They all wish they were as clever, funny, and efficient as GLaDOS

Besides what the other commenter mentioned, there’s also existing services you can use instead of doing it all yourself and having to keep track of another VPS/Server

https://www.noip.com/remote-access

Especially if all you want to do is access your own server from outside your local off-grid network, then the free tier of the above service is probably perfect. Paid tiers give you a bit more features and can use your own TLD; Oracle also offers something similar that is paid.

Yea, that base building aspect and time constraints for the Avatar Project of XCOM2 is the one thing that I’ve never come across in any other similar turn-based game. Although Wesnoth has the veteran soldier idea, you can only recruit them again during battle and there’s no interaction or adjustments inbetween. Certainly no camp or base to keep track of.

I agree on Into The Breach! I think I’ve managed to play it more than XCOM2. FTL still beats both (combined) for me, though, in terms of how much time I’ve sunk into it 😅 Captain’s Edition mod never let’s you live your life…

Is anyone surprised? Maybe the surprising part is that she’s still alive and only got fired.

Yea, it’s a tough itch to scratch, for sure. I only have suggestions for games that have similar mechanics, but nothing that could be considered a straight up replacement for XCOM2.

• Battle for Wesnoth. Open-source, been around almost as long as the XCOM franchise, and very similar but in a fantasy setting and 2D with hexagonal grids. You can train new soldiers, or level-up veterans. They can die and you lose all your spent resources on them, etc. Loads of community made campaigns, too.
• Wasteland 1/2/3. Out of all of these, this is probably the closest to aesthetics and mechanics, but not entirely the same thing.
• Baldur’s Gate 3. Obviously more fantasy and diff rules, but the combat is close enough at higher levels of difficulty.
• Divinity Original Sin 2. Uses action point economy, but otherwise like BG3. Combat is close.
• Expeditions: Rome. There are other Expeditions games, but this is the latest. A bit closer to XCOM I think, but in a historical setting.
• Into The Breach. Not exactly the same, but not entirely different either. Different gameplay focus but all turn-based on a grid with RPG elements in between battles to level up your squad.

You are correct. I don’t have a My2K account and I’ve been playing XCOM2 on Steam for at least 2 years now.

Even when I played online on the PS5, no account needed.

Yes! I had the exact same thought after I got my Steam Deck and started using Arch again about a year ago. I remember it being clunky and awful, but now it’s so smooth and simple.

Granted I don’t do anything crazy, I pretty much just load a clip, SHIFT+R at a few time stamps, and render a new file. Maybe add a dissolve or fade. There wasn’t really much that could even do this simple stuff well before KDEnlive beefed up, at least not that I used.

It’s a really interesting thought, and under ideal circumstances would work IMO. Obviously things are never ideal and there would be all sorts of roadblocks and gotchas as something like this was developed. Things we could think of now, and other things we probably couldn’t. Not to mention the whole problem of, “who develops it and how much trust can you give them?”

As I was reading the idea, it made me think of the suits from A Scanner Darkly that the undercover narcs wore. Basically heavily obfuscated the voice and displayed always-changing patchwork human features to anyone observing from the outside, including trying to hide body shape. Something like that could get similar results. Obviously a video filter would be much easier to develop than a sci-fi suit, but still.

Hell yea, new album end of May!

Now we just need another Hail Mary Mallon album.

Yup, that was it!

Ahh, I’ve never actually used it before. Will give it a go and see.

Just from this screenshot, seems like it makes the water more blocky than it was.

side note: According to the article, this is primarily for the Bedrock version right now and the Java version will get it later.

I don’t think the SPF / DKIM / DMARC stuff is overly complex nor the core of the problem.

It’s not the core of the issue, but the average joe that is a hobbyist self-hoster it will be.

IMO, the core issue is that there is no standard whatsoever. People just do whatever the hell they want with these records, pretty much. Microsoft and Google do it differently than each other, even.

The only solution for me is that we move on from email as a society.

Yea, if you are not willing to be meticulous about learning/understanding all the DNS stuff (SPF/DKIM/DMARC), and plan to host this at home, don’t.

I ran this same system for a very long time on a VPS and had no problems with blacklists, but I’m also a career systems engineer that maintained enterprise systems and exchange servers.

Also note how I am speaking of MIAB in the past tense…

I think the better option is to try and avoid email as much as you can, just like SMS. Outdated tech and not secure. At that point, any ol’ existing email service is good enough.

I’ve been wondering the same. I think I’m in the 1-2 year mark currently.