Do you have an example of apps designed for creating bootable media switching to a paid model?

Thanks for explaining. I didn’t know it went unmaintained for a while. I thought programs like balenaEtcher and Rufus might have other issues I was unaware of like certain OSs not flashing correctly

You can check the emulation wiki and see which ones they recommend. I’m not sure which are available on F-Droid but most of them are available through a GitHub page

https://emulation.gametechwiki.com/index.php/Emulators_on_Android

Didn’t they produce a lot of content in the Vita modding scene?

I’m not surprised. TheFloW has done this before with PS4/5 exploits . A lot of players don’t update their firmware in the hopes they’ll be able to run something like HEN.

Grand Theft Auto IV gave players choice with actions instead of dialogue but I feel like the end result was similar to Cyberpunk.

Characters you decide not to kill will often help you for a bit but it doesn’t drastically effect the story. You still hit a notable point of no return that only really comes into play at the very end.

Personally that feels more like an adventure game. I don’t think Cyberpunk is very unique in what it did.

I feel like you could say that about most games though. I wouldn’t say Cities Skylines is an RPG but you are fulfilling the role of a mayor. Chirper adds to the immersion aspect but I don’t think that’s enough to shift the genre.

Maybe it’s a hot take though. Kind of similarly I wouldn’t call F.E.A.R. a horror game. I’d say it’s an FPS with horror elements.

How so? To mean it felt like Grand Theft Auto IV. You go around doing jobs for individuals and get thrown a handful of choices and possible romance options along the way but it still feels very linear.

Maybe it’s because I associate roleplaying with the idea of player choice but I really don’t think it added a ton to the RPG aspect. World depth? Sure but not by much.

Good point. I had forgotten about disabling network access. I think a majority of the games I paid for work off the idea that if you connect a few times or have a certain amount of plays times you can then play offline. Well the ones that check that is.

Maybe I’ll give this a go. Thanks for the advice

What data would be sent off having Google Play services installed? I get that you can disable certain permissions and can also use profiles.

Ideally I wouldn’t want to use profiles. I could use something like Shelter on a rooted device but that kind of slows down multitasking

Thanks but I’m shooting for as little contact with Google as possible

I’ve tried lucky patcher with a few games with minimal luck. I haven’t tried it with Stardew Valley though so maybe there’s a chance

Why not go NES?

You can also use a lot of USB controllers, or use something like a MayFlash adapter to use just about any controller you want.

You can do this in software too if you wanted to use something like a generic Logitech PC controller or an Xbox 360 controller. Very plug and play.

If they ever add a PS3 emulator to the PS5, or if the PS5 library grows in general, it could still overtake the PS3 in the future.

That’s something I was kind of disappointed with when it came to the PS4. I thought it might have PS3 backwards compatibility and be pretty much the perfect system for me. A lot of the games I have been playing the past couple years (on PC) were released for the PS4 like Control, Death Stranding, Dying Light, and Far Cry 4 to name few.

All that said I did phrase the question in a way that omits backwards compatibility, game costs (with the price of retro games these days it would be enough to keep me from picking anything sixth generation or below), emulation, and online play because I was more curious what generation of games people think they could play in a kind of stuck on a dessert island scenario. Ignoring all of that I feel like going with the most recent generation of Playstation would be the way I’d go. It’s moddable, online is still available, backwards compatible with a lot of PS2 games, and you don’t really need to worry about a lot of the typical wear if everything is digital.

Good point. I had a feeling someone might choose the SNES or NES for the big library alone but the SNES era definitely did have some unique games

I’ll have to check out some of the ones on your list I don’t recognise

Fair enough. I’d probably just go for the Xbox One in that case and deal with a few games still being moddable and supporting the keyboard and mouse as peripherals rather than give up on gaming

I game on PC myself but why would you quit gaming all together if you couldn’t do it on PC?

Any reason why? What games do you like on them?

They all run mainstream operating systems, and are basically locked down PCs in a fancy box.

I feel like Xbox is the only console running a mostly mainstream OS. The Playstation series is based off of FreeBSD and but I think that’s at a base level and a majority of what’s added is custom proprietary code. Considering gaming on FreeBSD really doesn’t surpass Quake I’d say it’s quiet different.

I’ve seen the Switch’s OS described as

Proprietary OS, derivative of Nintendo 3DS system software (partially Unix-like via certain components which are based on FreeBSD and Android)