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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 15th, 2023

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  • If you liked Skyrim, check out Enderal - it’s a total conversion mod, but in Steam as it’s own game. It’s much more linear than Skyrim - the world still feels open, but it’s much more dense, and it’s scaled more like a traditional RPG, so if you wander off the intended path too far, you’ll get your ass beat by mobs that are much higher level than you.

    Side quests are meh, with a notable exception of the Rhalata line, which is kind of like a combo of thieves guild and dark brotherhood. Main quest line is fucking wild.

    If you skip the vast majority of side quests, you might have an issue with scaling, since you’ll be missing out on all that xp. If you run into that and don’t want to do the quests, just use the command console to cheat some in.







  • Enderal.

    I’ll edit this later when I can post from my comp (mobile now) with the full pitch as promised:

    Enderal

    Basically an indie dev crew broke skyrim down to its most basic assets, then rebuilt a completely new game using them. AND IT’S SO FUCKING GOOD. Completely new lore / game universe (has nothing at all to do with elder scrolls, tamriel, etc), new voice acting, terrain, music, you name it.

    Steers away from common story tropes to the point that there isn’t really an antagonist in the traditional sense - but it uses concepts, emotions, philosophies, etc as the driving force for the main story line and some of the larger quest chains.

    This game is an absolute passion project by the devs, which is something we don’t see often now-a-days.

    Note: link above is to the version that uses Skyrim SE’s assets (the 2016 re-release). If you have the original version of skyrim, use this link instead. If you own a different version of Skyrim, there might be a compatible version of Enderal here: https://sureai.net/games/enderal/

    Fair warning: the children NPC voice acting is even worse than the kids in Skyrim. The TAI (toggle AI) command can shut them up without breaking them.

    Fair warning 2: they redid combat. The OP shit in Skyrim, like the sneaky archer build, will get your ass beat to a pulp in Enderal. Make a save when you get to the point where you can spend some talent points, experiment with a few styles, and go from there.

    Fair warning 3: It’s built on Skyrim’s assets, which means it has all of Skyrim’s problems. Step on a basket full of cabbage just right; get launched into low orbit. Quest items clipping through the floor. Bounty that refuses to go away. Shit like that. Save frequently, and don’t be afraid to use the command console to do things like magic in a lost item or force a broken quest to progress to the next stage.


  • IBM SK-8845 Ultranav USB keyboard

    IT’S GOT THE RUBBER MOUSE NIPPLE AND EVERYTHING! Fucking lol, that’s amazing. I’m tempted to go that route just for pure nostalgia sake… I should probably avoid anything that’s long-discontinued though, as I probably wouldn’t be able to repair it if it stopped working, and then I’d be back at square one.

    Cherry MX Brown switches

    The actual post in the center of those is brown, right? I popped a key off, and the ones in mine are kind of a yellow-orange color like the Helios v2 ones you posted, but with a black housing. The noise they produce is pretty much entirely from the bottom of the keycap hitting plastic when it bottoms out (which is significantly dampened by rubber o-rings I added to it) and then another plastic-on-plastic sound on release… which maybe that is the components of the switch hitting itself? Most of the noise is from release. Slowly depressing a key until it bottoms out, then slowly releasing it so that all of the plastic-on-plastic collisions are super gentile, a keystroke makes virtually no noise.


  • Kind of intrigued by this option as well. My knee-jerk is that this is 100% outside of my skill level: I’ve never done any kind of real circuitry type stuff. Is there a for-dummies guide you’re aware of that treats the reader like an absolute dumbass who needs adult supervision through the entire project? …cuz that’s what I’d probably need to not fuck this up. At the same time, I do kinda love the idea of making my own unique board!


  • I would bet dollars to donuts you would love something along these lines if you swapped out the standard keycaps with low profile ones.

    I’ve never even heard of magnetic switches. I’m intrigued! Trying to imagine the feel of spring pushing against a magnet, I think I you’re right: that sounds like it would feel great! I’m going to hit a few local electronics stores to see if I can find one to try out - seems like an endcap-display kind of thing.

    Skimming that second link you posted, I see a few options on the keycaps, but none that say low profile. Would that be a 3rd party purchase thing, or am I overlooking something from Keychron?

    The magnetic switches themselves don’t actually click, right? I pulled up some reviews and it still sounds clicky, but I’m guessing that’s the plastic-on-plastic sound of the keycap hitting the post… so, does the rubber o-ring trick work with these to make it fairly silent?

    The Ornata also looks like a solid choice per my wishlist. I haven’t had great luck with Razer - tbh, part of me’s been looking forward to the Blackwidow finally breaking so I’d have an excuse to be done with them. But… a match is a match!

    Thanks for the feedback!


  • key roll-over

    I’ve heard people mention that issue with membranes. In a gaming context, the most I ever see myself hitting would be while sprinting diagonally (shift, W, A or D), jumping (space) and using an item or ability (1), for a total of 5 simultaneous key presses.

    …is 5 within reason for the cheapies? …and do any of them have supporting software that isn’t shit? I had a Logitech gaming mouse a few years ago and writing macros on that trash was a nightmare.