Quoting: GetBeanedI agree with everything you've said here. I know some people are very firm in supporting native versions so to pull the rug on it in this fashion sucks.

That said, in my experience, native versions are unfortunately almost always worse: missing features, worse performance, slower updates etc.

Honestly, I get really annoyed by the "Proton/WINE isn't native" arguments. If WINE or Proton were Emulation tools, I'd agree, but where emulation tries to mimic hardware and other aspects that simply can't be done "natively", WINE and Proton's other tools are actually rebuilding the Windows and DX APIs for use within Linux. As such, Proton/WINE are absolutely native but the very definition of what an API does. I'm speaking of this as a Software Dev myself that works with various APIs every day. I've said it before and I'll say it again, if WINE/Proton isn't "native", then no API is native.

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Quoting: Ehvis

Quoting: EagleDeltaThere are publishers who have removed a game from Steam and also removed it to download. It's rare, but it does happen.

Which one? So far I've only seen removed depots and I haven't checked whether they could be extracted from older manifests.

It depends on the game, but some like World in Conflict and Order of War are either completely gone from libraries (World in Conflict and Order of War) or files no longer exist in Depot (which is functionally the same thing)

Still rare, but it does happen.

EDIT: It also appears that the state of some Steam Games removed depend a bit on the Region a person is in too.

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[quote=amatai]

Quoting: chr

Quoting: MicromegasI think Itch.io doesn't get much of a say in this. Distributing a specific game can become illegal if some licenses expire (most commonly for music or car brand likeness used in the game), therefore Itch.io requires a method for the game uploader to remove the game from the platform.

I was under the impression that steam was able to keep games that has been bought downloadable even after they stop being sold. I may be mistaken, but if I'm not, that reflects very badly on itch that games that has been bought can disappear.

This is entirely a dev or publisher decision. There are publishers who have removed a game from Steam and also removed it to download. It's rare, but it does happen. This isn't unique to itch. The way IP and copyright law work means that every online store must have a way for the owner to completely remove their stuff

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Quoting: ExpandingManThis looks nice but I have to say I'm pretty bummed that this does not look nearly as modular as I had initially hoped. I'm not really interested in a desktop environment, but I do want a window manager and the current options are less than ideal for various reasons (nvidia re wayland having been a huge pain in the ass). I would be happy to use this if I could strip it down to basically just be a window manager but it's not really looking like it'll quite do that without elaborate modification.

And that's completely ok. This isn't necessarily targeted towards users like yourself or others that do heavy WM customization, but primarily targeted for general users that want some customization, but also want simple UX/UI out of the box.

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I thinks it's really really important to note that Valve does not officially support Snap or Flatpak builds. A huge amount of this, especially with Snap, is that the way it handles sandboxing conflicts with the fact that Steam Runtime for Linux also performs Sandboxing for Proton apps and any Linux games configured to run with the Runtime using PressureVessel..... which itself is just a modified version of Bubblewrap (used in Flatpak).

The consistent issue here is that Steam is already trying to sandbox games, so running Steam in another sandbox can tend to cause problems. Less so with Flatpak these days, but they did mention in a Github issue that Steam sandboxing breaks almost everytime a change is made to Snap.

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Quoting: Liam Dawe

Quoting: NyxWouldn't you just use steam family sharing and pass it down that way.
They can't login to the account but most of your library is still kind of passed on ?

This is mentioned in the article. But, that would require someone to share before they die. And whoever wants the account passed on may not have it shared, that doesn't really solve the issue at hand, and not all games are available via family sharing.

Part of me has a feeling that this entire subject is a legal quagmire as a whole. Under the law in many places, ownership is shared by a married couple and that cannot be taken away by some license agreement. But also, Valve likely has their own legal quagmire to deal with as it relates to selling license keys to other developers' software. As in, Valve likely doesn't have the legal power to transfer licenses to another person after death. This is something that would likely have to be resolved in court..... ESPECIALLY if the deceased was a spouse and passing ownership of account to said spouse may not be something that can be legally avoided.

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Quoting: finaldestI have removed the game from my wish list as will not support a studio who refuses to keep to their promises.

I have noticed a lot of publishers drop support for Linux and mac since the rise of Valves Proton (PDX as prime example). As much as I love what Proton has done for Linux gaming, I am now getting worried with the big decline in official Linux support through native builds.

I think the Linux gaming community needs to make a push for official support using Proton as an option. I don't like relying on Proton simply because the publisher can simply wash their hands and claim no support was guaranteed unless on windows. I have no problem using Proton but I want official support should a problem arise.

Native builds are currently really hard to support due to sub-par support in Game Engines for Linux + Vulkan. As it stands now (and as it seems to be going with parts of Proton like DXVK) Proton is a more performant and reliable "engine" or "target" than trying to build a "Linux Native" binary using Unreal/Unity/etc.

Also, Proton IS native. It is, for all intensive purposes, a gaming API for Linux. Not an emulator or "compatibility layer" really, but an API. It just allows Windows API calls to be mapped to Linux and/or Vulkan ones. If you've ever worked on connecting services together, this is exactly how we build things in code - connecting disparate systems together with a shared "language" - be that REST, GraphQL, gRPC, or something else.

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Quoting: scaine

Quoting: EagleDeltaNever go into Crowdfunding of any kind thinking you're money is related to being a customer. It's NOT, you're an investor that doesn't get any stake in the company or payout. Instead you get exclusive content and (usually for physical products) earlier access to the product than the rest of the public.

That's just practically quoting Kickstarter's entire cop-out line. And it would be fine if it was actually even vaguely structured like that. But it's not. It's "pledge at this level, get these rewards". Or "meet this goal, we make this promise". At that point, there needs to be accountability. But KS hide behind their "you're an investor" line and shirk all responsibility.

I mean, that is the definition of what Crowdfunding is, though. Lots of Investors never make their money back that they put into a company. You don't have to use it, but there are a ton of independent Board Games and Video Games that simply wouldn't exist without Early Access or Crowdfunding. Otherwise, you're generally looking at a big publisher, who are less trustworthy in most cases than most Crowdfunding sites are (Kickstarter isn't the only one out there).

You're not a "bad gamer" or anything for not wanting to support Crowdfunding, but also know that alternative is also something we complain about as well and it simply takes lots of money and/or time to make games, even small ones..... and that's with GameDevs making far less than their counterparts in traditional Tech.

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Quoting: JarmerThis is typical from them. DONT. EVER. SUPPORT. NIGHTDIVE. Horrible developer that somehow continues to exist despite lots of other good devs going under :(

What else have they done wrong?

The Remasters they've worked on have all been well received.

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Quoting: scaineThis encompasses perfectly why I gave up on Kickstarter years ago. Particularly disappointing given how much I advocated for it in its early days. Absolutely zero accountability from KS.

My last backed project was December 2014.

It depends on what you use it for:

1. Kickstarter/Gamefound/Backerkit are great for Board Games/TTRPGs. There are very few failures in that arena relative to video games.
2. Never go into Crowdfunding of any kind thinking you're money is related to being a customer. It's NOT, you're an investor that doesn't get any stake in the company or payout. Instead you get exclusive content and (usually for physical products) earlier access to the product than the rest of the public.

I mean, it's in the name - Crowdfunding, not Preorder.

As for those dissing on Early Access games. Without Early Access, a vast majority of video games will either then come only from Major Publishers, most of which have proven they can't be trusted, or from indie devs that are published by major publishers..... which leads to the same problem.

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