As some of you may know, I recently began my NAS and self-hosting journey by installing Proxmox and TrueNAS on a mini PC. TrueNAS has become a truly amazing part of my setup thanks to all the apps I can install on it with the ability to connect to them and sync data across my devices without relying on big third-party cloud servers.

My workflow includes a plethora of productivity tools, each promising to streamline my workflows and boost efficiency. However, I often found myself juggling multiple platforms for tasks, notes, and project management. I wished for a more unified system, and that’s when I came across the world of Obsidian and its incredible community plugins.

There have been a lot of big games this year that have felt all-consuming, like Monster Hunter Wilds or Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. Maze Mice offers something different: a small, pick-up-and-play experience that takes a bunch of ideas from some classics and adds a clever twist.The game, from Luck Be a Landlord developer TrampolineTales, mixes elements of Pac-Man, Vampire Survivors, and even the classic Snake. As an adorable, pixelated mouse, you zip around a maze to get blue experience gems that are guarded by cats. When you pass by the cats, they'll wake up and start chasing you, sometimes creating a hilariously long line of felines. (Cute ghost cats will also appear and inconveniently float right into your path.) All the action takes place on one screen, so it's easy to see where everything is at any given time.When you get enough gems, you can pick from a selection of three power-ups. The upgrades are often a little silly, like knitting needles that fly through the air to attack the cats pursuing you, but as with Vampire Survivors, it's fun to experiment with different abilities to create interesting builds.Maze Mice's most interesting feature is that time only moves whe …Read the full story at The Verge.

The Legend of Zelda series is a pillar of gaming at this point, with nearly 40 years' worth of games. What started on the NES with 8-bit graphics has gone to fully open-world games with Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild. With the Nintendo Switch 2 looming, which will feature paid upgrades for both Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild and GameCube classic Wind Waker on NSO, which makes now a great time to walk through the evolutions of the series has seen since the 80s. Originally an 8-bit game on the NES, there are a few major evolutions you can mark, most of which come with improvements to the technology, or in the case of our first big change, a new place to play.

The fighting game genre is filled with many crossovers. Characters from popular and iconic game series are often pitted against one another in exciting and interesting mashups that get fans very excited. Some of the best fighting game experiences have come from this, and have even led to the creation of new ongoing franchises. However, with as many crossovers we see within the genre, there are those few dream matches that we continue to think about seeing become a reality.

Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 83, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, please don't spoil Andor for me, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.) This week, I've been reading about Mission: Impossible and Sam Altman's kitchen and bad roommates, ranting to PJ Vogt about all the ways I'm trying to use my phone less, writing all my scratch notes in Antinote, deciding to be cautiously optimistic about The Paper, rewatching the last season of Mythic Quest, watching and reading about life as an air traffic controller, trying to restart a meditation practice after discovering I get Headspace through work, and using Ludex to see if any of my sports cards are worth anything. So far… they're not.I also have for you a pair of headphones you're practically guaranteed to love, two new sci-fi shows to check out, the new Airbnb, and much more. Let's dive in.(As always, the best part of Installer is your ideas and tips. What are you reading / watching / listening to / playing / carrying around in a backpack this week? What should everyone else be just as into as you are right now? Tell me everything: ins …Read the full story at The Verge.

Well, it's finally out. After months of waiting, people have gotten their hands on Doom: The Dark Ages. We even reviewed the game and gave it a shining 9/10 score, praising the satisfying combat and gorgeous visuals.

NotebookLM is a great tool for generating ideas, summarizing content, and providing various ways to study certain material. But when I learned about its Audio Overviews feature, which creates AI-generated podcasts from your sources, my expectations were low.

The M4 Mac Mini is pretty tiny, but how would you feel about bringing it with you as you travel? Well, it turns out that some people don't just want to make their M4 Mac Mini a portable computer; they want the rest of the desktop to come with it, too.

Nothing truly lasts forever. That's a universal law when it comes to all things in life, especially with the video game products we love to enjoy. New systems eventually get older and the support for them is taken away, leaving online servers and functionality completely abandoned. The digital storefronts for those consoles eventually become dormant, and prevent anyone from buying games through them, forcing players to move on to newer platforms. This is something, as a Nintendo 3DS owner, I'm very familiar with. And I could see an eventual repeat of what happened with the 3DS down the line for the future of Nintendo Switch 2.

It feels like everything comes with some level of 'smart' features, but smart home or IoT (Internet of Things) devices areat the top of the list for actual usefulness. But these devices have a terrible reputation for security, and you might be wondering how to securely add them to your home network. Even something unassuming like a smart bulb or temperature sensor could be a potential threat, but you can mitigate this risk by keeping on top of updates and keeping them away from the rest of your network.

When you're buying a new CPU, what should you focus on: spec sheets or reviews & benchmarks? The answer lies somewhere in between. Of course, you should refer to third-party reviews before making a purchase decision, especially since there's a lot of reliable content available these days. However, looking at some crucial specs is also necessary to avoid making a bad decision.