It'd be impossible to create a competitor in this day in age, because what made Steam win out is that it was the first and that it hasn't acted like a greedy dick trying (too much) to monetize their platform dominance. Arguably, GOG is a better platform because it is much more against DRM, but when you get right down to it, gamers don't really care enough about those issues to put a dent in it even if the loudest voices do, so I doubt Steam's success has much to do with being a 'democratic platform'.
this post was submitted on 26 Apr 2024
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Steam is a true “disrupter,” because they do business the way people did for centuries before higher short-term profits became the only goal.
The reason they can “sit back” and count their money is because they’re a private company. As soon as there’s rumblings of going public, then buy a sextant for navigating.
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I don’t even view Steam as being particularly innovative. They just don’t suck. It does what it’s supposed to do.
That's the thing. You can launch Steam and have it just get the hell out of your way, and go enjoy your games. You don't really have to interact with any of the features on a regular basis. For many players, that's perfect.
But it's actually been incredibly innovative. Proton has made Linux gaming a reality when it previously seemed impossible. Remote Play Together is basically wizardry. Steam Input is fucking brilliant and lightyears beyond other control customizations. These things are available to every Steam user gratis if you want them.
(fixed minor typos)
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I don’t even view Steam as being particularly innovative. They just don’t suck
Sadly, that's basically 'innovation' in this climate. Not being a shitty corpo is an innovation for a lot of MBAs that have more years in school than sense in their head.
I like the controller support and streamlining of Linux working compared to stuff like heroic launcher.
It's not innovative anymore, but it sure was when it released. But they kept it near its peak instead of making it utter horse crap.
It's not innovative anymore
What have you been smoking? That's just plain wrong. See my other comment for examples.
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It was utter horse crap when it released. The military green Steam was among the worst pieces of software ever conceived. So they worked a lot to make it as good as it is today.
worst pieces of software ever conceived
Oh you sweet summer child. You've clearly never used Peoplesoft, or the shovelware packed with printer drivers, or browser add-ons from the Netscape days, or the horrible CD burner programs pre-installed on PCs in the 90s...
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Corporate tactic, very secret: Don't self-destruct.
But if we don’t self-destruct, how do we create value for shareholders?
No shareholders if you aren't publicly owned. Stakeholders, yeah probably, but no shareholders.
You can still have shareholders in a private company, those shares just aren't traded publicly...
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Would be good to see gog get more popular. Fuck drm
You'd be surprised how many steam games have no DRM other than steam itself. And how easy it is to put in a replacement (open-source) dll that acts as a steam emulator and runs the games without steam. I'd say... pretty much every non-AAA game on steam can have DRM removed this way. It's such barebones DRM that I can't really find reason to be angry at it.
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FYI games on Steam don't actually have to use any DRM. e.g. Kerbal Space Program -- you can download it, close the Steam client, copy it to another folder, unplug your network cable... then go launch the .EXE from its directory and play anyway.
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I used GOG much more when they were the only ones in town releasing old games, especially DOS games, that actually ran on modern systems. Steam has a lot of what I wasn't able to get anywhere but GOG now; many are even updated graphically or on new engines because certain old games are in vogue now. This isn't Steam or GOG's fault though... If anyone can be blamed, I'd blame Nightdive for making kick-ass source ports and not having them available on GOG.
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Yup, but they need to support Linux better. I'm glad that Heroic exists and apparently they're now taking a cut of GOG purchases made through their launcher, but there's still a lot missing from what Galaxy does.
I like gog the site not the gog galaxy app. I always have to look too hard to start a game up.
No need to use the app at all. The games on there are drm free. Run the game any way you want. That said, I like gog galaxy cos it keeps all the games I own on every platform together, and I use the search function to find the game I want and hit play. Or just hit view all and browse.
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@JulesTheModest Er...How do you mean? The Galaxy app has its issues, but I've not run into this one.
Biggest issue I ran into was years back trying to point it to my existing directory of GOG games from before Galaxy to get it to recognize them without reinstalling them, but eventually I just decided to reinstall whenever I felt like playing them again (and uninstall from old location).
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Some of things I hate like extra launchers and DRM are still kind of good that Valve even gives people who publish there to have the flexibility to do whatever they want. Same goes for publishing of "crap" games. With Valve being the dominant one in the PC space being super draconian would be a bad thing, since just as they could go the good route for consumers they could go the bad route too. So the kind of "hands off " approach is a good one even if it doesn't always work out for us.
Nothing I appreciate more than checking out the reviews and seeing "don't let it go unnoticed that this is an Ubisoft title, and therefore uses their launcher and drm" saved me regretful purchases (before the 2 week/2 hour return window) many times.
Yep and Valve themselves display clear warnings on the store page for 3rd party account requirements, DRM and additional launchers.