I remember this happening to Steam on Windows 98
“Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no.”
- Betteridge’s law of headlines
When you bought your games through Steam did you buy the right for Valve to support every OS forever?
If you install every game you bought through Steam before Steam stops support for your OS you should still be able to run those games through their own EXEs or launchers so yes, you do own the games. What you’re really losing is access to Steam’s store and the ability to install the game from them. Which sucks, but it’s not fair to suggest this impermanence in gaming is something new; physical media didn’t and doesn’t last forever either. Disks get scratched up and cartridges wear out; consoles die and production ends.
For anyone effected by this I would suggest they install every game they own and have a really good backup / restore plan. But even then, eventually no one will make compatible hardware and it will be impossible to find used. After that it’s all about whether virtualization and emulation are good enough for them to be playable. But in the end, sadly, nothing can last forever. So it goes.
Yarrr, matey.
Well, fuck steam then
Win 10 has been out for 8 years now. You can’t really be that shocked they want to make it a minimum requirement.
This is one of the many reasons as to why I’ve avoided buying anything on Steam for the past 5 years. Steam/Valve are a steaming pile of doodoo.
For this, really? Those Windows versions reached EOL a long time ago, basically no one should be even running them nowadays. If you want to run Steam then just use a supported operating system, like Windows 10 (and above) or Linux.
Yeah…really. The thing is that, if you like to run older games on era-accurate hardware, Steam was already a pain in the ass to run on older machines. Probably 70% of these games, I purchased on Steam, and a lot of them are old titles.
Maybe this is ludicrous to you, but le good ole Prototype runs like a nasty turd on my main W11 machine that I use for design and 4K video editing. I’m not new to modding, troubleshooting, and I’ve even dabbled in game development, but none of the fixes online seem to help me run the game at more than 10 FPS, with dips to the 3FPS realm.
But guess what? Prototype runs like a dream on my restored Windows XP PC with a Core Quad and GTX260. Same as with Far Cry 2, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., Jade Empire, and so many others. And don’t even get me started on games from the 90s. Even if they run OK on W11 and I get past all the text rendering issues, I still want the experience of running them on W98, with a CRT monitor, metal ball mice and bone white mechanical keyboards. I paid for them, but Valve wants to dictate how I should run 'em.
If you can’t install Steam on older hardware, you can’t install your Steam games that you previously could. 🥸
if you like to run older games on era-accurate hardware
This is the edgiest of edge cases.
As I’ve said, I’m a bad boy doing bad-boy activities, i.e.: using old PCs with the OS they came from. 🩸🗡️😎🔥
I for one dislike your comment because you used non-ASCII characters (emoji) in your reply. I am viewing this conversation chain via mutt on a tty, as is my preference and hobby, and would appreciate if you avoid using characters that cannot be represented in 7-bit ASCII. If you’re going to the effort of having a discussion in a public place, you have an obligation to keep those of us on mutt in mind.
Sent via mutt 2.2.10 (gcc Version 2.7.2.3 (linux_3.3.1-1-i386))
OHH!!! EMOJIS! The 200K Karma Redditor inside you is surely raging!
I commented on why I think this announcement is just another corn in the steamy pile of doo-doo… dookie… manure, if you will, that Steam is for me.
I’m not expecting Steam to change for me or people in the same scenario as mine. Steam simply doesn’t fit my needs any more and I won’t support them. But then again, crucify me for my sins, daddy. I might go back to purchasing games on Steam if you do it well enough. 🍆💦
Imagine thinking your this smart and missing such obvious parody of yourself.
Hint: their comment had very little to do with emoji.