It can be convenient. You’re going to launch the games somehow, whether that’s clicking files in a folder or running a command. If you have a bunch of games it’s nice to see them neatly organized in one place with nice visual representation. Non-launcher options tend to either get unwieldy or require more customization work.
The Steam launcher does a whole bunch of other useful things, like managing saves, setting up Proton, tracking play time and achievements, connecting to friends, integrating the store. It’s not hard to see why people like the convenience.
It is annoying when it goes too far… like individual games that insist on having their own launcher.
Heroic is a nice middle ground. GoG gives you simple downloads, that you can then choose to access through Heroic.
I played PC games since the early 90s, so I am well familiar with how things used to be before steam. And it was fine. I was hesitant to use steam at first, because like you say, I simply didn’t understand the point of it. Sometime after Valve released the orange box, that ended up being the first thing I bought on steam. And back then, some of the first things that I noticed about it was the ease of installing games, and the friends list that let me talk to and play games with my friends. I ended up getting really into team fortress 2, largely because I could play with people I knew, and we could even chat outside the game easily. It was easy to buy other games that these same friends were playing, and then enjoy a different game with them.
I got used to steam and it began to feel convenient, and at the same time, physical media started dying off. Steam let me easily install and uninstall any of my games whenever I wanted. I didn’t have to keep track of any physical media. I don’t have any of my old PC games from the 90s anymore. I have no idea where there went or how I lost them. But they are just gone. However, I still have every game I’ve ever bought on steam.
I’m not a heavy gamer anymore. If I see something I want, it’s easy to just put it on my wishlist and wait until it goes on sale at a price I think is reasonable. If I feel bored, I might open up my full list of games and browse for something to install. My game saves get backed up to the cloud. My controllers just work. Everything related to the gaming experience is integrated into one place, and I like that, it makes it easy. And for the most part, steam kind of just stays out of my way.
I remember when steam launched, and we all fucking hated the “always online” requirement because be all had dialup and switching steam to offline mode was a damn annoying hassle.
I may check out this GOG eventually. Accounts, subscriptions, micro transactions, and criminal proprietary extortion are why I stopped gaming for the most part. For me, it has been full-source or fuck off for a long time. I cannot fix stupid in anyone else but me. I will not support criminal extortion and bank account skimming scams. They only exist because people have no real moral depth and self respect to say no.
I dont really need it but good launchers make things easier, especially on linux where sometimes a specific patch or version of something like proton is needed and i dont want to spend hours figuring it out by trial and error.
Im not a fan of launchers being required though, thats just DRM. But projects like Heroic launcher and Lutris are incredibly nice to have. Steam is alright, its hard to hate on a company that has done as much for linux gaming as valve has, but they do have their problems.
Updating all of my games is a huge boost. I also enjoy the sync feature as I may play the same game on my desktop, HTPC, and Steam Deck. I like GOG allowing installing without their launcher, but I still just install games through Heroic Games Launcher for the same reasons as above.
Depending on how you make the game some launchers can make sense. You can set display options before launching the game. Back in ye olden times some games would launch by default in a set resolution which often made changing that in-game difficult as it would be off screen. Also makes your first time launching it a better experience than some low-res garbage. Also, without a platform like steam they can handle updates.
That being said, I don’t think most modern games need those functions. Graphics engines are pretty good at getting screen resolution from your os (not perfect). And platforms handle patches and updates.
Now they’re mostly there to gather metrics and shove ads in your face, and enforce drm.
I use steam for the ability to plug in any controller I want and instantly be able to use it. I can download controller maps from the community on the fly.
I can stream straight to my TV and play in any room with a TV in it with zero effort. I can join my friends games with two clicks. Remote play allows you to play games you don’t even own with your friends. Works on linux. Integrated workshop. Easy modding.
I use gog for older games not on steam. Works on linux. (Heroic at least)
I could go on with steam, but those are the key points stands alone games don’t offer.
I really had fun with it though the city building aspect starts to feel too loading bar heavy. I wish they had a more clever way to disguise that aspect of it.
If you want a bit more depth to the lamb check out the games social media pages - they have a lot of fully voiced clips of lore, shenanigans and shitposts.
What really should bother us here is that the dead area applies to the farms but not the mills, iirc. It causes farms on the right side to be verifiably more efficient because farmers prefer the left side for pathing.
The whole mill perimeter is usable equally despite the way it looks, ironically enough.
Also farms that far away from the mills bothers me. Hate it when the French? campaigns do that.
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