I learned to play piano when I was pretty young and my parents wanted me to learn an instrument. Real acoustic piano, music theory, private tutor, recitals, the works. I stopped playing after high school and my lessons ended though, mainly since it felt like it was just another chore and I wasn't enjoying it or playing pieces of my own volition. It's been over a decade since then and most of my free time has been in video games instead. The piano's still there but it's been just another piece of furniture for the most part. I've never seriously considered dusting it off and trying it again, and I'm pretty sure I've forgotten everything I've learned at this point.

Recently though, I got the chance to play Taiko no Tatsujin in an arcade for the first time while in Japan and I enjoyed it a lot despite being a total amateur, and I wanted to go back and play more to get better. That's when a thought crossed my mind - if I could gamify piano playing too, wouldn't that be a good way to trick myself into learning and enjoying piano again?

So I did some digging into what gamified piano software was around now, and Piano Marvel seemed to be the one most suited for being both beginner friendly and also for sight reading. The software itself offers a fair bit of beginner content for free, with the more advanced stuff behind a subscription. You can also connect it to a digital piano to track key presses and score your performance, which is the important gamification part that sets it apart from me just pulling up some YouTube tutorials and trying to follow them.

So I did some digging into digital pianos to see what would work for me learning and budget wise. From what I could glean off of various subreddit and other forum posts, if the end goal is to learn piano and not keyboard, an 88-key with weighted keys is the only thing that comes close, which bumps the cost up to a minimum of about 400 USD for the cheapest decent one, a Yamaha P45. If I didn't have a piano that cost would be fine, but I do and it most definitely sounds better, I just can't connect it to software or plug headphones into it so I don't bother my family if I'm playing at night, and I kind of want both of those. I'm also slightly concerned that my parents might be a bit upset if I do get a keyboard since, again, there's a perfectly good acoustic piano right there that they definitely paid more than 400 bucks for, though I imagine they'd be happy to just see me take an interest in learning piano again.

The most important part of this is that I actually commit to it and play regularly, since it'll all be for nought if I lose interest or turn it into a chore again and stop playing after a few weeks or months. I don't know if a gamified piano software will actually do that for me or if I just don't actually like playing piano after all, but I would like some thoughts. Is there other good software for relearning piano in a fun way? Any keyboard recommendations, preferably not too expensive? Am I being a coward and should I just use my acoustic piano instead?

The other day, I happened to stumble on a YouTube video where the creator explored the problem of “discoverability” of video games on platforms like app stores, Steam, and Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo’s shops. That’s something that has been bothering me for a long time about the Apple App Store.

By pure coincidence though, this morning, as I was browsing through the “You Might Also Like” section at the bottom of a game that I am interested in, I began to go down a rabbit hole where I ended up finding a good handful of games I had played on Steam that I wasn’t aware were available on iOS/iPadOS as well. It’s quite sad, because these are games that I really enjoyed, and I paid for them on Steam, a platform that Valve (understandingly) neglects on macOS, whereas I could have played them optimized for iOS/iPadOS.

The creator in the YouTube video didn’t really have a solution for this problem, and it seems to me that as the industry grows, and more and more “slop” begins to flood these platforms, it will only become harder and harder to discover the good indie games buried underneath it all.

I feel this intense urge inside me to start some kind of blog or website to provide short reviews so that at least some people will discover these games. We definitely need more human curation.

I’m also appalled that so many of these games on the Apple App Store have little to no ratings. No one makes an effort to leave behind a few words so that other people can get an idea of whether it’s worth to invest their money in a game.

I guess that there isn’t really anything that can be done about the issue of discoverability. As an indie developer and publisher, you just have to do the that best you can to market your game, and hope to redirect potential customers to your website or socials, where you should clearly list all the platforms that your game is available on (surprisingly, a lot of developers don’t do this). But that’s about all that you can do. The rest is luck.

I've been deep in learning how to rewire sections of my house, trying to understand the logic behind my older (1950s-era) electrical system. In the process, I came across a free game on Steam called Wired developed by the University of Cambridge's Engineering Department. It's a puzzle game that gradually introduces core concepts in circuitry and logical flow. It doesn't replace proper training, but it is an engaging supplement compared to reading electrical code books.

But anyways, I though I would ask about games that don't just entertain but also teach. Not strictly edutainment in the shallow sense, but games that impart understanding, intuition, or practical knowledge through their mechanics.

What are some games you've played that taught you something substantial? I'm thinking anything from real world skills, conceptual insights, functional knowledge, or anything that stuck with you after playing.

Hello Tildes!

I've been trying out a lot of open-source apps these past few months but I've always hosted them on a VPS. It's been great and educational so far. However, I started considering to host my very own server on-prem so that my data is absolutely physically with me and nowhere else.

With that short intro, I'd like to say I'm in the market for a home server. I can install OS's, docker containers, etc. And that's how I managed to install Jellyfin, Immich, Paperless, Portainer, etc on my VPS right now.

What out-of-the-box miniPC can be good for someone dipping their toes in the home server scene? I feel like I might need the storage to be extendable somehow? And it must be able to stream music and video through Jellyfin.

The choices in YouTube videos are overwhelming that I keep jumping from saying "ooh I'll get that" to "oh wait maybe I'll get that other one".

I also am not very handy in terms of hardware so I would prefer something out-of-the-box (if possible). Maybe a max budget of 500? But around 400 euros would be preferred. (Edit: In EU also, if possible)

Thanks for reading! Hope to hear from you guys!

It just so happens that I was asked to write a paper about goals I hadn't achieved and I just thought about how I haven't touched my video game engine project in any meaningful way for around two months or so. On reflection, the main thing that is preventing me from working on it is that when I try to get back into it, I don't really know what I'm doing. I'm unorganized and can't figure out what exactly to do next because it's so open-ended. I'm absolutely terrible about writing down plans for what I should do.

I know that I'm not the only person who is trying to work on big solo projects, so I thought I'd ask: what are you doing to keep your project organized? Are you using any tools to help you? What do you find is most helpful to help you anticipate steps you'll need to address when things aren't very clear?

Tildes is a very serious site, where we discuss very serious matters like socialism, videos and gender affirming care. Tags culled from the highest voted topics from the last seven days, if anyone was obsessive.

But one of my favourite tags happens to be offbeat! Taking its original inspiration from Sir Nils Olav III, this thread is looking for any far-fetched offbeat stories lurking in the newspapers. It may not deserve its own post, but it deserves a wider audience!

Inspired by my long-ago try at Witcher 3, during which I died in the tutorial by falling off a platform. Yeah, definitely one of the lamest deaths possible. Gotta wonder what the others present thought about the legendary Geralt of Rivia dying from a simple fall, like geez isn't this guy supposed to be a living legend who's faced giant monsters that could fell armies?? I'm pretty sure the tutorial was a dream of a memory so his death didn't matter, but since then I've wondered:

How screwed would various video game worlds be if the hero dies during the tutorial of all things?

Figured this might be a fun question to ponder since there's so many possibilities. So think of any game with a tutorial where you can die, and then think about the consequences! Maybe you did die, maybe you didn't or came close. And maybe those potential deaths were super lame and super anticlimactic, leaving the other characters to just stare blankly because this guy casually walked right off a cliff, as if expecting some invisible barrier to stop them.

It's just fun to think of how the rest of the cast moves on without the protagonist—you know, assuming they can actually survive the game's plot without you. Or maybe they'll actually be better off...