2954

I think that’s maybe the biggest subset of players that hate the EGS exclusives, the pc players that use Big Picture and play on the couch.

2955

About 1,000 of these 3,000 posts are pro Epic/ambivalent people coming in to state that the other side is overreacting, unjustified, or unduly upset about a ‘different play button you need to press’.

So while one can certainly feel the Epic critics are silly, there is a highly motivated contingent engaged in passionately shouting them down. There are a lot of people really invested in trying to undermine/question other people’s shopping preferences and purchase decisions.

Now I don’t mind, it keeps things interesting, but if one is concerned about thread length there is a reason why.

2956

One difference between the two situations is that there are genuine, technical reasons why it takes time and effort to port a game from a console to the PC. With the Epic store, they’re simply doing it to fuck with you, e.g. cause you annoyance/harm if you don’t go with their preferred path. If you’ll permit me a wildly reaching metaphor, it’s the difference between not being able to see your parents because you live in another state for work, and not being able to see your parents because your abusive SO is intentionally trying to isolate you.

This is what really set me off. :D I was gifted a game for Christmas, a game that theoretically I should have liked, but in order to play the game I had to spend a full hour? two hours? installing UPlay, restarting, patching, making accounts, troubleshooting, etc.

By the time I actually reached the game, I was primed to dislike it, my hype bubble had been burst, and I didn’t end up putting in the effort to get over the hump of learning this new game. Apparently the situation is even worse today, with people unable to play the game at all because the gatekeeping service in front of it is so bad. And again, none of that is technically needed, it was all just hoops UPlay made you jump through because they thought it would make them more money. There’s plenty of reason to dislike yet another launcher, especially if it comes right out of the gate with these attempts to control what you can and cannot do. It just smacks of U2Play. There is a reason we are called PC Royalty and not Console Peasants. We need to woo’d and wined and flattered, like Steam did, that is the way to win our hearts. It’s against our dignity to try and be corralled and controlled like Epic is doing.

2957

Is there any title outside of Bethesda games that this is an issue?

2958

One thing I realized is that I will never buy a game from GoG or any other platform if the game is available on steam for one reason. DLCs. So many games have them, and I am always interested in saving a bit of cash on sale.

As long as platforms like Humble Bundle exclusively sells steam keys, I can’t feel comfortable buying games from GoG or anyone else because I will forever be locked into DLC prices from GoG or who ever I get it from. At least with Steam, I will have a large number of DLC vendors to choice from.

The other features of steam are interesting, but I rarely use. I don’t use big screen, or the control or the workshop or anything.

So, that being said, I have to ask, how do you compete with Steam and it’s network? You can’t compete on price because even if GoG had the cheapest version of a game, I am not going to buy it from them unless it’s a Game of the Year Edition. And Epic is in the same boat when it comes to non exclusives. I can’t imagine pulling the trigger on a game in their platform as long as games steam has a wider range of vendors.

So, I feel locked in for economic reasons and I don’t see how Epic competes with them on non exclusive games.

2959

There isn’t any way they can do that wouldn’t doom the EGS to failure. They’re going to go all in , keep buying games, until either gamers relent, or they lose too much money.

I predict gamers will relent, but that’s because I have a massively low opinion of gamers these days.

2960

Silent Hunter IV had some mod order issues—the megapacks and the campaign mods both touched the files which defined spawn rates, so you had to do them in the right sequence.

It’s rare, but it happens.

2961

For older games like that and Skyrim I can see it being an issue. But assuming the developers intend their game to be modded, I find this to be an odd thing for a moddable game released in the last few years to be lacking. Even Euro Truck Simulator 2 and its American cousin have built-in, simple to use tools to control mod ordering.

2962

What I don’t understand is why Illwinter doesn’t use the workshop for anything buy maps. It really is annoying.

2963

Ah, I haven’t played that game, thanks! Bethesda games are the only ones that I’ve had that issue with so didn’t know if it was unique to them.

2964

Absolutely, the games can just join the rest of of the list of that I’m going to wait anyway, due to backlog, waiting for patches and so on.
But that has nothing to do with whether there are issues and dangers with Epic’s practices. I’m not “angry” because it’s usually not really relevant to me playing something near release, but I am angry with the people who presume to know why I care when they just don’t listen.

2965

The whole free game thing was very clever as a way to rapidly generate investment bias on behalf of the EGS client.

2966

Those 1,000 posts keep ignoring the obvious. These are the social features and other features from Steam I have used in the last month that I do not think exist on Epic yet:

  1. I have written at least two reviews and put them on my Curator page. I then interacted with those who follow my curation.
  2. I have read reviews from curators I trust.
  3. I have read quite a number of both positive and negative reviews on games I am considering buying.
  4. I have reviewed the patch notes on games.
  5. I have used the Steam review metric to help become a more-informed consumer, looking at both the recent and total review scores. For instance, I noticed the review scores for ATOM RPG was rising and asked a curator friend if he was going to re-review the game since the patch notes addressed many of his concerns. I put that game on the wish list.
  6. I have used the chat system for many of these discussions.
  7. I have sold a couple of cards. $.14, I am rich.
  8. I used the voice chat to play Stardew Valley with my daughter. She likes Alex.
  9. I used the sharing so she could try out Banished. She did not like that there was no Alex.
  10. I used cloud saves to retrieve saves from games that had been uninstalled.
  11. I have used the forums to both seek and provide help on games.
  12. I have used the workshop to download mods (Parkitect, Kenshi, Banished, HOI 4).
  13. I have used my wish list to review which games I want to buy next.
  14. I have reviewed games on my queue because I am OCD. I do not want 35,000 games on Steam. Go me!
  15. I purchased a game cheaper from elsewhere and used the key to install it on Steam (actually many through the Humble Monthly).

Epic may be “just another launcher” but for many of us Steam is not. It is a community. If I had to do all of this without Steam it would have been far more difficult involved a lot more time and probably a dozen various websites that I would have had tor register for. So I can and will wait for games until / unless Epic can provide a comparable experience. I have no issues with people who choose the Epic store for whatever reason. I have issues with Epic buying exclusives which limits my right to choose, especially prior titles that I had interest in that had been advertised on Steam.

2967

Man… I literally use Steam for its “play game” button. Everything else is useless to me. GOG is the best because I don’t even have to use their “play game” button - it’s optional :)

2968

All of them. Steam does zero to validate mods don’t overwrite or otherwise interfere with each other. It also automatically updates mods which has its own bag of issues. Especially when using modpacks. It might not be an issue for most as many errors might be benign. But I don’t like it and prefer to have full control over mods. YMMV of course.

2969

I don’t even use it for that - when I install a game I make a shortcut and use that. But clearly lots of people do like those features, so more power to 'em.

2970

That is pure and utter bollocks. Stop spreading nonsense.

@draxen explained precisely what EGS is doing and why.

Epic also explained it.

Valve looked into it, found that to be the case, issued their own statement - without saying that EGS was doing anything nefarious or intrusive.

Most of us devs also checked, and were able to confirm that it’s doing precisely as Epic said. It’s not different from using Facebook, Twitter etc to login with or populate any number of apps that interface with those social media accounts. Heck, I can use LinkedIn to import my entire Outlook contact lists. EGS uses Steam data to do the same thing - for matchmaking purposes.

2971

  1. It’s not a “tool”. It’s the Steamworks API which would need to be integrated into EGS. Why would Epic use it when it’s not only a suite of other tools that contain useless bloat, but also it’s their competition.

  2. Using the already curated (by the Steam user) - with permission - is no different from LinkedIn asking my permission to export my Outlook contacts. Or Discord. Or XBox Live. Or PlayStation etc

It’s much ado about nuthin’; and the nonsense is perpetrated by people with an ax to grind in the Steam vs EGS fiasco. We just get to lol at them because dumbassery is contagious.

2972

Rubbish. EGS asks your permission. If you say no, it ends there.

2973

Steam has a web API too. No Steamworks required.

Edit: you can even get the data in VDF format! Pretty much exactly the same file they scrubbed a hard disk for, except that the Steam web API makes you ask the user for their Steam information.

I’m all for allowing Epic to import Steam friends. What I’m not for is Epic just assuming I’m going to want to do that and grabbing my Steam data from my hard drive ahead of time, rather than doing it the right way and getting the data through official channels only at the time when I say, “Please pull in my Steam friends.”