Kawaii Koneko

Nekopara's biggest appeal is that it is just so damn cute lol. Who could say no to those catgirls? And yeah, the R18 scenes are pretty amazing compared to other VNs. Dead Island is loads of fun. I never played Riptide since it looked like it was basically the same game as the first one, just with new missions. I don't care what anyone says about Dead Island. It may be a hot glitchy mess but it is an incredibly fun hot glitchy mess. It's a great game to play with friends.

Do you feel like their selection has really improved?

Haha, I just realized I incorrectly read what you wrote. I thought you meant the one as in the model after, not the One as in the name of the remote. My brain is foggy today lol. I just noticed that for $17 more, I can get a refurbished One that comes with the smartbase (or whatever it is called). Since I misplace my remotes all the time, that might be a useful thing to have. I use an HTC M9 and it has an IR blaster built in so I can already use it as a remote (that has already saved me on countless occasions lol) but I wouldn't have to worry about line of sight if I had the base. Hmmm.

Which one do you have exactly? The one after the 650 is the 665 which isn't touchscreen and after that is the 950 you had. Honestly, one of the main reasons I was willing to spend so much more this time was for better button reliability. I'm not sure if a touchscreen is really that important for a remote. So if I'm not getting better buttons, I might just go with the 665. I don't want to drop so much money on a remote if it is going to break anyway. But if the touchscreen helps prevent button wear, maybe it is worth it. Idk.

So I've been using the Logitech Harmony series of remotes for probably a decade now. I've had the 350, 600, and 650 and they all seem to have one fatal flaw, the buttons wear out over time. Of the five or so that I've had, every one has had the buttons eventually wear out. They would either stop working completely or require pressing extremely hard to get them to register. I'm considering buying the Ultimate One but I'm concerned about the buttons. Are they the squishy kind like on the lower end remotes or do they have a nice tactile click? Are the buttons more reliable on the higher end Harmony remotes? Does anyone have any experience with the Ultimate One when it comes to reliability? I see one of the bigger complaints with the remote is that the buttons are actually too sensitive. This is the remote in question: https://www.amazon.com/Logitech-915-000224-Harmony-Ultimate-One/dp/B00IAKLM54/ref=sr_1_6?s=audio-video-accessories&ie=UTF8&qid=1508892810&sr=1-6&keywords=harmony+remote

I have Crunchyroll, Funimation, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon. There is no one perfect source. They all have their pros and cons. Amazon is by far the worse. Their selection is a joke. It's very frustrating that not everything is included with Prime so you have to pay extra for a lot of content. Netflix is okay but their yellow subs are ugly to look at and I'm not even an elitist when it comes to font type, size, etc. They are inconsistent when it comes to subs vs dubs as well. Sometimes they will only have subs for a show that is dubbed and sometimes you are stuck with a dub when you only want subs. I prefer subs so this is a big downer for me. Funimation looks the best IMO and was my prefered streaming site since they get BD releases meaning uncensored content. If you prefer dubs, then Funimation is for you. Fortunately, they have dual audio for their home releases. Unfortunately, due to their new arrangement with CR, they no longer have subs for simulcast shows, they only have dubs. So they have become utterly useless for me when it comes to shows that are still airing. I have to either wait until Funi gets a home release or just go to CR. They do have a really good selection though. Crunchyroll - They have very few home releases meaning even years after a show has aired, you will be stuck with the censored version. However, pretty much everything is sub only which is great for me since subs are 99% of what I watch. They have a great selection as well. Hulu - I subscribed specifically for all the Sentai releases. They seem to get a lot of them. I imagine they have some kind of deal worked out with Sentai for exclusive rights, at least for some shows. They seem to have a very good selection in general. However, too much of their anime is not in HD for some reason. I can't understand how in the world that is in this day and age. I started watching some shows on Hulu and had to switch to CR because they weren't in HD. Lame.

If anyone could chime in, I would REALLY appreciate it. The X comes out in five days so I need to get this stuff ordered fast. That's okay bro.

That is a 1080p splitter, not 4k. Like I mentioned in my post, I actually own that very splitter. I use it for 1080p and under game capture.

Well, you may be right. The question is whether or not simply downloading pirated content is criminal or not. The FBI is pretty clear about criminal copyright infringement. "The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to five years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000." I'm actually having trouble finding a story about someone being arrested for simply downloading something without sharing. Everything I find seems to just involve them getting sued and/or fined.

I'm not a lawyer but I'm pretty sure you can be arrested for software piracy, even if you are just an end user. However, it rarely ever happens unless they want to make an example. Generally, they go after the people who are actually distributing pirated material, not just Jimmy in his bedroom downloading a cracked game. It is important to note that even if you are just downloading for personal use, you could potentially get in trouble for distribution. Every torrent program I have ever used has had seeding enabled by default. Most people just run with the default settings so they are technically distributing pirated material when they download an illegal torrent. So if they really wanted to get you, they could. I actually download stuff that I already own and I often worry that I will get in trouble for it. I have several of my consoles and handhelds modified so they can play backup games. So when I buy a brand new game for that system, I'll just download a torrent of it and keep the original sealed. Also, if I buy an album, movie, TV show, etc off Amazon or something and I don't want to wait for it to arrive in the mail, I will download it. Of course, I own a legal copy so I'm not doing anything wrong but I still worry that I would deal with a bunch of legal nonsense.

I picked up Nekopara Vol. 1 for $4.99 from Steam awhile back. It is $10 now but I believe they still run occasional sales on it. You can get Vol. 0 for like $2.99 or something. It doesn't have an official Linux port but Vol. 1 is listed as gold on WineDB. I have a fair amount of visual novels in my wish list that often drop to around the $5 mark. I have such a backlog of games that I haven't bothered picking them up but because of this, I see their sale activity. I did manage to pick up GTA IV: Complete Edition and Fading Hearts for $8.99 (only four dollars over $5 lol). How did you manage that? @Radium_AngelI see Civ III is only $4.99 on Steam right now.

Yeah, like has been said, this will work but it is highly inefficient. Not only will the energy received be minute but you are using one energy source (the flashlight batteries) to create energy. We do this all the time to make electricity but in this case, it makes no sense. However, if you had one of those windup flashlights, you could do this in a pinch I guess. Like if it was the Apocalypse or something lol. This reminds me of when I was a kid and I was fascinated by those solar polar calculators (I'm old enough that I grew up with real calculators and not phone calculators lol). I would hold them under lamps and flashlights to make them light up or slowly cover the panels to make the display slowly dim before my eyes lol.

Thanks for the suggestion but that is a switcher, I need a splitter and audio extractor.

This isn't the exact article I was reading before but it mentions what I read in the past and it touches on the ruling that you linked me to. https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/other/new-crackdown-on-kodi-boxes-launched-heres-how-it-affects-you/ar-BBzBTsJ "In a landmark ruling in 2014, the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled that internet users who look at copyrighted material online aren't breaking the law by doing so, citing Article 5.1 of the EU Copyright Directive. It stated that copies of copyrighted material that appear "on the users computer screen" and "in the internet 'cache' of that computer's hard disk" are "temporary" and "may therefore be made without the authorisation of the copyright holders"." From what I can tell here, this recent ruling is very narrow in that it directly relates to streaming devices and doesn't override the previous ruling. That is, if I am reading this correctly.

Funny you say that because I know a lot of Westerners think Western games are crap and they prefer Japanese games lol. Personally, I love both. Parasite Eve is one of my favorite series ever and just as a testament to how great of a game the original was, I didn't first play it until well into the 7th generation of consoles so by then the graphics were were quite outdated. Of course FF is fantastic as well. Well, I had it hooked up to old 40" Toshiba Regza (I don't have the exact model number on hand) and I thought it looked really good all things considered. I had it running through my Denon 3808CI though so it was working its magic to make the picture look a little better while upscaling it, so that may have helped. I was using component cables for the best possible quality and would never stretch out a 4:3 image. I think that helped quite a bit. I know a lot of people can't stand having black bars on the side and will stretch the image out. I always install a widescreen patch if one is available though. So yeah, I was pretty happy with the quality. It may have looked better hooked up to something from the era but playing on a modern display (if you can call my really old Regza modern) was an enjoyable experience. Now, that said, I just bought a new 55" Sony X900E which happens to be a 4k display. I have not yet played PS2 on it since I've only had the TV a few days but I have a feeling my eyes will really need to adjust. Honestly, I feel like 7th gen games like on the 360 actually look better on my old 1080p display than they do on my new one. Even playing 1080p games on modern consoles can reveal a lot more imperfections than were previously noticeable. Next time I play my PS2, I can let you know how it looks on a modern 4k display. Also, the PS2 is actually able output 480p. You have to press X and triangle when starting the console to initiate it and not all games support it. Here is a list of games that do: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_PlayStation_2_games_with_alternate_display_modes I highly recommend picking up a fat and throwing in a hard drive. It's pretty sweet because then you can replace the English dub with the Japanese audio track in some cases when dual audio wasn't offered and you can install widescreen patches. I believe you can force 480p in some cases where the game didn't natively support it as well. At least IIRC. Modding my PS2 was one of the best things I have ever done.

I kind of agree with this. They all are super fun when they work but too often you are left flailing around like an idiot while trying to get your moves to register properly. I have a Wii, PS Move, and both Kinects. I pretty much always opt to use normal controllers instead. When I do opt for motion control, I often end up switching back lol. At least the Kinect gives you the added bonus of voice control. I use it all the time on my XBox One for media and will be buying the adapter for the X as well. I can't live without it lol.

Or games that just don't benefit a ton from being on PC. I prefer to play all my Japanese games on the PS4 over the PC. Why? 1) Physical copy (yes, I still care about this lol) 2) I get to add to my trophy collection 3) There just isn't that big of a difference in many cases. 4) Sometimes they can be more hassle on the PC. For instance, Gal Gun Double Peace. I'm working on getting all the trophies for it on the PS4 and I haven't experienced a single bug. I was just looking on the Steam forums and people are having a ton of problems. I'd just rather not deal with that for a game like GGDP. If it was a AAA shooter or something, sure, I would mess around to get it running just right on PC but for an offline RPG, it isn't worth it for me. 5) Sometimes my friends get the console version and I want to play with them. I played through The Division twice now on PS4 and it was a great experience. Sure, I would have loved to play with with a m/k (especially for a game like the Division) and have better graphics, but ultimately, playing with my friend was way more important. 100% agreed. I have a gaming PC and will probably upgrade to a GTX 1070 at some point so it will be quite capable, but I still play my consoles a ton, everything from the PS2 to the XBox One. I even play a little mobile and handheld (PSP and Vita). Because of this, I have a very rich gaming experience. There isn't much that I can't play. Sure, the PC is better in many ways but consoles have their advantages too. You will have to pry them out of my cold, dead hands lol.

I wish I could find the link to the article I was reading concerning consumption of pirated content but from what I remember, at least in the EU, it isn't actually illegal to view pirated content from say a stream. Of course, if one were to download the content, then it would be illegal. Don't quote me on this but that is how I remember it. That said, depriving artists of the revenue they deserve is bad. I'm not unsympathetic to those with hindrances to legitimate access, but it's best to support content creators whenever possible. Also, if one were to choose to pirate, a stream would generally be the last place I would turn. Given the OP's desire for quality, I would do a little Googling for a torrent because it's possible to find some pretty good quality rips with surround sound intact. You can even sometimes find lossless rips.

I would check out the Sony X900E. For the price, this seems to be the TV to beat. It has an excellent price to performance ratio. It isn't OLED it looks pretty good. The biggest drawback is that it doesn't support Dolby Vision but this may or may not be an issue for you. If you really want it, you could step up the 930 (I can't remember the exact model number but it is the next model up). This should still be within your budget for the 55" version. I personally just bought one and so far like it. My biggest complaint is that it doesn't seem to handle upscaling lower resolution content that well. I'm not too happy with how the picture looks when upscaling. However, from what I understand, Sony is really good when it comes to upscaling so I imagine it would only be worse if I went with another TV. Anyway, check out some of the reviews for these units. They are getting a lot of praise.

Well, I finally bought a 4k HDTV, a Sony X900E. With the XBox One X right around the corner, I just couldn't hold off any longer. Unfortunately, I don't have a 4k surround receiver. I currently have a Denon AVR-3808CI which is only a 1080p receiver. Between the TV, the mount, and the upcoming XBox One X, I just dropped over $2k USD. So I'd rather not buy a new surround receiver right now. However, I just can't live without my surround sound. I know I could use the the optical out on the XBox One X but then I wouldn't get HD audio. So it seems like I'm going to need some kind of HDMI audio extractor so I can run the audio over HDMI to my receiver and bypass the receiver for the video. So in addition to that, I'll also need a 4k splitter. I would very much prefer a splitter that strips the HDCP for game capture purposes. This isn't that important though. If the price gets too high, I'll hold off on something that can strip the HDCP as I don't currently have a 4k capture device anyway. 3D support is not at all required, HDR is support is required, and of course, it needs to be able to handle HD audio. The thing is, I'm really not sure what to get. As this will only be temporary until I'm ready to upgrade my receiver, I really don't want to spend that much. Here is what I'm considering: Splitter: ViewHD VHD-4k1X4: This is a bit overkill in terms of outputs however, based on the comments, it does strip HDCP. I currently have a VHD-1X2MN3d which I use for my 1080p game capture and it works great so I have experience with ViewHD and it is good. At just a little over $30 USD, it's priced reasonably. I'm not sure if it supports HDR though. https://www.amazon.com/ViewHD-Splitter-Programmable-Settings-Outputs/dp/B01L0R639I/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1509555701&sr=8-1&keywords=viewhd+4k+splitter This one is dead cheap and is a number one seller on Amazon. I'm not sure if this can strip HDCP but it does support HDR. https://www.amazon.com/Bi-direction-Manual-Switch-Passthrough-Supports-DotStone/dp/B01L8LLP2G/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1509556100&sr=8-10&keywords=4k+splitter Audio extractor: This seems to support both DTS-HD and Dolby TrueHD and is reasonably priced at $50 USD. https://www.amazon.com/J-Tech-Digital-Extractor-Converter-Bandwidth/dp/B074HHSJVN/ref=sr_1_3?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1509556678&sr=1-3&keywords=4k+audio+extractor&dpID=41jtTlo-OAL&preST=_SY300_QL70_&dpSrc=srch This one is a little cheaper at $30 USD. https://www.amazon.com/AV-Access-Extractor-Converter-Amplifier/dp/B01IHBG458/ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1509556678&sr=1-4&keywords=4k+audio+extractor&dpID=41YxmsSGUAL&preST=_SY300_QL70_&dpSrc=srch What do you guys think? Would you recommend any of these or do you have any other suggestions? Thanks in advance!

It is well known that Apple has incredibly fierce brand loyalty. Android has a higher market share than IOS but yet you don't see comparable Android Wear sales. It isn't because they are bad devices either. Many Android users just don't feel they offer enough utility to justify the cost. Android Wear devices and the Apple Watch are quite similar functionality wise. At the end of the day, their main purpose is to deliver notifications. So unless Apple users take notifications more seriously than Android users, it's pretty easy to reason many of them are buying the Apple Watch just because it is an Apple accessory. I don't think most Apple users would even consider purchasing a non-Apple smartwatch no matter what it did. I haven't heard anything to the effect of Android Wear having an unfriendly environment to developers or anything like that. Or are you referring simply to the app count?

What is it exactly you want to know? I have the K70 RGB with Reds. I absolutely love it. It's great for both gaming and typing. I couldn't be happier with my purchase.

Same here. I don't know a single person who owns one. That said, I absolutely can't live without mine. I've actually turned the car around to go back home and get it when I've forgotten it, even when I was already 5-10 minutes away from home. It's Apple. If they put out an iToaster, Apple fanboys would run out and buy it lol. A majority market share doesn't necessarily mean the watch is better than an Android Wear device. In what way? You really don't need that much of a backend for a smartwatch. I'm still rocking my Asus Zenwatch from 2014 and it is far from what I would call half baked. It does pretty much everything I want a smartwatch to do and does it relatively well. Granted, Android Wear did go through a substantial update since then but I completely disagree that the Apple Watch transformed the smartwatch space. There were some half baked smartwatches before it, that's for sure, but there were some really good ones as well. The only criticism I have with my Zenwatch is that the heart rate monitor and step counter aren't that great but I didn't buy it for those features anyway. The only reason I would upgrade to a new smartwatch is for WiFi support but even that isn't driving me to go out and buy one right now. I'm quite happy with my pre-2015 smartwatch.

Honestly, for me it just isn't worth it yet. I like the older Mario games but have no interest in the newer ones and Zelda isn't really interesting to me either. So there really isn't a reason to buy one. I'm waiting for some good exclusives. Buying it for a multiplat isn't worth it for me since if I want portability, I can just use Remote Play on my Vita from the PS4. I'm not trying to bash Nintendo but that's just how I feel. I honestly hope that some good exclusives come out for the Switch because it is a pretty nice handheld for the most part. So I'm going to wait until some more come out before I buy. Then again, I was waiting for some more exclusives that interest me to come out for the Wii U and in the end there were only like four or five. Yeah, when more games come out, I would say it could make a great second gaming system but it definitely isn't something I'd want for a primary gaming device for the AAA titles. Also, Satania-chan best girl.

To be honest, while 60 fps is nice, playing at 30 doesn't really bother me. In fact, I generally crank my graphics as high as I can at the expense of fps. As long as I don't drop below 30 fps, I'm pretty happy. I'd rather have the game look as sharp as possible. it isn't that I don't notice the difference between 30 and 60 fps. 60 fps does feel more "fluid" but it doesn't take my brain long to adjust to a lower fps. That isn't to say that I don't want a high fps which is one of the reasons I want to upgrade my current GPU setup, but it just isn't as big of a deal to me as it is some other people.