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Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

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Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#211

Post by JohnJamesRambo »

throwaway09223 wrote: post #205
LudwigNagasena wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's kind of weird how the same companies that can squeeze all possible computational abilities and use every tick that exists to force a computer to show amazing graphics with complex logic behind can't make a simple GUI. Well, even Steam nowadays is kind of a wrapper for a browser.

There are a couple of highly technical, highly capable game studios. Bethesda isn't one of them. Most game studios produce poorly optimized junk and are barely managing to ship a working product.

The question I ask is if Bethesda spent all the time on technical things would they make the amazing games they do? Give me a Bethesda game with bugs over any other smooth game with no heart any day.

Every company has an attention budget to spend from.

Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#212

Post by lrae »

JohnWhigham wrote: post #177
lrae wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No worries, Origin will be replaced soon... by the even more awful EA Desktop Client.

I don't know about that. The fact that they released a bunch of EA games on Steam (most notably recent Battlefield games) made me think they're about to sunset Origin. But that was a couple years ago at this point so who knows

They just recently updated it. (https://www.ea.com/ea-app-beta)

Doubt they'll drop it, but who knows.

Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#213

Post by [deleted] »

ssl232 wrote: post #152
slavik81 wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I own Mirror's Edge on EA Origin. I bought it shortly after release. I still have the box with the CD key. I can still download and install the game. However, I can't launch the game because I've exceeded the install limit of five copies. I need to run the deauthenticator utility on the computers I installed the game on, but that's not possible because those hard drives were wiped years ago. I generally trust Valve t…

It's in this situation where pirating the game is 100% justifiable. You literally own it already.

[deleted]

Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#214

Post by Danieru »

jmyeet wrote: post #130

Kill all the launchers. Ubisoft, Rockstar, Bethesda (RIP), Epic. I really hate these mediocre "me too" wannabe social network / launchers. I'm actually surprised this hasn't been rolled into the Xbox launcher, which still exists right (on PC)?

So how are you going to buy games if you've killed all the launchers. No Steam, no Epic, no GOG Galaxy. Are you going to download everything over http from your browser?

Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#215

Post by mywittyname »

BbzzbB wrote: post #114

Is there a technical reason why Steam is a such a force in the space? People, myself certainly included, often criticize Apple for taking 30% of developer revenue for merely existing in it's walled garden. Right or wrong, they control the ecosystem, so their ability to monopolize and heavily tax the App Store is unsurprising, they're exercising their pricing power as much as they possibly can. But how is it that on P…

For me, it's that my 20 year old account has games I bought 20 years ago. I can trust that anything I purchase from Steam will be around for a long time. No other company has demonstrated that kind of reliability, except maybe Apple.

Plus, I think Steam is a superior product.

That being said, I also try to buy on GoG as much as possible, since I really prefer to have DRM-free games and I want some competition in the market.

I have an Xbox Game Pass subscription, but will never buy anything from the Microsoft store because their products are bundled into encrypted archives (so no modding/changing games). Plus, it has a nasty habit of leaving 40+GB binaries on my system that can't be deleted from within Windows.

Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#217

Post by throwaway09223 »

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #211
throwaway09223 wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a couple of highly technical, highly capable game studios. Bethesda isn't one of them. Most game studios produce poorly optimized junk and are barely managing to ship a working product.

The question I ask is if Bethesda spent all the time on technical things would they make the amazing games they do? Give me a Bethesda game with bugs over any other smooth game with no heart any day. Every company has an attention budget to spend from.

Sure. There's nothing wrong with a non-technical focus.

Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#218

Post by Sebb767 »

BbzzbB wrote: post #114

Is there a technical reason why Steam is a such a force in the space? People, myself certainly included, often criticize Apple for taking 30% of developer revenue for merely existing in it's walled garden. Right or wrong, they control the ecosystem, so their ability to monopolize and heavily tax the App Store is unsurprising, they're exercising their pricing power as much as they possibly can. But how is it that on P…

Next to all the other good points, Steam has managed not to f up in all these years. If you go deep, their launcher has an insane number of features - trading, backgrounds and picture frames, drops, profile levels and a lot more - but their basic MVP user experience was never cluttered by it. You can right now log into your account from years ago and start playing with very few clicks; if you don't care about all that stuff, it doesn't bother you. The also never really enraged a majority of their users (like digg, for example) and they were the first to adopt a reasonable return policy (it was partly forced, but it's still not standard).

They simply started out well and managed not to loose their lead.

Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#219

Post by paulryanrogers »

indymike wrote: post #149
BbzzbB wrote: post #114

Is there a technical reason why Steam is a such a force in the space? People, myself certainly included, often criticize Apple for taking 30% of developer revenue for merely existing in it's walled garden. Right or wrong, they control the ecosystem, so their ability to monopolize and heavily tax the App Store is unsurprising, they're exercising their pricing power as much as they possibly can. But how is it that on P…

> Is there a technical reason why Steam is a such a force in the space? \ I'm not much of a gamer - but my five kids are, and I can see the difference. It starts with being multiplatform. Buy once, run on PC, Mac, Linux. Steam's promise isn't cheap subscriptions, or trendy titles. I can buy games with confidence and know they will run - even if school requires a Mac next year or the only machine around is Dad's Linux…

> I can buy games with confidence and know they will run - even if school requires a Mac next year or the only machine around is Dad's Linux laptop.

This hasn't been my experience. Plenty of Steam games have fallen by the wayside as operating systems evolve. GOG is slipping in this regard as well, but began as a way to buy and run older games. It also provides some nice pressure for Steam and its publishers to compete and reduce DRM.

Then there is Mac dropping 32 bit support, to which Steam seems to have thrown up their hands.

Re: Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam

#220

Post by dspillett »

LudwigNagasena wrote: post #161
ivraatiems wrote: post #52

Thank goodness. Bethesda's launcher was uniquely awful in a number of unpleasant ways. Slow, prone to crashes, bad user communication, not suitable for use on small monitors. The worst of the launcher apps I have used - and there are so many! I remember when it was in vogue for every game maker to build their own launcher or even full Steam clone - when EA pulled all its new games from Steam to get people to use Orig…

It's kind of weird how the same companies that can squeeze all possible computational abilities and use every tick that exists to force a computer to show amazing graphics with complex logic behind can't make a simple GUI. Well, even Steam nowadays is kind of a wrapper for a browser.

* companies that can squeeze all possible computational abilities … to show amazing graphics with complex logic … can't make a simple GUI.

The wage slaves they've got working on the store and launcher front-ends are probably not the same highly talented designers and others that they have working 80 hours trying to panel-beat a game into a shape that they can get out of the door without too many major patches being needed in the days following release.

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