Just want to drive by and mention - a friend told me to play DDLC and I was highly skeptical given the anime pin-up girl art style. I eventually gave in and gave it a shot.
It's an amazing "playable story" unlike anything I have ever played. Super creative and well worth the couple hours it takes to play. I think it could use a few trigger warnings and it should be rated PG-13 / R, but there's stuff on Netflix 10x more disturbing so I don't quite grok the Google push back on this one.
And it's also one of the most impressive displays of RenPy's capabilities you'll ever see.
Plenty of games do amazing things with ren'py that you wouldn't think were possible just by looking at the dialogue DSL. Maps, HUDs, minigames, incredibly dynamic pathways through the game. But DDLC takes it to a different level, partly by looking so "normal" on its surface.
In college I made some spare cash writing Ren'py games for some creatives online who had the writing and illustration chops, but needed programming help. At the time, DDLC was the model for great game design in Ren'Py. There are plenty of more technically impressive Ren'py games nowadays, but DDLC is still a terrific example of technical sophistication facilitating the story.
Ren'py is awesome by the way. A tour de force of software design, in my opinion.
If you only played it once without knowing the ending, I strongly recommend a second playthrough. Some dialogues and poems have a wildly different meaning once you know things.
Also, I fully recommend DDLP+ too. The extra stories don't have any real gameplay, but they are really good, and add.some depth to the characters.
1bil+ people have surrendered their right to artistic expression to Google, and another 1bil+ to Apple, and another 1bil+ to Microsoft. Many more billions have surrendered it to Visa and Mastercard. The world will only continue to get worse for the foreseeable future as five corporations assert global control over what is allowed to be published. It is mournful knowing that humanity's peak is behind us.
Hey, on the other hand, zero malware! It is zero, right? Please say it's zero...
Just today I found a malicious version of Ledger on the macOS app store. It's been there for five weeks, and there are already some anecdotes out there of people losing their coins.
I guess that's somehow the developer's fault for not "staking their claim" to their name, as Apple seems to only monitor for malicious duplicate submissions if the original is in the App Store to begin with...
Many European countries have had viable online alternatives since forever, and a lot of them are being consolidated into Werk, which will also enable physical payments
Many countries have alternatives already. In Poland Blik is ubiquitous and very very easy to use. And I love how it's implemented, Visa and MasterCard could learn from it.
Tldr - you open the app on your phone and it gives you a 6 digit BLIK code, you give that code to the seller, then a notification comes up on the app saying "seller X is trying to debit your account by amount Y, agree?". It's brilliant because then the seller gets nothing identifiable about you. Even if someone overhears the code, it's only valid 60 second so it's useless. Unlike with regular cards there is no risk of losing one or using a fake terminal that scans your card instead. And any transaction has to be explicitly rather than implicitly approved. Love it.
MS has mostly abandoned that approach now. But during Windows 8 days? Yeah. There was a legitimate concern that MS will lock down Windows and try to funnel everything through Microsoft Store, establishing an Apple-style walled garden.
The concern was serious enough that Valve took a defensive posture and started investing into Linux support. Which, at first, largely failed - but eventually resulted in Steam Deck.
For sure, and I'm glad they backed off from it. I'm also glad they did it because of how it pushed Valve into making Steam OS so good. But Microsoft really did want to go down the same path, and I do not trust them not to try it again.
The Surface RT that I tried absolutely was, and everything else I'm seeing to make sure I'm not misremembering shows that Windows RT was still locked down. So you should expand on what you mean.
Windows S Mode shows that Microsoft still thinks this is a good idea, too.
I wonder if this was coerced by Visa/MasterCard yet again, as they have done against many Japanese styled games in the past years. Despite some motions from the current administration, the payment processor monopoly seems keen on policing the public, which is one reason why crypto must still exist as a plan B payment method.
Maybe regulators can be bothered this decade to do something about these corporations abusing their power over mobile app distribution and payment processing.
The EU's DMA has been a step in the right direction, even if it's yet been fairly toothless with Apple and Google flouting it.
DDLC is a disturbing (good, but disturbing) game that opens as a bright cheerful one. So long as the description explained what the user is in for later on, I think Google shouldn't have done this. I haven't seen the Android version; I played it on PC, but as it is basically a "visual novel" I doubt there was very much difference between them.
wikipedia actually makes the game sounds interesting unlike a typical dating sim.
WARNING possible spoilers, don't read if you plan to play, but just know it's not just a dating sim.
> while it appears to be a light-hearted dating simulator, it is a metafictional psychological horror game that extensively breaks the fourth wall.
> Reviewers pointed out that the game's horror was built on the destruction of a sense of control over what happens in the game and the feeling of helplessness that stems from the distortions in the game's world
[Spoilers] For those who haven't played, DDLC has subject matter related to self-harm, mental health, suicide that sort of thing. It generally treats the subjects seriously. It has content warnings on it, so people know what they are getting into.
Its weird how we seem much more hung up on censoring video games we are than books or movies. There is way more disturbing books and movies out there. If this was a book i doubt anyone would care. There probably wouldn't even be content warnings on it.
On the other hand, maybe someone trying to ban you is how you know you have achieved the status of "great literature" like all the other banned books.
Self-harm (especially when depicting minors) has special standards. The recent court ruling on child safety against Meta probably led directly to this decision.
In a few months Google will automatically deploy new software on our devices. This will be for our benefit and to help protect us.
If you still want to sideload dangerous unnaproved applications, first just ask Google for permission and then a day later they'll let you sideload applications to your device. I'm so grateful that they are allowing us to do this and protecting us.
If you wait 18 years before being able to install apps outside Google Play you get a nice bonus of automatically becoming age verified in a private manner. So don't complain, it's for your own good.
Aside from the comments on the rest of this thread, I’ll point out this unique point:
If this game’s content is objectionable, where was Google 5 months ago when it was released? Are they admitting that they don’t review apps that are submitted? Do their reviewers have zero familiarity with major multi-platform game releases?
How are they justifying the availability of the Grand Theft Auto or Resident Evil series on the Android platform if this game can’t be published?
Hopefully this turns out to be some kind of error or misunderstanding that gets corrected.
Google and Apple know better than you what you want to play and what you want to do on your phone.
Visa and Mastercard know better than you what you want to buy.
Don't disagree with them, because they're only doing this for your own good.
It's an amazing "playable story" unlike anything I have ever played. Super creative and well worth the couple hours it takes to play. I think it could use a few trigger warnings and it should be rated PG-13 / R, but there's stuff on Netflix 10x more disturbing so I don't quite grok the Google push back on this one.
Doki Doki was created with the Ren'Py Visual Novel Engine by the way.
Plenty of games do amazing things with ren'py that you wouldn't think were possible just by looking at the dialogue DSL. Maps, HUDs, minigames, incredibly dynamic pathways through the game. But DDLC takes it to a different level, partly by looking so "normal" on its surface.
In college I made some spare cash writing Ren'py games for some creatives online who had the writing and illustration chops, but needed programming help. At the time, DDLC was the model for great game design in Ren'Py. There are plenty of more technically impressive Ren'py games nowadays, but DDLC is still a terrific example of technical sophistication facilitating the story.
Ren'py is awesome by the way. A tour de force of software design, in my opinion.
Games are still seen as something children engage in despite the average gamers being adults.
Also, I fully recommend DDLP+ too. The extra stories don't have any real gameplay, but they are really good, and add.some depth to the characters.
Just today I found a malicious version of Ledger on the macOS app store. It's been there for five weeks, and there are already some anecdotes out there of people losing their coins.
I guess that's somehow the developer's fault for not "staking their claim" to their name, as Apple seems to only monitor for malicious duplicate submissions if the original is in the App Store to begin with...
Any chance folks in the US can use these, in the US?
This is a genuine question, although I don't have my hopes up. It would be nice to have some actual competition / choices
Tldr - you open the app on your phone and it gives you a 6 digit BLIK code, you give that code to the seller, then a notification comes up on the app saying "seller X is trying to debit your account by amount Y, agree?". It's brilliant because then the seller gets nothing identifiable about you. Even if someone overhears the code, it's only valid 60 second so it's useless. Unlike with regular cards there is no risk of losing one or using a fake terminal that scans your card instead. And any transaction has to be explicitly rather than implicitly approved. Love it.
No Steam on Xbox Series X/S, last I heard.
> Apple
Steam still works on macOS, last I checked.
The concern was serious enough that Valve took a defensive posture and started investing into Linux support. Which, at first, largely failed - but eventually resulted in Steam Deck.
Windows S Mode shows that Microsoft still thinks this is a good idea, too.
The EU's DMA has been a step in the right direction, even if it's yet been fairly toothless with Apple and Google flouting it.
wikipedia actually makes the game sounds interesting unlike a typical dating sim.
WARNING possible spoilers, don't read if you plan to play, but just know it's not just a dating sim.
> while it appears to be a light-hearted dating simulator, it is a metafictional psychological horror game that extensively breaks the fourth wall.
> Reviewers pointed out that the game's horror was built on the destruction of a sense of control over what happens in the game and the feeling of helplessness that stems from the distortions in the game's world
And I guess it's not worth porting games for adults to walled gardens.
Note that i said games for adults, not adult content. If you're expecting porn, move along.
Provide the content, content provider
[Spoilers] For those who haven't played, DDLC has subject matter related to self-harm, mental health, suicide that sort of thing. It generally treats the subjects seriously. It has content warnings on it, so people know what they are getting into.
Its weird how we seem much more hung up on censoring video games we are than books or movies. There is way more disturbing books and movies out there. If this was a book i doubt anyone would care. There probably wouldn't even be content warnings on it.
On the other hand, maybe someone trying to ban you is how you know you have achieved the status of "great literature" like all the other banned books.
(I've never played it.)
If you still want to sideload dangerous unnaproved applications, first just ask Google for permission and then a day later they'll let you sideload applications to your device. I'm so grateful that they are allowing us to do this and protecting us.
If this game’s content is objectionable, where was Google 5 months ago when it was released? Are they admitting that they don’t review apps that are submitted? Do their reviewers have zero familiarity with major multi-platform game releases?
How are they justifying the availability of the Grand Theft Auto or Resident Evil series on the Android platform if this game can’t be published?
Hopefully this turns out to be some kind of error or misunderstanding that gets corrected.