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Relic Finally Drops Games For Windows Live
The upcoming Dawn of War II standalone expansion, Retribution, uses Valve's Steamworks for its authentication and networking services rather than relying on the stillborn Games For Windows Live infrastructure. The one developer whose games were good enough to make me deal with that awful interface has given up on it. Huzzah, the witch is dead!
In an interview with PC Gamer, Relic producer Jeff Lydell said, "Mostly it was related to the end-user experience." No, Jeff, really? You mean that the non-intrusive Steam login that every PC gamer has run on startup is better than the buggy, cumbersome GFWL interface that nobody else uses? I could never have guessed.
Sorry, Microsoft, but your best efforts at killing PC gaming for good have failed.
This may seem mean, but seriously, Games For Windows Live has always been terrible. It's a horribly botched implementation of features that Steam has handled well for years. The only good thing about it is that you can link your GFWL login to your Xbox Live profile.
But if I uninstall GFWL from my machine, I won't be able to take advantage of the bumpin' Shadowrun community!
Ugh.
Unfortunately, Dawn of War II and its first expansion, Chaos Rising, are still good games and will continue to use GFWL, so I can't get rid of it quite yet. Hopefully this means that Relic has finally given up on the godawful platform for future products, though.
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