Table of Contents

• What is Steam Deck?
• Steam Deck as a workstation
• Where I can get one?
• Why steam deck is best thing since sliced bread?

What is Steam Deck?

Steam Deck is a mobile, handheld gaming console and its primary are for playing games from Steam game library.

But there is one other, in our opinion, very important advantage of Steam Deck over other handhelds and gaming consoles in general. It’s not only a gaming console but also a Linux workstation, and mobile computer.

Most of us will use it to play some games from time to time sitting on the couch, or while on the road in a car or on the train, similar to Nintendo Switch.

Steam Deck as a workstation

This console can transform a workstation for students/children – add an external display, mouse, and keyboard and a full desktop is available for use to fill homework, do some projects, or do programming.

Yes, the most expensive version of the Steam Deck is about two times as expensive as Nintendo Switch, but the 2-in-1 aspect of the Steam Deck is very attractive, at least for us. If one is buying for their kids might be a good thing and probably could be some economy.

The cheapest version has a small amount of disk space, you can push in the micro SD card to extend the memory, which also would give you an opportunity to copy data from one desktop to another desktop or laptop if necessary.
There will be possible to upgrade the drive after the fact, but not everybody would be comfortable in doing so.

The pupil/student will need some kind of desktop or laptop to do their homework and Steam Deck could allow you to combine fun with studies, but well not everybody can do that. Steam deck could lower expenses as it would be possible to do the working and playing on the same device. Playing on the go, attach it to the dock and you can work on your projects, and tasks on it.
That’s for consideration for each person, maybe it’s better to get a laptop instead as working on the go on the laptop would be much more comfortable.

Where I can get one?

At the moment the device is possible to reserve, that costs 4 Euro. The first items are planned to ship around Christmas, but now, the waiting line is deep for the next year. The reservation is possible to cancel at any time if you could not wait and bought something else. You will get the reserved amount back in your digital wallet. Maybe it’s a good idea to reserve, just in case?

Why steam deck is best thing since sliced bread?

• Steam has a huge game library, there are discounts pretty often. If you have patience you can get good games for friendly prices. Well, new games at the hype moment will not come cheap on any platform and not all games that are on other platforms are on the steam store.
• The gaming console has a pretty open ecosystem. You will be able to install things that are not sold via the steam store. You will be able to install your own games or free games, such as Minetest, Hedgewars, Super tux kart, Super tux
• You will be able to run older gaming platforms emulators, for example, Dosbox, Fuse (ZX Spectrum), PlayStation, Nintendo
• If you want to install other game libraries, launchers: Gog, Epic Games
• Add mouse, keyboard, and display and use your steam deck as a desktop.
• You can also use it with a VR headset, that’s speculation, but my guess is that it will be possible, only need to see if the performance will be enough for VR. For sure there will be some reviews of this, just have to wait a bit until when the first items will be shipped.

It will be hard to find a similar versatile handheld gaming console, but everything has its drawbacks. For example, there will be games that will be exclusive to one or another platform and not available on the Steam store, but this goes both ways, not all games that can be found in the Steam library can be played on PlayStation, Xbox, or Nintendo Switch

The post Steam Deck – handheld gaming console, computer appeared first on Gudlenieks.

Table of Contents

• Minetest? You mean Minecraft right?
• Minetest is free and opensource
• Minetest works on any potato
• Minetest works on several platforms
• A lot of possibilities to extend via mods
• Can play locally by yourself or together with friends
• Can play with friends anywhere in the world

Minetest? You mean Minecraft right?

We encourage to build towers in the real life from real blocks, but there is no way to live nowadays without digital world.
This could be awesome hobby for “dark” time of the year, to build dream house in virtual world. Who knows it might be a starting for realizing this idea in the real world.
Minecraft does not need advertising, so we encouraging to check, try out Minetest. So we compiled list of things that we think is better or different from Minetest.

• Free and opensource game
• You can play it on almost any potato
• Available on several platforms (Windows, Linux, Android)
• Free of charge extensions and add-ons, also can build your own extensions
• Can play on local network with friends
• Or play via internet with friends over the world.

Minetest is free and opensource

Although the software/game itself is free might be that you will need to invest your time and nerves to get you want.
Minetest will work without an issue, you can play around by yourself or you can connect to some of the public servers.

But if you will want to create your own world and connect several kids or kids friends you will need to read quite a bit.
If you need some help you can surely contact us, we will try to help out.
The mod setup is relatively easy (have to copy one folder into another), you have to find the right folders and for regular users this might be a challenge.
Any case its worth tinkering around, cause when 7 cousins are building and destroying together its ultimate fun, more importantly in times when meeting in person is restricted.

Minetest works on any potato

Minetest requirements are not high. You can download it on Android to test it out, but of course its much comfy to play on the computer, good thing is that you don’t need powerful pc to game Minetest on.
We have played on more than decade old computers and it runs pretty well.
The fact that you can run it on older hardware is pretty important in cases when you want to play the game with friends or relatives and might be that not everybody has resources or hardware to play Minecraft.

If you have in somewhere lying around old dusty laptop, with flat battery and the hinges one the bring of the breaking. This could be good machine to tryout the Minetest and could give the second life to the hardware.
That what we are doing when some kids friends arrive and some one is without device to play on Minetest.

Minetest works on several platforms

Linux, Windows, Andorid those we have tested and setup of the game is pretty straight forward. From documentation we can see that its possible also to get it on MacOS. But (at least for now) iOS not available. iOs is closed ecosystem and its hard to get ported opensource software to the iOs as there is no particular owner/company behind it, and as its hard to get third party software, its tough to get open source projects on iOs as all software have to go trough the AppStore and its not the easiest thing to do.

A lot of possibilities to extend via mods

Possibilities are so many. Trains, electronics, doors, chairs, computers, animals, cars, fighter jets…. and so on. But sometimes some mod could be in conflict with some other mod. That’s why it good strategy is add mods one by one and see whats happens by playing the game.
Mods can be found here.
While playing around we have made our own blocks just for test if we can, you can do and only thing you need is a bit of time and interest in doing so.

Can play locally by yourself or together with friends

Download the game and go ahead. Can play survival game, different puzzle games or play around in creative mode. If friends comes around, you can play together on local network. Well, first, you should know what is local network, that could be a challenge to some of the users.
But all challenges are for us to get smarter.

Can play with friends anywhere in the world

There are several open Minetest worlds, where you can meet friends and relatives view, get inspiration from other Minetest players and communities.

Write if you have any question or suggestion. We will try to help out.

The post Minetest / Minecraft appeared first on Gudlenieks.