If you’re going to try and compete with something like Steam, you need to actually compete.
Most launchers are storefronts at best and nothing else. Often the buying experience isn’t even good.
I would like to see Steam broken up so it is just as a storefront as well
why?
Monopolies
As the comment section points out; it’s impossible to compete with steam because they have so many adjacent perks
And all software should only ever do one thing, otherwise it’s bloat
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By broken up I’d like to see the community, workshop, chat system, achievements, and marketplace all be separate companies
That would be better for everyone
Why? All those features already exist as separate companies. Discord for chat, Nexus for workshop, like 5000 places run their own marketplace etc.
How would it be better for everyone if you have to set up 5 separate things? That’s currently the issue with Epic’s launcher that it does nothing other than let you buy games so it doesn’t provide the value Steam does.
Because then they would plug and play with whatever service you use
Except what steam does isn’t considered bloat to a large swath of users.
Or developers
I’m not sure I agree, but thank you for explaining
Obviously the unpopular opinion with the neckbeards, but I agree with you. I don’t understand the blind love for Steam. I mean it’s an effective platform I guess, definitely the better one for sure, but they all are pretty unnecessary. Steam definitely is pretty monopolistic. But whatever, everyone also enjoys paying $1200 for video cards from the same two suppliers, that were a quarter of that price not more than 6 or 7 years ago.
Can you articulate how Steam is a monopoly?
It’s weird how ruthlessly it tears down battle.net for its interface, but doesn’t even mention it for steam
It’s kinda the same for EGS. They added a bunch of things like achievements, user scores and critic scores, but no mention of those.
This doesn’t take away that it runs like a buggy mess sometimes. I just hate false equivalencies
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yeah I mean who can compete with family share. wait what. one person being on means the library is unavailable???
Ya I never understood that. I can understand that one game being locked while someone is playing, but everything is ridiculous
I’ve always thought that was something they had to put in place to place publishers. I mean, sharing is basically the same as stealing, right? So they had to make it really dumb in order for pubs to go along with it?
I doubt it. It makes it essentially useless nowadays to given how many single player games have a online requirement.
Is there a universal launcher like Lutris available for Windows? I was looking to build a gaming HTPC and want to interface with it with just only a controller, just like a console.
Playnite.
Seconding Playnite, works stupidly well with everything from emulators (it can even download and install them to folders from within if you want that), and with add-ons shit gets wild
Playnite. Combines all games from all connected launchers into one and configurable/themeable to your hearts desire
I use Playnite. It automatically adds all you games from all famous launchers, lets you add games manually, download the meta data for it and has theme and plugin support.
(not for windows, OS) Maybe have a look at Bazzite? It’s supposed to be a SteamOS but Fedora based. I’ve been meaning to have a look at it eventually, so i dont know how it actually is, maybe it’s garbage for all i know
There is ChimeraOS too, based on Arch.
The problem with Linux is that you will always have to tolerate a nontrivial section of games being straight-up unavailable, of games breaking, running suboptimally and requiring hacky solutions to run, and the complete absence of first-party support from hardware manufacturers and game developers. It’s not suitable for HTPCs despite having terrific UI unfortunately.
I’m hoping it gets to the point where lutris/proton/other compatibility layers are automatically sorted out by the OS and whatever you install would use what it needs. Maybe a fool’s dream ¯\(ツ)/¯
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Launchbox has got you covered.
Does steam count? I use it to launch non-steam games.
From other launchers like Itch, Epic & GOG as well?
You can add them as shortcuts. UWP need a tool to set them up in steam, but you can do them too.
They’ll still need to open the other launchers to run, but it’s about as close to seamless as you’ll get. You can make Windows log in automatically, not lock when it sleeps, and launch to steam big picture mode. It might take a search or two to set up, but after it’s (minus windows being windows) relatively out of your way.
You can do the same with Linux, but you lose anticheat games and setting up other launchers is more work.
You don’t need any extra tools. A basic function of Steam is “Add non-Steam Game” it’s the little + symbol at the bottom left of the window. Find the .exe of the game you want to add, click, and it’s in your steam library now. You’ll want to add custom artwork, but it works. If the game launches in a separate launcher, that launcher will launch from steam of course.
Unless it’s changed in the last year or so, Windows store stuff doesn’t show up, because it’s not a normal executable. You needed UWP hook to import them to Steam.
Launchbox. But the 10foot controller interface is behind a paywall with a weird scheme.
I think it depends on what type of controller. Dualshock 4s and Dualsenses are natively supported by Windows and you don’t really need DS4 anymore to work with Launchbox. Xinput controllers may need a special driver.
