Quoting: kuhpunkt

Quoting: iiari

Quoting: scaine...you've raise the excellent point that a threat to Steam/Valve is indeed a threat to your carefully horded (and paid-for) steam library. We're just renting those titles (permanently) rather than owning them.

Is Epic running the same gig? Or can you download a DRM-free version of their titles for play without the need for the Epic launcher? Knowing Epic, I'd expect both a forced launcher AND draconian, bullshit DRM on everything.

Outstanding point... Good question about Epic, and I agree with you that given their history, draconian is what we could probably expect on DRM...

http://i.imgur.com/4sa1Ln6.jpg [External Link]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/18mzcn/i_asked_steam_support_what_happens_to_my_games_if/ [External Link]

In the case of a corporate shuttering (e.g. bankruptcy), the company involved (Valve Corporation, CD Projekt, etc) may no longer have the time and resources to follow through on promises of making purchased games available to customers, nor, in so far as I am aware, have any of these digital distribution service providers contractually stipulated that you have rights to your libraries in the event of them going out of business or even in the event of them making some other stark change (such as moving to a monthly paywall service charge). I believe rights of access for these typically end at termination of the license agreement or the subscription itself (to which the license applies) and by agreeing to the current EULA you usually also agree to possible unilateral future changes, and of course, the license confers no title or ownership, more or less just access to the service as it exists (if you don't run afoul of EULA provisions and get booted off for other reasons).

The provided URLs seem to be primarily focused on what would happen if Valve went out of business. Of all possibilities, I would be least concerned about the larger digital distribution platforms going under. More so than closure, I am more concerned about how large (i.e. corporate-run) services can change (due to external or internal pressures), and sea changes can happen rapidly. Gabe Newell won't always be the head of Valve Corporation, someday CD Projekt might be bought out by a company that doesn't share its values (or perhaps CD Projekt might decide to divest itself of GOG Sp. z o.o. in order to focus solely on video game development and possibly other entertainment media creation), etc.

The service being shutdown isn't the only way you can lose access to your digital library temporarily or permanently. A security breach is one, and that can be a headache to clean up.

Even with great security protections in place, that won't protect you from EULA changes. For example, no matter how well-intentioned, an overreaching code of conduct being put in place, which you opt into by accepting the terms and conditions of the EULA, could result in an accused person being temporarily locked out of her/his account on a first or second alleged transgression, and being permanently banned if accused again. Affected users would really have little defense in that situation, other than trying to draw attention to the incident publicly, and on a matter such as this, you are unlikely to meet with much success speaking out.

If at some point a service adopts draconian bans based on perceived cheating, you could be banned if you trigger anti-cheat software with a false positive. Based on whether this has happened several times, this could result in a permanent ban.

The aforementioned are just a few hypotheticals. But even if all history and current evidence suggested that everything will remain status quo 'throughout the universe in perpetuity', just as a matter of general precaution, I would rather back up my games now rather than try to do so in the unlikely event of an emergency, and, as much as possible, I would prefer games not be code dependent on the features of a specific third-party service (e.g. Games for Windows Live). Changeable, default configurations are okay; e.g. a game relied on GameSpy multiplayer servers, GameSpy multiplayer servers were shut down, but if multiplayer servers used by the game can be manually configured by users, then it's not a big deal. If a game is so heavily integrated with one distribution platform's features that it would be gimped (e.g. no multiplayer) if offered through another distribution platform, that is lamentable and not very robust.

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Quoting: SalvatosI doubt Valve would let any publisher sell thousands of keys without taking their cut, no matter if the keys come in a box or an e-mail.

It's hard to say for certain. There is a game named Far-Out which was removed from Steam because the developer paid for reviews. I don't remember the exact specifics, but I believe the developer came clean to Valve about what he had done, and the game was subsequently delisted. He may have also been banned from publishing any future games on Steam; I'm not certain. He still sells Steam keys (which must have been generated prior to the game being delisted) on itch.io (he also used to sell Steam keys for the game through G2A and G2Play, but it appears he is down to a few remaining keys left). Under these circumstances, I doubt Valve received a portion of the sales after the game was no longer available for purchase on Steam.

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I am disappointed that this happened (and it is more likely than not that this won't be the last occurrence, at least until Valve does something more progressive than their most recent revenue split model, as well as enforcing better quality control, amongst other changes), but I guess I am less riled up after years of watching the jockeying between corporate gatekeepers and the tribalism between gamers. At Steam's inception, it was pushed forward by Valve tying it to Half-Life 2. I have seen quite a few Linux gamers suggest that Valve should make its future games timed Linux exclusives or even permanent Linux exclusives and that it should incentivize third-party publishers to do the same. How is PlayStation 4's desirability over Xbox One often expressed by gamers? By the number of exclusives to the platform. This is just the latest chapter in an old story. People both tout and complain about these practices in the same breath.

The underlying operating system and hardware is slowly being supplanted by the digital distribution service itself as the concept of what constitutes the gaming platform (this will truly take hold if cloud gaming succeeds in the future or possibly even if subscription services like Origin Access and Discord's Nitro become the norm). Years from now, people may not ask what hardware you game on or what operating system you game on, but if you game on Steam, Epic Games store, etc. It's already that way somewhat.

We are use to Valve being the only 800-pound gorilla in the territory, and that appears to be changing. If the current commotion helps bring better value to developers, I don't despise developers for trying something different, but I would like to see measures that increase consumer value as well. We don't own copies of games, we own licenses, with little recourse if our access is temporarily or permanently revoked. I never used Desura, but I saw posts from people who had trouble downloading their games while Desura was going through its death throes, and since then, I've taken to proactively backing up my GOG library. It's unlikely (and let me stress that), but perhaps competition will drive one of the already established digital stores to adopt what Robot Cache is seeking to achieve and shake things up further still.

I'm not crazy about the way Metro Exodus' exodus from Steam was handled, just as I wasn't crazy about The Long Dark being removed from GOG with minimal forewarning, but it is the rights holder's prerogative, even if I think it is a regrettable decision. People who already paid for the game will be able to access it, those of us who hadn't yet will miss out. In the case of Metro Exodus that means waiting until at least the middle of February 2020.

While I am disappointed, I am not terribly bent out of shape by timed exclusives because if I know a game is eventually coming to my platform of choice, there is no need to switch. I'm not Veruca Salt, I can wait; I will not lack for gaming entertainment in the meantime. Between Steam, GOG, etc, I have a sizeable backlog of games. Developers (probably at the behest of their publishers) may try to incentivize early purchases with pre-order DLC, but they also undermine this push for pre-orders by releasing games of beta quality and then later release redux/remastered/game-of-the-year editions. By the time Metro Exodus makes its way to Steam, patches will have been applied, and a redux version may be available or impending.

What fewer people seem to be commenting on is that, at least in the US, Metro Exodus is priced cheaper on the Epic Games store than it was on Steam. If the Epic Games store beats Steam on head-to-head pricing, then there will be serious competition. The Epic Games store certainly has the potential to cause disruption to Linux gaming if it is left to grab market share unchallenged, but Valve has a war chest of its own. As for the Discord store, there is no point in speculating on whether or not it will support Linux at some future date. Either it does or it doesn't, and right now it doesn't.

I've looked through the Epic Games and Discord stores, and right now, from a gamer perspective, they leave much to be desired, although they probably (hopefully) have improvements in the works. Most publishers don't care about the majority of missing user features; they do, however, care about discoverability. In my opinion, in terms of store apps, discoverability at both (Epic Games and Discord) stores is currently worse than it is on Steam, GOG Galaxy, itch, Game Jolt, Origin, and Microsoft Store. In my opinion, discoverability on the Discord store is currently about on par with Uplay, not quite on par with Bethesda.net, but close. The Epic Games store trails all of the aforementioned, only Battle.net is as underwhelming (although both Epic Games store and Battle.net have only a handful of games so that in and of itself could be seen as facilitating discovery in some publishers' eyes I guess).

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