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Yep, I actually own 7,255 games on Steam. I’ve played 23% of my library. I regret nothing. (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 year ago by to c/games@lemmy.world
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Why do I play all these games? Because it’s important that they’re played.

Because every game is a story, a world, a moment in time crafted by someone who cared enough to create it.

Because each one teaches me something new—about design, about culture, about myself.

Because in a sea of pixels, there’s magic waiting to be found.

And because, honestly? Sometimes I just want to escape, explore, and lose myself in different worlds.

So yeah. I own thousands of games, and I’ll keep playing them.

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[–] [S] 18 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Say what you will, every game I’ve bought—I can still play. And I’ve been buying Steam games for over a decade.

Meanwhile, none of my GameCube discs work on my Switch.

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  • [+] 15 points 1 year ago (1 child)
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  • [–] 20 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 child)

    While you're not wrong, by that logic, it's actually fairly trivial to take my Steam downloads drive and run it on any computer even without my Steam account.

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  • [+] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)
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  • [–] 14 points 1 year ago

    It works in the same way that dumping your GameCube games and running them on Dolphin works... It's quick and easy, but it's against the ToS and requires breaking DRM.

    Steam's DRM is weak, and in some interviews some Valve developers even gave hints that this is on purpose. Many Steam games will simply run without Steam if you just double click the .exe in the install folder, and the vast majority that only rely on Steam's DRM can be opened by running a free "Steam Emulator" software that pretends to be an active Steam account with a correct license.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    A lot of Steam games don't have any DRM, and most of the rest are pretty easy to strip.

    Give it a shot sometime. Completely quit out of Steam, turn off your internet, and try running some of your older Steam games directly from the Steam folder.

    I do this somewhat often when my kids are on my other computer playing games on my account and I still want to play something. It's a little trickier on Linux since you need something to run the Proton/WINE layer, so I mostly stick to Linux-native games in that pretty rare case.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Family share is actually great for this now.

    It used to be that if anyone in the group was playing any game it would lock you out of playing anything else on the main account without kicking them off.

    But they eased up on it now so you can both play at the same time as long as you aren't playing the same game at the same time.

    So just make a burner account for you or for your kids and family share the library to it and now you don't even have to go offline unless everyone in the house wants to play BG3 simultaneously.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago

    Really? I haven't tried that since they revamped the sharing thing. I have three accounts, one for me, my wife, and one my kids share, and they're all linked. Most of the time my kids use my account, but I can easily change that if it'll allow simultaneous play (on different games).

    Thanks for the tip, I'll try it out!

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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    You can still play it but increasingly games are becoming very different from what you bought.

    I've started noticing a disturbing trend. More and more games that are older being sold at steep discounts or "free to play" and simultaneously jampacked with invasive telemetry and/or ads/microtransactions. And since Steam won't let you play older versions, those games are effectively dead.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)

    (deleted content)

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

    That is what firewalls and sinkholes are for. Stupid telemetry.

    That shouldn't be necessary and is beside the point.

    The whole industry goes to shit, but it's not steam's fault.

    1. Steam has the clout to fight back against this
    2. As I already mentioned, it is partially because they don't allow you to run older versions of games.
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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago* (1 child)

    [...] because they don't allow you to run older versions of games.

    They do if the dev makes it available, I'm looking at four different versions of Terraria in the beta menu right now that stretch back four major versions. I'm pretty sure a couple games in my library somewhere have their entire update history in there, though I can't think of one to name off the top of my head right now, that's not a feature I use very often. [Edit: Rift Wizard is one that does precisely this, I knew I had at least one in here]

    This is not true of all games, but it could be, either directly by game devs without Valve even having to care, or via pressure by Valve by just making older versions available whether the devs want it or not. I think the latter option is probably the better move, but there's technically nothing stopping the former other than the game devs themselves.

    There's also a valid argument that making downpatching very easy would be a huge boon to piracy. This is a reasonable talking point no matter which side of that fence you sit on. It would also probably benefit modding as well, which I think is a more objective good but some game developers or more likely publishers would probably disagree.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago*

    They do if the dev makes it available

    That shouldn't be their decision.

    I'm looking at four different versions of Terraria

    Literally never seen that before. I think I see if the dev pushing their 4th update that day and now I have to wait a half an hour to play the damn game.

    downpatching very easy would be a huge boon to piracy.

    Not my problem. Guess I'd better just pirate the game instead.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)

    (deleted content)

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago* (1 child)

    Firewalls and especially sinkholes are VERY necessary

    You misread my comment. I didn't say they weren't necessary.

    Imagine 1 million clueless gamers running an older version of their game because they're too lazy too update.

    1. GOG already does this and it's not a problem.
    2. It updates automatically but you can choose to roll it back at any time.

    how should online games work if every Joe and Jane got their "own" favorite version?

    Not talking about online games. Besides, the how or why do not matter, the point is the games are gone.

    Also, you can install an older version. Just with more hassles.

    I pay Steam to deal with the hassles. I am not a software engineer.

    But, of course, only indie devs do that.

    Valve has the power to enforce this system-wide.

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  • [+] 1 point 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)
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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (1 child)

    Gog does it, but Gog only offers a mere fraction of what Steam has.

    And that matters for the purposes of this conversation why?

    Sure, Valve could enforce that, but...as said....why?

    I explained why in my first comment. It's why we're talking in the first place.

    Fragmentation and the resulting nightmare of customer-support. On steam's AND the dev's side.

    I don't see it. Neither of them have to support old versions.

    But the vast majority of people are clueless (and still use those devices) and need to be "guided".

    No they don't. If people are clueless, they don't need to utilize this feature. It's call an "option".

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  • [–] [S] -1 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Out of the thousands of games I have, not once have I noticed anything like you describe.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Oh well if you haven't experienced it, it must not exist then 🤷

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    hmmm that doesn't ring a bell here either. Which games do this ?

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago* (2 children)

    The most recent ones I've noticed are Riders Republic and Borderlands 2. Helldivers also introduced a bunch of new microtransactions years after it's launch.

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  • [+] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)
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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    And since Steam won't let you play older versions, those games are effectively dead.

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  • [+] 1 point 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)
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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (1 child)

    So it's the fault of the delivery-device?

    ...yeah? Of course it is.

    Why didn't you make a backup of an older version just in case?

    I pay Steam to do that.

    Besides, last time I checked, you can. With a bit more hassle.

    Not interested.

    All not the case for a "live" online-game. Which borderlands wants to be.

    That's exactly the problem.

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  • [+] 1 point 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)
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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (1 child)

    Why would you think another company doing it better makes Valve not responsible? I don't understand the logic.

    As BL2 offers online-coop, and is also the major selling point of that game, a fragmented market is impossible.

    ...no? It's not. You don't have to play it online.

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  • [+] 1 point 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)
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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (1 child)

    It doesn't matter if you prefer offline or not or that you CAN play solo, it is online coop.

    Of course it does?

    Hence it begs the question whether it's the platform's fault per se.

    There is no question. GOG is proof that you can do it. Therefore if others don't do it, it's their fault.

    Once again, all of this is beside the point. The point is that those games are effectively gone.

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  • [+] 1 point 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 child)
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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (1 child)

    It only matters in the sense that you're allowed to not purchase online games.

    Virtually every game in existence has some sort of online element. But what you seem to be unable to grasp is that many of them have single player modes that don't require any internet connection.

    It's as simple has having a server that checks the version of the game installed before allowing access to online services.

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  • [–] [S] -3 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    I mean, if it’s a trend, you’d think I would have noticed it by now.

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