arch seems the coolest, with Wayland, kde, hyperland customization
While I have no experience with Unreal Engine, so I can't give an informed recommendation, I just figured I'd point out that you can do this with every distro
I work in ecommerce, so the answer is "ours". I get far too many calls saying "Do you sell x", or "How much is y", and because of how terrible our website's search function is, I can't just say "use the fucking website, that's what it's there for" like I desperately want to.
Custom ROMs were always a pretty niche thing, and they've become much less worth it since:
Stock Android doesn't suck as much as it used to
Banking Apps aren't guaranteed to work
VoLTE doesn't work (this might depend on phone model)
Most manufacturers now offer software support for a reasonable length of time
So unless there's an old feature you want to keep (LG Quad DAC diehards represent), or you're super privacy-conscious, most people aren't going to bother.
Me saying "RIP" was an attempt at hyperbole. That being said, shoehorning AI into something for which a big selling point is that it's user-made is a gigantic misstep - Maybe they'll listen to everybody, but given that they tried it at all, I can't see them properly backing down. Especially when it was worded as "pausing" the experiment.
I remember when I first bought my Gamecube... I had to sign an agreement that I would never play a non-Nintendo property again. "How could they ever enforce this?" I thought. Little did I know that the next day, the Sony SWAT Team would be bursting into my house to extract my Playstation. It was absolutely terrifying.
I haven't played a single non-Nintendo game since.
If they thought this would be well-received they wouldn't have sprung it on people. The fact that they're only "pausing the launch of the experiment" means they're going to do it again once the backlash has subsided.
The massive negative reception could certainly be considered a "rejection". Whether people actually stick to their guns and refuse to buy them is another story.
Yeah, I didn't consider that the exchange rate in 2012 was really good. With the new price and today's exchange rate, it would be $180 NZD, which isn't the end of the world, but feels kind of wrong because electronics generally get cheaper the longer they're on the market.
That being said, it isn't just Kindles. Kobos used to be ridiculously cheap, and now they're the same price as Kindles if not more.
It's crazy. I bought the then-current basic model Kindle for $90 NZD in 2012, which still works. I recently started looking for a new eReader with USB C and without the rubberised coating that slowly turns back into oil. The cheapest I've found is over $200.
It's still in active development, but you might want to keep an eye on Plasma Bigscreen. I've been looking for a similar setup to you, and it seems to tick all of the boxes, at least for me.
I only learned about it recently, and I've been too busy to try it in that time, but I'll edit this post with my impressions once I get the time to have a play with it.
...Patreon has existed for 12 years. Websites have had "Buy me a coffee" buttons for even longer. You not noticing something doesn't mean it didn't exist.
While I have no experience with Unreal Engine, so I can't give an informed recommendation, I just figured I'd point out that you can do this with every distro