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captblakhelm · 4 years

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My response to MetalJesusRock’s video to other ways to catalog your game collection was worthy of a lengthy blog post..... so here it is.

I often forget smartphones apps exists, as I only really use my phone as a phone, or something to kill time when I'm at work or otherwise at home.

Here are some I have used:

Backloggery: A website to catalogue what games you have completed. Keeps track of your completion level and ownership level. Displays games you're currently playing Trend list shows comparison between games you've beat and haven't beat. Has a bit of a social network vibe as you can add friends, post on each other profiles, compare recent changes, and has some Twitch integration. There seems to be no database, so every entry is hand made by each user - so expect typos and other incorrections thanks to human error

HowLongToBeat: More used to compare completion times between gamers, but has a huge database of games, thus can be used to catalog game libraries. I haven't used it extensively though.

Steam: Obviously, Steam will show you all your Steam games, but it has been improved recently to allow you to sort your library more easily and use Dynamic Collections which can grow automatically as you get more games, based on parameters like Genre, features, players and more. Steam allows you to list your non-Steam games as well, allowing you to list your DRM free games and games from other launchers. The interface is pretty visual, so you can use a custom image as "Box art" and there is a budding community of people making custom box art to use on Steam

GoG Galaxy: GoG made a big effort to make a unifying PC game launcher made to scan games from all major game store fronts, including consoles. Also tracks recently added games, achievments, and hours plays. Feels a bit like a spirtual sucessor to Raptr, albeit not as robust. It's based on libraries from game stores, so "executable games" you may have on your PC won't be detected. You can add games manually, but I think they only work on games already on connected platforms, not loose entries from users. Anarchy Arcade : I'm possibly cheating here, but this is actually a free game on Steam. It is a digital world/sandbox where you can create your own virtual arcade by importing your Steam games. You can add various arcade machines, PCs, and TV setup that display and launches a Steam game with in the game. I'm pretty sure you can also have in world game boxes so you can make bookshelves or stacks of loose games with your actual game library

GiantBomb.com: This is bit of a misnomer, as GiantBomb is a game coverage site, mixed with a forum, social network, games wiki, and lists. You can use lists along with the game database/wiki to list your games. It's a bit cumbersome to use as a game catalog compared to other options, but many regulars have used it as such.

Defunct

Raptr: This was an AWESOME program that would scan your games libraries and also display achievements, ratings, and show which of your friends from which platform were online and playing. If I remember correctly, you could use it for chat as well and I'm pretty sure there some community/forum/social aspect to it as well. The best thing about Raptr is that it tracked what games you played and for how long. At the end of the year, you could generate a "This year in gaming" report that would show every game you played, how much you spent on it, which genre's you played in pie charts, and a bunch of other neat information. You could compare your report to friends reports as well.

Favslist: This was used as a social network/tool to list your favorite lists of game related stuff, and non-related stuff. Since games was it focus, it had a huge community-created games database. Truly, you probably couldn't catalog a huge collection of games somebody like MJR, AVGN, or The Last Gamer would had, but it was awesome to make lists of "Your favorite fighting games" or "Favorite games of 1997" or "Favorite Characters". Unfortunately, the primary creator/owner, Pape Badiane died tragically and with it, the funding for the site, making the site spiral out of maintenance, updates, and eventually existence. Fans/former members of the site are apparently working on things in the background, and one of them on Discord mention there is plans to get the site back up, as the data/lists on there are still backed up somewhere.

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wolfgabe · 5 years

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Oddworld Soulstorm and the Epic exclusivity problem

Now just to make it clear now this is not a hate post on Oddworld Inhabitants or the Epic Store but I feel this is something that needs to be explained and saId so here goes

So it recently has come to my attention the PC version of Oddworld Soulstorm will be an Epic Store exclusive. Yes while I can understand OWI’s decision to an extent, I I believe now is a good time for me to go into detail on why I feel all this rampant exclusivity hoarding from Epic is quickly becoming a serious problem for the PC market in general.

Okay lemme first explain my current pc gaming setup which consists of just two platforms. The first is steam where I get the majority of my PC games and the second is GOG which I set myself up with recently to better satisfy my retro PC gaming interests. Between these two storefronts I felt relatively confident all my PC gaming needs were satisfied as pretty much any game on PC I was interested in I could generally find on Steam if that wasn’t the case there was GOG which is great if you are into older PC games in particular. It never felt like I was really missing out on anything in general nor did it feel like I was being punished for choosing one platform or the other. But now we have the Epic Store which at times I cannot help but feel is being used by Epic as a means to punish Steam users in particular outright through their rampant buying of exclusivity which brings me to one of my main issues with the Epic Store in that it is starting to feel like freedom of choice on PC no longer matters. To understand why I feel freedom of choice is key in the PC Market, lets take a look at Microsoft who as of late has been taking more steps to get many of their Xbox exclusives on more platforms as a way to expand their audience. Cuphead for example is readily available on the windows store but there is nothing stopping you from purchasing the game through steam and they even offer it on GOG if you would prefer to get the game DRM free. The point is Cuphead is not only on PC for those who do not own an Xbox console but PC users also have the added freedom of being able to get the game on their preferred storefront of choice. Microsoft could have easily just kept Cuphead and the rest of their Xbox games on PC exclusive to the Windows Store but they actually respect the customer’s freedom of choice which is ironic considering how in the 90s they got a lot of flak for being highly anti consumer.

Now I have seen people complaining about exclusives but to be straight I don’t really mind console exclusives as their primary purpose understandably is to give consumers an added incentive to invest in that particular platform. This has long been one of the key staples of Nintendo’s continued success as they possess some of the most valuable IPs in gaming which give people a reason to invest in Nintendo platforms because that is the only place where you can play those games. To break it down in general most console exclusives tend to fall into three main categories. The first is the first party games which are primarily developed by the platform holder’s in house teams i.e pretty much almost every Nintendo game in general. Next we have the second party titles which are not developed in house but usually by an external studio that is owned by or has ties to the platform holder which constitute the majority of Playstation and Xbox’s own exclusive titles and to an extent a lot of NIntendo’s recent games which are often farmed out to external studios an example being the recent Luigis Mansion games which have been handled by Next Level Games. Another example would be Rareware during the SNES and N64 era due to Nintendo having a significant stake in ownership of the company Last we have the third party exclusives, these are generally the result of a deal between the developer and the platform holder such as the Persona series other times its the result of the platform holder offering to assist in funding and publishing the title i.e Nintendo and Bayonetta 2. In some cases third party exclusives may be timed exclusives in that they are only exclusive to that platform for a limited time frame before being released on other platforms.

Now looking at the Epic Store you start to notice that really the majority of its exclusives tend to fall into just two categories either being paid for by Epic or in some cases Epic literally mandating exclusivity just to allow the game to be sold on their store. What makes this particularly worrisome is the fact a lot of the games Epic has acquired the exclusivity to have roots in crowdfunding which more often than not has led to people who have backed the game being screwed over entirely on certain platforms with Shenmue 3 being the most glaring example of this. Paid exclusivity is just something I feel that does not belong in crowdfunded or kickstarter games in general period. Like imagine with Shovel Knight if you backed the game for PC and found that now the game will be Wii U only because Nintendo offered Yacht Club a mountain of cash. You would understandably feel both cheated and betrayed because you backed for so long is now going to be locked to a platform you had no interest in to begin with.

Back to my previous point when a third party game is console exclusive it is generally because the developer has determined that particular platform is the most suitable for their games primary audience or it is because the devs and the platform holder manage to reach a deal designed to benefit both parties as well as the consumer. Bayonetta 2 being Wii U exclusive was largely due to Nintendo offering to help publish the game because no on else would really. This is why the Bayonetta series going forward has largely become Nintendo exclusive because the series owes much of its continued existence to Nintendo. With the Epic Store a lot of the games that are exclusive really feel like they have no reason at all to be Epic Store only. With the Epic Store exclusivity feels less like an added incentive and more like a punishment for non Epic Store users as well as a means to try and mask the stores own inherent problems.

This brings me to my next main point in that Epic has given people relatively little reason to want to invest in their platform outside of exclusive games. When you compare the Epic Store to Steam and practically every other PC storefront the numerous flaws and shortcomings quickly become apparent. I am fairly certain most people are readily familiar with the horror stories about the Epic Stores horrendous security holes as well as Epic’s connection to Tencent a shady Chinese corporate entity, but what I find most baffling is why Epic somehow expected to seriously compete with Steam when their storefront does not even have a fraction of the functionality and features that have largely been a staple of every other PC storefront for years. Imagine how it must feel for someone who has bought all the Borderlands games on Steam only to be forced to abandon all their friends to play Borderlands 3 on a platform that is not even capable of something as simple as creating friends lists. Coupled with the fact that Epic apparently cannot even manage their own store sales properly and you can clearly see why a good majority of people would prefer not to give Epic their money.

It’s pretty easy to forget Steam’s beginnings were relatively humble compared to the digital distribution behemoth it is today, When steam initially launched in 2003 it was little more than a glorified matchmaking portal for Valve’s own games. When you look at the Steam’s history and evolution you see that Steam did not become what it is today through exclusivity hoarding or trying to punish devs and players for choosing other platforms. Steam became what it is today because it grew and evolved with what the PC gamer wanted. This brings me to the problem I believe that most people have with the Epic Store in that it doesn’t feel like it’s trying to be what the gamer/consumer wants. Instead what the Epic Store has amounted to so far is essentially Epic attempting to steamroll its way into the PC distribution market through paid exclusivity and punishing people who choose Steam as their primary platform on PC. I do not mind the idea of multiple storefronts on PC and I do believe competition is necessary for a healthy market. But I strongly believe Epic has no right to proclaim they are fighting Steams monopoly when Steam never really was trying to be a monopoly to begin with along with the fact that almost everything Epic has done with their store front over the past year or so has been the exact opposite of pro consumer.

Back to Soulstorm, while yes I can understand that Oddworld Inhabitants would likely need some financial assistance to complete their game I cannot help but feel there are plenty of other people or publishers they could have easily partnered with that did not involve restricting the availability of the PC version of Soulstorm. While I am not angry with Oddworld Inhabitants, I still consider this move highly self defeating in a way as they may have effectively self sabotaged their own game’s sales potential as well as alienated a good chunk of their fanbase by allowing their game on PC to be locked to a storefront a good majority of people hate for very good reason. I won’t be surprised at all if this ends up backfiring on Epic in the end as the Epic Store exclusivity has simply served to push more people toward the Playstation version of Soulstorm based on a lot of reactions I have seen so far.

#epic store #Steam #Oddworld #oddworld soulstorm #oddworld inhabitants #PC #pc gaming

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buytabletsonline · 6 years

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Enlarge / A foolproof plan!

Aurich / Getty

Companies in industries ranging from iced tea to image processing to fast-casual dining are jumping on the recent blockchain-mania as a way to try to revolutionize often-moribund businesses. Now, startup Robot Cache wants to bring that same technology to bear in revolutionizing the way we buy and sell PC game downloads, with the backing of game industry luminaries like InXile’s Brian Fargo and Atari founder Nolan Bushnell.

Robot Cache CEO Lee Jacobson said in a press release that “expertly leveraging the power, flexibility, safety, and transparency of blockchain technology” will bring benefits like lower fees for game publishers and the ability to resell digital purchases for gamers. But despite the buzzword-heavy promise, there are a lot of risks involved that have us skeptical of whether Robot Cache can actually deliver on its vision.

How it works

Enlarge / InXile’s Brian Fargo is among the advisors who think the blockchain can revolutionize PC game distribution.

Centralized game distribution platforms (like Steam) rely on servers maintained by a single company (like Valve) to determine whether a player actually owns the downloadable game they’re trying to play. Robot Cache wants to decentralize this process by putting that ownership data on a public blockchain that is constantly being verified by other users, who are themselves trying to mine a cryptocurrency. For Robot Cache, that cryptocurrency is IRON, an ERC-20 token built on top of the Ethereum network.

“The blockchain is the most secure technology that we know of for insuring there are not duplicate copies of items and that faith is one of the key factors to giving the publishers confidence in trusting a service that allows for a resale of a game,” a Robot Cache representative told PC Gamer. “In addition, it allows for a lower cost of distribution which gives us extra margin to share with gamers for a resale.”

By offloading all that confirmation effort to a network of miners, Robot Cache promises to pass its savings on to both game publishers and players themselves (the publishers and/or Robot Cache would presumably still be responsible for the significant bandwidth costs of actually delivering those games). For publishers, Robot Cache will only charge a 5-percent fee on the “primary” sale of any games, much lower than the 30 percent charged by platforms like Steam and GOG. For gamers, Robot Cache will be one of the first PC game platforms to let players resell downloadable games when they’re finished with them.

Do “used” digital games make sense?

Before you get too excited, those digital resales come with some strict rules attached. For one, publishers will be able to “set resale pricing” according to a Robot Cache press release. For another, the publishers retain 70 percent of the purchase price for any resold games, leaving only 25 percent for the gamer actually selling the title (after Robot Cache’s 5-percent fee).

Those are probably important promises for getting publishers on board with the new concept of digital game reselling. But they also seem exceedingly likely to fundamentally break the potential market for these “used” digital games, at least from the player’s point of view.

Since publishers get a larger chunk of revenues for new sales than they do for resales (95 percent vs. 70 percent), there doesn’t seem to be any direct incentive for those publishers to set resale prices any lower than new sales prices. That means gamers looking for a good deal on Robot Cache’s “used” game market are unlikely to find one. It also means that publishers are exceedingly unlikely to get that juicy 95-percent revenue share from a “new” sale if there’s even a single (and identical) used copy available on the marketplace.

What’s more, platforms like Steam have proven that companies can often generate a lot of revenue by offering “new” copies of downloadable games at steep discounts after release. Why would a publisher allow low-priced “used” sales to compete with its own planned discounts on identical “new” copies, which can be generated at will with little overhead at whatever price the publisher wants?

Allowing the resale price to float based on total supply and demand (based on a Steam Marketplace-style auction system, perhaps) would help solve this problem. But it would also significantly lower the digital resale revenues for publishers (and the gamers doing the selling), making them less likely to buy into the resale program in the first place.

The IRON bank

Enlarge / Even the Robot Cache logo looks a bit skeptical of the idea…

On the other end of the resale market, players getting up to a 25-percent rebate for finished games is better than the complete inability to sell digital games on other platforms. But resellers on Robot Cache will be paid only in IRON. That’s convenient if you want to buy more games on Robot Cache but much less useful if you want a more liquid currency.

A lot of the potential for Robot Cache to work is riding on the promise that IRON will be a valid and desirable cryptocurrency in its own right. Robot Cache is looking to raise at least $15 million by pre-selling the rights to 105 million IRON tokens to institutional and accredited investors at a discount, well before that IRON is actually generated some time in the second quarter of 2018. Those early investors are taking a risk that Robot Cache and the IRON network will launch as promised and on time; as spurned investors in the Tezos cryptocurrency found out last year, that’s not a guarantee.

When IRON does launch, though, the “real” value of those tokens won’t be just an academic concern, especially to the Robot Cache publishers who will be getting paid in IRON for their games (and who will then have to turn around and pay their employees in government-backed cash). Robot Cache says IRON earned from game resales will “likely stay in the ecosystem,” suggesting they don’t expect users to simply turn around and convert it into a more robust form of currency.

But if the value of IRON in real-world currencies ends up being as volatile as it has been for other cryptocurrencies, the price of Robot Cache games that are denominated in IRON could fluctuate wildly over the course of a single day. Even if Robot Cache converts IRON to dollars instantly at the time of sale, unstable valuation could give users pause about when it’s best to buy or sell (will this game be effectively cheaper if I buy it with IRON in an hour? In a day?).

Just last month, Valve stopped accepting Bitcoin payments on Steam in part because quickly changing valuations were leading Bitcoin-denominated prices to change too rapidly to handle. Valve also cited Bitcoin transaction fees reaching as high as $20 in suspending its Bitcoin-based sales. Robot Cache promises that publishers will “receive payment in minutes (not months)” and that “the use of an ERC-20 token ensures that IRON will settle quickly,” but a lot of that promise depends on how well the underlying Ethereum network is able to scale as it becomes more popular.

And unlike other cryptocurrencies, which allow for much broader uses, IRON as a currency is being created solely to power a single video game marketplace. Thus, in the end, the real value of IRON will depend largely on how much people want to buy games that are on the Robot Cache platform. It feels a bit like backing a new currency with GameStop gift cards.

We don’t want to be too negative about the prospects for Robot Cache. The company has a lot of interesting ideas, and it has a good deal of potential to shake up the distribution of PC games. But there are also a lot of hurdles and a lot of uncertainty to Robot Cache’s stated blockchain-based plans that the liberal use of a lot of cryptocurrency buzzwords can’t mask.

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); http://ift.tt/2FMqUFO January 17, 2018 at 11:12PM

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