General Gaming News

[Alan]

https://www.eurogamer.net/microsoft-wil ... to-ubisoft

[Drarok]

So, the worst of both worlds? Great…

Edit: Ubisoft have probably the worst of all the shitty game launchers around, and being the bottom of that barrel of shit is no easy feat.

[Alan]

Its just streaming, its mostly all dogshit anyway.

[Raid]

Perhaps, but I feel like we just don't say how awful Ubisoft's launcher is often enough. I've lost count of the number of times I've shut down my PC, forgetting that I'd had Ubisoft Connect open, and come back hours later with the PC still being on because Ubisoft think so highly of their launcher than it prevents Windows from shutting down.

We have a catch-all insult in TGA Ghosts. It's "Fucking Ubisoft."

[Alan]

Cryptic.

[Drarok]

And when you dare launch it, it'll request admin permissions at least three times in a row.

Every. Fucking. Time.

[ManBearSquid]

And when you dare launch it, it'll request admin permissions at least three times in a row.

Every. Fucking. Time.

Oh god, yes, this. Absolute pish.

Battle.net gets my vote as the biggest turd. I hate it. Thankfully, I also rarely use it, I just took the notion to play the last two Modern Warfare campaigns and that was that.

[Wrathbone]

I see your Battle.net and raise you the Rockstar Social Club. Not once have I successfully remembered my login details for it, or understood why it's necessary for single player.

[Sly Boots]

RSC single-handedly obliterated any enthusiasm I had for playing RDR2, never finished it.

[Drarok]

Battle.net gets my vote as the biggest turd. I hate it. Thankfully, I also rarely use it, I just took the notion to play the last two Modern Warfare campaigns and that was that.

As soon as they announced CoD on Steam, I jumped ship. I don't think I have anything in Battle.net anymore. It's not quite as bad as Ubi, IMO, but they are both wank.

CoD still doesn't use the Steam feature where shaders are built at install time, instead waiting for you to actually try to play the game and then hitting you with the delay. Not to mention CoD's fuck-awful UI/UX and repeatedly making the same bloody mistakes from one version to the next. Ugh.

[Animalmother]

There's a lot to be said for playing on console that's often crap but having to deal with multiple launchers isn't one of them. It never ceases to amaze me the lengths companies will strive to to make sure you can't enjoy their games.

[Raid]

I think if we cast our minds eyes back to the early 2000s, and remember what PC gaming was like before Steam, what benefits have we actually had from these sorts of launchers? The only issues they improved on are game installation, manual patches and friends lists for multiplayer. Were it just Steam (I suspect that's the only launcher we all actually like) we were talking about I could add a lot of other things, but when you have five additional launchers that are almost uniformly terrible the benefits really don't outweigh the negatives.

[Drarok]

It's just like the streaming wars in TV land. Originally there were one or two, but then everyone wants their own slice of the pie and rush to market with a sub-par product, leading to shitty UX.

At least on consoles it's a consistent experience, but they're still not for me. The types of games I like to play don't lend themselves to controllers. Are the update cycles and sizes about the same? My internet is pretty poor, CoD updates are brutal.

[Animalmother]

The install sizes are the same as PC these days I think, Battlefield 2042 is almost 90GB on Xbox. I do wish there was more mouse & keyboard support for games, RTS's with a controller just sucks so I avoid them. I tried playing Valheim recently but the crafting and building menu with the controller was so terrible I just gave up.

[Wrathbone]

Were it just Steam (I suspect that's the only launcher we all actually like)

I used to like GOG Galaxy, but as of a year or so ago it's become an unstable mess with constant drops in connection, failed installations and other crap.