this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2025
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PC Master Race
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Going against the grain here, but conceptually is that really such a good thing?
Yes, Steam is pretty decent and yes, Valve have consistently shown good business practice and a pro-consumer stance, and yes third party launchers are generally absolute donkey tonk... but isn't converging onto one launcher like Steam very anti-consumer at its core?
Isn't this about stopping games from being launched like this:
Going Launcher => Launcher => game.
That should be banned.
It sounds like what you're interpreting it as is "Games that have their own or alternate launchers should be banned from sale on Steam" (e.g., games available on Epic, EA, etc. shouldn't be available on Steam).
I'd agree that that's anti-consumer. But if I buy the game on Steam, it shouldn't feed me through an additional launcher. If I want to buy the game directly from elsewhere and that requires a different launcher, that's perfectly fine.
Launcher > Launcher > Game is grotesque. 2 different accounts and an internet connection required just to play a game you ""own"".
Fuck that shit
Girls' Frontline 2 is basically a launcher you download on Steam, which then downloads the actual game
No, the companies that need a login or are tracking you, will just need to move it into the game itself. Convenient, but fixes nothing
Wouldn't that also count for Emulators?
Good point, but it could be argued to be a different case where the secondary launcher only runs silently in the background to support running the game.
vs. something else that pops up and is trying to get you to sign up for an external account
Anti-consumer is forcing them to use a service they don't want to in order to use the thing they paid for. Someone using steam clearly wants to use steam.
Now, is it a good idea to put all our eggs in the valve basket? Probably not, but that's not "anti-consumer", it's just unwise.
Nah that's cool, thanks for your view. I'm on board with what you're saying.
I fucking hate launchers with a passion, almost as much as I hated when Steam came out with one of the Half Life patches.
Admittedly though, if there was going to be one current launcher to rule them all, Steam is the best bet.
I was forced to use Steam when I bought a physical copy of Portal and the only thing inside was a CD with Steam installer and a code. I didn't want Steam, but it was the only way to play Portal.
So Steam is also anti-consumer.
I mean, sure, but that Portal launch was almost 2 decades ago lol
No, nobody said they couldn't have there own launcher or put it on other platforms, we just don't want launchers in our launcher that we have to use a keyboard and mouse on an other wise controller based game.
I am about to have an old man yells at cloud moment but I remember when it was incredibly controversial to have a launcher at all, steam itself in a less restricted form than we have today was very controversial.