Here's the problem with the Steam Deck, and every modern handheld. (And actually also the DSi XL noted in GP.)
The DS Lite can fit in your pocket. Comfortably. Not, like, technically fit, at the cost of making it uncomfortable to walk around. You can keep a DS Lite in your pocket all day, ready to be pulled out the moment you enter the crowded subway, or while in the doctor's office. Situations you didn't necessarily plan for.
The stupid Switch, and especially the even larger Steam Deck, I never actually have with me when I want it. All I have is my stupid iPhone, which is great for many things but doesn't have buttons, and it turns out you kind of need those for games. Developers have been trying, for nearly two decades now, to find ways to avoid buttons, and it even kind of works sometimes, but not really. Not when you want precise control over a character.
No one makes portable consoles anymore. I mean, they're portable in the way that a laptop is portable. They're handheld in the way a vacuum cleaner is handheld. But they're not portable like the DS Lite or GBA SP.
You can buy these little Android things designed for emulators, and I've almost bought them a few times, but I've pretty much already played all the NES games I want to play, and because there are very few new NES games being released, the library doesn't expand.
I gifted a Brick Hammer[1] to my
brother-in-law for Christmas. It's an amazing little device, form factor of a Gameboy Pocket and can run games from the PS1/N64 down to NES. The build quality is extremely high too (I got him the metal chassis version). I think it can even run 3DS games, but don't quote me on that.
Thanks, but same problem. I meant "NES" as a stand-in for "retro games".
Now, what I would almost certainly buy is a Steam Deck in that size. It doesn't need to be as powerful as a Steam Deck (impossible, of course), just enough to play 2D indie games.
Yes, that is mostly for portable PC games, and lacks what using PSP, PSP Vita, Game Gear, and all others have in convenience, battery, and game library, on games designed on purposed for tiny screens.
Many people talk about the Steam Deck, when in reality it isn't that much of a hit in units sold compared with any portable games console from Nintendo, SEGA, Sony.
Well Switch games aren't really designed for small screens either.
I haven't bought a Steam Deck because I think it's (1) too big (see my sibling comment on console size—to be fair I own a Switch 1 and 2, but the Steam Deck is even bulkier) and (2) too fiddly, this is the thing I've never liked about PC gaming.
For me the main issue with the Steam Deck and many other such devices is the battery life. I can play Nintendo DS for multiple days, whereas I have to charge every day or just keep the Steam Deck plugged into the charger.
Steam Deck is the device of my wildest childhood/teenage dreams. A fully functional portable Linux computer that also plays PC games, are you kidding me?! But I do get how it's not really in the same category of old school handhelds. I don't take it around much except within the house.
I once bought 4 air tags, never got to work them in any useful sense. I keep getting warnings about leaving my keys behind, which are in my pocket. I don't recall any time being warned about leaving things behind when I did. Can't really locate things a few meters away.
That’s so odd! They’ve worked exactly as promised for me. I never, ever get warnings about my own tags, or my wife’s tags that she’s shared with me. Not even once. And yesterday I used them to find my keys that the cats had relocated to across the house.
I don’t have any explanation for how our experiences could be so different, but they are. Mine even did the cool thing where you can watch your luggage move through an airport until you join up with it.
It seems like Apple should notify users that their AirTag disappeared and ask them if they would like instructions on replacing the battery or to remove it from their account.
I had this experience too. They beep like this if they're not near an updated iDevice logged into your account.
You'll have the same problem if you do something like: set the AirTag up on an iPad, but then carry around with an Android phone on you or just any phone not logged into your Apple Account. The beeping is the anti-stalking feature since it thinks it's separated from its owner.
Generally you tag your home as a trusted location, which eliminates most regular pings. Then you make sure that your Find My shows all of your tags; if you missed enrolling one and it still pings as a "stranger's tag" that can be a cause of confusion. (If you live with someone else, I've heard it is useful that you share your Find My data with each other.)
When actually traveling with your stuff there's a personal comfort question of how comfortable you feel in setting things like hotel rooms as "trusted" so you don't get a lot of pings when you leave things behind intentionally in places like hotel rooms. I think that's my biggest ask for AirTags is an easier way to set explicitly time-bound trusts: trust this exact hotel room until my checkout date; trust this exact office space until the end of this work day.
Ads feel good when they’re for something we’re actively in need of. But they usually aren’t, and they are also often scammy or scummy. I bet we’d feel a lot different about ads if these things changed.
Which can be a useful lesson sometimes (as the article mentions teaching that lesson with accidentally destroyed floppies). With burning one's own DVDs you potentially balance that fragility with easy replacement (just burn another copy).
reply