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Google, Netflix, Apple and Amazon are the "barbarians at the gate" of the games industry, says ex-Sony boss
(www.rockpapershotgun.com)
this post was submitted on 05 Sep 2023
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Oh great, yet another launcher.
I'm not worried. They literally titled it "Vaporware". If that doesn't show how insanely out of touch they are then nothing will.
Dozens of companies have tried to make storefronts and launchers to claw back some market share but none have come close to feature parity with Steam.
The main problem is that its not enough to be competitive with Steam at this point... you need to put out something so good that it give people enough of a reason to leave the comfort of Steam... you need Steam and then another layer of goodness on top of Steam.
This is the same issue that a lot of MMOs had when trying to become a WoW killer. You not only needed to have pretty much everything Blizzard put into the game, but more on top because otherwise why would anyone bother to leave the comforts of Azeroth to play something that is maybe marginally better, or a possibly worse experience?
Yeah... A new store would need to have a handful of killer apps and significant feature superiority over Steam, all on release, just to have a chance at being a successful competitor. And it would probably need to maintain that momentum for a decent amount of time, and it would probably also need a fuckup on Valve's part.
Freakin EA didn't achieve it, freakin Sony didn't bother trying it, Epic dropped a fuckton of cash just to barely move the needle. I can't imagine what it would take.
Well, maybe? A Steam competitor could try what Epic did and offer better deals. This time to publishers and players if they actually want customers. Or they could try to offer things Steam doesn't. Or they could just try for parity and see if it works? We haven't seen a platform with parity yet so maybe people would want a new option?
But if Amazon does it, it will be a rushed out steaming pile with half the features and twice the price, as is their custom.
The thing is Amazon dosent exatcly need to be competetive.heck they could make it basicaly a Amazon prime semi-exclusive platform for games basicaly competing with xbox game pass instead of steam or with both of them at once
Could they be any less original?
Their competitor to Steam is just… another word for Steam.
My guess it's just an internal name to boost morale, inside joke sort of thing. Many software projects do that. Would be funny if that was the name though
Don't worry, they havent made a game worth playing yet.
They already have one where the put most of the prime games called "Amazon Games App". So if "Vapor" is something new it is more of another another launcher.
If they however just update the game app to also be a store front, it be fine I guess. I'm not thrilled about everyone needing there own launcher, but Amazon already has one, so can't really blame them for spicing it up a bit, to be at they other launchers level.
Amazon already tried, with a Twitch branded game launcher and included game licenses for that platform in Amazon Prime.
Obligatory xkcd