Sunsetting the Bethesda.net launcher and migrating to Steam • Hacker News Board

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

#391

Post by spijdar » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 6:43 PM UTC

_carbyau_ wrote: post #241

paulryanrogers wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can trust that anything I purchase from Steam will be around for a long time. Unless the publisher pulls it or pushes an update cutting music because of license deals expiring. Or gets a stealthy replacement with a worse remaster. Or your OS drops 32 bit / x86 support.

I agree with most of your comment ... but "OS drops 32 bit / x86 support" gets a hard disagree. Steam provides the game . It "will be around for a long time." It is not Steams job to ensure the game runs on every device or OS version for eternity however. That is up to the publisher of the game. If you install Steam on an older version of the OS that does have 32bit/x86 support, Steam does its job. I do think however…

I believe GP was referring to the fact Steam itself is 32-bit only, with the singular exception of MacOS (last I checked, if this has recently changed, I apologize).

So even if your game is 64-bit, you still need 32-bit libraries and OS support to run the DRM. Sucks when either your OS doesn't support 32 bit (MacOS, OpenBSD), you don't want to add 32 bit multilib, or you're doing funky emulation on a non-x86 machine where you can only effectively emulate x86_64 (see: ppc64le).

These are all niche situations (the last one almost facetiously so), but the point stands. I really wish valve would release a 64 bit client on Windows and Linux :/

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

#392

Post by Octopodes » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 6:47 PM UTC

lrae wrote: post #105

guiomie wrote: post #92

Origin needs to do the same, their integration with steam is awful.

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

Origin is a pile ... how could the replacement possibly be worse?!

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

#393

Post by gpderetta » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 7:59 PM UTC

mikepurvis wrote: post #390

gpderetta wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also steam link!

I was going to mention that, but tbh it's been lackluster every time I've actually tried it. It's possible my computer just isn't up for doing the stream encoding part, but even outside of perf issues, I feel like I've had problems with the controls, it interfering with Window audio devices, and other random headaches. Maybe it's been a better experience for some others though?

I use it on my TV downstairs, connected with my Linux desktop upstairs. Performance wise it works great when wired, but it is unreliable on wireless. For casual gaming the latency is perfectly fine, but some games, like Dirt Rally, it can make huge difference even for a mediocre player like me.

Audio works fine almost always [1]. Controls usually work ok (I use both an x360 controller and a steam controller) but sometime it requires a bit of connecting and disconnecting, but to be honest it is probably more of a proton issue than steam link.

Overall I'm quite happy, although it is not yet a seamless console-like experience.

[1] There was a brief period last year when steam would crash when running under PulseAudio, and switching to alsa would prevent audio to be streamed. The issue fixed itself, either because of a steam update or a system update.

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

#394

Post by ThatPlayer » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 8:11 PM UTC

Macha wrote: post #353

ThatPlayer wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Netflix wasn't profitable at a €9.99 subscription, and therefore that was never sustainable. Look at how Netflix continues to raises prices just this year already.

That's not the only reason to raise prices, or they wouldn't have raised them this year given they made a profit in 2021. Netflix's net income has been positive for the last decade: https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/NFLX/netflix/net-i... It might be a better business _for the the business owners_ with less licensing fees due to less third party content and higher prices, but that's not the same as being bette…

Their net income is positive, but their free cash flow afterwards is pretty substantially negative until recently: https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/NFLX/netflix/free-...

It doesn't matter if it's better for the users if it is not sustainable. That's how you go out of business, which is no good for anyone.

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

#395

Post by ziml77 » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 8:15 PM UTC

p1necone wrote: post #321

ziml77 wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason that you see drivers release with specific games mentioned is exactly because of this. And also why the driver installer packages are so large. What I can't say is how much of a difference the GPU manufacturers work makes on average. I would have to assume there's a reasonable bump otherwise it wouldn't be worth it.

You get an absolutely massive performance boost by using newer drivers on Halo Infinite. I don't know exactly why, but it never goes above about 36 fps on low settings on older (AMD, 6800xt) drivers, but hits smooth 80+ at 4k on high with the drivers that mention Halo Infinite in the patch notes.

That’s wild. But if they have cases where gains can be that much then it’s very clear why it’s worth it to fix the the stuff that other companies wrote

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

#396

Post by LegitShady » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 8:16 PM UTC

usrusr wrote: post #323

LegitShady wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

but it wasn't a general marketplace for games.

To be fair Steam wasn't either, in the beginning, which also ruins my argument wrt the iTMS quite a bit: even the Orange Box was still a retail product to most (it's even in the name!) that just happened to be consumed through Steam. Not much different from how iPod users had to use the client app for CDs bought in retail (or far more likely: mp3 from the Napster substitute du jour)

You couldn't download even blizzard games through battle net until 2013. Steam's first third party games were in 2005. They're not really comparable.

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

#397

Post by Narishma » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 10:41 PM UTC

sbarre wrote: post #87

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…

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..

Epic's launcher is one of the worst, constantly consuming resources doing who knows what in the background.

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

#398

Post by charcircuit » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 10:50 PM UTC

account42 wrote: post #367

charcircuit wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>to provide downloads There are 2 problems with this. 1. You can't downloaded patches of game updates (with good ux). You would need to downloaded the entire game for every update which is bad. 2. You can't install the game to the system without a program. >and payments from their website Steam can provide less friction to make a payment since someone likely already has payment information attached to their account.…

> 1. You can't downloaded patches of game updates (with good ux). You would need to downloaded the entire game for every update which is bad. Lol no patch installers were a thing before Steam. And usually more efficient - for the longest time Steam would re-download any changed files.

>patch installers were a thing before Steam

That would essentially be a launcher. We are talking about a downloaded on a website. A website can't patch a file, not know what patches you need to get up to date.

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

#399

Post by _carbyau_ » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 11:45 PM UTC

mdoms wrote: post #319

_carbyau_ wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the thing Australians hate. We don't get a straight $ for $ conversion. As a general rule we get charged more for the same digital download because of regional pricing. A reasonable price has to be found by buying steam keys from [HumbleBundle/GreenManGaming/etc]. I don't play the latest anymore. I will wait a year or two and get it on sale. I get a patched, solid game with well known reviews and the communit…

Australians are incredible wealthy. In my experience (I lived in Aus for 5 years) Australians have no idea just how wealthy they are compared to other, even Western, nations.

You are probably right. I don't know enough to compare country citizen wealth.

But while your point is relevant to the marketing person, it is irrelevant to me as a consumer.

As per most humans of course, I never feel like I have enough. Like many, I have a mortgage and so am required to work until the day I die to keep a roof over my family's head. Not a glamourous roof, but ours.

So when I have friends overseas getting the same digital files as I am for less money, I feel ripped off.

For physical items in Australia you could argue the large distances for transport explain the cost/convenience difference.

But on the internet where the cost of information transport is negligible, a minimum 20% mark up is too blatant for the exact same convenience.

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

#400

Post by WorldMaker » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 11:51 PM UTC

Hamuko wrote: post #2

I'm surprised that they're not migrating customer games to the Xbox store considering Bethesda is a subsidiary of Microsoft.

One thing I'm seeing here is that Bethesda is trying to migrate everything including Save Files where they can. (Which great for them, that sounds like the right thing to do.) A migration to Steam may be technically easier for some of those things. Save files can be weird in Xbox games/Microsoft Store games. In particular, I think the Xbox Store has a much smaller portion of the "Creation Club" mods than Steam, and that may have been a strong motivator.

More cynically, this seems a "games generation" where Microsoft is trying to "win PC gamers back" by being very Steam friendly/Steam forward in their PC releases and strategy. There's a lot better PR for Microsoft here if Bethesda migrates everything to Steam, and it may just be for those PR reasons.