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Internet Article: (Opinion only) "Microsoft plans to destroy competor Steam"

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by ArachnidAnimal, Jul 27, 2016.

  1. neginfinity

    neginfinity

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    Their goal would be increasing profits, but there's more than one way to go about it, and it isn't necessarily increasing apple's market share on desktop.

    Also, forbidding users to install non-appstore software seems to be perfectly compatible with apple products.
    apple_win.jpg
     
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  2. Ryiah

    Ryiah

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    Building really bizarre systems is most of the fun though! By the way if you use a thumbnail people can just click or tap it to see the image in a fullscreen viewer. Is there an advantage to using the spoiler tags I'm not aware of?

    bizarre.jpg
     
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  3. neginfinity

    neginfinity

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    That's roughly what I meant when I said that "this is not how PC should work". The PC system was always the one you could tinker/mess with.

    Well, it is non-thumbnail image, so just in case someone is viewing the forum on a toaster, I put it under a spoiler tag. Also, I know how to use thumbnails.
     
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  4. JasonBricco

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    If that's going to help Apple's profits, then wow. I have a very wrong idea about how things work in the business/customer land, I'll say that.
     
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  5. jc_lvngstn

    jc_lvngstn

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    Funny thing is...that's pretty much how it's always been, right? Microsoft has the most versatile operating system ever, and all the burdens that come with it.
    Apple locks everything down ... er "walled garden" I guess, and every is like...ok! and throws their money at them. All the while talking about how anti-competitive Microsoft is.
     
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  6. Ryiah

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    Microsoft has the most popular operating system. Actual versatility at this point belongs to Unix-like OSes such as Linux.
     
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  7. Eric5h5

    Eric5h5

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    Yeah, except that's not true. iOS and OS X are different things; people need to stop conflating them. I don't recall anyone complaining about WP8 being locked down.

    --Eric
     
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  8. Murgilod

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    To be fair, I don't recall anyone talking about WP8 period, aside from comments of "where does this belong when Android and iOS exist?"
     
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  9. jc_lvngstn

    jc_lvngstn

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    Fair enough. I think I'll celebrate by going down to best buy, and buying an OSX machine they put together with the innards of my choice. And since -you- mentioned iOS, I think I'll ask Apple where the windows install for XCode is so I can do some development for it. I can't seem to find the link :)
     
  10. jc_lvngstn

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    Well, to be fair I haven't messed around with Linux since the late 90's. But how is it more versatile? I see a lot more software and hardware supported by Windows. Do you mean the desktop UI?
     
  11. JasonBricco

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    Not like I can get Visual Studio on a Mac, either... and how I would like it. Such a better debugger.
     
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  12. jc_lvngstn

    jc_lvngstn

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    I thought Visual Studio Code could be used with Unity? I'm pretty sure it's available for OSX. But...how viable it is overall compared to full Visual Studio, I have no idea.

    However, Apple encourages bootcamp so that you can run Windows on your Mac. Oddly enough, it doesn't offer the same when it comes to OSX, running on your Windows box.

    Ah yes. Here's the link:
    https://techcrunch.com/2015/04/29/m...-free-code-editor-for-os-x-linux-and-windows/

    Interesting quote:
    “A lot of people use Windows as their development environment, but we are also seeing a lot of people on Linux and Mac,” S. ‘Soma’ Somasegar, Microsoft’s corporate VP of its developer division, told me earlier this week. “Instead of making them go to Windows, we want to meet them where they are.”

    Horrible isn't it?
     
    Last edited: Jul 30, 2016
  13. Eric5h5

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    So...where can I go to buy a Microsoft-manufactured desktop? Oh, they don't make one? No laptops either? What's that you say, their business model is based on licensing software, not selling hardware, which is a very different thing? And that Apple's computer line is not referred to by people as a "walled garden" like iOS is, since they don't prevent anyone from creating and distributing apps as they like? Well golly gee, not sure how I missed that!

    --Eric
     
  14. Ryiah

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    The definition of versatility is the ability to be easily adapted from one task to another. Windows is mostly restricted to desktop, server, and reasonably powerful mobile devices. Linux covers those and many more additional platforms that Windows cannot due to current requirements. The Raspberry Pi Zero comes to mind but there are others.
     
  15. tiggus

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    I realize OS wars don't go anywhere but in the interest of sharing some stuff I was only recently made aware of, Windows IoT now runs on raspberry Pi 2 and above :)

    https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/iot/getstarted
     
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  16. Ryiah

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    Doesn't that need another computer to even be functional?
     
  17. tiggus

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    To do development yeah I suppose, but it does support graphical displays using windows drivers. Then again, how many people develop on their Pi with linux? It is painfully slow to compile anything directly on the Pi from personal experience.
     
  18. neginfinity

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    Unix-likes have more programming toys than windows. For example, clang was initially linux only. Ocaml has components that aren't ported to windows, etc. Basically, if there's some sort of unusual langauge, there's a high chance that it is non-windows only, or that some of its tools are not available on windows system. If you're planning to tinker with anything unusual (like robotics), linux would be the system of choice.
     
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  19. Dustin-Horne

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    https://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/Surface-Book/productID.325716000?WT.mc_id=pointitsem+Google+Adwords+5+-+Surface+Book&s_kwcid=AL!4249!3!110495384453!e!!g!!surface book&invsrc=search&ef_id=V3xedQAAAAhkcugT:20160731213102:s

    The Surface Book has actually been getting some pretty great reviews. I've only played with one but it was pretty nice.

    On the flipside I use my Surface Pro 3 which works pretty much just like my laptop except that the keyboard is detachable.
     
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  20. Eric5h5

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    I'm aware of the Surface, but it's just one thing, doesn't really sell that well, and doesn't change Microsoft's business model.

    --Eric
     
  21. angrypenguin

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    Yeah, I love my Surface, but in the big picture I don't see how it fits with MS being a mostly software-centric company. The Xbox is another product that stands out.

    I haven't actually looked, but the adverts that they send me suggest that even with the Surface being a flagship product they're still selling 3rd party computers right along side them on the Microsoft store itself. That makes sense, because the Surface itself is a premium offering (it's cheapest one is 2 or 3 times the price of an entry level laptop from another brand) where Windows's strength is that it runs on a variety of systems.
     
  22. CaoMengde777

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    id LOVE to see steam go away, (forced updates are just DUMB DUMB DUMB!!! (kills mods... players just wanna have fun))
    but its lame they want to make... basically another steam, right?
    "universal windows platform" sounds like garbage.

    screw that garbage!

    wtf is "Windows Store"
    who uses this garbage?

    idk all i see is like those Keurig coffee makers, i tried one of those once at a hotel, and maaan that crap SUCKKS!! making coffee with a normal coffee maker is fine, if it works dont break it

    all it is, is a scam, a tactic, to get people to use a non-product, a FAKE key BS before you can actually use what you want..

    its a scam ,its despicable , its morally corrupt,
    its garbage
     
    Last edited: Aug 1, 2016
  23. tswalk

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    actually, it is pretty damn close... not so many "bells and whistles" but you are starting to see a ton of addons, and it includes intellisense and codelens, which IMO are most critical.
     
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  24. tswalk

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    i can't tell if that's sarcasm or not :)

    if not, then you don't understand the significance of the paradigm change they're making for software developers.. especially with the inclusion of DotNet Core.. develop once, for any platform (OSX, Windows, iOS, Android, Linux)... i mean seriously, how can that be considered garbage?
     
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  25. Martin_H

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    Steam actually offers a very convenient way to stick with specific old versions of games for mod compatibility. Under properties -> betas, users can opt in to different branches of a game. Those can be old stable releases or new bleeding edge beta releases etc.. It's just that almost no dev makes use of that feature. That's not steam's fault. Check out "7 days to die" if you want to see a game that offers a lot of old versions.
     
  26. Player7

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    Have you actually taken a look at it? .net core current release is literately fking garbage.
     
  27. hippocoder

    hippocoder

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    I like steam a lot, it's very convenient to just manage my stuff, and I can let family play my games too, so those 60+ games I'll never play actually get appreciated. Let me know when another store offers that functionality and I'll consider it.
     
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  28. Ryiah

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    I was listening to a Linux podcast a few months back and the guy leading Ubuntu MATE said the majority of the users for their distribution are actually Raspberry Pi users. Apparently it's very popular in some parts of the world. Mostly countries where a normal desktop computer is prohibitively expensive.
     
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  29. Deleted User

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    I mean, good luck toppling everyone's favorite "private party."
     
  30. angrypenguin

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    You can swear about it all you want, that won't convince anyone of anything. What is wrong with it that makes it "garbage"?
     
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  31. neoshaman

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    I don't know about OS war, only my personal experience, I like system 6 on mac then I don't get what happen, then windows spend its life F***ing with me. By the point I'm in now, I'm okay with jumping ship, they force me anyway by killing stuff I relied on, it really doesn't matter.
     
  32. AcidArrow

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    GOG has a superset of steam features, although I haven't used their client too much to know if it's as user friendly as steam. It is lacking in number of available games though.
     
  33. Murgilod

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    GoG's client and updating process are kinda miles behind Steam. I actually rebought a game I owned on GoG because the Steam version made things so much smoother.
     
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  34. hippocoder

    hippocoder

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    So why is there steam hate again? is it because steam is cross platform, has regular cheap deals, updates auto if you wish and allows friends and family sharing, in game chat and more?
     
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  35. neoshaman

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    It doesn't stop me from working and F*** the productivity soft I had.
     
  36. Ryiah

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    It might be because they allow games like this onto their store. Honestly I'd be tempted to give Microsoft's equivalent to the Steam store a chance if it had proper curation.

    (I'm getting sick of Firefox's spellchecker missing half the words in the English language - why doesn't it have a simple word like "curation"?!)
     
  37. AcidArrow

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    I am not sure if you are referring to my post, but I don't hate steam. I rather like it.

    I would like it to have some competition though, I thought GOG is a good candidate, but considering what @Murgilod said, it's not even close at this point.
     
  38. Murgilod

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    Most of it seems to be DRM fist-shaking, which I can kinda understand to an extent. There have been more than a few times where I've been unable to access locally installed games due to strange network issues, and if Steam ever was to shut down there's kinda like a thousand dollars worth of games I'd lose, which would suck. That said, there's no signs of Steam ever shutting down considering how it's probably the most profitable digital distribution network on the planet.
     
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  39. Ryiah

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    There are ways around the DRM though. At the very least you'd still be able to play those games that don't need net access.
     
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  40. kB11

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    Surface is supposed to be the flagship hardware that guides the rest of the OEMs into new directions to prevent the Windows ecosystem from stagnating. E.g. the new 2in1 category has been popularized by Surface and is seeing growth (which is good for Windows because it is the only OS that can properly work on 2in1 devices).
     
  41. Martin_H

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    Afaik the dev side for gog is a lot more hassle. A friend of mine bought something on steam again too because the dev basically stated its too much hassle to keep the gog version up to date at the same pace as the steam version. Don't know which game it was.
     
  42. Dustin-Horne

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    I actually quite like the direction of .NET Core. It's an early product so it's still evolving, but rapidly and it's open source. Not to mention the new Netstandard model which is infinitely better than the old PCL (Portable Class Library) model with PCLs thousands of possible combinations. And, they're explicitly putting Unity support into .NET Core which will make platform upgrades much easier and quicker for Unity because they'll be targeting Netstandard. So let's say Unity eventually targets Netstandard 1.6... at some point they can target 1.8, 2.0, etc, with minimal changes because the base remains the same. In fact, everything that targets 1.3 for example will work on 1.4, 1.5, 1.6 etc. It's designed for forward compatibility.

    Good question... this started as a Microsoft hate thread and morphed into a Steam hate thread somehow... I don't think either party has earned it in this case.
     
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  43. Eric5h5

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    Steam's DRM is relatively unobtrusive as far as DRM goes, but it's still DRM, and they can remove access to your games library at their whim. Now they most probably won't, since that would usually be bad for business, but it's still a non-zero chance, and it has happened. (In at least one case I know of, access was eventually restored since the user was not actually at fault, but it took months of fighting with Steam about it.)

    Personally I buy through GOG unless there's pretty much no chance a particular game will appear outside of Steam, which is usually the case for bigger games. Also, a bit annoyingly, sometimes there are Mac versions of games on Steam, but not GOG. It would be bad if Steam was the only distribution channel.

    --Eric
     
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  44. ShilohGames

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    As a user, I like Steam. It does a good job with automatic updates. I remember a time before Steam when I had to manually search for updates for each game I played. With multiplayer games, it was tough keeping servers and users running the same compatible build. With Steam, all of the is handled automatically. There is even an option to disable updates on a per game basis for people that don't want automatic updates.

    As a developer, I like Steam. Before Steam, it was a lot harder for indie developers to reach a large audience. With Steam, everybody can try to make a game and try to release it on Steam. The quality of games varies, but Steam has both a review system and a refund system, so the really bad games suffer while the good games do well.

    I am not trying to convince anybody that Steam is perfect, but I definitely believe Steam has been awesome for both end users and developers.
     
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