Anyone thinking of getting it for Linux should buy it via Steam now because it will only be available for PC through Epic Game Store when it goes FTP next Wednesday. I got my kid his own copy last week because he was loving playing bots and doing training mode on my account. He's only 4 and there seems to be enough players at his level to keep queue times short.
I really think it is the best competitive game (video or otherwise) ever made.
Can I still get a refund? I only got to know about it now, I have not logged into my Steam account for some time. Sad to see that I bought a game I could play and now I cannot. Proton does not work for me for some reasons I am too lazy to discuss, and besides the point anyway.
It was inevitable after they were bought. Funny how they lied about this up to the last moment still. It's also blatantly illegal. Well the game is readily available at the common piracy sites though.
Adding new criteria to play the latest patch of a game is something basically every major developer does on a regular basis - you'll get EULA confirmation prompts after installing an update, especially if it's an online game like Rocket League. I'd say I see one 1-2 times a year for every online game I play.
The EULA not being visible definitely sounds illegal, though. Really absurd oversight.
I doubt it's criminal but probably against Steam's terms of service. Who probably require not having a third party account as a condition to play a game bought on Steam.
If that's against Steam ToS, Epic wouldn't be the first on Steam to break it. I had to create a account with Paradox Interactive to play some of their games in multiplayer.
Edit: Also from the text of the announcement blog post on cross account progression:
"Rocket League’s cross-platform progression is made possible with an Epic Games Account. So, creating one or signing into your existing Epic Games Account is the first step of the process. You'll be prompted to do this when you start up Rocket League for the first time after the update. Once that's completed, there are a couple of different ways to connect your Rocket League platforms to your Epic Games Account and complete the process for cross-platform progression. "
I just want to be able to buy skins for me cars outside of the Rocket League store. I don’t appreciate the Rocket League monopoly on rocket league skins.
There's a reason we have anti-trust laws. You're comparing a company that sells video game items to less than a few million people to a company that practically controls the digital life of hundreds of millions of people.
Oh, I meant half the smartphone using population of the US, which is around 280 million people.
It's a fact that the iPhone has half that market and that number is only growing since they also have somewhere between 80 and 90 percent of the youth market in the US.
Rocket League skins have no comparison here, whatsoever. Just wanted to make sure that everybody is aware of that.
What would this look like? Clearly the entire purpose of being able to buy skins is to provide revenue to the developers/publishers. This is even more apparent now that the game has gone f2p. Therefore, it's not really reasonable to expect that any third party would be able to make and sell skins (like how any third party can make and sell software for windows, for instance). The only alternative would be something like a cd key store model, where you can buy from multiple storefronts. However, I'm not sure how that would benefit the consumer, other than possibly allowing them to use exotic payment methods.
Back in the day TF and CS and other goldsrc and source games allowed custom sprays: square textures you could decal onto a surface and share with the server.
Most of the time it was benign or hilarious, but enough of the time it was pornography or gore that Valve disabled that feature on its managed servers.
Epic could allow other studios to create stores within Rocket League so that I could buy from those other studios instead of Epic. I just don’t want to be restricted to what Epic has to offer.
I’m actually just taking the piss out of Epic legal arguments that Apple has a monopoly within their own platform.
The rolling upgrade cycle for software and games is running afoul of our assumptions about what you get when you pay for a product.
With RL, customers have lost Linux support and are now losing the ability to opt-out of the EGS.
But it's not the only example; Valve's own TF2 increased its minimum system requirements over its lifespan. They may not have stated as much, but the rolling updates eventually made the game unplayable on machines that could play it decently.
Hell, Oculus is going to require a Facebook account.
And so on, there's plenty of examples of game developers breaking a product their users paid for, and with no recourse for them.
The TF2 example is especially. Seems a better solution, when facing the issue of updates leading to a worse experience to lower spec machines, would be to iterate and make TF3 or keep a classic TF2 (like they did for counter strike).
User base with low spec machines must not be with it, though, and people may have upgraded hardware over time. There's also the slew of new video games that complete for user attention/money.
We need to get rid of invasive technology like anti-cheating software. Many of these things are actually implemented as kernel drivers that are designed to take over the machine and monitor everything users do. That's the only way they can even hope to prevent cheating and it's not even guaranteed.
Lots of games will start working again on Linux if we get rid of this stuff. Online gaming with random people is just like networking with random people: you never know who is going to be a malicious actor. People should play only with those they personally know and trust.
SaaS games are the only proven viable alternative to anti-cheating software; if the host is the sole authority then there's less concern for peers to cheat. Wallhacks and input hacks notwithstanding.
Cheaters can still automate inputs, decision making and what not. Honestly, given how games these days are straight up designed to be addictive, I'd even say they should be automated in order to cure people of their addiction to stuff like daily rewards.
There's just no way it's going to work unless there's trust between the people playing. Can't trust randoms.
But anti-cheat software does work pretty well. It certainly reduces the amount of cheaters. It’s an arms race against the cheaters, rather than a perfect mechanism to stop all cheating, but it helps a lot.
You're gonna be disappointed. People manage to cheat even on consoles which are designed to only run software if it's been signed by the manufacturer.
There's got to be a point where they ought to stop and say "okay, this is as far as we can go with this idea". That point is probably when they start making kernel drivers that own your system for the sake of trying to guarantee a video game hasn't been tampered with. Some of these things don't exactly have a friendly privacy policy either.
You have a choice: roll down the knotted hill where you're certain to smear dog poop on youtself doing so, or roll down the hill that almost never has dogs on it and is frequently mowed and maintained.
You left out the part where the gardener watches over your shoulder as you do your banking, apply for a passport, apply for a better job, yadda yadda.
Given my druthers I'd prefer the ability to block people I don't want to play with, and have no anti-cheat system.
As an example if you play Warframe on consoles you'll find that you are encountering the same people game after game. So a block list (as a way to punish cheaters) would be useful because you aren't playing with a random selection of the entire world. There's also the case that Warframe is a game where cheating doesn't matter (though some abilities have been modified to prevent griefing).
If a subscription to a game store means it's possible to prevent multiplayer games matching me up with certain other subscribers, I'd much prefer that over the game publisher wanting to install anti-cheat software that takes control over my operating system.
To be fair, the amount of cheaters has gone down a lot in my games. There has to be some middle ground. I paid for a game that I want to be fair and fun for everyone. Fall Guys with cheaters takes away 100% of the fun.
Any software that depends on an Internet connection to function and/or auto-update should be regarded as SaaS, not a static program or a product that you "buy" in the conventional sense.
Modern software is full of bait and switch techniques. Get people involved with certain expectations, then require more sign ups, accounts, permissions, etc. once they are already invested.
>The rolling upgrade cycle for software and games is running afoul of our assumptions about what you get when you pay for a product.
>With RL, customers have lost Linux support and are now losing the ability to opt-out of the EGS.
What should people assume when they buy a game that is more or less entirely multiplayer online? As an example, I paid $20 for Rocket League 2 years ago. Does that mean I get to play it online, in perpetuity, without anything changing? Probably not.
^ This. I’ve bought a few games outside of Steam than turned out to just be a Steam redemption code. That’s not a problem.
Take Minecraft for example.[a] One used to be able to buy and play Minecraft without an account. Then Microsoft bought it and the game now requires an XBox Live account![b] Why? Sure, it wasn’t a big deal as I already had a MS account for Windows, but why must I use it?
EDIT: I just checked, and they’ve also added this “feature” to the iOS version as well. Which means a game I spent actual money on now requires me to use an account. As in, people who previously didn’t have to agree to MS’ TOS now do. And it’s too late to “refund” the game.
[a]: My memory may not be the full picture as I play it on and off. I previously played on iOS, but now on the Switch.
[b]: Even local play on the Switch requires a Microsoft account!
> Take Minecraft for example.[a] One used to be able to buy and play Minecraft without an account. Then Microsoft bought it and the game now requires an XBox Live account![b] Why? Sure, it wasn’t a big deal as I already had a MS account for Windows, but why must I use it?
Somewhere between me having more or less accidentally created about a dozen (different) Microsoft accounts for all their previous and weird Many-SSO things, the Mojang acquisition and Mojang-internal account migrations it seems like my original 2009 account was just lost... :|
Bungie did a similar thing with Destiny 2, as you now need to login with Steam, not Battle.net. It happens that more people have Steam accounts so it didn’t upset too many people, but how is this different? It seems like people are just finding reasons to get mad at Psyonix instead of pushing hard on the big issues, like dropping Linux support.
The difference, to me at least, is that you can't find Destiny 2 on Battle.net anymore - they entirely switched platforms. This is an end run around sneaky where they require you to have your steam account AND an epic account, so you can't play a steam game without an epic account - with Destiny 2 whatever platform you were on you needed a matching account.
Now why is this egregious while Ubisofts uplay launcher isn't? I'm not sure. I assume it's just because uplay has always been there and awful, and this is new.
Part of the issue is that rocket league was cross platform if I recall correctly. Then epic comes in, buys it out and screws the potatoes who bought it on the competitor platform.
Huh, great timing, it looks like I did my last 2hrs ingame last week. I hadn't played since the announcement, I thought I might give it some more playtime since its the funnest game of the decade - but dang these principles I have. Oh well I lose. GG. Well played. What a save!
For a long time I've been like you, but at this point I can't really justify not playing something I love because of stuff like this. I had to create a Steam account to play Counter Strike, a Blizzard account to play Overwatch and now an Epic account to play Rocket League. Is this such a bad thing?
This is misleading. With one button you can create an account w/ no name, email, password, or any other information. So technically I guess I have an Epic account, but I have no way of accessing it outside of RL. And Epic has nothing except a random ID that they generated for me.
I went through the process last night. It was exactly as I described. IIRC they had an option to create/link an Epic account or create the shell one. I chose the shell and then it asked me if I wanted to link Steam friends. I said no and that was the end of it. Took 10 seconds.
But the flow was confusing because it asked if I wanted to link an account, I clicked "Not now", and then it automatically created an account for me with no input from me and then I could play.
Sorry, I wasn't very specific with my post. I meant your last sentence is a very optimistic reading - why would Epic have done this if it wasn't to harvest your data?
Standard buyout practices. Epic wants the whole pie and is willing to be a toxic market player to get there. Valve was too good for the gaming market, consumers are bad at recognizing a snake pit, they just see the magical free games and exclusive cuts in price, not remembering that those costs will be made back by the company later.
AFAIK, Steam has never insisted on exclusivity from those selling on its store; yes, Valve's own games aren't sold elsewhere but that's not quite the same as demanding exclusivity from others.
And Epic explicitly refuses to add forums and reviews, which many of us find to be invaluable sources of information.
And Epic has/had atrocious account security; for instance, not verifying email addresses on new accounts.
Those are my personal gripes; you'll find longer lists elsewhere.
Valve is not at all anti-competitive and will even let you sell Steam keys on other storefronts without taking a cut, for one. And they've demonstrated significant goodwill by having their VR platform be open and doing significant work in making Linux gaming viable.
IMO, it comes down to having a clear, customer-facing message.
Steam has spent a decade plus saying "we're going to make PC gaming a better experience than going to a Gamestop and buying a box with a CD-ROM in it." They've delivered in many ways-- from the technical/distribution space, to shaking price expectations, to providing discoverability for indie creators, to building a community big enough that people can use their reviews as a shopping tool.
Epic came in and made some mealy-mouth comments about "we want to be a lower-margin store so devs keep more cash", but that doesn't directly mean much to the consumer. Rather than offering something inherently compelling, they have to force people into the door with exclusives, forced accounts, and selling dollar bills for 90 cents (subsidized discounts and giveaways.)
A good counterpoint is GOG. They don't match Steam point for point, but they've made a clear niche out of benefits customers can see (no-DRM, and a catalog of retro titles that would be a pain to acquire and run today)
No, but there are plenty of other organizations that would run a better app store than Apple, and Epic getting its way would mean that users stuck on iOS would get to benefit from them.
There is no reason to suppose that. If Epic gets its way, companies like Epic with large war chests will end up running stores. Amazon, Google, and presumably the stores that Phone Carriers will pre-install are good starting points.
Presumably the Facebook app will integrate a store and the apps will provide telemetry without asking permission.
Users and developers will have to contend with all of them.
There is no reason whatsoever to suppose these will be better than Apple’s approach, and plenty of history to suggest that it will be worse.
Who did you have in mind? Perhaps there is someone I haven’t thought of.
I'm very bummed about this. I'm on Linux and didn't go for a refund when they dropped native support because I was playing the game through Proton anyways but this one really hurts. Epic employs scummy practices all around and I dislike them with a passion. With over 1.2k hours clocked in this game it might have very well come to an end for me.
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 156 ms ] threadI really think it is the best competitive game (video or otherwise) ever made.
The EULA not being visible definitely sounds illegal, though. Really absurd oversight.
This is the key part, it should be BEFORE you install the update, and with "Do you accept these new terms and wish to install"
Not like it is today
"We have forced these new terms on you, and if you do not accept you lose all access to this game"
as there is no easy way to rollback to the previous version that worked
Rockstar games for instance required a third-party account to play GTA5.
Thank God for brexit, couldn't be having any of that free trade and consumer protections
Edit: Also from the text of the announcement blog post on cross account progression: "Rocket League’s cross-platform progression is made possible with an Epic Games Account. So, creating one or signing into your existing Epic Games Account is the first step of the process. You'll be prompted to do this when you start up Rocket League for the first time after the update. Once that's completed, there are a couple of different ways to connect your Rocket League platforms to your Epic Games Account and complete the process for cross-platform progression. "
There's a reason we have anti-trust laws. You're comparing a company that sells video game items to less than a few million people to a company that practically controls the digital life of hundreds of millions of people.
If you don’t like Apple you can switch to Android, Lineage OS, or other open source variants. You have dozens and dozens of phones to choose from.
If you don’t like Rocket League you can switch to...?
Which one has the monopoly again?
It's a fact that the iPhone has half that market and that number is only growing since they also have somewhere between 80 and 90 percent of the youth market in the US.
Rocket League skins have no comparison here, whatsoever. Just wanted to make sure that everybody is aware of that.
[0] https://macdailynews.com/2019/05/16/apple-iphones-installed-...
[1] https://www.counterpointresearch.com/us-market-smartphone-sh...
[2] https://www.techspot.com/news/74108-over-80-us-teens-iphone-...
Most of the time it was benign or hilarious, but enough of the time it was pornography or gore that Valve disabled that feature on its managed servers.
I’m actually just taking the piss out of Epic legal arguments that Apple has a monopoly within their own platform.
With RL, customers have lost Linux support and are now losing the ability to opt-out of the EGS.
But it's not the only example; Valve's own TF2 increased its minimum system requirements over its lifespan. They may not have stated as much, but the rolling updates eventually made the game unplayable on machines that could play it decently.
Hell, Oculus is going to require a Facebook account.
And so on, there's plenty of examples of game developers breaking a product their users paid for, and with no recourse for them.
User base with low spec machines must not be with it, though, and people may have upgraded hardware over time. There's also the slew of new video games that complete for user attention/money.
Tons of factors to think about!
I feel consumers need better protections against this stuff.
Lots of games will start working again on Linux if we get rid of this stuff. Online gaming with random people is just like networking with random people: you never know who is going to be a malicious actor. People should play only with those they personally know and trust.
There's just no way it's going to work unless there's trust between the people playing. Can't trust randoms.
There's got to be a point where they ought to stop and say "okay, this is as far as we can go with this idea". That point is probably when they start making kernel drivers that own your system for the sake of trying to guarantee a video game hasn't been tampered with. Some of these things don't exactly have a friendly privacy policy either.
You have a choice: roll down the knotted hill where you're certain to smear dog poop on youtself doing so, or roll down the hill that almost never has dogs on it and is frequently mowed and maintained.
Given my druthers I'd prefer the ability to block people I don't want to play with, and have no anti-cheat system.
As an example if you play Warframe on consoles you'll find that you are encountering the same people game after game. So a block list (as a way to punish cheaters) would be useful because you aren't playing with a random selection of the entire world. There's also the case that Warframe is a game where cheating doesn't matter (though some abilities have been modified to prevent griefing).
If a subscription to a game store means it's possible to prevent multiplayer games matching me up with certain other subscribers, I'd much prefer that over the game publisher wanting to install anti-cheat software that takes control over my operating system.
>With RL, customers have lost Linux support and are now losing the ability to opt-out of the EGS.
What should people assume when they buy a game that is more or less entirely multiplayer online? As an example, I paid $20 for Rocket League 2 years ago. Does that mean I get to play it online, in perpetuity, without anything changing? Probably not.
Take Minecraft for example.[a] One used to be able to buy and play Minecraft without an account. Then Microsoft bought it and the game now requires an XBox Live account![b] Why? Sure, it wasn’t a big deal as I already had a MS account for Windows, but why must I use it?
EDIT: I just checked, and they’ve also added this “feature” to the iOS version as well. Which means a game I spent actual money on now requires me to use an account. As in, people who previously didn’t have to agree to MS’ TOS now do. And it’s too late to “refund” the game.
[a]: My memory may not be the full picture as I play it on and off. I previously played on iOS, but now on the Switch.
[b]: Even local play on the Switch requires a Microsoft account!
Somewhere between me having more or less accidentally created about a dozen (different) Microsoft accounts for all their previous and weird Many-SSO things, the Mojang acquisition and Mojang-internal account migrations it seems like my original 2009 account was just lost... :|
Now why is this egregious while Ubisofts uplay launcher isn't? I'm not sure. I assume it's just because uplay has always been there and awful, and this is new.
But the flow was confusing because it asked if I wanted to link an account, I clicked "Not now", and then it automatically created an account for me with no input from me and then I could play.
And Epic explicitly refuses to add forums and reviews, which many of us find to be invaluable sources of information.
And Epic has/had atrocious account security; for instance, not verifying email addresses on new accounts.
Those are my personal gripes; you'll find longer lists elsewhere.
Steam has spent a decade plus saying "we're going to make PC gaming a better experience than going to a Gamestop and buying a box with a CD-ROM in it." They've delivered in many ways-- from the technical/distribution space, to shaking price expectations, to providing discoverability for indie creators, to building a community big enough that people can use their reviews as a shopping tool.
Epic came in and made some mealy-mouth comments about "we want to be a lower-margin store so devs keep more cash", but that doesn't directly mean much to the consumer. Rather than offering something inherently compelling, they have to force people into the door with exclusives, forced accounts, and selling dollar bills for 90 cents (subsidized discounts and giveaways.)
A good counterpoint is GOG. They don't match Steam point for point, but they've made a clear niche out of benefits customers can see (no-DRM, and a catalog of retro titles that would be a pain to acquire and run today)
Presumably the Facebook app will integrate a store and the apps will provide telemetry without asking permission.
Users and developers will have to contend with all of them.
There is no reason whatsoever to suppose these will be better than Apple’s approach, and plenty of history to suggest that it will be worse.
Who did you have in mind? Perhaps there is someone I haven’t thought of.