I guess they're giving up on convincing people to download their launcher.
Not gonna play them if they include their launcher after game is started from Steam lol.
This should be unacceptable. Launchers are bloatware.
I don't understand what the point of a blizzard launcher is - steam is already a launcher.
Ads. Ads and data harvesting.
yeah, plus steam takes 30%
The games are coming to Steam. Even if the launcher is there, Steam still gets the 30%
IDK what your comment is about, but its not a coincidence the first blizz game coming to steam is free to play,
In-app purchases, mtx, DLC, and premium currency are also subject to Valve tax for games that are on Steam. Free to play means "enough people pay $200+ that we can get away with not selling it for $50", putting it on Steam still means Valve gets a piece of the pie.
The Battle.net launcher pre-dates Steam though, doesn’t it?
Edit: guess not. Steam came out in 2003. I hadn’t heard of it until well after the Battle.net launcher came out in 2013. 🤷🏻♂️
Battle.net actually launched in 1996, though the client as it existed back then would hardly be recognizable as a launcher/storefront today. The modern client launched in 2009.
Battle.net is dead and gone. The launcher has nothing to do with battle.net and everything to do with attempting to harvest as much data as possible, bonus if you run it in the background without playing any of their games.
I was wondering why it sucked so much ass. This explains it
Yeah I just mean the launcher application. I dunno, I had it way before Steam was even on my radar though.
Mike Ybarra confirmed on the bird site that these games will launch directly through Steam, no bundled launcher nonsense.
confirmed
I've heard OW2 has dropped PVE while it was confirmed that PVE will exist lol.
It was not just "confirmed" - that was whole point of OW2.
Lmao yeah
That's awesome!
Battle.net launcher can literally be closed after the game is running. It even has a setting to automatically do so. Why would they pull this sort of bullshit, I have no idea
Why would they pull this sort of bullshit, I have no idea
They aren't, they said that the Steam versions of Blizzard games will not require the Battle.net launcher at all.
Each time battle net launcher opens,it displays a popup banner for cosmetics, warcraft stuff, overwatch stuff etc. They get free ads in your eyeballs.
No way they will let it go. It will be steam -> battle.net -> game
I expect the worst, and I am usually right. You are probably correct lol.
My immediate reaction was:
Pffffffffffff.....get fucked!
Do we know if it'll work this way ? It sounds so stupid but I wouldn't put it past them
Pretty sure it either allows to login within game, or launches their own (micro?) launcher first, where you have to login with Blizzard account and then starts the game.
Pretty much all "steam games" that are primarily available elsewhere run this way using mini launchers...
On Steam Deck EA games often fail to start at all due to EA launcher updates, and Rockstar launcher takes around 3-5 minutes to start a fucking game (which should start instantly).
I mean, this sounds suspiciously like something a company that makes the device that also owns and runs the biggest digital game store might do intentionally.
Except its not. Valve has gone out of their way to make sure other peoples' games and launchers work, even if they're not selling directly through Steam. Look at the Proton patch notes if you're not just being a conspiratorial asshole and actually care about the facts.
I really wish Steam would put their foot down and stop these launchers. They are nothing but a nuisance and add no value for the customer.
EDIT: Just to be clear, when EA Play joined Gamepass there wasn't a separate launcher when you went to play an EA game on the Xbox. Steam could make this work with them and the other companies. They have enough pull to make this work - it would be greatly welcomed.
According to the steam page it says it only requires a battle.net account. Usually it says when another launcher is required.
Steam having a monopoly is not a good thing for anyone. Competition is good, even if the other launchers are a bit annoying.
Yeah but like, launcher isn't a market. Game Store is the market they're in. I'll happily buy a game from a different store if thats the only place it's offered or even if it's just cheaper there. The annoyance is when they want to be Steam. I don't want to be forced to download another launcher to play a game. If you want what Steam has, create a launcher that offers better services than Steam.
But most games aren't DRM-free, so the launchers are necessary to verify your account and ownership of the game. Otherwise every store would be GOG, and most publishers won't use it.
Steam already does that verification.
Yeah, but why should Steam be the only game in town? That's a very dangerous monopoly.
What are you even talking about? It's an application that launches a game. It adds nothing of value to the process of opening the game. How is it less of a monopoly to use a launcher to launch a launcher to launch a game?
It's not just a launcher, it's a storefront. Uplay, EA-whatever, and Rockstar Launcher are all storefronts where you can buy the games those companies make.
The launcher itself is a UI which lets you "launch" the game. Steam for example, is a launcher and a storefront, as is Uplay.
Having all your games in a single launcher/storefront is bad, as it gives a single company entire control over your games, and monopoly pricing.
Also remember that Steam takes a 30% cut, which is totally unnecessary, and is what directly caused giants like Ubisoft and Rockstar to make their own storefronts. Because why pay a 30% tax just for selling your game, this ain't the 1990s anymore with CD-ROM pressings.
Fuck Steam and it's monopolistic, 30% rent seeking bollocks.
Tell me a single benefit to me as the consumer of blizzard or any other company forcing me to install their launcher and run it everytime I open a game I bought through Steam.
There is no benefit, I never claimed the launcher within a launcher was a benefit.
The problem is the cancer that is Steam itself. We need more competing storefronts which don't require the Steam launcher, and even better if there's no launcher of any kind at all, just a binary to run to play the game.
Gog? Itch? Plenty of developers choose to sell their games in DRM-free formats. Plenty of games don't even cost money.
Exactly, and I have written about how much I love GOG and Itch and why I hope they take more market share away from Steam.
Just a note, as a storefront, there are plenty of competing options that work with Steam. Think Humble Store and other resellers, Steam doesn't take any cut from those sales and while they do enforce some standards (Things like staying close to price parity with Steam on alternate storefronts) and can refuse to give out keys, the market there is definitely very healthy.
Also remember that Steam takes a 30% cut
20-30% cut, which is in-line with most digital storefronts.
which is totally unnecessary
Companies exist to make money. Making money will never be "unnecessary" for a company. And hosting secure data centers around the world delivering 15 Tbps a day is not exactly cheap.
and is what directly caused giants like Ubisoft and Rockstar to make their own storefronts.
Also remember that Ubisoft and Rockstar (and Microsoft and Blizzard) came crawling back to Steam all the same, meaning they thought they would make more money even with the 20-30% tax. So a 20-30% tax must seem pretty fair to these companies for what they are getting.
There's plenty of others. GoG and Humble come to mind as the major alternatives.
Yeah, and GoG is fantastic and I'm so glad it exists. We need more DRM-free storefronts without launchers for sure.
That's an argument for Steam not being the only game store, it doesn't make much sense after you already bought it from Steam and the game requires an alternate launcher to be installed.
But on that other matter, I think you have a point in theory, but EA, Ubisoft and Activision Blizzard don't seem to have any interest in providing a better service or unique benefits. Steam's dominance is overly maligned when it's the only one where the company actually earned its place, by providing a better service.
And even then Steam doesn't even have as much of a monopoly over PC games as console manufacturers actually do over each of their platforms. But since it is by design that consoles only support the platform-maker approved games, it doesn't even register in people's minds as a monopoly. As if they were never supposed to control these devices they have bought.
Launchers are a solution to DRM, not the solution. The way today's modern market is, it's understandable that some gamers have forgotten that there used to be games you bought directly from the publisher's website. DRM was done by asking you to sign into your account before launching the game, a lot of games still make you do this today. There's also the tried and true method of phoning home with a product key for DRM as well. There's no shortage of ways to be independent, very few companies are interested in doing so because Steam is convenient.
Aside from the fact that logging into every game separately would be a nightmare, it would only work for online games and be a major hassle for developers because it means they also need to compensate for not having a launcher on things like automatic updates and deployments. It's not really a solution either side would like.
I'm getting downvoted hard but people are forgetting that a game store not having a launcher is suicide. GOG tried that, started bleeding money, caved in and made their own launcher. Steam also has 20 years under their belt so saying worse launchers shouldn't be allowed to exist would just kill competition entirely.
GOG and Humble are really good stores though
Gog is reportedly failing and Humble's success is because they're selling Steam keys, so they still depend on them.
This isn't a monopoly issue. Other launchers exist. Most of the games on Steam are available on these other launcher, yet people still prefer Steam.
I can only speak for myself, but I prefer Steam because it's more customizable so I can set it to open to my library first instead of a rotating ad banner, the storefront ads are not intrusive and can be easily ignored, and steams remote play is something that no other launcher offers.
In fact, I am not sure what the other launchers offer that they excel at over Steam.
Steam has competition by way of Epic, EA, Blizzard. Steam is just the far superior product and people don’t want to change
Having a monopoly is not good.. I just wish others wouldn't completely ignore Linux users.. Valve/Steam on the other hand is seriously pushing it forward which makes me very much biased toward them.
Yeah. While them having the most successful platform for distributing games can be troublesome in the monopoly sense, I'm still sunny to them just because of their support for the Linux community.
At least Valve isn't a public company and beholden to shitty investor politics though, so I am more okay with Steam than... literally any other game launcher.
Plus they're the only launcher that fully supports Linux, so until that changes I am rooting for Steam.
Yeah, steam is good, but it can get bad if they sit around for too long and get fat. The threat of others is a good thing.
I just wish the competition gave any attention to Linux support. GOG Galaxy has been out idk how long, they sell Linux games, and still not even a launcher.
Competition is good, even if the other launchers are a bit annoying.
What does "competition" between companies really mean? It means they are competing for customers. Annoying me with shitty launchers is the opposite of competing. Make things cheaper, offer better services and more features. This is competition. Steam (and GOG) is the only one actually "competing" here. And look what happened? Microsoft, Ubisoft, Blizzard... one by one they fall to Steam because they simply cannot comprehend this fact.
i love how polarizing the votes on this are, you aren't wrong. gog is a huge competitor but they have their own launcher too which is annoying
So let them distribute their launchers and storefronts, Valve couldn't stop it. But it's not monopolistic for Steam to say "if you want us to approve your product for our store, you can't have the game launch into a pop-up for someone else's store".
False. It’s a good thing for Gabe.
How is a shiti launcher a competition...
You want competition go to GoG or Epic... Or pirate
Never touched my Blizzard Account again after the sexual harassment and paygap scandal.
I've put 15 years of lifetime into my druid... It still hurts a little because I've loved WoW for a long time.
So Blizz switching to Steam couldn't interest me any less.
Same after they kowtowed to China about Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Ditto. I won't even give them usage stats on games I had previously purchased. Nothing to take to the board and say "we have returning users that we hope to convert into sales!"
Now I'm not gonna buy/play them on steam too
You and me both brother.
Glad they made this decision right after the worst patch in Diablo history
What happened with this Diablo patch? I’m skipping D4, but I love me some drama.
Same old story: buffs for the already-strong, nerfs for the fun stuff, kneecap progression and loot. All the stuff that pisses players off.
Diablo 2 is tied with “my favorite game I’ve ever played” and everything I hear about D4 makes me happy I skipped it. :c
Diablo 2 is my least favorite Diablo game, and you are right to skip D4 if you're a massive fan of D2. D4 is much more like Diablo 1 and Diablo 3 had a baby.
Path of Exile may be up your alley tho! I strongly recommend that game for any D2 fan.
I’ve tried PoE! It was pretty good. Didn’t really scratch my itch, though. D2R was insanity good. I enjoyed D3 well-enough, but mainly at launch. Without trade and economy, I’m just decked out immediately and it gets boring.
Desperation
I love this! Finally there’s going to be actual statistics to see how much their games are actually dying.
Blizzard had plans to dump the launcher shortly after D3 2.0 dropped. Then they backpedaled and where like no wait launcher is great! 🤷♂️
“Players on Steam will still have to connect Overwatch 2 to a Battle.net account, but they’ll have access to all of Steam’s amenities like their friends list and achievements.”
Finally, so much people will join, that I'm sure someone will fix the Proton bug where the mouse pointer loses focus and you have to tab out and back in to regain focus after respawning. Hell, there are so many heroes that don't require precise aiming, that it would even make it a playable game on the Steam Deck.
It has been fixed in protonGE
Does valve ever merge commits from PGE ?
People love a monopoly when it suits them
Steam is the best platform by far, and the only one with Linux support. It's not Valve's fault if other publishers aren't even trying to make a good product.
People love things that benefit them as consumers and hate things that don't, end of
It wouldnt be so notable if they just let me download the game by itself. If I have to download a fucking launcher every time then I want the games to be centralized atleast somewhat.
Seriously every fucking conpany a fucking launcher for a while there, even fucking bethesda had one.
I'm permanently annoyed with the launcher thing, too. I wish someone would come up with a software store app that 1) installed all the right crap so the game works right and 2) didn't require you to open the app to open the game. Steam, for example, lets you install the game with a start menu shortcut, but if you don't have Steam open, clicking on the start menu shortcut opens Steam first, then Steam launches the friggin' game. Then there is the Bethesda launcher. Then Blizzard's Battle.net launcher. There's an Xbox launcher. Yadda yadda. I don't know if their primary goal is monopoly as much as it is forcing you to open a program with a store in it so you see stuff to buy when you want to play a game. I think having a monopoly is secondary. Primary to them is forcing you to see that they have more shit for you to buy. I'm pretty sure Apple's iTunes is the one that started it all. Let's integrate shopping for music into the computer. Then, the phone. Now it's not just music. It's every friggin' thing. People with shopping addictions must have a hard time if they're also gamers or fans of other digital media.
I think you can choose your library as the startscreen when steam opens.
But I think you are right that the game should open without starting steam. I would guess it has something to do with DRM? because with GOG you can just download the game and start it from desktop without launcher.
Yes, your library can be the start screen when it opens. But first you must see the other window (that I always close without reading) telling you about today's "special deal" or some game you might like to buy.
I doubt anyone will complain if Blizzard's games are brought to other storefronts too.
I like Steam. Steam has the best features, best UI, good sales, and while they are not without faults (systems can stay unchanged for a long time!), they are run by a company that by and large respects its userbase.
I don't mind if games are brought to Steam and any or all other storefronts. Put it on GOG, Windows Store, EGS, Itch.io, battlenet, Origin, Uplay... You name it, I approve of it going there also. If those other storefronts want me to use them, they need to provide a comparable or superior experience. GOG comes the closest, but its inability to get games in a timely or predictable manner, if at all, is too much of an obstacle for me.
best UI
Steam has one of the worst UIs I've ever seen lol. It looks and feels like a website from the early 2000s.
I find it infinitely more usable than all of the other storefronts I've used or seen. Interacting with my library is easy and straight forward. Buying games is easy and straight forward. When it opens I'm not inundated with ads for games I don't care about, or ads at all.
Showing you games that are available on the store isn’t an “ad”. This mentality needs to go away. If you walk into a store, everything on the shelves isn’t an “ad”, it’s a product.
Functionality over form. This ain’t Apple
I'm ambivalent on console exclusives for this reason. It certainly drives sales for a console, but it's so anti consumer
I feel like a game being made available on an additional platform is like the opposite of monopoly. If steam paid Blizzard for exclusive storefront rights and you could only get the games on PC from Steam id be inclined to agree.
Indeed! Monopolies are great. Why have five stores when you can have a one-stop-shop?
It is the capitalism that is wrong.
Just stop already with the “capitalism bad” shit. The only negative thing about Lemmy so far. In all systems its the people who ruin it. End of story.
But that’s the point…? Pretty much every economic or political system “works” In theory. Capitalism, Communism, Democracy, Dictatorship. What goes wrong is always the people.
Therefore, one should aim for a system where people have the least possible ways to screw everything up (not that I have a suggestion, sadly)
You could stop at five or six stores... or just one.
Apparently Steam is being sued for being a monopoly and abusing it, which is probably why they have to allow other companies games now.
Valve has like five games, and the hundreds of thousands of other games on Steam are from other companies, and they've had 3rd-party games since 2005.
Activision/Blizzard didn't put their games on Steam so they can push their own store, it was to not make payments to a third party, and have high visibility of their own products (e.g. advertise CoD to Diablo players and vice versa). Of course, they miss out on the visibility of being on the largest game marketplace.
Correction: Activision)blizzard COULDN'T put their game on steam with their own store because of steams monopolistic TOS: which is what they got sued over.
EA have their games on Steam and Origin and have for years, Blizzard could (and will) have their games on Steam and Battle.NET. I've seen nothing to suggested they were unable to put their games on Steam, but rather decided it wasn't in their interest, given Steam's TOS and/or what they could gain from having their own marketplace.
Steam is being sued by Wolfire for antitrust, but there is no outcome in this suit yet. Unless you're referring to a different suit I don't know about.
Even if Valve loses this lawsuit, it doesn't meant they have to allow any specific products from other companies on Steam. It just might mean a reduction in fees, or an inability to sign exclusivity deals (which are common across the industry, weather you like them or not, and I know I don't).
The Wolfire antitrust lawsuit is because they sell other companies games on Steam, to the point that they dominate the marketplace, not because they were stopping other companies from selling games on Steam.
i'd be okay with having diablo on my steam library. too bad i bought them all on battle.net....
If it goes how Bethesda did you'll migrate your library over
That's what happened to Destiny 2 from battle.net to steam, expansions and all.
But different sitch I guess, Activision was selling the IP
Awww, they are such a good guys. They are doing this for us and they want to make sure they respect user's choice. Totally it's not the fact Overwatch2 is not earning anything and other games have been in decline since Activision merger.
Probably more just prepping for the MS deal to be finished as they've promised to bring games to other platforms/launchers.
With ActiBlizz it's all about money. Just look at D3 auction house. They purposely dropped wrong items to players in order to force them to use auction house. When it was found out they backtracked. But it's always been like that. Same with WoW and mounts. Etc. They keep milking everything.
I have never thought I'd see the day when I think MS is the good guy in a merger.
I still think they're gonna just launch Blizzard.net anyways, similar to Ubisoft games and EA games. Let's not get too ahead now.
Great news for Linux users! Bnet was one of the better launchers, but having a launcher for 5 games is a bit silly.
There's nothing stopping them from pulling of a Rockstar move and still requiring you to use a launcher when you start the game in Steam.
So far that is not the plan - they could change it of course I'm sure, but it won't be this way at launch.
Yeah, but it's a bit easier to install the game directly from Steam instead of installing Bnet as a non Steam game and then downloading the game on Bnet.
Lol. I have hundreds of hours on OW (NOT OW2) and Diablo III (not IV), and i can safely say I forgo ever playing those 2 games again because of the toxic entity that is Acti-Blizz. Not that I have much choice considering OW cannot even be played as its own game now.
You'll have to hold out for OW Classic (that you'll have to rebuy).
That one single downvote is because they know it's true. 🤣
Played alot of OW but really not a fan of OW2 and how the whole game revolves around the battle pass.
Was nice to just play a game or two a night, get my free lootbox and slowly get skins
Now unless you dedicate a full time job amount of hours, you'll be lucky to get 4 unlocks a seasons
Plus single tank is awful
I left when I read that Blizzard staff got the axe while Kotick got himself a sweet sweet money enema of a bonus.
When Michael Chu left in 2020 i started playing more Monster Hunter and Genshin. When Jeff Kaplan left I finally uninstalled Battle.net.
Now unless you dedicate a full time job amount of hours, you’ll be lucky to get 4 unlocks a seasons
Thanks. At least I have some affirmation I made the right choice. At least I can be content I'm playing something worthwhile like Genshin. #damnedeitherway 🤣 🤣 🤣
You still have to use Battle.net, so that's an absolute no-go from me.
Glad they're giving folks options though.
You need a battlenet login, but not the launcher
Doesn't the launcher also double as their anti cheat system? I thought the launcher also managed Warden
I don't think so, but also I thought most of ow2 anticheat was serverside
Warden works on Battle.net the server not the launcher. Very few games have Warden.
The launcher isn't really the problem, it's the fact that Overwatch 2 isn't making them any money!
Reading the comments I tend to think that people are so unfamiliar with competition that they fail to recognize it when seeing it at work: if you have competition, stuff fails and dies.
This idea that everything should survive and that I as the user should be the receptacle of thousands of shitty products preaching variety as an excuse for their existence is insane.
Launchers existed, could have used IP as an advantage to develop a valid product instead failed and therefore will disappear.
I still use GOG Galaxy no problem alongside Steam.
Pretty obviously trying to pull an "Apex Legends" to try and save the flailing Overwatch 2.
I'm not a hardcore gamer but I'm a fan of cloud gaming, first Google Stadia (rip) and later Gforce Now.
And Gforce Now supports Steam games so the more games available in the Steam-catalogue, the better.
Well, not all Steam games. Funny thing is, launcher isn't even totally the barrier to getting a game in GFN; UPlay and Epic have games available in GFN as well. Whenever I'm away from home and decide to use cloud, I mostly end up playing Ubisoft games through them.
Battle.net has been around since at least StarCraft 1. I'm glad Blizzard is showing signs of throwing in the towel when better storefronts/launchers are available
I can nearly guarantee you that once you download it from Steam servers that it will require the Battle.net launcher.
I can see this isn't your first rodeo!
Mike Ybarra confirmed this is not the case. They will launch directly from Steam.
Is there a source? I want to believe this so much.
This is battle.net 2.0. Most of Battle 1.0's functionality had to either be ported or just isn't there.
Battle.net 1.0 is so different that warcraft III vomited server instability when it moved to 2.0. They're the same in name only.
And as others have pointed out, it will probably still require 2.0 in order to play the games, just that Steam's launcher will point you to battle.net
Since Diablo. Back when I played on dialup. I'm old.
This is really good and really bad news.
On the plusside, it really seems like running Battle.net is not a requirement, and it just logs in the bnet account once ingame. Two thumbs up. More availability and people being able to use Steam as a somewhat sensible launcher instead of the frankly annoying Battle.net, even better.
On the downside, I guess this also confirms beyond the investors call that OW2 is bleeding players quickly - and for good reason, since they've shown they cannot handle the fundamental design changes from the switch to 5v5 at all.
Ow1 with flexible teams was fine, I get why they added the restrictions, but they didn't help.
Ow2 is pointless trash.
Overwatch 2 failing is bad news? It's everything wrong with GAAS development. If it eats shit and dies, the industry can only take away good lessons from it.
I was burned on the notion that I could no longer play Overwatch 1. I have 2 copies, one PC and one PS5, that are just coasters now. Granted things are digital these days, but restoring OW1 would be a good first step.
They'll learn lessons, just not the ones we want them to.
This'll be nice. I refused to play blizz games based on their conduct with women and I didn't want their launcher on my pc.
That and their response to "Free HK" really pissed me off.
I don't think I remember that. What was their response?
They banned a player from tournament play in Hearthstone for saying "Liberate Hong Kong" in a post-match interview.
That's lame.
Also took away his winnings
Ditto.
A tip for others in the same position - I recently discovered that, for me, Risk of Rain 2 is the game that made me stop missing Overwatch 2.
The company that makes Doom lets you use steam and allows you to transfer your data.
Microsoft.
I'm actually looking forward to checking it out on Steam, then I don't have to fiddle around anymore with Lutris on my Linux box and I can just use Proton normally within Steam itself.
Quite a treasure you have there in that horadric boob
Being able to play the original Warcraft again would be awesome and nostalgic.
If you mean Warcraft 2, then yes. If you mean 3, that's not possible they killed that one for the "remake".
I meant the first one. Orcs and Humans.
Ah, so that's what you meant when you said "original" .........
You can score a copy of it on GoG. Then download Wargus and enjoy it with more modern controls ;)
This is great info! I wanted to try it, but the very dated controls stopped me in my tracks
I wonder what the playercounts will look like? It'll only capture people launching the game through Steam, of course, but I figure they'll be decently high and score among the top concurrent players anyway.
If it's anything like Path of Exile, around 60% of their playerbase uses Steam over their standalone launcher.
Bwahahaha. I was already back and forth with wow for the longest time after wotlk but you could see the direction change and I was a huge overwatch fan. It was my new TF2. But damn it was like coming out of childhood and realizing your favorite hero was not who you thought he was. I'm still holding out hope for valve. They aren't public (I don't think) and gabe has made some very good business decisions. Not to mention the steam deck has done more to take market away from the guilt windows has on gaming. This is a wild time to be alive.
Valve is just about the only company I somewhat trust. Pre-ordered the highest version of the steam deck, and the way they handled the entire development process solidified my faith in them
For real, they're like one of the only companies I know left that just do their thing and not step on anyone's toes. Also the sly push to Linux gaming from creating the steam deck and having people want to make it compatible. Most my machines are Linux now. I only have 1 gaming windows PC left. I wanna learn by immersion.
I'm glad the steam deck took off and actually did well. I think it made a lot of positive changes overall in gaming for linux and handheld consoles. Now I just have to hope they bring back the steam controller
Great news!
Just Overwatch 2?
Looks like it's a start of a selection of games. Given that they only make a few games, I read that as all our games.
Can we have Overwatch 1 instead?
I wonder how this decision relates to the Microsoft acquisition.
Microsoft did go on the record saying that pulling Call of Duty from Steam was a mistake. Given that they also release their own exclusives on Steam, it's clear they understand that, even if Valve takes a 30% cut, not releasing on Steam is almost as bad as not releasing your game at all.
I've been boycotting Blizzard since the bNetd bullshit.
Glad Steam lets you block entire publishers.
I’ve been boycotting Blizzard since the bNetd bullshit.
Hey, neat! This is the first time I've ever seen somebody other than myself commenting that.
Figures that I'd have to leave Reddit for Lemmy to find it.
Hey, me too, nice to see you both :)
If they can do GOG I'll pick up their games, steam is ok but really I want to own my games and only GOG does that.
Only OW2 for now, hopefully HS soon though.
Haven’t you always dreamed of having a launcher to launch your launcher which launches the actual game? Seriously who approves these choices
Hope, that sc2 would achieve some online from this move
We still can't get free expansions for WoW subscribers? I can't think of any other service where you have to buy the software and pay to use it. Either you buy it and own at least that version outright or you pay a recurring fee for access to the latest version.
FFXIV also has this model, and tbf, every sub-based MMO. ESO, for instance, also requires you to buy latest expansions to be able to play it.
This used to be pretty common. And to be fair, I prefer this model compared to excessive cash shops. (WoW also has one which I don't like, but at least there is no item shop. Though I'm sure they would if it not caused too much of a backlash)
Guild Wars 2 has no monthly fee and has a cash shop but the items are either QoL improvements or cosmetic. There's nothing there that gives the player an edge over non-paying players.
I really like the Guild Wars 2 model. The base game is free to play now too.
Yes, I played gw2 for a long time. Unfortunately, I didn't like how WvW played essentially as big blobs stuck together. Pvp was interesting, but missed some objectives there. I'm currently trying WoW, it also has its many flaws, but is a new flavor for me.
Goddamn I miss GW1. It was the opposite model where you bought the game but then could play for free forever.
But anyway, what an amazing game.
This is the same in Guild Wars 2. They make their money from the shop and by selling expansions.
Oh I know. I was a huge fan of GW1. Wife and I bought GW2 opening day. And while it was an interesting game, it wasn't for me. I loved the skill system in GW1. I spent too many hours designing skill builds while at work (shhh).
But that was gone for the sequel. I understand why they did it, but I still think it was a travesty to lose something so unique and well thought out.
Gw doesn't really have anything that gives someone an advantage though. It's designed completely different from WoW and to compare them in this way is kons of disingenuous.
The idea is everyone can reach the same statistics in terms of weapons, armour and build. It's skill that makes a player better than others. That's why I avoid PvP and WvW :D
I know and that is exactly what I am saying. That's why I prefer GW PvP over WoW PvP.
Please yes. Running Diablo in steam deck is annoying. Install lutris, run battle.net,then run Diablo, then login to battle.net, then login to Diablo, then pick your character to actually play the game. Please remove some steps
Oh wow, I use Steam to launch B.net. I don't know how Lutris handles their translation layer, but Steam's Proton hasn't failed me!
Why do you do it this way? Just add the installer to steam. Install the client. Then add the client, launch and install and play.
I just followed some directions online
There there, then!
Will it keep blocking Linux / Steam Deck users from playing, though?
Battle.net works pretty well in Linux at the moment.
What are you having issues running on Steam Deck? I got the Blizzard launcher working and have played OW1 and 2 successfully
I was under the understanding that Overwatch 2 had an anticheat that prevented Linux players from playing.
Not to my understanding. I was able to get it working just fine once Proton had a patch for it. There are a few guides out on YouTube, it's not a terribly difficult process! Go 4 it :)
Nah
It's been [UMPTEEN YEARS] since I registered a Steam account, and when I registered my CD key for original Half-Life, I got the Blue Shift and Opposing Force for free. (As is the case with of most Steam library items, I've yet to complete them!) Now. Please let me transfer my shit from Battlenet to Steam. I can't wait to get my Starcraft installed! I could finally be a proper PC gamer! /very mild sarcasm
It'll be nice to at least track playtimes and have that data in 1 location.
YES! Very legal very cool
The only good game that Blizzard has released is Diablo 3, in my opinion.
Also, they are a shitty company that I do not plan to support on Steam.
Warcraft 1, 2 and 3, Star Craft, Diablo, Diablo 2...
Personally, I had never been into Warcraft or Starcraft. For me Diablo 3 is the peak, I like how well it is optimised for the consoles. It is my preference.
I mean, people seem to have liked the Diablo 2 remaster, along with both StarCraft games. So I'm excited to check those out.
I'm sure their games will still use their bnet DRM, d4 especially. Seems like a cheap cash grab, but what else to expect from actiblizz
Lol the desperation of a flailing bad company. Sorry Blizzard, winter is over.
Gimme steam support for D4 so I can get full compatibility on my steamdeck
But steam is where I keep my trash. No need for a second pile
Considering how poorly their dev’s have been since Activision-Blizztard went woke (around when Vanguard came out) it’s no surprise they are trying to maximize their market. Back when WoW was the undisputed champion of all things MMO’s they never would have considered doing this.
Diablo 4 is garbage, they literally destroyed the concept of seasons that was what kept people playing Diablo 3 for so long.
I’m actually kind of surprised that they aren’t showing up on the Microshaft store first.
I don't understand what the word woke is supposed to mean here...
Not gonna play them if they include their launcher after game is started from Steam lol.
This should be unacceptable. Launchers are bloatware.
I don't understand what the point of a blizzard launcher is - steam is already a launcher.
Ads. Ads and data harvesting.
yeah, plus steam takes 30%
The games are coming to Steam. Even if the launcher is there, Steam still gets the 30%
IDK what your comment is about, but its not a coincidence the first blizz game coming to steam is free to play,
In-app purchases, mtx, DLC, and premium currency are also subject to Valve tax for games that are on Steam. Free to play means "enough people pay $200+ that we can get away with not selling it for $50", putting it on Steam still means Valve gets a piece of the pie.
The Battle.net launcher pre-dates Steam though, doesn’t it?
Edit: guess not. Steam came out in 2003. I hadn’t heard of it until well after the Battle.net launcher came out in 2013. 🤷🏻♂️
Battle.net actually launched in 1996, though the client as it existed back then would hardly be recognizable as a launcher/storefront today. The modern client launched in 2009.
Battle.net is dead and gone. The launcher has nothing to do with battle.net and everything to do with attempting to harvest as much data as possible, bonus if you run it in the background without playing any of their games.
I was wondering why it sucked so much ass. This explains it
Yeah I just mean the launcher application. I dunno, I had it way before Steam was even on my radar though.
Mike Ybarra confirmed on the bird site that these games will launch directly through Steam, no bundled launcher nonsense.
I've heard OW2 has dropped PVE while it was confirmed that PVE will exist lol.
It was not just "confirmed" - that was whole point of OW2.
Lmao yeah
That's awesome!
Battle.net launcher can literally be closed after the game is running. It even has a setting to automatically do so. Why would they pull this sort of bullshit, I have no idea
They aren't, they said that the Steam versions of Blizzard games will not require the Battle.net launcher at all.
Each time battle net launcher opens,it displays a popup banner for cosmetics, warcraft stuff, overwatch stuff etc. They get free ads in your eyeballs.
No way they will let it go. It will be steam -> battle.net -> game
They've stated it will launch OW2 directly.
I expect the worst, and I am usually right. You are probably correct lol.
My immediate reaction was:
Pffffffffffff.....get fucked!
Do we know if it'll work this way ? It sounds so stupid but I wouldn't put it past them
Pretty sure it either allows to login within game, or launches their own (micro?) launcher first, where you have to login with Blizzard account and then starts the game.
Pretty much all "steam games" that are primarily available elsewhere run this way using mini launchers...
I mean, this sounds suspiciously like something a company that makes the device that also owns and runs the biggest digital game store might do intentionally.
Except its not. Valve has gone out of their way to make sure other peoples' games and launchers work, even if they're not selling directly through Steam. Look at the Proton patch notes if you're not just being a conspiratorial asshole and actually care about the facts.
I really wish Steam would put their foot down and stop these launchers. They are nothing but a nuisance and add no value for the customer.
EDIT: Just to be clear, when EA Play joined Gamepass there wasn't a separate launcher when you went to play an EA game on the Xbox. Steam could make this work with them and the other companies. They have enough pull to make this work - it would be greatly welcomed.
According to the steam page it says it only requires a battle.net account. Usually it says when another launcher is required.
Steam having a monopoly is not a good thing for anyone. Competition is good, even if the other launchers are a bit annoying.
Yeah but like, launcher isn't a market. Game Store is the market they're in. I'll happily buy a game from a different store if thats the only place it's offered or even if it's just cheaper there. The annoyance is when they want to be Steam. I don't want to be forced to download another launcher to play a game. If you want what Steam has, create a launcher that offers better services than Steam.
But most games aren't DRM-free, so the launchers are necessary to verify your account and ownership of the game. Otherwise every store would be GOG, and most publishers won't use it.
Steam already does that verification.
Yeah, but why should Steam be the only game in town? That's a very dangerous monopoly.
What are you even talking about? It's an application that launches a game. It adds nothing of value to the process of opening the game. How is it less of a monopoly to use a launcher to launch a launcher to launch a game?
It's not just a launcher, it's a storefront. Uplay, EA-whatever, and Rockstar Launcher are all storefronts where you can buy the games those companies make.
The launcher itself is a UI which lets you "launch" the game. Steam for example, is a launcher and a storefront, as is Uplay.
Having all your games in a single launcher/storefront is bad, as it gives a single company entire control over your games, and monopoly pricing.
Also remember that Steam takes a 30% cut, which is totally unnecessary, and is what directly caused giants like Ubisoft and Rockstar to make their own storefronts. Because why pay a 30% tax just for selling your game, this ain't the 1990s anymore with CD-ROM pressings.
Fuck Steam and it's monopolistic, 30% rent seeking bollocks.
Tell me a single benefit to me as the consumer of blizzard or any other company forcing me to install their launcher and run it everytime I open a game I bought through Steam.
It's adware.
Edit: To be fair and give credit where it's due: Mike Ybarra said it will be "directly through steam", so if they follow through with that I commend them for it.
There is no benefit, I never claimed the launcher within a launcher was a benefit.
The problem is the cancer that is Steam itself. We need more competing storefronts which don't require the Steam launcher, and even better if there's no launcher of any kind at all, just a binary to run to play the game.
Gog? Itch? Plenty of developers choose to sell their games in DRM-free formats. Plenty of games don't even cost money.
Exactly, and I have written about how much I love GOG and Itch and why I hope they take more market share away from Steam.
Just a note, as a storefront, there are plenty of competing options that work with Steam. Think Humble Store and other resellers, Steam doesn't take any cut from those sales and while they do enforce some standards (Things like staying close to price parity with Steam on alternate storefronts) and can refuse to give out keys, the market there is definitely very healthy.
20-30% cut, which is in-line with most digital storefronts.
Companies exist to make money. Making money will never be "unnecessary" for a company. And hosting secure data centers around the world delivering 15 Tbps a day is not exactly cheap.
Also remember that Ubisoft and Rockstar (and Microsoft and Blizzard) came crawling back to Steam all the same, meaning they thought they would make more money even with the 20-30% tax. So a 20-30% tax must seem pretty fair to these companies for what they are getting.
There's plenty of others. GoG and Humble come to mind as the major alternatives.
Yeah, and GoG is fantastic and I'm so glad it exists. We need more DRM-free storefronts without launchers for sure.
That's an argument for Steam not being the only game store, it doesn't make much sense after you already bought it from Steam and the game requires an alternate launcher to be installed.
But on that other matter, I think you have a point in theory, but EA, Ubisoft and Activision Blizzard don't seem to have any interest in providing a better service or unique benefits. Steam's dominance is overly maligned when it's the only one where the company actually earned its place, by providing a better service.
And even then Steam doesn't even have as much of a monopoly over PC games as console manufacturers actually do over each of their platforms. But since it is by design that consoles only support the platform-maker approved games, it doesn't even register in people's minds as a monopoly. As if they were never supposed to control these devices they have bought.
Launchers are a solution to DRM, not the solution. The way today's modern market is, it's understandable that some gamers have forgotten that there used to be games you bought directly from the publisher's website. DRM was done by asking you to sign into your account before launching the game, a lot of games still make you do this today. There's also the tried and true method of phoning home with a product key for DRM as well. There's no shortage of ways to be independent, very few companies are interested in doing so because Steam is convenient.
Aside from the fact that logging into every game separately would be a nightmare, it would only work for online games and be a major hassle for developers because it means they also need to compensate for not having a launcher on things like automatic updates and deployments. It's not really a solution either side would like.
I'm getting downvoted hard but people are forgetting that a game store not having a launcher is suicide. GOG tried that, started bleeding money, caved in and made their own launcher. Steam also has 20 years under their belt so saying worse launchers shouldn't be allowed to exist would just kill competition entirely.
GOG and Humble are really good stores though
Gog is reportedly failing and Humble's success is because they're selling Steam keys, so they still depend on them.
This isn't a monopoly issue. Other launchers exist. Most of the games on Steam are available on these other launcher, yet people still prefer Steam.
I can only speak for myself, but I prefer Steam because it's more customizable so I can set it to open to my library first instead of a rotating ad banner, the storefront ads are not intrusive and can be easily ignored, and steams remote play is something that no other launcher offers.
In fact, I am not sure what the other launchers offer that they excel at over Steam.
Steam has competition by way of Epic, EA, Blizzard. Steam is just the far superior product and people don’t want to change
Having a monopoly is not good.. I just wish others wouldn't completely ignore Linux users.. Valve/Steam on the other hand is seriously pushing it forward which makes me very much biased toward them.
Yeah. While them having the most successful platform for distributing games can be troublesome in the monopoly sense, I'm still sunny to them just because of their support for the Linux community.
At least Valve isn't a public company and beholden to shitty investor politics though, so I am more okay with Steam than... literally any other game launcher.
Plus they're the only launcher that fully supports Linux, so until that changes I am rooting for Steam.
Yeah, steam is good, but it can get bad if they sit around for too long and get fat. The threat of others is a good thing.
I just wish the competition gave any attention to Linux support. GOG Galaxy has been out idk how long, they sell Linux games, and still not even a launcher.
What does "competition" between companies really mean? It means they are competing for customers. Annoying me with shitty launchers is the opposite of competing. Make things cheaper, offer better services and more features. This is competition. Steam (and GOG) is the only one actually "competing" here. And look what happened? Microsoft, Ubisoft, Blizzard... one by one they fall to Steam because they simply cannot comprehend this fact.
i love how polarizing the votes on this are, you aren't wrong. gog is a huge competitor but they have their own launcher too which is annoying
So let them distribute their launchers and storefronts, Valve couldn't stop it. But it's not monopolistic for Steam to say "if you want us to approve your product for our store, you can't have the game launch into a pop-up for someone else's store".
False. It’s a good thing for Gabe.
How is a shiti launcher a competition...
You want competition go to GoG or Epic... Or pirate
Never touched my Blizzard Account again after the sexual harassment and paygap scandal.
I've put 15 years of lifetime into my druid... It still hurts a little because I've loved WoW for a long time.
So Blizz switching to Steam couldn't interest me any less.
Same after they kowtowed to China about Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Ditto. I won't even give them usage stats on games I had previously purchased. Nothing to take to the board and say "we have returning users that we hope to convert into sales!"
Now I'm not gonna buy/play them on steam too
You and me both brother.
Glad they made this decision right after the worst patch in Diablo history
What happened with this Diablo patch? I’m skipping D4, but I love me some drama.
Same old story: buffs for the already-strong, nerfs for the fun stuff, kneecap progression and loot. All the stuff that pisses players off.
Diablo 2 is tied with “my favorite game I’ve ever played” and everything I hear about D4 makes me happy I skipped it. :c
Diablo 2 is my least favorite Diablo game, and you are right to skip D4 if you're a massive fan of D2. D4 is much more like Diablo 1 and Diablo 3 had a baby.
Path of Exile may be up your alley tho! I strongly recommend that game for any D2 fan.
I’ve tried PoE! It was pretty good. Didn’t really scratch my itch, though. D2R was insanity good. I enjoyed D3 well-enough, but mainly at launch. Without trade and economy, I’m just decked out immediately and it gets boring.
Desperation
I love this! Finally there’s going to be actual statistics to see how much their games are actually dying.
Blizzard had plans to dump the launcher shortly after D3 2.0 dropped. Then they backpedaled and where like no wait launcher is great! 🤷♂️
“Players on Steam will still have to connect Overwatch 2 to a Battle.net account, but they’ll have access to all of Steam’s amenities like their friends list and achievements.”
Lol. Okay then.
Link to original news source on Blizzard.com https://news.blizzard.com/en-us/blizzard/23982127/overwatch-2-coming-to-steam-on-august-10
Link to the Steam Page https://store.steampowered.com/app/2357570/Overwatch_2/
Finally, so much people will join, that I'm sure someone will fix the Proton bug where the mouse pointer loses focus and you have to tab out and back in to regain focus after respawning. Hell, there are so many heroes that don't require precise aiming, that it would even make it a playable game on the Steam Deck.
It has been fixed in protonGE
Does valve ever merge commits from PGE ?
People love a monopoly when it suits them
Steam is the best platform by far, and the only one with Linux support. It's not Valve's fault if other publishers aren't even trying to make a good product.
People love things that benefit them as consumers and hate things that don't, end of
It wouldnt be so notable if they just let me download the game by itself. If I have to download a fucking launcher every time then I want the games to be centralized atleast somewhat.
Seriously every fucking conpany a fucking launcher for a while there, even fucking bethesda had one.
I'm permanently annoyed with the launcher thing, too. I wish someone would come up with a software store app that 1) installed all the right crap so the game works right and 2) didn't require you to open the app to open the game. Steam, for example, lets you install the game with a start menu shortcut, but if you don't have Steam open, clicking on the start menu shortcut opens Steam first, then Steam launches the friggin' game. Then there is the Bethesda launcher. Then Blizzard's Battle.net launcher. There's an Xbox launcher. Yadda yadda. I don't know if their primary goal is monopoly as much as it is forcing you to open a program with a store in it so you see stuff to buy when you want to play a game. I think having a monopoly is secondary. Primary to them is forcing you to see that they have more shit for you to buy. I'm pretty sure Apple's iTunes is the one that started it all. Let's integrate shopping for music into the computer. Then, the phone. Now it's not just music. It's every friggin' thing. People with shopping addictions must have a hard time if they're also gamers or fans of other digital media.
I think you can choose your library as the startscreen when steam opens.
But I think you are right that the game should open without starting steam. I would guess it has something to do with DRM? because with GOG you can just download the game and start it from desktop without launcher.
Yes, your library can be the start screen when it opens. But first you must see the other window (that I always close without reading) telling you about today's "special deal" or some game you might like to buy.
I doubt anyone will complain if Blizzard's games are brought to other storefronts too.
I like Steam. Steam has the best features, best UI, good sales, and while they are not without faults (systems can stay unchanged for a long time!), they are run by a company that by and large respects its userbase.
I don't mind if games are brought to Steam and any or all other storefronts. Put it on GOG, Windows Store, EGS, Itch.io, battlenet, Origin, Uplay... You name it, I approve of it going there also. If those other storefronts want me to use them, they need to provide a comparable or superior experience. GOG comes the closest, but its inability to get games in a timely or predictable manner, if at all, is too much of an obstacle for me.
Steam has one of the worst UIs I've ever seen lol. It looks and feels like a website from the early 2000s.
I find it infinitely more usable than all of the other storefronts I've used or seen. Interacting with my library is easy and straight forward. Buying games is easy and straight forward. When it opens I'm not inundated with ads for games I don't care about, or ads at all.
Showing you games that are available on the store isn’t an “ad”. This mentality needs to go away. If you walk into a store, everything on the shelves isn’t an “ad”, it’s a product.
Functionality over form. This ain’t Apple
I'm ambivalent on console exclusives for this reason. It certainly drives sales for a console, but it's so anti consumer
I feel like a game being made available on an additional platform is like the opposite of monopoly. If steam paid Blizzard for exclusive storefront rights and you could only get the games on PC from Steam id be inclined to agree.
Indeed! Monopolies are great. Why have five stores when you can have a one-stop-shop?
It is the capitalism that is wrong.
Just stop already with the “capitalism bad” shit. The only negative thing about Lemmy so far. In all systems its the people who ruin it. End of story.
But that’s the point…? Pretty much every economic or political system “works” In theory. Capitalism, Communism, Democracy, Dictatorship. What goes wrong is always the people.
Therefore, one should aim for a system where people have the least possible ways to screw everything up (not that I have a suggestion, sadly)
You could stop at five or six stores... or just one.
Apparently Steam is being sued for being a monopoly and abusing it, which is probably why they have to allow other companies games now.
Valve has like five games, and the hundreds of thousands of other games on Steam are from other companies, and they've had 3rd-party games since 2005.
Activision/Blizzard didn't put their games on Steam so they can push their own store, it was to not make payments to a third party, and have high visibility of their own products (e.g. advertise CoD to Diablo players and vice versa). Of course, they miss out on the visibility of being on the largest game marketplace.
Correction: Activision)blizzard COULDN'T put their game on steam with their own store because of steams monopolistic TOS: which is what they got sued over.
EA have their games on Steam and Origin and have for years, Blizzard could (and will) have their games on Steam and Battle.NET. I've seen nothing to suggested they were unable to put their games on Steam, but rather decided it wasn't in their interest, given Steam's TOS and/or what they could gain from having their own marketplace.
Steam is being sued by Wolfire for antitrust, but there is no outcome in this suit yet. Unless you're referring to a different suit I don't know about.
Even if Valve loses this lawsuit, it doesn't meant they have to allow any specific products from other companies on Steam. It just might mean a reduction in fees, or an inability to sign exclusivity deals (which are common across the industry, weather you like them or not, and I know I don't). The Wolfire antitrust lawsuit is because they sell other companies games on Steam, to the point that they dominate the marketplace, not because they were stopping other companies from selling games on Steam.
i'd be okay with having diablo on my steam library. too bad i bought them all on battle.net....
If it goes how Bethesda did you'll migrate your library over
That's what happened to Destiny 2 from battle.net to steam, expansions and all.
But different sitch I guess, Activision was selling the IP
Awww, they are such a good guys. They are doing this for us and they want to make sure they respect user's choice. Totally it's not the fact Overwatch2 is not earning anything and other games have been in decline since Activision merger.
Probably more just prepping for the MS deal to be finished as they've promised to bring games to other platforms/launchers.
With ActiBlizz it's all about money. Just look at D3 auction house. They purposely dropped wrong items to players in order to force them to use auction house. When it was found out they backtracked. But it's always been like that. Same with WoW and mounts. Etc. They keep milking everything.
I have never thought I'd see the day when I think MS is the good guy in a merger.
I still think they're gonna just launch Blizzard.net anyways, similar to Ubisoft games and EA games. Let's not get too ahead now.
Great news for Linux users! Bnet was one of the better launchers, but having a launcher for 5 games is a bit silly.
There's nothing stopping them from pulling of a Rockstar move and still requiring you to use a launcher when you start the game in Steam.
So far that is not the plan - they could change it of course I'm sure, but it won't be this way at launch.
Yeah, but it's a bit easier to install the game directly from Steam instead of installing Bnet as a non Steam game and then downloading the game on Bnet.
Lol. I have hundreds of hours on OW (NOT OW2) and Diablo III (not IV), and i can safely say I forgo ever playing those 2 games again because of the toxic entity that is Acti-Blizz. Not that I have much choice considering OW cannot even be played as its own game now.
You'll have to hold out for OW Classic (that you'll have to rebuy).
That one single downvote is because they know it's true. 🤣
Played alot of OW but really not a fan of OW2 and how the whole game revolves around the battle pass.
Was nice to just play a game or two a night, get my free lootbox and slowly get skins
Now unless you dedicate a full time job amount of hours, you'll be lucky to get 4 unlocks a seasons
Plus single tank is awful
I left when I read that Blizzard staff got the axe while Kotick got himself a sweet sweet money enema of a bonus.
When Michael Chu left in 2020 i started playing more Monster Hunter and Genshin. When Jeff Kaplan left I finally uninstalled Battle.net.
Thanks. At least I have some affirmation I made the right choice. At least I can be content I'm playing something worthwhile like Genshin. #damnedeitherway 🤣 🤣 🤣
You still have to use Battle.net, so that's an absolute no-go from me.
Glad they're giving folks options though.
You need a battlenet login, but not the launcher
Doesn't the launcher also double as their anti cheat system? I thought the launcher also managed Warden
I don't think so, but also I thought most of ow2 anticheat was serverside
Warden works on Battle.net the server not the launcher. Very few games have Warden.
The launcher isn't really the problem, it's the fact that Overwatch 2 isn't making them any money!
Reading the comments I tend to think that people are so unfamiliar with competition that they fail to recognize it when seeing it at work: if you have competition, stuff fails and dies. This idea that everything should survive and that I as the user should be the receptacle of thousands of shitty products preaching variety as an excuse for their existence is insane. Launchers existed, could have used IP as an advantage to develop a valid product instead failed and therefore will disappear. I still use GOG Galaxy no problem alongside Steam.
Pretty obviously trying to pull an "Apex Legends" to try and save the flailing Overwatch 2.
I'm not a hardcore gamer but I'm a fan of cloud gaming, first Google Stadia (rip) and later Gforce Now. And Gforce Now supports Steam games so the more games available in the Steam-catalogue, the better.
Well, not all Steam games. Funny thing is, launcher isn't even totally the barrier to getting a game in GFN; UPlay and Epic have games available in GFN as well. Whenever I'm away from home and decide to use cloud, I mostly end up playing Ubisoft games through them.
Battle.net has been around since at least StarCraft 1. I'm glad Blizzard is showing signs of throwing in the towel when better storefronts/launchers are available
I can nearly guarantee you that once you download it from Steam servers that it will require the Battle.net launcher.
I can see this isn't your first rodeo!
Mike Ybarra confirmed this is not the case. They will launch directly from Steam.
Is there a source? I want to believe this so much.
https://twitter.com/Qwik/status/1681720303389667328
HOLY SHIT!
Thank you!
They already said this won’t be the case
This is battle.net 2.0. Most of Battle 1.0's functionality had to either be ported or just isn't there.
Battle.net 1.0 is so different that warcraft III vomited server instability when it moved to 2.0. They're the same in name only.
And as others have pointed out, it will probably still require 2.0 in order to play the games, just that Steam's launcher will point you to battle.net
Since Diablo. Back when I played on dialup. I'm old.
This is really good and really bad news.
On the plusside, it really seems like running Battle.net is not a requirement, and it just logs in the bnet account once ingame. Two thumbs up. More availability and people being able to use Steam as a somewhat sensible launcher instead of the frankly annoying Battle.net, even better.
On the downside, I guess this also confirms beyond the investors call that OW2 is bleeding players quickly - and for good reason, since they've shown they cannot handle the fundamental design changes from the switch to 5v5 at all.
Ow1 with flexible teams was fine, I get why they added the restrictions, but they didn't help.
Ow2 is pointless trash.
Overwatch 2 failing is bad news? It's everything wrong with GAAS development. If it eats shit and dies, the industry can only take away good lessons from it.
I was burned on the notion that I could no longer play Overwatch 1. I have 2 copies, one PC and one PS5, that are just coasters now. Granted things are digital these days, but restoring OW1 would be a good first step.
They'll learn lessons, just not the ones we want them to.
This'll be nice. I refused to play blizz games based on their conduct with women and I didn't want their launcher on my pc.
That and their response to "Free HK" really pissed me off.
I don't think I remember that. What was their response?
They banned a player from tournament play in Hearthstone for saying "Liberate Hong Kong" in a post-match interview.
That's lame.
Also took away his winnings
Ditto.
A tip for others in the same position - I recently discovered that, for me, Risk of Rain 2 is the game that made me stop missing Overwatch 2.
The company that makes Doom lets you use steam and allows you to transfer your data.
Microsoft.
I'm actually looking forward to checking it out on Steam, then I don't have to fiddle around anymore with Lutris on my Linux box and I can just use Proton normally within Steam itself.
Quite a treasure you have there in that horadric boob
Being able to play the original Warcraft again would be awesome and nostalgic.
If you mean Warcraft 2, then yes. If you mean 3, that's not possible they killed that one for the "remake".
I meant the first one. Orcs and Humans.
Ah, so that's what you meant when you said "original" .........
You can score a copy of it on GoG. Then download Wargus and enjoy it with more modern controls ;)
This is great info! I wanted to try it, but the very dated controls stopped me in my tracks
I wonder what the playercounts will look like? It'll only capture people launching the game through Steam, of course, but I figure they'll be decently high and score among the top concurrent players anyway.
If it's anything like Path of Exile, around 60% of their playerbase uses Steam over their standalone launcher.
Bwahahaha. I was already back and forth with wow for the longest time after wotlk but you could see the direction change and I was a huge overwatch fan. It was my new TF2. But damn it was like coming out of childhood and realizing your favorite hero was not who you thought he was. I'm still holding out hope for valve. They aren't public (I don't think) and gabe has made some very good business decisions. Not to mention the steam deck has done more to take market away from the guilt windows has on gaming. This is a wild time to be alive.
Valve is just about the only company I somewhat trust. Pre-ordered the highest version of the steam deck, and the way they handled the entire development process solidified my faith in them
For real, they're like one of the only companies I know left that just do their thing and not step on anyone's toes. Also the sly push to Linux gaming from creating the steam deck and having people want to make it compatible. Most my machines are Linux now. I only have 1 gaming windows PC left. I wanna learn by immersion.
I'm glad the steam deck took off and actually did well. I think it made a lot of positive changes overall in gaming for linux and handheld consoles. Now I just have to hope they bring back the steam controller
Great news!
Just Overwatch 2?
Looks like it's a start of a selection of games. Given that they only make a few games, I read that as all our games.
Can we have Overwatch 1 instead?
I wonder how this decision relates to the Microsoft acquisition.
Microsoft did go on the record saying that pulling Call of Duty from Steam was a mistake. Given that they also release their own exclusives on Steam, it's clear they understand that, even if Valve takes a 30% cut, not releasing on Steam is almost as bad as not releasing your game at all.
I've been boycotting Blizzard since the bNetd bullshit.
Glad Steam lets you block entire publishers.
Hey, neat! This is the first time I've ever seen somebody other than myself commenting that.
Figures that I'd have to leave Reddit for Lemmy to find it.
Hey, me too, nice to see you both :)
If they can do GOG I'll pick up their games, steam is ok but really I want to own my games and only GOG does that.
Only OW2 for now, hopefully HS soon though.
Haven’t you always dreamed of having a launcher to launch your launcher which launches the actual game? Seriously who approves these choices
Hope, that sc2 would achieve some online from this move
We still can't get free expansions for WoW subscribers? I can't think of any other service where you have to buy the software and pay to use it. Either you buy it and own at least that version outright or you pay a recurring fee for access to the latest version.
FFXIV also has this model, and tbf, every sub-based MMO. ESO, for instance, also requires you to buy latest expansions to be able to play it.
This used to be pretty common. And to be fair, I prefer this model compared to excessive cash shops. (WoW also has one which I don't like, but at least there is no item shop. Though I'm sure they would if it not caused too much of a backlash)
Guild Wars 2 has no monthly fee and has a cash shop but the items are either QoL improvements or cosmetic. There's nothing there that gives the player an edge over non-paying players.
I really like the Guild Wars 2 model. The base game is free to play now too.
Yes, I played gw2 for a long time. Unfortunately, I didn't like how WvW played essentially as big blobs stuck together. Pvp was interesting, but missed some objectives there. I'm currently trying WoW, it also has its many flaws, but is a new flavor for me.
Goddamn I miss GW1. It was the opposite model where you bought the game but then could play for free forever.
But anyway, what an amazing game.
This is the same in Guild Wars 2. They make their money from the shop and by selling expansions.
Oh I know. I was a huge fan of GW1. Wife and I bought GW2 opening day. And while it was an interesting game, it wasn't for me. I loved the skill system in GW1. I spent too many hours designing skill builds while at work (shhh).
But that was gone for the sequel. I understand why they did it, but I still think it was a travesty to lose something so unique and well thought out.
Gw doesn't really have anything that gives someone an advantage though. It's designed completely different from WoW and to compare them in this way is kons of disingenuous.
The idea is everyone can reach the same statistics in terms of weapons, armour and build. It's skill that makes a player better than others. That's why I avoid PvP and WvW :D
I know and that is exactly what I am saying. That's why I prefer GW PvP over WoW PvP.
Please yes. Running Diablo in steam deck is annoying. Install lutris, run battle.net,then run Diablo, then login to battle.net, then login to Diablo, then pick your character to actually play the game. Please remove some steps
Oh wow, I use Steam to launch B.net. I don't know how Lutris handles their translation layer, but Steam's Proton hasn't failed me!
Why do you do it this way? Just add the installer to steam. Install the client. Then add the client, launch and install and play.
I just followed some directions online
There there, then!
Will it keep blocking Linux / Steam Deck users from playing, though?
Battle.net works pretty well in Linux at the moment.
What are you having issues running on Steam Deck? I got the Blizzard launcher working and have played OW1 and 2 successfully
I was under the understanding that Overwatch 2 had an anticheat that prevented Linux players from playing.
Not to my understanding. I was able to get it working just fine once Proton had a patch for it. There are a few guides out on YouTube, it's not a terribly difficult process! Go 4 it :)
Nah
It's been [UMPTEEN YEARS] since I registered a Steam account, and when I registered my CD key for original Half-Life, I got the Blue Shift and Opposing Force for free. (As is the case with of most Steam library items, I've yet to complete them!) Now. Please let me transfer my shit from Battlenet to Steam. I can't wait to get my Starcraft installed! I could finally be a proper PC gamer! /very mild sarcasm
It'll be nice to at least track playtimes and have that data in 1 location.
YES! Very legal very cool
The only good game that Blizzard has released is Diablo 3, in my opinion.
Also, they are a shitty company that I do not plan to support on Steam.
Warcraft 1, 2 and 3, Star Craft, Diablo, Diablo 2...
Personally, I had never been into Warcraft or Starcraft. For me Diablo 3 is the peak, I like how well it is optimised for the consoles. It is my preference.
I mean, people seem to have liked the Diablo 2 remaster, along with both StarCraft games. So I'm excited to check those out.
I'm sure their games will still use their bnet DRM, d4 especially. Seems like a cheap cash grab, but what else to expect from actiblizz
Lol the desperation of a flailing bad company. Sorry Blizzard, winter is over.
Gimme steam support for D4 so I can get full compatibility on my steamdeck
Blizzard is trash and so is Steam
Why is steam trash?
https://spyware.neocities.org/articles/steam
But steam is where I keep my trash. No need for a second pile
Considering how poorly their dev’s have been since Activision-Blizztard went woke (around when Vanguard came out) it’s no surprise they are trying to maximize their market. Back when WoW was the undisputed champion of all things MMO’s they never would have considered doing this.
Diablo 4 is garbage, they literally destroyed the concept of seasons that was what kept people playing Diablo 3 for so long.
I’m actually kind of surprised that they aren’t showing up on the Microshaft store first.
I don't understand what the word woke is supposed to mean here...