PC Game Launchers

[webhead 518]

Borderlands 3 release info accidentally posted?

 

Please don't let this be an Epic store exclusive.  Please.  I am not buying anything in that damn store.

[Mera'din 306]

Wouldn't surprise me if it was. They have the money to throw around and Gearbox doesn't give a fuck. I honestly don't know why it matters all that much. It's still on PC regardless of how you buy it and Steam needs the damn competition so that maybe someday Valve can dislodge their head from their ass. My only complaint is Epic needs to ramp up their fucking launcher updates if they actually want to be that competition. Their roadmap is a fucking joke. How do you launch a storefront that doesn't have a fucking SHOPPING CART?? Never mind everything else. 

[webhead 518]

They're not real competition.  They're a shitty store, with no refund policy, no features, and they're trying to buy games away from everyone else.

 

If they put an actual effort into developing a good store and client, it would be mildly annoying but fine.

[Galeigh 284]

I fully understand why people arent happy about the epic store, and all the features they lack... But fuck steam right now. Valve has been coasting on good will earned years ago long enough. I hope the epic store does take off, if for no other reason than to get valve to pull it's head out of it's ass. 

 

I mean, Steam was built on the back of half-life so why can't the epic store be built on the back of fortnite? The way I see it they are taking full advantage of their excess money and valves utter disregard for quality control.

[webhead 518]

Valve doesn't pay money for exclusivity.  If Epic wants their own games there, well annoying but fair enough, but if they're going to throw buckets of money to keep games off Steam, that is crap.

 

Actual competition would be multiple stores selling the same games.

[Galeigh 284]

I don't see a problem with it. It's a common thing on consoles so why not between PC online retailers?

 

They need SOMETHING to break the "I'll just get it on steam like all my other games" mentality.

[Mera'din 306]

8 hours ago, webhead said:

If they put an actual effort into developing a good store and client, it would be mildly annoying but fine.

 

They have it planned out to get it to the point that Steam is at, but they're just kind of failing at basic store features in general right now which is why I don't care for it. The paying for exclusives thing isn't going to be forever either and they've said as much. Seems like they mostly are trying to get a foothold. Yes, it's stupid and annoying but it's nothing new. It's a MUCH better platform for developers though (they only take a 12% cut vs Steams 30%) so I wouldn't be surprised if it starts to take off when they finally work through their roadmap of planned features. 

[webhead 518]

I hear that AAA devs get better deals on Steam but Epic keeps throwing boatloads of cash at people to get them over there.  I dunno.  The whole thing just stinks and their attitude towards their actual customers is cancer.  If they spent as much money improving their client as they do giving developers buckets of cash, maybe it wouldn't be so awful right now.

 

Also I'm fucking especially annoyed because I've been using Linux and trying to game there.  Valve has done a huge amount of work to get shit running on Linux and then Epic bursts in and doesn't even have a god damn Linux client for launching games.

[Galeigh 284]

Nah, steam takes 30% regardless. Thats why uplay and origin became a thing and why activision decide to attach cod to the blizz launcher. 

 

Epic store can only grow at this point. Publishers are greedy and will favor whatever gives more money every time. 

[webhead 518]

20 hours ago, Galeigh said:

Valve has been coasting on good will earned years ago long enough.

 

I'd actually like you to expand upon this and I'll open that with a question.  Show me which launcher is better than Steam and then you might have a point about them coasting on good will.  The Steam client and storefront and just Valve as a whole have been doing a lot of shit over the years.  Between their immense investment into Linux (to try and get Microsoft's strangehold off of PC), their huge investment in VR (new stuff just got leaked yesterday), and the revamp of the friends system into basically Discord, I'm not sure why anyone would be mad at Steam.  Maybe they're a little slow at times and they're not always trailblazing but a shitty store with nowhere close to the featureset of Steam is not going to make Steam better.  It's just going make PC gaming more annoying with store exclusives.

 

Like I said, I understand when a company makes one of these for their own games.  It's understandable.  When they start pulling the games of other companies into their stores as exclusives is where I start getting frustrated.  That's not consumer friendly and it never will be.  If they want to be the better store/client they need to actually MAKE a better store and a better client.  Buying exclusives is just forcing people into mediocrity to play the games they want.

[Mera'din 306]

It's almost impossible to find anything on Steam anymore unless you know exactly what your looking for. Trying to browse new games is nearly impossible sometimes because there is so much shoveleare and asset flips being thrown up that everything gets buried. There were over 9000 (lol)  games released on Steam in 2018 and it's been nearly that bad for the past few years. They don't even pretend to police what's going on at all. It's pretty much WHY their refund policy improved. And they know it too. They've actively invited bigger names in the gaming community to voice opinions on how to improve the state of things on the platform but only made minor changes without addressing the core problems.

 

Having said that, you're right though. Nobody has the options they have right now and they have done a LOT of good in there with the lazy fuck fest. But competition is not a bad thing for something like this and I wish Epic and whoever else tries their hand at taking them on luck. Even if it only amounts to Steam improving it'll be for the better.

[Galeigh 284]

Honestly, as a platform, GoG is objectively better. It lacks innate DRM, has all proper features of a digital storefront (friends, auto-updates, cart, etc) and matches, in not beats, steams sales. 

 

There are 2 main reasons it hasnt topped steam: It's focus more on older titles, and people wanting all their games under one roof. 

 

The first reason is their own choice, while the second is something ALL digital storefronts have to contend with due to Steam's age. 

 

As for the goodwill thing: At first steam was highly curated and exclusive which ensured that customers knew that if it was on there then it met a certain standard (i.e. it worked and wasn't illegal). This built up a massive amount of faith in the platform for both game devs, who got free publicity by just being on there, and Customers who knew that anything they bought was checked to ensure that it worked as intended. 

 

After the advent of Greenlight, though, the overall quality dropped and it became harder and harder for new games to be found under piles of DLC and Asset flips. A problem that has only gotten worse since then. 

[webhead 518]

[Ulyster 35]

No one is currently saying that the Epic store is better, so I'm confused why you're using that image as some sort of trump card...

 

They're saying that Valve/Steam NEEDS a competitor, so can't wait until Epic gets their shit together

[webhead 518]

That's not a trump card.  I just saw it and thought it was funny.

 

If Epic can actually funnel money into making their store/client better and stop doing nasty things like buying exclusives, I am all for competition.  Throwing piles of cache at developers at the expense of consumers being forced into your shitty store/client is something I am not for.

 

That being said hey, maybe Valve should lower that share.  I've always thought 30% was fucking insane (if I'm not mistaken it's not too far off consoles though).

[Ulyster 35]

13 minutes ago, webhead said:

Throwing piles of cache at developers at the expense of consumers being forced into your shitty store/client is something I am not for.

I agree, but if they want to make something of their store, this is the only option open to them at this point in time. Their store/launcher/whatever is severely lacking in features at the moment, so no one is even going to give them the time of day if they can just get War Shooter 13 on Steam, alongside all the other games they already have there. It's a gambit. They're betting that by the time the exclusivity runs out, they would have actually made something that people would habitually check to see what is currently on sale.

[webhead 518]

My issue with that line of thinking is that the Epic launcher has been around for a couple years and they've done dick with it.  They decided to launch their store recently and while I can somewhat understand the need to grab some high profile shit or watch their store die, it's not like they exist in a vacuum right?  They could very well have taken the time to launch a proper store front and a proper launcher client that was comparable to Steam or at least like...Origin.

 

I think what makes me mad the most really is seeing them throw money at developers like this instead of spending the time and money to make a client and store that are actually good.  No Linux client (this annoyed me greatly after all the work that Valve put in and I've started using Linux a lot more), shitty refund policy, and all the stuff in the image above.  It's not the worst thing in the entire world but it's very frustrating and a bit anti consumer.

 

If they get Valve to lower their rates, kudos.  That is a net benefit.  But I'm still not particularly happy about my favorite game series being forced into a store/launcher I don't want to use.  It was annoying enough when every company has to have their own launcher (Blizzard/Activision, Origin, UPlay, Bethesda, etc), but this is even more annoying because now they're snagging 3rd parties exclusively.

 

Plus there is competition. I read that generating Steam keys is free.  There are tons of storefronts selling keys to the various launchers (also something Epic doesn't support).  That's competition isn't it?  I've bought a fair number of games from Green Man Gaming myself.

 

The whole thing just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.  I AM somewhat conflicted because it is a better deal for devs and I hope Valve stands up and takes notice.  I'm definitely trying to not be like all the alarmist people on Reddit but I just do not like this at all.  I understand that having a competitor that does something better makes Valve do things better (eventually got them to fix their lack of a refund policy).  I'm just having a real hard time seeing what Epic is going to make Valve do that actually benefits me as a consumer.  That's the question I'd pose.

[Galeigh 284]

Imagine going to steams upcoming releases and NOT seeing 6000 asset flips instead of actual titles. 

 

That change alone would be a benefit. Also, we bitched at Microsoft for doing this on the 360 last gen.... But it worked out for everyone eventually: ps3 got held up to a higher standard and created PlayStation Plus and Customers saw a quality hike in exclusives all around. Microsoft needed to do it because of the poor performance of the original xbox and the massive success of the ps2.

 

Epic is trying the same thing. 

[webhead 518]

2 hours ago, Galeigh said:

Imagine going to steams upcoming releases and NOT seeing 6000 asset flips instead of actual titles. 

 

That change alone would be a benefit. Also, we bitched at Microsoft for doing this on the 360 last gen.... But it worked out for everyone eventually: ps3 got held up to a higher standard and created PlayStation Plus and Customers saw a quality hike in exclusives all around. Microsoft needed to do it because of the poor performance of the original xbox and the massive success of the ps2.

 

Epic is trying the same thing. 

 

Sorry...I keep writing walls of text.  Just imagine this in a very calm manner and not like me shouting angrily.  I'm definitely not going for that.

 

Microsoft and Sony made their own games for their own platform so of course they have exclusives.  I'm sure you didn't support Street Fight 5 or Tomb Raider being bought away from other platforms right?

 

They also have an extremely closed system so I'm confused by this argument..  I know you don't want that so I guess I'm not understanding?  At worst just use another site to get recommendations and then go buy them on Steam.  They keep trying (very slowly) to make it better but the openness of the system is of course going to flood it with shit.  No other launchers really have this problem because they don't let just anyone play in their sandbox.  If you want good exclusives, you want Valve to actually make games.  That would be nice.

 

The store could use improvements.  Epic is doing literally nothing in that space at all that I can see (their store and launcher is worse in every way afaik).  Their store has not even remotely a fraction of the games Steam has so they can't be an example to Steam there.  I think you're caught up in the competition part (which I can completely understand) but not actually thinking of what specifically Epic is doing to show Steam an example to improve.  They literally aren't doing anything better than Steam that I can see (except the debatable 30% thing).  A good competitor to Steam would be great.  Competition is good.  Having an inferior store/client and purchasing exclusives doesn't make Valve improve imo.  You know what I mean?  That's what frustrates me.

 

---

On another note, I saw this online:

https://www.resetera.com/threads/what-cut-do-valve-actually-take-from-devs-is-it-really-as-high-as-some-people-think-lets-find-out.109435/

 

Talks about the way the Steam store works with unlimited key generation and retail sales and stuff (I alluded to this earlier).  That cut Steam takes isn't quite as cut and dry as it seems.  Was surprised by how many keys are sold outside Steam.

[Mera'din 306]

12 minutes ago, webhead said:

 

  They keep trying (very slowly) to make it better but the openness of the system is of course going to flood it with shit.  No other launchers really have this problem because they don't let just anyone play in their sandbox. 

 

Steam wouldn't have this problem either if they did ANYTHING about it. Literally the most they've done to stem the tide is stop Greenlight (and replace it with a system that just made it so people had to pay them first instead of getting votes to throw up all over the store), and overhauling the curator system so that they can let other people do the work they should probably have somebody doing themselves. The discovery thing is one of the best features they've added in quite a while I think. 

 

They had the right idea with opening the platform to people who want to make games and have a centralized place to get them some exposure, but they had NOTHING in place to stop abuse of the system and have done nearly nothing to stop it from happening since it became an issue in like 2014 and it only gets worse as time goes on. Steam is a great platform that is literally buried under heaps of shit and it's hurting them. If Epic really can ramp up their storefront quickly, they'll be in a prime place to take a share. If Valve can sort some things out though they can cement their hold because Epic's roadmap puts them even pretending to be comparable to steam a minimum of 6 months out (more for a few things). Also, the "Recently Shipped Features" section makes me lol every time I see it because imaging an online store without some of those features is ridiculous.

Here's the roadmap in question:
https://trello.com/b/GXLc34hk/epic-games-store-roadmap

[webhead 518]

I get what you're saying but I've never understood why this makes Steam worse than anything else.  You want a game, buy it, use it.  Store has a billion things in it but I'm not really getting why that's so bothersome.  Do you ever actually use the store to discover new games?  I've never done that.  I'm not saying it couldn't be better because holy shit it could but like I said before, what is Epic doing better?

 

Also keep in mind that Steamworks does a lot of shit for developers.  It's an entire system of servers and all kinds of stuff (match making, invites, friends, etc).

[Galeigh 284]

I actually browse the store all the time, or at least I used too. Pre-greenlight was a golden era of discovering new IPs for me. After that though, it's too risky to try anything new and NO ONE is able or willing to sift through all the bullshit to find actual games anymore. It's also no one but valves job to even try too, but they wont (curator and tag system were designed to dodge that responsibility)

[webhead 518]

What would your solution be?  I'm genuinely curious because I don't really know honestly lol.

[Galeigh 284]

My best case scenario is this: Epic store makes good on the roadmap and actually meets or exceeds Steam, causing a loss of sales on steam forcing Valve to do their fucking job and curate that shit giving us 2 very solid choices of platforms to buy games from. Maybe even get Half-Life 3 as valve tries to win back customers

My boy sterling lays it out better

 

 

He does another video pointing out Epics flaws too, but we all agree on what those are and why they are stupid so I dont feel the need to post that vid. 

[Mera'din 306]

3 hours ago, webhead said:

 Do you ever actually use the store to discover new games?

 

 

Yes. I didn't at first, but one of the sales when they had you use the discovery queue thing to earn cards I tried it out and really liked the idea and have looked through it a few times and added things to my wishlist before. I also look at the new games list but shit gets buried so fast there that it's pretty much meaningless a lot of the time. 9050 games in 1 year is an average of nearly 25 games a day and I sure as fuck don't look at Steam every day. It's too much and a LOT of it has no reason to be there.

 

As far as what they can do? A lot of this shit is legitimately just asset flips of stuff from Unity or whatever. Ban shit like that. Remove it from the store, ban the person who puts that kind of thing up. Having to pay $100 to put the shit up is obviously not stopping them since they can get it back anyway so they need to figure something else out. Maybe restrict what can be put on the new release page via some sort of criteria? I'm sure there's lots of things that are a lot more direct then everything they've done so far put together. That last statement is mostly hyperbole because I know they HAVE been trying to do things it just seems like it has no actual impact sometimes and comes really slowly. Part of the problem with their system being so great and open and easy to make use of is the scum of the industry will be there to exploit it in any way they can.

 

A big part of it is the achievements and trading card shit. To be fair, I THINK they starting restricting games being able to have them through some means or another late last year? I don't remember for sure but I thought I saw something about it since that's how these people made their money back since there are people that will pay $1 for shit that isn't even really a game if it will give them achievements and steam cards. Not sure how thorough it is though.

[Hoob 10]

My personal problem with the whole Epic store thing is that EA has their Origin, Ubisoft has their launcher, Acti-blizz has their launcher and then there's steam. At what point can I just have my games and not bloat my shit with their unnecessarily flashy, buggy launchers. 

 

If Epic really wanted people to start buying from their store they'd do some kinda exclusive deals or minor discounts or in game promotional content, these methods would be honey where they're currently using vinegar. It only serves to potentially hurt developers who buy into it and their sales suffer! 

[webhead 518]

Yeah people had floated giving a discount on Epic since the discount is supposedly so great (debatable as I saw in that link I posted).  Make the game 50 on Epic and people will crawl out of the woodwork to buy.  But instead the opted to piss everyone off by forcing them into it if they want the game at all.

[Galeigh 284]

They will get over it like every time it happened on consoles

[Galeigh 284]

 

[webhead 518]

On 4/2/2019 at 12:57 AM, Mera'din said:

The paying for exclusives thing isn't going to be forever either and they've said as much

 

Guess not.

 

Epic Games CEO Says it Will Still Sign Exclusivity Deals With Steam Games

[webhead 518]

16 hours ago, Galeigh said:

 

 

I agree with this video.  I feel like this video disagrees with you.   They're free to do it because they can...and they're shitty for doing it.

[Galeigh 284]

Never said what they are doing isn't shitty, but it's their ONLY option if they wanna succeed

 

[webhead 518]

That's not the only option to succeed.  It's the only option to try and strangle the market.  They are trying to take down Steam and replace it with something crappier lol.

 

Serve your customers before you serve yourself and people won't be so cynical about the thing.  They had PLENTY of time to implement basic features BEFORE they started throwing money at everyone not to mention the more I read the more it becomes apparent that either their client will never ever have the features Steam does or that great sounding 12% is competent unsustainable and they're trying to pull a Walmart move.  Steam takes 30% (they give the big boys a discount) but they also provide a lot of different services for that money. If they didn't direct2drive and the services that existed before Steam was big would not have been killed by it.

[webhead 518]

Hey look, Epic are being douche bags AGAIN.  Not enough to put in zero effort but now you pause support on a huge anti cheat service that tons of games use that Valve was attempting to getting working in Proton/Wine.  Awesome.

 

 

 

[webhead 518]

Epic stooped to another new low.  A game people backed on fig (like Kickstarter) just got an exclusive launch on the Epic store even though backers were told it would be on Mac/Linux/Steam.  They haven't specified when it will actually launch on the promised platforms just that it'll be later.  Classy.

 

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2019-05-12-outer-wilds-becomes-another-epic-games-store-pc-exclusive-and-some-backers-are-not-happy