Afaik you can only develop UWP apps on retail Xbox. Aka Windows Phone apps. Aka “those shitty programs with horrible UI that made Windows 8 everyone’s favourite Windows version”.

I made the mistake of buying the Europa Universalis IV base game, and getting 3 months of subscription for all DLCs… Im playing the Anbennar mod, which is a fantasy total conversion of the game. There goes the little bit of spare time I still have…

They only mention “payment processors”, not Visa, MasterCard, PayPal,… So, this does not answer which payment processor(s) are behind the push.

Sorry for being pedantic, but the only confirmed information in that article is “payment processors”. The author seems to just assume that this means credit card companies (what is a reasonable assumption, as said), but it does not sound like that part is confirmed…

Are there trustworthy sources that it’s VISA/MasterCard, or is this speculation?

I mean, I would not be surprised at all, since they have a history of misusing their power (iirc they were the reason OnlyFans nearly went SFW), but before calling names, I’d like to be certain.

This article has a screenshot listing some removed titles (and I think also a link to the original source): https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2025/07/valve-gets-pressured-by-payment-processors-with-a-new-rule-for-game-devs-and-various-adult-games-removed/

If you count DOSBox as emulation (what it definitely is - unlike WINE it actually emulates an x86 PC and peripherals):

• The Settlers 2: This is a timeless classic. The graphics are 2D, but they still look OK today.
• Albion: A Science Fiction and Fantasy RPG (yes, it has both, and that’a a key point of the story). The gameplay itself isn’t that great, but the lore, story and the graphics are amazing.

I’ve played both on the Deck, and they both work great. (Btw: I did not use Settlers 2 as an example for my DOSBox setup guide by chance. I picked it because it is an amazing game and still fun nowadays.)

Signed Kernels are problematic for some users. While the distribution-supplied kernel binaries are fine for most users, there are always those who want to (or need to, due to hardware quirks or bugs) tinker with the kernel compile-time configuration, or the kernel source code itself…

This. So much this.

The “backlog” is not something to work through, it is a lesson to learn: Do not buy a game unless you have time and are motivated to play it that very moment. If you buy it to play it “later”, or “next week”, you very likely are not going to play it, and it is just wasted money.

(The same is true for books, by the way. And when it comes to books, I refuse to learn this lesson.)

Oh, and just in the moment I hit send, I remembered another gem from the olden times:

Unreal World: Basically the survival game. 99% of today’s survival games are just a pale shadow of this. I mean, nowadays there are even “survival” games without hunger mechanics or proper simulation of wounds… No, this is not one of those easy mode survival games. This is Fantasy Finland, and it’s the Fantasy Iron Age. Available for free or, if you want updates faster, also for money on Steam.

If I weren’t currently at work and would have time to think about the answer, I could probably come up with more titles, but those are the top 2 that come to mind, if I ignore cRPGs (at least that’s how I read your “avoiding final fantasy-esque” requirement):

Settlers 2: It’s new enough to still look decent by today’s standards, and has amazing game design. Available at GoG.

Star Control 2: One of the best early open world games. The graphics have definitely aged by today’s standard, but the humour hasn’t. Or maybe it has, but just a bit. Available for free and open source.