this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2023
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Linux Gaming

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[–] [email protected] 95 points 1 year ago (3 children)

One of the few companies I've purchased digital good from - and they haven't enshittified themselves yet

[–] [email protected] 61 points 1 year ago (2 children)

If anything ever happens to Gabe such that he can't run the company, that's the day I'm immediately downloading and backing up my entire steam library to a hard drive.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Wouldn't those games be locked up through steams DRM?

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Some games from Steam can still be used without Steam's DRM. It's a little difficult to pull it off, but it can be done

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A lot of games don't require Steam's DRM, you quit Steam and launch through the Steam directory and it still works. I haven't tried it, but I'm pretty sure I can copy that game to a computer with no internet access and no Steam client and it'll work. I haven't done that though, I've only done it when I forgot my kids were playing on my account on another computer and wanted to play a game.

A lot of games don't work this way, but a lot do. Try it for yourself.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You'd need something like the Goldberg Steam Emulator, since a lot of games rely on services and APIs that Steam provides

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Looks like it's for MP? I almost never play MP, so maybe that's why I haven't run into it.

Thanks for the correction. :)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I believe it holds true for some single player games as well. I seem to remember Half-Life 2 not wanting to launch without Steam present, same for some other Source games. That really might not be the case though, I'm curious to do more testing... Either way, I watch enough Linux gaming on ARM SBCs (check out MicroLinux and LeePSPComputer on YouTube), can I see them using Goldberg from time to time to get games running with no Steam

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Even then. If steam actually locks out out of your games, then I bet hacked will quickly put more effort to sidestep the drm and make that more easily accessible.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

Drm on Steam is optional. It's up to the dev whether to include any or not.

However, if the game uses any steam features, like achievements, voice chat, leaderboards, etc., then those won't work without steam.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

Yarr. Want some crack, kid? Harr.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

It's because they're a privately owned company.

The pressure for enshitification mostly comes from shareholders. Without them, the company can actually think about their long term future and decide exactly when and when not to increase profit.

I tend to avoid proprietary things whenever possible these days, but I found most things by small, privately owned companies are pretty good towards their users.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I would be so proud to be the dude who first said “enshitification” right now.

It’s probably my favorite new word I’ve ever heard in my life and seeing it widely used brings a smile to my face.

I’ve got a cousin who is probably claiming he invented it at this very moment.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It has been used so much recently that there is even a wikitionar entry for it - with a link to its original creation!

https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/enshittification

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Oh hey, it actually was my cousin. Cory is always claiming he coined every cool word or phrase so haha, funny he actually did for a change. He actually claimed he popularized “epic” and “uber” in the 2000s. I mean, I know people pay attention to him but in all honesty he’s always kind of tooted his own horn wherever possible.

I’m sorry. I made all of that up. I guess my actual cousin and I aren’t that different, only he’d never say he made it up. He’d say it was a fact until he takes his last breath haha.

Hope everything is going well for you bud.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Well they did try to sell paid mods and push pay-to-play in the steam marketplace with Artifact, but luckily they ran it back. Steam is super good now but don't get too comfortable.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago

Yeah, I've been burnt before and know it's only a matter of time. Enjoying it while I can.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I mean, I don't have a problem with mod authors earning money for what they do instead of having to offer it for free. Especially the mods that bring the base game to a whole new level.

What's the argument that paid mods shouldn't be a thing?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

It was pretty disastrous. As soon as money was at play tons of people re-uploaded other's free mods and tried to sell them. They even tried copying their steam profiles to seem legit. There was another can of worms where paid mods would use assets from other games or made by other people. Aside from all the attempted theft, there was also tons of spam and fake/unconfirmed mods lying about what they are or trying to upload the same thing multiple times under different names to appear more in search... Etc...

Moderation didn't keep up and the whole thing collapsed on itself. Mods shouldn't be paid IMO, it just encourages terrible things rather than people making content for fun.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Using someone else’s IP for making money is generally a little questionable.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

But in the paid mods situation Bethesda was for the mod makers making money from the mod they made. It wasn't questionable then

The main issues that arose was there was no way to verify if x mod was by y uploader and quite a few mods made use of other mods like SKSE.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 1 year ago

entitled children wanted free labor, that's about it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

I remember the outrage at the time but just because it's paid doesn't mean it's bad.