iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 01/09/2026

I think I'll disappear from social media for a bit, maybe until I have something meaningful to show/share. Feel free to message or @ me, though I get that people don't really have a reason to. Take care.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 29/08/2026

Still (slowly) learning, and don't think I'd seen this, so thanks for bringing it up. Must have just been a common shorthand in trade or something...?

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 22/08/2026

I imagine a number of people can't stop themselves from wanting to get every costume. I still get annoyed that I'm priced out of getting costumes in fighting games (since aesthetics are a big deal to me), but I've long accepted that I can't afford it. Having no limit feels exploitative to me...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 17/08/2026

... higher budget (where the engineering side might get the breathing room to go crazy with systems at scale) and higher expectation of returns might seem like too much of a money sink to fund. Feels like the push for the aesthetic needs to come from indies or bigger strategy devs(?).

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 17/08/2026

I imagine a big thing for dense 3D environments might just be a general shift in expectations for fidelity. Loads of nerds would be cool with basic pathfinding and low-poly dense city blocks (especially with the rise of late-90s and early-00s aesthetics), but realising such an environment with a ...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 17/08/2026

Maybe part of it was the pivot to 3D and how much more expensive it is to render and run pathfinding in dense 3D environments than dense 2D scenes? Automation/Factory games have made dense industrialisation a pretty big thing over the past handful of years, but yeah, far less urban density...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 14/08/2026

(In case you haven't seen it and might be interested, Matthewmatosis did a fun commentary of Ghouls 'n Ghosts with his thoughts about a month ago: youtu.be/MwGh8OYPEDk )

youtu.be

Ghouls 'n Ghosts Commentary

YouTube video by Matthewmatosis

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 13/08/2026

Yeah, from what I remember of End of Eva, Shinji and I have different ideas as for how to pass the time

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 10/08/2026

The Evaposting made me start rewatching Eva, so thank you. Fortunately, I'm not Gendo. Unfortunately, it's looking like I'm still Shinji.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/08/2026

(I should say, I generally prefer games looking gamey, anyway. I'm a ditherlord and like aliasing and basic lighting, so realistic rendering is more of a tech spectacle to me than something I really want.)

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/08/2026

From what I've seen, some of the results can look nice outside of the noise patterns (which do distract me a bunch), especially in well-lit areas. Using Lumen or other RT also means more consistent dynamic lighting and immediate accurate lighting in the editor (since it's real-time). Big trade-offs.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/08/2026

and noise issues) for the realistic lighting of Lumen's GI, and the cinematic look of filmic post-processing (with film grain, chromatic aberration and motion blur). And, the combo of these issues with the ubiquity of the stock PP effects in UE4+5 have made UE5 a big target for image quality qualms.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/08/2026

... that this noise and the post-processing qualms coincide with many games reconstructing from a fairly low internal resolution, meaning that they already have issues with clarity. Generally, I think UE5 games have a reputation among many for sacrificing image quality (with resolution, clarity ...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/08/2026

... Loads of UE5 games use the software-based version of Lumen, which has a lower ray count (and less data to work with) and is reconstructed less effectively (leaving the noise that manifests as a stronger "boil" than other RT solutions), especially in darker areas. I think the key thing is ...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/08/2026

... ship with the same stock post-processing effects, often in games that are going for realistic, "cinematic" rendering and that have other issues with visual clarity. UE5's noise issue is from Lumen, mostly when it has a lower ray count and isn't using GPU vendors' ML reconstruction tech. ...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/08/2026

... and CA and full-screen motion blur can also both cause issues for people with motion sickness. With all post-processing stuff, I think people only complain if they can't be disabled. I think these things are often thrown-in with complaints about typical UE5 rendering because many UE4+5 games ...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/08/2026

With different people replying to different points, I think you've been led down multiple overlapping paths with responses. I think many people have issues with post-processing effects like film grain and chromatic aberration, assumedly because of how they make the image less clean, ...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 29/07/2026

My taste is pretty broad, but it definitely helps that I like driving in games, get a kick out of satisfying physics interactions and am cool with separating movement and camera perspectives. I can also find slow, methodical movement fun if it's satisfyingly analogue and has well-paced tension.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 29/07/2026

I think the biggest draw of the game is that it's weird (in a stronger way than "unique" gets across), on top of generally seeming like a really good time (from playing the demo and watching the footage you've shared). The core concept (literally the name) is also super endearing to me.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 23/07/2026

Glad you're alright. That's a hell of a mood to go into an EoE viewing with. Need to rewatch it, myself, but don't want to find out I'm Gendo...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 22/07/2026

An enormous problem is the combination of every kid only playing some combination of the same three games, and each of those games' publishers wanting to make increasing annual profits despite already having impossible player numbers. It's unprecedented predation on kids' money and attention.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 10/07/2026

Yeah, just checked the post history, and I don't get how someone can have so little going on in their life to fabricate an identity around making strangers' life marginally worse on a social media platform they apparently hate(...?)

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 10/07/2026

Are you a bot or just a loser? My life's absolutely in shambles, but people with a shred of empathy don't say that about other people.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 10/07/2026

Yeah, I'm in England and got hit with this when it started. Everything sucks, man... That said, I don't even have the thing of people reading my posts (outside of replies), so I could have probably stopped using social media when it happened, really...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/07/2026

(I think there's just a general shift in what people expect from a game to consider it good or fun. People probably feel worse about it looking like they're mashing buttons in a video game when they mash buttons in a video game, versus what I expect from the average SFII player in the 90s.)

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/07/2026

I think people have come to expect that they have to be good at a fighting game to enjoy themselves, probably because they've seen good play in videos/streams. When I played SFIV badly with friends, it was exciting to fight someone in a video game, and maybe we'd get to do some cool-looking moves.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 02/07/2026

A big thing for me is being able to pick-up a game I love, hand it to someone and say "you should play this." Annoyingly, I'm not really among people who care to play stuff, but I hate that corporations are pushing games as ephemeral products and services rather than artefacts to treasure and share.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 01/07/2026

I'm getting really sick of people deciding to make everything worse

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 18/06/2026

I really appreciated how dense the video is, with plenty to say and constant meaningful visuals (with examples and complementary points to your voiceover). And man, it's such a beautiful game. I really should put some time into it (beyond the brief faffing I did when the CFC released)...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 15/06/2026

I could probably respond to any crisis in my life with just soundbites of Link from OoT and Mario from SM64. I feel bad for my friends and their eardrums whenever I accidentally yell one of those over Discord...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 12/06/2026

I say Super Metroid is "a Metroid game" and save the "Metroidvania" terminology specifically for the Castlevania games with a Metroid world structure and added stats/levelling (as well as anything that uses that specific combination), though only with quotation marks (because I'm insufferable).

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 25/05/2026

Seemingly sacrificing the ability to emote for marginal improvement at Gradius

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 20/05/2026

All of these figures have been winners - they nailed that face, man

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 08/05/2026

Go home and play some Kirby, man. (Those games are joy incarnate)

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 07/05/2026

I'm a bit disappointed that it's another remake of 64, and thus another retelling of the Lylat Wars. A bit concerned about the cutscenes damaging the pacing, too... 64 is super good, though, so I hope this remake gets more people to play it. Plus, the remake itself does look super good.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 06/05/2026

Hope you have a good time over there

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 05/05/2026

What are/have been your favourite things (enemies, attacks, encounters, traps, items, et cetera) to lose/die to in video games? It could be because they're funny, cool, terrifying or otherwise entertaining. Have a good one, anyway.

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 01/05/2026

I'm all about the momentary positivity that comes with thinking "it'd be super cool to open an arcade café one day," right before the second thought hits

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 26/04/2026

I think Leon S. Kennedy might actually have a chance (over other gun people), since the guns are (an exaggerated) part of a wider action kit, he's still a relevant character being pushed and Capcom have a good relationship with Nintendo. I'd really like a weirdo from Nintendo's past, mind you...

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 20/04/2026

We were a Ratchet & Clank household, and this track still randomly pops into my head whenever it likes: youtu.be/hGyP1dWj4OY?...

youtu.be

Ratchet & Clank - Kerwan - Metropolis

YouTube video by supersaiyan13100

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Dean Rands | Crowence @crowence.com · 15/04/2026

Hope it's a nice birthday :¬)

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