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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

#331

Post by CppCoder »

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…

Every now and then I like to mention the rules were a lot different on PC many years ago. Back then, the developer got the 30% and the publisher (similar to Steam) received the full 70%.

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

#332

Post by hnbad »

eatsyourtacos wrote: post #174
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…

Steam- * Just works * It's simple * Cloud saves all of my games (with a few exceptions when the game developer doesn't enable it for whatever reason, this has only been for a few games so I'm not sure why) * Family sharing - this is HUGE for me. I can't re-buy every single game for my kids, so the fact that they can just play a game I purchased on their own account when I'm not online is an insane life saver. * Steam…

> * Steam sales

I think it's worth adding that Steam's (more recent) refund policy is also a big deal. Even if you don't need it, knowing that it's there can influence buying decisions because it feels more like you can "try before you buy" (although this actually involves paying before you get to try and then putting yourself in a situation where Steam could refuse to give you your money back).

After using Steam almost exclusively for years, picking up a Nintendo Switch was jarring because there's pretty much no way to walk back from a purchase even if you have only played it for a few seconds (or just downloaded it). This also goes with games perpetually sitting at AAA release day price points, release dates often being unclear or promoted more than the actual release and sales affecting your wishlist being undercommunicated in comparison to Steam.

Steam simply lures you back in by sending you that e-mail that the game you wishlisted five years ago is currently on sale at a 90% discount.

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

#333

Post by baud147258 »

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…

to be fair, even on stores without the 'cartelish' 30%, prices don't seem any lower, so it's not as if how much the storefront takes has any difference for the consumer. Personally I'd say it's a combination of first mover advantage, good (enough) product/service and the fact that a collection of game is rather 'sticky', sine you can't move it to another storefront

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

#334

Post by hnbad »

tyfon wrote: post #330
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> * Just works I don't game very often, but the way Steam "just works" can't be understated enough. It's not perfect. I've run into weird bugs occasionally, though they were likely the fault of a specific game. However, it's miles ahead of other game launchers I've dealt with. I'm a casual gamer, so if I end up fighting the game launcher and update mechanism for more than a few minutes, I'm just going to give up and…

It also "Just works" in linux. None of the other launchers do that :)

I did have some problems with some games that claimed to support Linux but wouldn't run on latest 64bit Ubuntu or take issue with whichever graphics drivers I was using, but yeah, generally Steam games would simply work whereas the rest either wouldn't or would require layers of indirection like WINE and a lot of fiddling.

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

#335

Post by tyfon »

mywittyname wrote: post #215
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…

>except maybe Apple.

Apple obsoleted all 32 bit iphone apps a few years ago, so not even remotely comparable to steam in this area imho.

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

#336

Post by CppCoder »

The annoying part with Steam is, almost every time I start it, it is downloading a few hundred MB large update.

This makes absolutely no sense to me. * first of all they could reduce the patch size * second, what need is there to update a launcher this often, why not pull the required info from some online database

This thing is wasting internet traffic without any apparent good reason.

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

#337

Post by baud147258 »

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.

It's exactly what I did last time I couldn't play a game I bought on Steam because of third party DRM issues; though that time it was with Ubisoft and their new uplay that wasn't compatible with the game (and I don't think I had my uplay account information anyway)

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

#338

Post by Mindwipe »

judge2020 wrote: post #278
sbarre wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With the rise of the Epic Game Store, I think there's more competition in the launcher/store space and I bet the big publishers got better deals which removed the need for them to invest in the ongoing development and maintenance of their own stores/launchers. It can't be that cheap to maintain an app like Origin or UPlay and all the associated infrastructure, etc..

The issue with Epic is the pure lack of features (user profiles, reviews[^1], community forums) , and no Mac/Linux support. ^1: I doubt reviews are ever coming since it would mean bad games would get fewer sales; Imagine how many more sales Cyberpunk 2077 has gotten on the Epic store as no potential buyer sees the negative reviews for the game.

The Epic launcher supports Macs.

There's not much software that supports Macs, but there's increasingly little on Steam too that runs on a modern version of MacOS too because of Apple's decision to abandon the space.

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

#339

Post by tyfon »

hnbad wrote: post #334
tyfon wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also "Just works" in linux. None of the other launchers do that :)

I did have some problems with some games that claimed to support Linux but wouldn't run on latest 64bit Ubuntu or take issue with whichever graphics drivers I was using, but yeah, generally Steam games would simply work whereas the rest either wouldn't or would require layers of indirection like WINE and a lot of fiddling.

Yeah. Now in my older days I really appreciate the "Steam play" proton layer.

It just sets up everything for me so I don't have to mess with lutris, various wine versions and whatnot.

I've found that using the libraries included in steam also removed all manual "fiddling" compared to running it with native arch linux libraries.

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

#340

Post by 1_player »

CppCoder wrote: post #336

The annoying part with Steam is, almost every time I start it, it is downloading a few hundred MB large update. This makes absolutely no sense to me. * first of all they could reduce the patch size * second, what need is there to update a launcher this often, why not pull the required info from some online database This thing is wasting internet traffic without any apparent good reason.

You probably open it pretty infrequently (or you're on the beta branch), because I open it daily and updates happen once a month if ever.

It'd be the same if you were to open Chrome once a month and it wasn't autoupdating itself in the background. Steam doesn't have an autoupdate background process like Chrome does.

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