71UhoFI ) .
RaceRoom, Its just plain borked I tested this before posting this as when I was on windows I spent some money here, still not working asking of Internet exploder then crashes. Proton.db rating BORKED
Grid 2019, some time ago, Codemasters delete the DirectX11 executable, and now only works with DX12. In the last versions of proton has problems, but some months ago, It worked well thanks to the inclusion of VKD3D on Proton.. Proton.db rating Bronze
WRC 8, I did purchase this myself to test then refunded it, it is borked and didn't feel like tinkering with it. Proton.db rating BORKED
Tony Stewarts racing games, Both sprint Car and All-American Racing need testing, so no idea
Sebastioen Loeb Rally EVO, This game is reported to work but it doesn't have enough reports really Proton.db rating GOLD
If you own some of these games and like to tinker please feel free to play with them on Linux and submit a report.

Utilities,

PyLinuxWheel: Currently it supports a lot of Logitech Steering Wheels (from very old Steering Wheels like WingMan Formula to newer like G29 and G920) , it has more functionalities like set Force Feedback, combine pedals, export and import profiles, test pedals, set range, etc. Also, it is very easy to install as it has Appimage and deb packages. Thanks to u/odinTdh for the update in the comments!
PyLinuxWheel is compatible with the kernel driver and new-lg4ff, but if you want to configure the extra functionality that new-lg4ff gives, is best to use OverSteer as is an awesome program created by the same person that developed new-lg4ff.
Oversteer: This utility is more advanced than the previous one and also allows you to change the range of the steering wheel, combine pedals, create profiles for games, test axis and buttons, and automatically modify the rule permissions to easily use wheel. In 2020 we now have the logitech driver in the kernel thus making most of the features on the logitech wheels work plug and play
Telemetry: It's possible to activate and consult telemetry in F1 2017 thanks to this software designed to be used with Java
Fanatec Wheels, Probably the biggest update in 2020 we had, there is now a community driver on Github https://github.com/gotzl/hid-fanatecff That has the elite and sport working. I do not have a fantec wheel to test this. I will be purchasing a few in the coming months to test this out though, so I look forward to trying something besides the logitechs

Hardware

So this is what I have tested as working and reported to be working
I tested in all these games and confirmed working that I own

Steam Controller
Xbox 360 Controller
Logitech Driving Force Pro
Logitech G29
Logitech G920
Multiple DIY sifters and handbrakes using Arduino and other boards

Not tested by me but reported to be working

Fanatec CSL elite
Fanatec Club Sport

I forgot Thrust master wheels first time there are two projects to get FFB working on them as u/berarma has stated below I don't own thrust master so I cant test these myself at the moment.

Some Direct drive wheel companies have reported to look into Linux Simcube being one and I have heard that the AccuForce Pro V2 works without the software and drivers, I do not know, I might pick the latter up after I toy with the Fanetec stuff. IF sim Cube sees this somehow, there is demand. We the community have been hard at work bringing more games and hardware on board.

VR

So on this question this is what I can answer for certain, Gabe at valve is more committed to Linux as a main gaming OS than windows and as such has a team working on VR on Linux combined with so many talented opensoruce developers. If the game is native to Linux with VR its going to work, if its not like PC2 for instance it still works but you might need to fiddle. I do not know the details as I have no interest in VR, I already dislike wearing the headset for mics.

If you have any info or something I missed on here let me know, specially if I can give credit to the maintainers reddit accounts for some of these utilities

Please keep the comments civil and know we are all a niche community no matter on windows or Linux and are all here to race and have fun.

[Video Games] A Too Human Story: How Nordic cybergods brought Ragnarok to the people that made them

I don't think anyone doubts that making games is hard work, even for those that have been in the industry for years, and following their stories can sometimes be more interesting than the games they made...or haven't made. Gaming history is littered with titles that briefly appeared on everyone's radar and then faded away without so much as a discount sale, leaving behind lessons that some studios take to heart as warnings from the past or inspiration to try and raise the bar higher for themselves. Then there are extinction events like the one that brought down Silicon Knights.
This is from years ago having taken place part way through the latter half of the 00s during another round of "console wars" pitting Microsoft's Xbox 360 against Sony's PlayStation 3. Microsoft's spunky new console, despite the Red Ring of Death silently killing some of them, was at the top of its game (except in Japan) inaugurating memorable titles like the Gears of War and the Mass Effect series.
Silicon Knights had a reputation shaped by its collaboration with Nintendo for the sanity crushing adventure of Eternal Darkness on the chibi-like Gamecube, a great Lovecraftian story that's one of my favorites on the system. This followed their anti-hero vampire, Kain, in Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain on the PlayStation years earlier which also became something of a classic (and one that I did not get to play yet...sadface). And now with the Xbox 360, they set their sights even higher with their biggest project yet.
Too Human would bring to life a distant future inspired by Nordic mythology wedded to a "Shakespearian approach" to storytelling. It boasted that it could take "fifty to eighty hours" to get to level 50 with tons of loot, combos, everything that an action RPG could be and more.
Delivering a Diablo-like experience to consoles was something of a big thing back in those days and bringing that to a cutting edge console leaping off the starting blocks of a new generation cycle was a major play for any studio worth its salt like Silicon Knights. They had the experience and the ideas to do it from anyone's perspective at the time and the window for opportunity was wide open.
Could Too Human's "innovative" controls make its mark on consoles before Blizzard stepped in with Diablo III? Would it be the thinking man's action RPG? Could this be...The One? For many players like me that were thirsty for a new Diablo-like on consoles, we hoped that it could be.

Baldur's Journey

A bit of backstory.
As mentioned before, Silicon Knights earned cred with games such as Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain on the Playstation in the 90s though they had already cut their teeth in the industry with titles on PCs such as Cyber Empires in 1992 for Commodore's powerful Amiga PC series. The director for Blood Omen was one Denis Dyack.
During Too Human's journey, Denis Dyack spoke about the experiences that took him into game design, mentioning that he has three degrees, one of which was for Physical Education. He was a wrestler during his university years with some of his friends going on to the Olympics or the UFC revealing someone laser focused on being both competitive with himself and whatever he put his mind to, an attitude that he brought to his work at Silicon Knights from the beginning. He, like a number of other designers then and today, didn't only see the games he made as "games" -- he saw each one as an ambitious opportunity to bring real change to the medium, to tell stories in ways that others couldn't. He'll be a major figure as this saga unfolds.
Too Human was something of a passion project for Silicon Knights stretching back to the OG Playstation back in 1999 where it was teased at E3. It was one of the two projects from Silicon Knights that another studio, Crystal Dynamics, looked at before ultimately deciding to work with them on Blood Omen.
After Blood Omen was finished, murmurs about Too Human began drumming up interest again with hints that it would be a multi-disc game taking place in the far future with a sci-fi cyber human take on Norse mythology. In 2000, however, Silicon Knights inked a development deal with Nintendo for their Gamecube refocusing their efforts on making two important games for it -- Eternal Darkness and a collaborative remake of Metal Gear Solid that would be known as Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes.
Following Nintendo, Silicon Knights moseyed over to the Microsoft camp in 2005 (the year the Xbox 360 would land on retail shelves) and real development finally resumed on Too Human with an eye for release Holiday 2006. A demo had even shown up at E3 that year in May as a preview for press meetings. Despite grabbing attention from outlets such as Electronic Gaming Monthly which featured Too Human as its exclusive cover story in the same month, the overall sentiment for Silicon Knights' biggest project based on what was shown...wasn't great.
Writing in an IGN blog entry in 2007 a few months later, Dyack admitted that a week before the event they already knew the demo wasn't "what it should be" going into the show. Fast forward a few more months and Dyack would also question the "relative value of previewing a game" noting that the press they received at E3 didn't justify the months spent in making the demo that would have otherwise been used to actually work on issues facing the project, a sentiment that more than a few developers even today still deal with. The shadow this cast over Too Human in 2006 would haunt it well up to its release as Silicon Knights went relatively quiet to focus, skipping E3 2007 though keeping interest alive with the occasional interview with Dyack as its staunch advocate.
Throughout Too Human's journey on the Xbox 360, Denis Dyack was front and center in interviews and video pieces talking up the game and Silicon Knights' storied approach to the medium, though some of the loftier claims could certainly be a bit...lofty. In one instance, he opined that the technology of the day paved the way to "create production values where people can look at Lord of the Rings or Too Human and say "I'd rather have the experience of playing Too Human.". If you were thinking that was a bit much, you weren't the only one. That led to more than a little pushback from skeptics and players, especially if you were already worn out by others like Peter Molyneux who was marching his own hype parade through the internet thanks to a little something he was working on called Fable II.

Denis Dyack Wrestles the Internet

Before "influencers" on Youtube and Twitch had become a thing and even before Twitch evolved into Twitch, gamecentric forums from Kotaku to GameFAQs to others were where a lot of internet-savvy gamers found their news and rumors. As forums and the growing power of other social channels continued to break down more barriers, NeoGAF, with its reputation for strong moderation creating something of an internet water cooler around which developers from the industry would occasionally participate in discussions there, was one of the most influential back in the day depending on who you talked to.
Dyack's outspoken personality reared itself on NeoGAF's forums in late June, 2008, weeks before a demo for Too Human would land on the Xbox 360 in July with the full game raiding retail shelves in late August. Up to that point on the heels of the hype train following the Xbox exclusive, skeptics booked travel plans on their own train led by articles such as posts by Jim Sterling on Destructoid questioning Dyack's increasingly purple claims.
Apparently having enough of some of the pointed negativity churning its way through the forum and elsewhere on the internet regarding Too Human, Dyack lobbed a challenge to "Stand and be counted" either "For" or "Against" the game, boldly proclaiming that Too Human was fast approaching and that "there is going to be a lot of trolls crying here". If the game failed, he was willing for his account to be tagged with "Owned by GAF". But if it succeeded, he wanted to see those who voted "Against" tagged with "Owned by Too Human". It was a gauntlet not so much thrown as dropped through top of a chain-link cage like Mankind was by the Undertaker. Or punching a hornet's nest while naked.
Some said "For". Some were "Against". Others just sat back aghast at what appeared to be a childish publicity stunt from a developer who should know better, others ascribed Dyack to having balls of "titanium". Arguments were made on what Metacritic score and sales numbers would be enough to make people shut up. Others made it seem like Dyack was playing 4D chess. I ate popcorn. After devolving into debates between posters, the thread was eventually locked leaving everyone to wonder what would happen next.
A bit afterwards, Too Human's demo dropped during the midst of E3 2008 on July 15th eventually reaching nearly a million downloads in short order. Dyack continued painting Too Human in glowing terms as well as mentioning an automatic camera/control system so innovative that it took eight years to develop and that he would be "shocked if there is any game in this genre that comes close to Too Human in the next couple of years." In another interview that later asked about reactions to the demo, Dyack had been quoted as saying "...what we're also seeing is for the people who didn't like it, generally just don't get it" to which Jim Sterling responded "That HAS to be the reason, Denis. We are just too stupid to comprehend the greatness that is Too Human...".
Reception to the demo, which featured an entire level, was somewhat mixed. Some lauded the game for its setting while worried over its repetition. Still others were satisfied enough to keep their pre-orders.
The NeoGAF thread calling for those who were "For" or "Against" had already been locked earlier but Dyack hadn't forgotten the forum.
In an interview in August with VG247, Dyack explained that he chose NeoGAF to make a point about the "effects of negative forums", deciding on the site because he "considered it the worst". That quickly led to his ban and an angry response from one of the site's moderators who didn't take kindly to calls for the forum to be shut down or used as a "social experiment". Even though Dyack was pretty outspoken, a developer of his caliber being banned on a forum as popular as NeoGAF back in those days was something of a seismic event picked up across the internet.
A few weeks later, Too Human arrived.

Bored by Death

Aside from the poor combat controls, dodgy camera system, and clunky user interface with menus that felt as if they were transitioning through tar, the salt in the wound for a number of reviewers (and more than a few players) was the valkyrie death scene. Dying in Too Human can happen often due to a combination of factors, not the least of which were the janky mechanics, and that always triggered a nearly half-a-minute long cinematic of a valkyrie coming down from the heavens to escort your soul. I should mention that it's also unskippable.
Concerns over the infamous "valkyrie death cinematic" had even been brought up earlier with the demo. When asked about this days before Too Human's full release, Dyack responded "The bottom line is ... If it's a sign that people love the game so much that they just want to get in and play, could we make it skippable? Sure, it's an easy change." That change that never happened and for some that played the game, it was emblematic of the arrogance that had fueled the hype behind it. Predictably, Destructoid's Jim Sterling did not like the game very much with his review though he did praise the world and the concept -- just not so much the execution. And he wasn't alone.
Ultimately, Silicon Knights' magnum opus was met with middling reviews although some players did enjoy the game despite its faults. In 2011, in an interview with Joystiq in which he pushed back against criticisms leveled at the game (including those made against the infamous valkyrie death animation), he noted that the game had sold 700k copies since 2008 and that the trilogy would continue. However, this wasn't even the worst of it.

Silicon Knights Fight an Epic Battle

While Dyack wrestled opinions in defense of Too Human, Fenrir was lurking in the background.
Before Epic became a Fortnite juggernaut, they were busy building and maintaining a little something called the Unreal Engine. Created in the 90s by Tim Sweeney but arguably overshadowed by id's own engine tech at the time, it eventually came into its own during the heady days of the 00s and the 360/PS3 generation with some very big titles. Much like how Quake III had reinforced id's savvy know-how to the masses (and other developers), Unreal Engine 3 (UE3) powered games such as the uber popular Gears franchise for Microsoft (which Epic was also developing) and Mass Effect from BioWare, doing the same thing for Epic which would pay off in the years ahead.
So remember when Too Human was supposed to come out in 2006? At the time, Silicon Knights had blamed missing the launch on "trouble" with UE3 that Dyack later brushed off by saying things were actually working out fine. Events suddenly took a bizarre turn a year later.
In 2007, Silicon Knights sued Epic Games claiming they "misrepresented the abilities of their Unreal Engine 3", essentially saying that they weren't happy with UE3, had to build their own engine from scratch to do what they wanted, and were also seeking damages. They had also alleged that Epic had saved the most functional versions of the engine for themselves and their work on Gears, "sabotaging" their development. Uh oh.
A few observers might note other developers at the time using UE3 from Mistwalker (Lost Odyssey) to EA (Medal of Honor: Airborne) to BioWare (Mass Effect) apparently didn't have the same issues, or if they did, managed their way around them instead of suing Epic. Epic seemed to have felt the same way.
Shortly after taking Silicon Knights' thrown legal punch, Epic countersued stating that they were clear on what was being promised, that any updates made to the engine during their work on Gears would be shared, and were now suing Silicon Knights for what Epic believed was an effort "to take Epic's Licensed Technology, pay nothing for it, and use it any way it pleases".
The court case would drag on for several years, well past Too Human's debut and even after Silicon Knights' X-Men: Destiny later hit shelves in 2011. In 2012 Epic proved its case in May with a jury finding Silicon Knights guilty and awarding $4.5 million in damages. Then in November, it was reported that it was doubled to a whopping $9 million, adding attorney's fees, interest, and other costs to the tab. The courts found that Silicon Knights did copy code from UE3 including "non-functional, internal comments Epic Games’ programmers had left for themselves." leaving even the mispellings they had made in those comments intact.
But that's not all. In addition to the fine, Silicon Knights was also ordered to destroy all unsold copies of the games made with the technology such as X-Men: Destiny and Too Human at its own expense.
Silicon Knights would attempt to appeal the ruling which failed in early 2014. Before that happened, however, there was one more match that Dyack and company would fight.

A Kickstarter Enters the Ring

In 2011, Silicon Knights laid off most of its employees by October weeks after the release of X-Men: Destiny (which was critically panned), a title shadowed with allegations ranging from heavy mismanagement to leaving the names of people that left the company but worked on the title out of its credits. A short time later, Dyack quietly left Silicon Knights and, with a few others from the company, formed another company called Precursor Games in 2012.
In early May of 2013, Precursor launched a Kickstarter to fund development for Shadow of the Eternals, a spiritual successor to Silicon Knights' Eternal Darkness (Nintendo owns Eternal Darkness' rights). At the time, it seemed like a slam dunk, surfing the golden tide carried by crowdfunding wunderkind such as Tim Schaefer's Broken Age, Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity, and the Ouya console that promised a living room revolution (cough cough).
Precursor's first attempt set the bar at $1.3 million in funding and it wasn't doing particularly well compared to peers that had shattered records in hours. Just a few days after kicking off its Kickstarter campaign, Dyack would find himself having to respond to those publicized allegations from earlier about X-Men: Destiny, particularly the part talking how resources meant for making the game were diverted to work on a demo for a new Eternal Darkness title at the time to shop around to interested publishers instead.
Dyack, who was Precursor's chief creative, explained that Silicon Knights actually put more of their own money into the project, a collaboration between themselves and Activision and Marvel, and had even apologized not only for the poor state of the game itself but for things said in public about that and "other projects". The reason he had ignored the article for so long was so as not to substantiate what he felt were groundless claims until he felt it was necessary to chase away doubts that might haunt Shadow of the Eternals.
The Kickstarter was eventually canceled to reboot it again in July with a more modest funding goal at $750k and a change in scope (episodic installments instead of one big game). Ultimately, that barely achieved half of what it set out to do probably due to a number of factors ranging from Dyack's reputation over what happened with Epic and Too Human, the Kotaku article, to one of the former developers at Silicon Knights and a founder for Precursor Games being arrested for child pornography.

Free Baldur

When Silicon Knights failed its appeal in 2014, long after both Kickstarters had ended, it finally filed for bankruptcy though it was barely alive as anything more than a legal body at this point. Dyack went quiet for a time after that, surfacing briefly on Youtube in 2016 with assurances that Shadow of the Eternals lives on and blaming "extremely unethical" press for the failure of its crowdfunding efforts. He most recently popped up again in 2020 announcing work on a spiritual successor to the Legacy of Kain with Deadhaus Sonata which is quietly building content and has already laid the foundations for a detailed world with the help of the community. No Kickstarter involved this time.
Oddly enough, Too Human showed up in 2019 as a free download for the Xbox One as a part of Microsoft's backwards compatibility program. According to Polygon, Epic "discreetly" confirmed giving Microsoft the green light to do so.
As for waiting for that Diablo-like... Diablo III was ported over to consoles like the Xbox 360 in 2013 nearly a year after its own painful birth in the PC space, eventually showing up on the PS4, Xbox One, and even later, on Nintendo's new chibi-like console, the Switch. It's pretty fun.

Things I like, Dislike about Stadia (From a casual player)

Hello Everyone!
Just wanted to give some input into Stadia's gameplay as of today in my opinion.
To give a little intro. I'm not a pro player nor I own any other consoles aside from a SNES and a Anbernic RG-350 although I have played Ps1 and 2. this should tell you a bit about my taste in games and how ignorant I am about newer consoles (Xbox, ps4 & 5, and others)
I decided to buy the Stadia simply because I wanted to play Cyberpunk and racing games with my brother. we had been thinking about a PS5 but as we all know... they don't exist lol
so we googled a few options in terms of gaming and came across Stadia. we bought and we loved it!!! but after a few weeks of play and learning about it, I have a few notes I would like to share and also hopefully some of you can help as well.
This is all my own opinion so feel free to disagree/agree.
THINGS I LIKE🙂:
CONTROLLER: the Stadia controller OMG!!! it feels amazing, the weight distribution and size fits perfectly. And I really enjoy the clicking noises, they sound precise and not mushy.
EASINESS OF USE: the installation of the whole thing is simple and fast.. the app is really easy to use and its pretty much straight forward. (notes on this under things I don't like as well)
MULTI LOCATION PLAY: Its all wireless, which to me is actually really cool as I can simply take my controller anywhere and play on the go.
COST: the cost of the whole thing is a no brainer. compared to $400-500 for an actual console.(more on this under things I don't like) Stadia pro ($10 extra monthly) is really good if you are definitely putting more time on this platform as you get access to multiple free titles and 4k if available I believe.
LAGGING/GLITCHES OR POOR CONNECTION: I have experience 0 lag when playing even thought this is a 100% cloud gaming. (I do have fast internet and I also have an ethernet connection to it) compared to SNES and Anbernic, the graphics are amazing (I know I know lol)
FAMILY SHARE: there is family share!! which means I can share my games with someone else and they can play it without buying the actual game.
STORAGE: Unlimited free storage space from games!
GAMEPLAY: Games are smooth and quick. The controller is quick and responsive there are no loading screens!!!! at least from what I have seen Achievements!! This is a guilty pleasure as I get really excited to see achievements unlocked. I guess it gives me a sense of playing in a regular console. There's a free tier of games and Stadia's library is only getting bigger which means more games under the free tier. Streaming, and although I haven't used it I can see the potential specially for YouTube monetary gains or simply to showcase your gameplay. Online free play!
There is a lot more I cold go into such as State share, but I'm not too familiar it so I won't speak on it
THINGS I DONT LIKE👿:
I definitely dislike that after a year, there are multiple AAA titles missing such as Fortnite and COD but I assume they will be available in the near future.
MULTIPLAYER: my brother and I bought Stadia mainly to play together. Whether it's split screen, online, or multiplayer... This has proven to be very difficult in certain games.. we spend almost 30 mins trying to figure out how to multiplayer DBZ With no luck. We were able to play a few other titles together but very limited and I hope this changes....
APP: The chat app is POINTLESS!!!! It's like texting but with extra steps.(Unless there's an online keyboard I'm not using) NO SEARCH BAR!!!!! Like seriously..... That's like Instagram without pictures 🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️ I'm not even sure what the reasoning behind it is... (IOS APP) Seems a bit dumb....Stadia needs to have a native app on the TV ( I believe it's in the works) Simply because everything you do on Stadia has to fall on the phone at some point. which is annoying because I don't see the reason behind having to go back to your phone for messaging, adding games, settings etc, when I could easily do this directly from my TV... I guess the reasoning behind it in my opinion is that your phone is essentially the console or an extension of the "cloud console" it just seems weird.
COMMUNITY: The Stadia community is still bare compared to renown consoles but I have a feeling that it will grow eventually making online player games more entertaining.
CONTENT: I think this will change and has been changing but Stadia needs to add more games faster to start competing with the big consoles. there is a lot of work to do before this platform can be taken more serious.
IT COULD GET PRICEY.... Soo this one could definitely be subject to each individual.... In my case it seems odd that you have to buy the game at retail price.. but it's cloud gaming so you technically do not own it... If you want 4k and a couple of monthly free titles then you need to pay $10 monthly for pro. And that's not including pre-orders and add … Again this one is subject to each individual...
SIDE NOTES AND PERSONAL OVERVIEW:
To end this lengthy P.O.V discussion LOL I want to add that Stadia has definitely filled a gap of free time I previously had. And I enjoy playing the available titles such as cyberpunk, ff, and Hitman and the new additions of exclusive games and smaller titles is definitely welcomed
For the average player looking for a time pass that does not want to drop a huge amount of money, or simply wants to play casually, I think the Stadia is a great choice.. I think Google is definitely adding improvement and I think Stadia is starting to be taken more seriously by not only players but also 3rd party gaming companies...but as I stated before, I think Stadia needs to move quickly or it will fall behind Luna and other cloud gaming services.
For whoever is reading. Please correct me if there is outdated/incorrect information or if you want to add additional information.
Thank you for reading!

If you need help or you're New to roms and emulation these are some tips

If u want to ask any questions please DM me
First thing first You need an Emulator i suggest RetroArch is a Newbie Friendly good all in one emulator this is a video to how to setup and use ReTrOaRcH
OpenEmu FOR MAC USERS THAT WILL NOT USE RETRO ARCH BECAUSE IT'S NOT ENOUGH LOOKING LIKE MAC UI OR THEY HAVE AN OCD OR something like that it's good anyways ( i didn't use it bc i'm not a mac user )
🕿︎♋︎◻︎◻︎●︎♏︎ ◻︎❒︎□︎♎︎◆︎♍︎⧫︎⬧︎ ♋︎❒︎♏︎ □︎❖︎♏︎❒︎◻︎❒︎♓︎♍︎♏︎♎︎✆︎
and a download Manger
Jdownloader ( download the jar version ) A photo to explain what to download (don't download the .exe version it has an adware in it ) and u need java
or idm u can trial reset with this
For Android i think ADM is the best
Tor is a web browser that connect u to a another device that is connected to another device that is connected to the website it helps if u want to
a torrent clients (credits to Piracy wiki)

Transmission - Simple and lightweight open-source torrent client
qBittorrent - Open-source torrent client. Has a built-in search feature that searches popular public trackers. Consistently updated
qBittorrent Enhanced - Fork of qBittorrent intended for blocking leeching clients such as Xunlei
PicoTorrent - Simple and lightweight torrent client
Deluge - Open-source torrent client
Tixati - Extremely customizable. All menus can be rearranged and color scheme can be changed completely.
BiglyBT - Feature filled, open source, ad-free, bittorrent client. A continuation of the popular client previously known as Vuze
kTorrent - Torrent client for linux
rTorrent - Terminal-based torrent client for linux
ruTorrent for rTorrent - Web management UI for rtorrent
Flood for rTorrent - Sleek web management UI for rtorrent

for mobile ( torrent clients ) [credits to Piracy wiki]

LibreTorrent - Ad-free, open-source torrent client for Android.
Flud - Popular torrent client for Android.
aTorrent - Popular torrent client for Android.

stay away from [credits to Piracy wiki]

uTorrent has bundled malware (a bitcoin miner) into the software in the past. The company developing this software is not trustworthy. Bittorrent (the torrent client) is owned by the same company.
Bitlord (torrent client) is malware.

second you need sources to download roms these are the best sites + some tips
sites :
ziperto
No intro romset ( you can download it directly without a torrent you CAN FROM HERE ) (If you don't want to download the whole romset for the system press view content )
AlvRo's Collection
Vimm's Lair
The Eye
GamesTorrents ( of course if u can torrent )
MEGA-ROM
N(itro)blog
THE MEGATHREAD
RomsUniverse
MOBAsuite
IDK?? A WIKI FOR ROMpacks?????
The Old Megathread idk why u need it
A guy who uploaded some roms but he didn't get attention
ROMstorge ( idk how to use this site )
Roms WIKI
Downloadgameps3
Edgeemu
EmulatorGames ( the name is baaaaaaaad )
ROMsDownload
WoW Roms
cdROMance
Startgame ( wtf is this name )
Retrostic
ROMulation
If u Want to Check if the site is safe go to here and comment ur site url
Emulator Files at Gametechwiki - BIOS files, menu files, etc ( credits to piracy wiki )
Small ROMpacks
Redump(http)
Tips :
Tip #1 : If you're in a country that hate piracy like USA or Germany ( i think Germany have dmca or something ?? idk ) etc. stay away from torrent and Use vpn or Tor when u visit sites and use https hosts to download
( download Https Everywhere extension and enable encrypt all sites eligible option by pressing on the icon of https everywhere ) even if your browser included with it . because it will warn you if the site is http... And if ur using a phone download firefox and install it Firefox for phones supports add-ons and it's available in it + ublock origin is available too and dark reader it save ur eyes
Tip #2 : FBI will not raid your house ( because fbi will not waste there time on you )
Tip #3 : your ISP can still see the site that u visit even if it HTTPS + they can see the site u download from and the size of the file but they can't see the name of the file
Tip #4 : install an adblock i suggest Ublock Origin
Tip #5 : install a pop-up blocker if you have a chromium based browser like Brave, Chrome, New Edge etc. i suggest this ( if you know a better one please give me the link ) poperblocker
Tip #6 The MegaThread is your OTHER BEST FRIEND if you want an rom head to the megathread and press ctrl + F and search ;)
Tip #7 DON'T DO NOT OPEN ANY ANY ANY .MSI .EXE/.DMG/.DEB or ANY OTHER FILE THAT you CAN OPEN WITHOUT AN EMULATOR THE FILE IT'S 2000% A VIRUS ( EXCEPT WHEN you DOWNLOAD RETRO ARCH [ or any other emulator OF COURSE ] ) AND DON'T OPEN .BAT FILES ( except if they are the 3ds decrypting tool or if they are from a TRUSTED PLACE ) IT CAN DELETE SYSTEM32 FILE AND IT'S ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT FILES IN WINDOWS.
Tip #8 Emulating is Legal but Downloading ROMs is ILEGAL ( OF COURSE IF you're LIVING IN A COUNTRY THAT DMCA IS A HOLY THING ) ;-)
Tip #9 If you're suspicious of a file u can scan it on VirusTotal or Hybird Analysis ( you need to upload the file because it will open it on a vm in there sever ).
Tip #10 I recommend using a controller if you have a xbox controller just connect it to your pc and you're good to go BUT if you have a dualshock controller (ps controller )
use DS4 Windows ( if you have a windows pc ) ( I Know it's the fork bc the og creator stopped working on it in 2016 or somthing like that )
or any other controller .
Tip #11 If you download a rom and it came in .rar .zip .7z .r001( if the rom came with multiple files like .r001 .r002 .r003... you need to extract just a one file) etc. you can use 7-ZIP or Winrar ( don't worry 40 days trial doesn't end ).

Tip #12 if the rom came in this order rom.rar.exe don't think to open it and if you hide the extension file from showing from the file name it will show like rom.rar but it's actually a .exe or .dmg etc.

Tip #13 if you have a linux pc or a mac that doesn't mean you will not get infected even Temple OS have malwares ( if you don't what's a malware is [Malware is any software intentionally designed to cause damage to a computer, server, client, or computer network. A wide variety of malware types exist, including computer viruses, worms, Trojan horses, ransomware, spyware, adware, rogue software, scareware, Backdoors, Rootkits, and Remote Access Tools (R.a.t) etc.]).
Tip #14 if ur tired of link shorters and etc. use universal Bypass
Tip #15 Some good emulators :
Dolphin - a wii and gamecube emulator ( check the compatibility list to check if the game work )
Citra - 3DS emulator ( check the compatibility list to check if the game work )
BSNES HD beta - if u want to play snes games on HD
PCSX2 - the best ps2 emulator
EPSXE - a little bit old but it's good (ps1)
DON'T use zsnes ( a guy on the comments said that )
RPCS3 - PS3 ( check the compatibility list to check if the game work )
Xenia - Xbox 360 ( check the compatibility list to check if the game work )
Cemu - WiiU Emulator ( check the compatibility list to check if the game work )
a Decryptor for 3ds games if citra won't open the rom HERE
DeSmuME (OLD) - DS ( if u have a good ds emulator give me the link pls )
Project64 - N64
DOSBox - DOS emulator ( check the compatibility list to check if the game work )
mGBA - Game Boy Advance emulator
THERE ARE CURRENTLY NO EMULATORS FOR XBOX ONE. ANY YOUTUBE VIDEOS CLAIMING TO OFFER THEM ARE SCAMS

IF U HAVE any other emulator pls link it in the comments <3
Tip #16
Romsmania
CoolRoms
etc. are NOT SAFE
if you have any other tips share it =)

This Week At Bungie 9/24/2020

Source: https://www.bungie.net/en/News/Article/49596
This week at Bungie, the weather is changing…
You feel that? The slight chill in the air? It’s time to prepare for a colder climate, Guardians. Europa has no sympathy unprepared guests. You might want to come with a weapon or two, because frigid storms aren’t the only danger to be found here. Don’t be afraid, though. An old friend will be waiting for your arrival.
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The weather may be brutal, but that won’t stop you from exploring this frontier. Take a look at the map of Europa, and be sure to check out our most recent weather forecast.

Europa Report: 100% Chance of Snow

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You now have less than seven weeks to get ready. Don’t get caught out in the cold without a plan. November 10 is coming quick, and we’re eager to see how long you survive.

It’s a Pass… for Games!

Earlier this week, Forsaken and Shadowkeep became available on Xbox Game Pass. With Beyond Light on the way, there’s no better time to gear up and get acquainted with what’s going on in the world of Destiny.
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A few housekeeping notes for Guardians who are being freshly rez’d in the Cosmodrome:

You’ll need to download Destiny 2, Forsaken, and Shadowkeep to access this content.
- Without Destiny 2, you can’t launch the game.
For new Guardians joining our ranks through Xbox Game Pass, we have a Help Article specifically for you.
- Our help forums are also available at any time if you hit a snag on your way to the Tower.
If you encounter any issues accessing game content or Xbox related services, please refer to Xbox Support.

Eyes up, Guardians. Welcome to the community.

Ye Olde Banner of Iron

A few weeks back, we announced the extension of Season of Arrivals, noting that we’d be adding a few fun things between September 22 and the new November 10 launch date of Beyond Light. First, we featured some Double Ordeal loot on Lake of Shadows. This week, Drifter has been upping the ante with Triple Infamy. Next week, Lord Saladin returns with Triple Valor, themed weapons and armor, and his Pinnacle Power bounty rewards.
Don’t go in thinking it will be easy to snag some loot, though. Control is the name of the game, and Power is enabled. If you haven’t risen through the Pinnacle band yet, you may find yourself facing a raid boss or two on the other team.
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Iron Banner
Starts: 9/29/2020 10:00 AM PT
Ends: 10/6/2020 10:00 AM PT
There will be a few more weeks with increased rewards for Vanguard, Crucible, and Gambit, so stay tuned for announcements!

Talking Tech – Preparing for Beyond Light

With Beyond Light on fast approach, it’s time to shift our TWAB gears a little. Today, we’ll be talking through some of the back-end changes that will be coming to Destiny 2 on November 10. To guide us through this process, we’re passing the mic to Destiny Engineering Director David Aldridge.

DAldridge: When Destiny 2 launched three years ago, we had no idea that in 2020 we’d announce a new trilogy of expansions (among other 2020 surprises we didn’t anticipate). At the time, we thought Destiny 2’s arc would look a lot more like Destiny 1 – a couple of expansions, and then a sequel.

We learned many lessons from the transition to Destiny 2, and from shipping Curse of Osiris, Warmind, Forsaken, the Year-2 Seasons, and Shadowkeep. When we evaluated those lessons, we decided not to pursue a Destiny 3, but instead to reinvest everything in Destiny 2 and make it all that it can be (check out our longer writeup on this choice here). To support that strategy, we’ve made several tech investments to help us sustainably evolve the game for years to come, and some of those investments are arriving in Beyond Light.
Many of these changes are under the hood and won’t affect your experience (except insofar as they help us deliver you more and better Destiny in the future), but some may result in neat improvements, curious behavior differences, or bugs. This means that, on November 10, some places and things will feel a little like Sliders (only 90s kids will get this), so we’d like to give you a rundown of some of the changes and possible side effects.
We shifted our mission scripting model to run on the Physics Host instead of the Mission Host (more details on this split here, in the interview with Matt Segur). In the long run this change will give designers options to create more novel mission mechanics by giving the mission scripting environment full access to the game state, instead of the much more limited access the Mission Host had. For example, the Physics Host knows exactly where enemy combatants are and what actions they recently performed – while the Mission Host only knew how many combatants were alive in a squad and what that squad was generally trying to accomplish. In Beyond Light we’re only launching the foundations of this system, and we look forward to evolving and leveraging it in the future.

What you might notice:

The new scripting environment changed many behaviors in complex ways, and you may see interesting behavior changes or bugs in pre-Beyond-Light missions (and public events, and similar) that were originally built and tested on the previous system. We’ve tested these missions heavily and stamped out many bugs, but some will undoubtedly slip through. We’ll be monitoring and fixing remaining bugs over time. In some cases, these issues were more severe – for example, they caused the Prophecy dungeon to be unavailable temporarily. We’re all excited for its triumphant return, slated for the end of this year!

One other cool new feature in this area is face-to-face joins in social spaces, so you can now fireteam up with Tower friends without a long Tower reload!

We revamped our content building and patching pipeline for speed and install size. With the tremendous size of Destiny, our complete shippable content builds were frequently taking north of 24 hours. We made investments to bring that down to sub-12 hours, which resulted in a bunch of changes to our content and patching formats. We also took on work to allow us to cull content that we’ve upgraded or replaced – our previous patching system had limited capabilities here (due to trying to minimize patch sizes and other constraints), and the current Destiny 2 install has a significant amount of accreted ‘dead’ content (e.g. assets in the base install that were replaced in later patches).

What you might notice:

Due to all these changes, Beyond Light will be a full re-download on all platforms – we know this will be painful for those with slower or metered internet connections, and we’re sorry about that. To help mitigate this, we’re planning to enable Beyond Light preloads sometime in the evening of November 9, Pacific Time, which should give everyone at least 10 hours to download before the gates open.

Destiny 2's install size shrinks by 30-40%: Due to a combination of culling unused or replaced content, install size optimizations, and moving some content to the Destiny Content Vault, Destiny 2’s install size will shrink to between 59 and 71GB (depending on platform), a reduction of 30 to 40%. These improvements should also help us control install size better in the coming years.

We hope to use these much faster builds to accomplish two things:

Help us ship mission-critical fixes faster when game-breaking bugs arise.

Reduce our overall ship pipeline depth, enabling us to work on Destiny releases closer to their ship dates, so we can react to fresher information about what’s happening in the live game. For example, historically each of our Seasons has had to get deep into production before the preceding season launched, preventing us from reacting to learnings from that preceding season. These tech improvements should give us 1-2 more weeks of flexibility on a Seasonal scale, helping us pivot more quickly in some cases.

We rebuilt our character face system. We know that how your Guardians look is important to you, and we’ve long wanted to add more player customization to Destiny. Our original system for player faces had some combinatoric content authoring problems – for example, every decal had to be authored completely custom for each player face permutation. This prevented us from extending this area of the game with more content and features. We’ve upgraded to a significantly more capable system (with e.g. runtime decal projection), which we hope to leverage for more player customization options in the future. As part of this process we reviewed the existing player models with our Diversity Committee and Employee Resource Groups in the studio to make small tweaks to existing player heads. We’re also building a list of Guardian face shapes we should bring to the game in the future in order to increase Guardian diversity in Destiny, with the long-term goal of enabling everyone to imagine themselves as their Guardian.

What you might notice:

Your Guardian’s face may look a bit different.

We relit portions of EDZ and Nessus. During the early stages of Beyond Light production the Lighting and Skies teams had a desire to provide a visual refresh to the two remaining D2 Year 1 destinations, EDZ and Nessus, as they enter their fourth year in rotation. To that end, the teams performed relights and global lighting updates to a number of locations on both destinations.

What you might notice:

Different lighting on existing destinations! The changes are intentional and are meant to bring the visual quality of these spaces up to our current lighting standards, while providing a fresh coat of paint for some of our Year 1 locations. We hope you enjoy these updates to some familiar locations when you explore EDZ and Nessus this November.

We’re excited to leverage these improvements to redouble our efforts on Destiny 2, and we aim to make Destiny 2 still feel like your home away from home.

Thanks,
-David Aldridge
P.S. Congratulations on making it to the end of this long and nerdy love letter. If your passion for all things Destiny Tech is not yet spent, you may enjoy the Reddit AMA that Destiny Engineering Manager Chris Kosanovich and I did a couple months ago!

Did You Say… More Emblems???

Beyond Light isn’t just bringing Europa to the fold. It’s also bringing many, many pieces of loot. This year, we’re refreshing a few Community emblems for you to hunt. Whether it be Fashion, Art, Movie of the Week, or the Bungie Bounty, we have some new swag to hopefully catch your eye. I’m personally giddy that we have seven total Community Emblems to show off. There’s just something about that number that we love so much…
Fashion Show
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Featured Artist
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Movie of the Week
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Bungie Bounty
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Shadowkeep variants for each emblem will be available through November 10. There will be a few final chances to earn them before the new hotness becomes available. Stay tuned!
We’d also like to take a moment to celebrate our Community Volunteers. If you’ve ever visited the help forum, you may have noticed some members answering questions and linking players to general help articles and Bungie-authored troubleshooting methods. These are the Mentors, the “white gloves” of our community, dedicated to lending a helping hand to any player trying to get back into the game.
Our Moderators, however, are referred to as Ninjas. They work in the shadows, removing bad actors from our forums whenever the Code of Conduct is broken. You may see one every so often in the forums replying to threads, but their work is behind the scenes.
As of late, we’ve also been receiving some help from community moderators during Bungie livestreams. Whether they be Bungie Bounties, charity initiatives, or whatever reason we decide to broadcast, these individuals are helping to keep chat a bit cleaner. Join us in welcoming Shields to the fold of our community moderation teams.
Each volunteer group will be receiving a new emblem this year. While it might seem like a minor gesture, we hope that you join us in giving them thanks whenever you see these emblems in the wild.
Mentors
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Ninjas
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Shields
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If you’re wondering “How do I become a volunteer?”, our members are all community sourced. If we see you helping out in the forums frequently or just having a good time in chat while upholding our Code, we may reach out to see if you’d like to join up! That said, don’t do it for the emblem. Do it out of the kindness of your heart and for the betterment of our community. The emblem is just a little treat.

Support Specialists

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This week was a fun one. A new Hotfix arrived at our door, and Xbox Game Pass kicked off in spectacular fashion. Destiny Player Support is here with vital information on what issues have been found, and what troubleshooting methods are available.
This is their report.

XBOX GAME PASS
Earlier this week, Destiny 2: Forsaken and Destiny 2: Shadowkeep became available for Xbox Game Pass subscribers to download and play through Game Pass. Xbox Game Pass members will continue to be able to access these Destiny 2 expansions if their Game Pass membership is maintained. For more information, please visit our Destiny 2 on Xbox Game Pass guide.
RESOLVED ISSUES
Below is a list of issues that have been resolved with Hotfix 2.9.2.1 on September 22:

The Refurbished Black Armory shader now drops 100% of the time when dismantling Black Armory Refurbished weapons acquired from completing Forge Ignition activities.

Fixed a crash that could occur when too many arrows were shot into a Titan’s Barricade.

CURRENT KNOWN ISSUES
For a full list of emergent issues in Destiny 2, players can review our Known Issues article. Players who observe other issues should report them to our #Help forum.

Enough Words, More Movies

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Woof, this TWAB’s getting long. My fingers are getting tired from the typing. Let’s take a break, shall we? The movies we have on tap from the Community Creations page this week are pretty entertaining; definitely hope to get a little giggle in there while marveling at the skill required to craft such fun videos.
Movie of the Week: Hmmmmm….
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Honorable Mention: Hunters have the best Fashion
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Wait, do you see your video listed here‽ Awesome! Let’s check off a few things before we get you your emblem. Is your Bungie.net profile linked in the description of the video? Good. Did you credit any fellow creators who appeared in your video? Sweet! We’ll get your emblem to you within a few business days.
Did you make it this far? Always fun to have a meaty TWAB. I’ll spare you a long outro, but I do want to say this: Thanks for stopping by. We always appreciate those who tune in for the weekly conversation, whether we have a lot of new info, or just a simple check-in to see how everyone’s doing between content drops.
Festival of the Lost is on the way. It’s almost time to get Spooky. Stay tuned for tricks and treats, because they’ll be coming soon…
Cheers,
-dmg04

For anyone playing Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 and Cyberpunk 2077 on same PC, I have questions.

[Video Games] The reboot that got rebooted: The rise and fall of DmC: Devil May Cry

Let's cut through the pre-amble:

What is Devil May Cry?

Devil May Cry is an action series developed and published by Japanese company Capcom, beginning with Devil May Cry 1 in 2001 for the Playstation 2 (Here's an advert showing it as part of Sony's holiday lineup that included landmark gaming titles such as Final Fantasy X, Grand Theft Auto 3, Metal Gear Solid 2 and... Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance). The game series began as a prototype build for Resident Evil 4 that had more of an overt action focus than the acclaimed horror franchise was known for. Rather than scrap the build, Capcom saw potential in the idea of a stylish action game, and gave director Hideki Kamiya permission to make it a full title.
Kamiya would involuntarily leave the series after DMC 1 as Capcom didn't ask him to work on DMC 2. Instead, a still-to-this-day unknown phantom director was put in charge of the game and he ran it into the ground. With less than half a year before DMC 2's 2003 release, Capcom brought in a new director to course-correct and get the game out for release: Hideaki Itsuno. In less than six months, Itsuno would rally the team, basically make the entire game, and create several features that would go on to become series staples, and while DMC 2 sold well, it was critically panned for being a very boring game. Itsuno, not wanting his reputation to be sullied, came back in 2005 with Devil May Cry 3, generally considered one of the greatest action games of all time. From here several core traits are instilled: chief among which being style meters that track the player's skill with combos and Dante having a style system that lets him use different movesets.
And it's in 2008 with the release of Devil May Cry 4, marking the series going multiplatform for the first time as it came out on the PS3 and Xbox 360, that this story really begins:

The build up to 2010

With DMC 4's release in 2008, Capcom set the sales expectation that the game would sell 1.8 million units by the end of the fiscal year. DMC 4 would sell two million units in under a month, but Capcom were a bit unimpressed. They were hoping that now that DMC was on a wider range of platforms that the sales would correspondingly go up, but instead the game just saw a modest increase over DMC 3. The cost of game development had also shot up in the new console generation, making Capcom more concerned about DMC4's sales just being fine, especially coming off of huge sales juggarnauts from 2007 such as Halo 3, Call of Duty Modern Warfare and Bioshock. (It doesn't help that DMC 4 had a very rushed development leading to the now infamous case of Dante's playable chapters just being Nero's but backwards)
Japan at the time was also in a weird place when it came to gaming. The mobile phone gaming market was about to take off, and the playerbase in Japan was already smaller than the worldwide market for obvious reasons. In the home regions, it was safer to look into handheld gaming, and while Capcom had dallied with the idea of a DMC game on the Playstation Portable (at one point considering a remake of the first game that reached in-game screenshots and box art that was quietly shelved for unknown reasons, alongside a prequel focusing on Dante's father Sparda), these ideas never left the ground. Seeing how Western markets were more traditionally concerned with console gaming at this time (and the success of the God of War franchise proved Action was a genre people wanted), Capcom's idea was simple:
Give their IPs to Western studios and let them take a crack at it, with the idea being their knowledge of what the West wants would let the games sell better. The results were mixed. The Bionic Commando reboot is nowadays more known for the twist of YOUR WIFE IS THE ROBOT ARM and only sold 27,000 units in a month, but Dead Rising did fairly well under a Capcom Vancouver branch until Dead Rising 4 happened and uh... kinda killed the series because it was awful.
Capcom eventually set their sights on giving the West a crack at DMC, leading to them eyeballing several studios. This worked out well for them in that Itsuno was also burnt out. After having spent five straight years on DMC and having redeemed its image after DMC 2, Itsuno was ready to take a break and make his dream game: Dragon's Dogma, a dark fantasy game that is very fun. It got a Netflix anime adaptation recently that is... not as fun. But while Itsuno was making Dragon's Dogma, Capcom had some time to spitball handing the series off. They eventually settled on Ninja Theory, an up and coming British team best known for Heavenly Sword (a very pretty game with mediocre action combat and a priority on storytelling), and Enslaved: Odyssey to the West (a modernisation of Journey to the West that was very pretty but priotizied story over gameplay). Rumors began to circulate in early 2010 that Ninja Theory had acquired the license and would be making a prequel focusing on Dante's early days, but it would only become clear at Tokyo Games Show that year when DmC: Devil May Cry* was formally announced.
And the fanbase collectively hated it.
(* Yes that does technically mean this reboot's name is Devil may Cry: Devil May Cry. I'm going to call it DmC from here to differentiate it from the core series)

The TGS Trailer

For those unaware of DMC, I should stress that by 2010, it had a reputation for a certain flair and theatics. Dante was known to be a goofball in cutscenes, taunting enemy demons and making a mockery of them. He has an entire cutscene in DMC 4 where he acts like he's on the stage of a theatre with how grandious he is. People liked Dante for this reason, he was a breath of fresh air in a time when most protagonists were stotic, gritty jerks who only talked in curse words and gravelly shouts. And his flowing white hair was also certainly iconic.
So here comes the new take on Dante, the West giving him a go and oh... hoo boy. There's no charisma, there's no panache. The trailer has no gameplay. Dante doesn't look like a trash talker, he looks like a meth addict. He's smoking, something the DMC 1 design documents said Dante would never do as (per Kamiya) smoking is uncool. His hair isn't even white!
Now let me be clear: I am not opposed to a new take on Dante. Certainly, the idea presented in the reveal trailer that Dante is imaging the demons he fights as an acute case of psychosis is an interesting idea, as it raises the question of whether or not the demons are real or if he's senselessly killing random people. But the execution would have had to be perfect, and opening with just a fancy trailer that had no signs of gameplay for an action franchise was not the right foot to start on.
What doesn't help was that the entire Western Capcom initiative was one pushed by a very controversial figure in gaming called Keiji Inafune, who would leave Capcom right after DmC's announcement in 2010. Inafune was the one most strongly advocating for the western development approach (Something Capcom were quick to stress in 2010 after his departure), but with his departure the movement had less steam. Inafune would go on to make Mighty Number 9, a Kickstarter that went miserably wrong on every turn and is usually seen as one of the most disappointing games of the 2010s.
I should also point out here: Dante's radically different design from the norm of the series was a mandate imposed by Capcom. Ninja Theory's original concept art for Dante was much more closer to his traditional design- white hair, red coat and all. But Capcom, and Itsuno especially, were adament that if Ninja Theory were going to be doing something new with the franchise, that they needed to go off the cuff- in Capcom's own words, "Go crazy."

The development

So Dante got a new color palette, a darker jacket and black hair. But at the time (this news only came out two years after the redesign was revealed), people didn't know about Capcom explicitly telling NT to go off the rails, and what they saw... was Ninja Theory going off the rails in the wrong way.
So from the word go, fans aren't happy. Fans are usually never happy but I mean they were unhappy. Chief Creative director for Ninja Theory Tameen Antionades said after the reveal: “The vitriol was immediate, aggressive and relentless for the next two years. Without a second of gameplay being shown, it had been written off as a disaster in the making.” Tameen would become the ball and chain around DmC's marketing, which is quite apparent in how Ninja Theory would dial back on his appearances as we get closer to the game's release. The backlash to the launch clearly surprised Ninja Theory and caught them off guard, with Tameen publically lashing out at the original fanbase for writing the game off or being unhappy at Dante's visual redesign. This would go on to dominiate the discussions about DmC for its pre-release cycle, as it became less about the game and more about the community and whether or not the response was justified (alongside in typical internet fashion, a few death threats being tossed around which apparently included a full metal song). No matter which side of it you lean on though, Tameen had habit of putting his foot in his mouth in regards to PR:

When asked by Venturebeat how he felt about the fan reaction to the TGS trailer, Tameen (and I am quoting them word for word here) “took a drag of his cigarette and without blinking or pausing to exhale the smoke from his mouth, said: ‘I don’t care.’”
Tameen went on to insult Dante's original costume in a later interview when saying that what was and wasn’t cool had changed in the years since DMC1: “If Dante, dressed as he was, walked into any bar outside of Tokyo, he’d get laughed out.”
Finally, he disparaged the original series for its depiction of women, particularly the demon hunters Trish and Lady, saying: "I've nothing against big tits - I'd rather have my head resting on a pair right now - but if you're going to try and stimulate someone on different levels, there's better ways to do it... We did that in Enslaved with Trip. People loved her, not because she had big breasts and high heels, but because she felt like someone who could be your girlfriend. That to me is more attractive than a prostitute walking around with a big gun." The idea that Tameen was dismissing Lady and Trish (Lady especially has basically the largest character arc in DMC3 and it's as much her story as Dante's) irked the fanbase.

Capcom likely stepped in behind the scenes and encourged a few changes. Notably, Dante's design underwent a few shifts, including making him more muscular and rewriting portions of the game to give him a few more of Old!Dante's trademark quips. A few voice actor was also cast, named Tim Phillips... though NT wouldn't budge on the haircut as it was part of the story. The Dante psychosis/prisoner angle from the TGS trailer was also completely scrapped from the final product, having Dante instead be confirmed to be sane and fighting demons, not people. Even though Capcom had encouraged NT to go off the rails... money still reigns supreme and Capcom wanted to turn a profit. So closer to release, Capcom made a point of stressing that Itsuno and several other DMC veteran staff were supervising the combat system and offering guidance. Combat designer Rahni Tucker spoke positively of the exchanges she had with Itsuno:

While Capcom Japan kept a close eye on Ninja Theory’s work on DmC’s characters, story and world, its greatest focus was, naturally, on the game’s combat. Itsuno and other key personnel would visit the studio in Cambridge every few months to check in on its progress, Ninja Theory staff would often make the trip out to Japan, and in between those times there would be regular video conferences and daily email updates. All that communication helped to unify the two companies, despite a fundamental split between their approaches to game development: Ninja Theory liked to start with the visual design, and Capcom with the mechanics. Modestly, Itsuno admits he learned a lot from the collaboration; Tucker believes she picked up an awful lot more. “I learnt so much,” she says. “Itsuno would speak philosophically about how he approaches combat and enemy design. They build most of the player’s set of actions first, and then think about the things they can build to allow players to exploit particular elements of the system they’ve designed. They really put the emphasis of the baddie design back onto the player’s actions. It’s kind of obvious, but just the way that he spoke about it was inspiring, and it made a lot of sense to me.”

The damage however, was long done. Even with the post-TGS revisions, DmC was facing an uphill battle from the community, with a minority waiting to give it a try themselves before casting judgement, but the majority either being apathetic or downright hostile to the game, not helped by Tameen's attitude creating the idea that Ninja Theory inherently hated what made Devil May Cry good (again, keep in mind most players wouldn't learn that Capcom were pushing for the radical Dante changes until years post-release). Ultimately though, Capcom themselves are to blame for the choices that impacted DmC: Ninja Theory were only doing their jobs to the best of their abilities and for the most part many of the staff clearly loved getting to work on such a popular franchise and boosting their studio's name. It came down an unfortunate blend of Capcom misreading what people wanted from future projects, an attempt to appeal to a Western market that fell on its face, and a director unprepared for the mass backlash his product got.
Either way, the game finally came out in early 2013.

The game itself

Eh, it was OK.
DmC launched in March 2013 and got decent reviews on all platforms, getting a consistent 8/10 on all platforms on Metacritic. The PC port was especially praised for its sheer variety of features including an uncapped framerate. Critics quite liked it, praising the story and art direction, feeling it was a necessary step for the series to make the games somewhat easier to let newcomers in without facing as daunting a challenge as the games could be (I'm pretty sure learning how to fly a plane is easier than mastering Dante in Devil May Cry 4). Old Dante's most famous voice actor, Reuben Langdon, spoke on a podcast about the game and admitted that while he wasn't fond of the new Dante's characterisation, he applauded Ninja Theory's craftsmenship.
The fanbase were colder, even with the pre-release biases set aside (this wasn't helped by Platinum, helmed by several ex-DMC 1 developers including Kamiya, releasing Metal Gear Rising Revengeance also in 2013. Metal Gear Rising is a very good game that involves flipping giant robots and fighting a very actractive Brazillian man with a gun-sheath sword). The game's framerate on consoles was capped at 30FPS for technical reasons when all prior games ran at 60FPS. Dante had lost a lot of his mechanical complexity (including DMC 3 and 4's style system which offered Dante special abilities he could switch between such as more sword and gun combos, blocking and dodging) in favour of a more universal moveset. The Devil Trigger super mode was pretty lame and automatically knocked all enemies into the air, which people didn't like as it made most encounters too easy. Building up style was too easy and the game had no systems to stop you spamming the same combos over and over. The game's weapon system of angel/demon themed weapons included color-coded enemies that forced you to use the right gear or you'd be punished. There was no Turbo Mode, a feature in most games that automatically boosted the game's speed by 20% on average.
Ninja Theory still made a good action game, albeit one that needed a bit more refinement to reach its true potential. But the lack of several core features (or worse, poorly implemented iterations of said features) led to the fanbase adopting a term:

"It's a good game, but it's not a good Devil May Cry."

The fanbase were willing to concede to the good aspects of the game- especially in audiovisual aspects. Enemies now got a subtitle during their first appearance, weapons getting a slight glint when the player pauses to let them know they can launch a pause combo attack, the soundtrack was now dynamic and evolved up the higher your style rank got, alongside the killing blow at the end of a fight getting a cinematic camera angle. Ninja Theory's sense of style itself was something that impressed the Capcom team, as all of these aspects were modified and adopted into the mainline games come 2019. The game was also very beautiful in places, leaving the Gothic archetecture of the main games for a more European feel in Limbo City. Madrid in Spain and Genoa in Italy are clear influences on the archetecture, and the design team adapt them well in making Limbo a city that is itself a weapon trying to kill Dante through compressing alleyways, closing off paths or mocking him through writing on the walls, Splinter Cell Conviction style. Combichrist and Noisia's collaberations for the soundtrack were also praised between their licensed work and new music composed just for the game, especially the songs Never Surrender and Throat Full of Glass.
But for all the praise, reluctant or otherwise, that game got mechanically, the story that the critics had acclaimed as mature and a right step forward had few supporters among the playerbase. There's been a lot written and said about DmC's story so I'll cap off the highlights here:

Dante, even after the TGS revisions, was still far too crass and unlikeable. A scene early on in the game was also seen as a potshot at fans of the old games as a response to the TGS backlash where a mop falls on Dante's head, making him look like his older self, before he snarks "Not in a million years" and throws the mop aside. Fans quickly took to several creative nicknames to refer to this new iteration of the character, with the most popular being DINO (Dante In Name Only) or Donte. Fans hated Donte's personality so much that they began unironically championing the Spanish dub of the game due to his dub actor having more fun in the role, leading to people making mods to highlight the misadventures of Donté, el exterminador de demonios. Dante being changed from a half-human half-demon to half-angel half-demon also led to mocking jokes comparing Dante to the Adam Sandler film Little Nicky.
The game relied far too heavily on swearing, with the exchange between Dante and Succubus becoming infamous for the lines "Fuck you!" "Fuck you!" "FUCK YOUUUUUUUUUUU." A scene with Dante and Vergil where the two engage in brotherly banter only for Vergil to end the argument with "And I've got a bigger dick" also went viral for all the wrong reasons.
Dante's brother Vergil in the core series is a man of MOTIVATION who would sooner cut his throat than admit to anything being stronger than him, alongside someone who hates firearms. Entire essays have been written about how amazing Vergil is in Devil May Cry 3 and in some communities, his name has become synonymous with the rival archetype. Here, he's presented as a thinly veiled analogue to the Anonymous movement (you can carbon date this game to early 2010s in general with the Anonymous analouges and WAKE UP SHEEPLE energy), openly admits to Dante that "I'm powerless to stop you" from just leaving his goal to stop the demons, and in the most infamous scene of the game, uses a sniper rifle to shoot a pregnant woman in the chest, blowing out her entire stomach, before headshotting her. To make things even worse for the reputation of this version of Vergil (who had been mockingly named Vergin), the launch version of DmC had him wearing a fedora. In 2013. I don't think I need to add anything to that if you remember what became of the fedora around 2013.
Despite Tameen's comments about women in video games and "prostitutes with guns," DmC was reviled for how deeply mysoginistic the game truly was. Kat (the one heroic female character in the game and the only female character to survive the game), had several far more revealing costumes planned in concept art (Alongside the idea that Kat fought with a violin weapon pre-Lindsay Sterling which was pretty cool). Here's one of the better pieces of art where Kat was planned to be a biker chick with platinum blonde hair. Kat is ultimately a vehicle for Dante's character development as he softens up around her, only for her to be kidnapped and brutalized by the police. Dante and Vergil then kidnap the mistress of Mundus (the main antagonist) who is pregnant with his child, and trade the two women off like Pokemon cards (the camera in the trade scene, linked above in the Vergin section includes several disturbing shots that linger on Kat trying to get up after being shoved to the ground), leading back to the Sniper Rifle Abortion. The fanbase got very creative with memes relating to that part of the game. Kat's main involvement in the final act of the game is just to give Dante a map of the building she was tortured in, then hide behind a dumpster when Dante and Vergil come to blows over whether or not they should rule humanity. And in the re-release of the game, the final cutscene is modfied so the last shot of the game is Dante copping a feel of Kat's ass.

The end was an OK game let down by a bad story. The tale of many a game. And unfortunately, partly thanks to the game just not being good enough for the DMC pedigree, DmC underperformed. Capcom initally hoped for 2 million units to be sold like DMC 4, but later quietly lowered their projections down to 1.2 million. Some rumors speculate that Capcom had to artifically boost the game's sale numbers by counting anyone who downloaded the game when it was for free as part of Playstation Plus in January 2014 (games that go on PS+ or Microsofft's Xbox Live Games with Gold service are usually games that are either selling so well they can take the hit, are past their lifespan and looking to reignite the playerbase, or did very badly and this is a last ditch effort to get interest into the game). While not speaking directly about DmC, Capcom spoke frankly in a financial report regarding their Western outsourcing, attributing the lack of success to a "delayed response to the expanding digital contents market," "insufficient coordination between the marketing and the game development divisions in overseas markets," and a "decline in quality due to excessive outsourcing". The long and the short of it was: DmC flopped commerically, failing to meet the sales of DMC 4 in the West (which remember was Capcom's entire reason for the reboot) when it was released on the exact same platforms, and the consoles had a larger install base due to five years having passed. For what it's worth, Itsuno himself support the game and approved of Ninja Theory's efforts, even saying he'd have been honored to work on a DmC Devil May Cry 2 had Capcom gone with that project.
Some post-launch support would follow, including DLC costumes based on concept art for Dante and several alt skins based on his DMC 1 and 3 appearances, Bloody Palace (basically a time trial gauntlet run) and a campaign focusing on Vergil that sets up a sequel hook which never gets followed up on.
Some Ninja Theory staffers didn't take the news well, especially as they knew that their reputation was going to take a large hit after DmC. Art director Alessandro Taini gave a GDC talk where he went on a weird rant involving editing DMC 4 Dante into stills from... Brokeback Mountain and Batman and Robin, while also saying reboot Dante was based on... Tyler Durden from Fight Club (for those who don't know Fight Club, you're not meant to agree with Tyler or find him a role model). Keep in mind that this is Taini basically shit-talking character designs he had no hand in making. In a hilaripus twist of irony, Dante would later in the series get a cowboy hat as a weapon. Revenge is a dish best served cold.
Capcom up to this point had been going back and forth on what DmC even was- was it a prequel, a reboot, an alternate universe? They seemed to change the answer every month. But after the game's failure to meet expectations commercially, they quietly settled on it being based on an alternate universe, as was confirmed in of all things, Donte appearing as a DLC alt skin for Dante in Marvel vs Capcom Infinite.

(While I'm on the topic of weird fighting game trivia, Donte actually also got a full fighting game appearance in the "classic," Playstation All Stars Battle Royale as an attempt to market DmC ahead of its release. Yes, Donte technically didn't even debut in his own game. This story is so weird to me! In the trailer he even fights the protagonist of previous Ninja Theory game Heavenly Sword)

In 2015, Capcom re-released the game for the new consoles as DmC: Devil May Cry: Definitive Edition. This was largely helmed by the Capcom team in Japan who modified the game to make it more in line with DMC's series standards of gameplay. And you know what? It's really good! Genuinely, it actually makes the game and takes it from "A good attempt" to "one of the best Western attempts at action games period." 60FPS on consoles, all DLC included, Turbo Mode was back, a new mode called Must Style where you have to get an S Rank in combos before your attacks do damage, all alongside an insanely detailed changelog penned by Rahni Tucker. The one downside? It never got released on PC for unsaid reasons, presumably that most of the new gameplay additions... were based on mods made by the PC fanbase. Mods you can no longer find as the site storing them has gone down.
However even with this, DmC would get sand in its eye one more time. In the same year, Capcom released a similar re-release of DMC 4 called Special Edition. It was far more bare bones than DmC: DE, only adding three new playable characters in Lady, Trish and MOTIVATION Man himself, Vergil. Despite the game only getting a physical release in Japan and being digital only here in the West (whereas DmC: DE got a full release), Capcom eventually said that DMC 4 SE obliterated the DE in sales, with Capcom specifically saying that 4SE's digital sales led to a better quarter in 2015 than they were anticipating. As of 2020 (due to Capcom counting their re-releases of games separately than the original release when it comes to sales), we know that DMC4SE has sold 1.5 million units, while DmC: DE sold 1.1 million.
However, ultimately, I'm very joyful to admit that everyone got a happy ending! No, literally, everyone came out of this for the better. Ninja Theory in 2017 would release Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice, a critical and commerical darling made on a self-styled "AA" budget that was praised for its handling of mental health through the lens of its MC Senua. It made its budget back easily, they're now owned by Microsoft and they're currently working on a sequel called Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2. Capcom would bounce back from their slump in the Early 2010s, beginning in 2017 with the releases of Resident Evil 7, Monster Hunter World and a certain title I'll mention in a minute. They've been releasing hit after hit for the last four years and they have more on the horizon. And Itsuno, now having made Dragon's Dogma, came back raring to go with more Devil May Cry. Though there are some rumors by Dante's voice actor that he had to threaten to leave Capcom to get it, at E3 2018 as part of the Microsoft panel, Itsuno took to the stage and announced:
"DMC IS BACK!!!"
(Watching people react to this trailer and freaking out when they see it's DMC gives me so much serotonin)
Thanks for reading this... long disaster of a post. Have a good one, and remember to keep this party crazy. Let's rock. :)

Additional reading if you'd like more words on this reboot:

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Installing xbox one games without internet

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XBOX One Games that I installed offline without an internet connection.

XBOX One Games that I installed offline without an internet connection [August 2019 update]

The Ultimate guide for OFFLINE features, split-screen, Bots, LAN Play in Cold War