chloyster

That's true, and fair. I am optimistic though since from what I understand Arkane didn't want to develop a multiplayer game. Sounds like this has been something remedy wanted to do

Yeah I'm realizing I didn't word that super well. Yes sync is a thing and they know that, but they don't want to have to use Firefox on mobile because they think it's slow

That's super fair and I agree for the most part. Though it's hard to be super enthusiastic about it when they focus on a plethora of super limited edition color ways for the pocket instead of keeping the base one in stock and completely abandoning DAC support which they promised a while ago (and recently scrubbed all mention of on their site)

Yes that would actually be very helpful! I've had trouble doing that on the android version, and I have heard that can help show what exactly is causing the issue. I have heard some settings on ublock can cause this (which I have tried tinkering with)

I think they know about the cross device syncing but yeah think it's too slow. Idk how long it's been since they used it.

There is an issue I've had with Firefox on Android that I've tried to fix but haven't been able to, where the first time I load a website in like... An hour or 2, it takes a long time to load. After that everything is pretty quick but the first load after the app has been suspended (is my guess) is slow

The problem is they apparently really value having cross device syncing between desktop and phone, and dislike Firefox on mobile a bit due to speed. Idk I mean yeah I think chromium browsers on android are technically faster (seems to me at least) but with no ads it's way better

Hoping this could maybe help convince my friends who are just looking for a chromium alternative and won't even consider firefox

I have a love hate with analogue. They undoubtedly make really excellent products, and I absolutely adore my pocket. However they really lean into the fomo of their stuff. They make very few units, and you have to be ready to go when they drop more product most of the time. I will say though the price of this is a lot lower than I expected. And while you shouldn't count on it, every analogue system has gotten some form of ability to play roms from other systems (whether it's built into the OS (not happening for the 3D) or a "jailbreak" is released by basically an employee of analogue).

Analogue stuff is good if you have cartridges you want to play, but at this point, with the recent release of Taki Udon's cheap Mister Pi (https://retroremake.co/pages/store), I think Mister is the way to go. It's an open source project as opposed to analogue's implementation. The issue with Mister was you needed a pretty expensive DE10 Nano board to utilize it. Now you can get one of these new boards for only $100 (if you can get your hands on them. Only 2 batches have been sold so far and they sell out quick). Plus Taki is planning on using this new board to make a handheld Mister which I'm super stoked for.

Hell yeah good for them

Earthbound / mother 2 is also 5 stars for me and can definitely be played before hand. There is overlap in the antagonist and references but otherwise mother 3 takes place an incomprehensible amount of time in the future. I didn't include earthbound since its a tiny bit more backtracky and explory but tbh it's about as linear as m&l superstar saga so I'd def recommend it if you want to play!

I suppose I have to ask how linear. Like can it be mostly linear while having the chance to explore off the beaten path very briefly? Or like straight up hallway simulator.

Ive been using a site actually to rate games I've played so I'll start listing some of my 5 and 4.5 star games that I would personally consider linear.

5 star games

• Astrobot
• Silent hill 2 (enhanced edition mod for PC, remake I'm still working through but it's good)
• Rayman origins
• Mario and Luigi superstar saga (borderline linear)
• Kingdom hearts 2 (you can pick the order of worlds at times and have the option to backtrack but not necessary
• Mother 3
• Re4 (og and remake both 10/10 to me)

4.5 star games

• Chants of sennaar
• Kirby super Star ultra
• Halo 2
• Rayman legends
• WolfenStein the new order
• Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney
• Dead Space
• The last of us
• the last of us 2 (has one shortish open area section)
• Alan wake 2 (has some open exploration areas at points)
• Celeste
• The case of the golden idol

I could go on, and some are borderline linear, but these are my faves that mostly involve going from one moment to the next

Edit: the site I've been using. Feel free to check out my list of played games ordered by rating if you want more. I have a lot on there: https://backloggd.com/u/chloyster/games/user-rating/type:played?page=1

Idk if I'd really consider it an ad for the book tbh. If anything it's an ad for another Eurogamer article, which is an interview they did with Jason. It's pretty common for sites like this to link to articles that have similar topics to keep you reading