Steam dropping Windows 7 and Windows 8 Support in 2024 - because of course a game platform is locked to one shitty web browser

[IamnottheNSA]

And that's why I try to buy games on GOG whenever possible.

 

[Judge Dredd]

Will you be able to run Steam without updating, like they did for WinXP?

 

[vomitusdeux]

And that's why I try to buy games on GOG whenever possible.

That brings me to ask a question here. Since you can cross link steam and GOG could this potentially be a bypass until GOG also drops support?

 

[Kermit Jizz]

>service stops supporting a 14yo OS
>this is something to be upset about apparently
I really don't see why this controversial. I get not wanting to use Win 10/11, but you're kind of retarded if you didn't expect this to be coming down the line eventually. Valve isn't going to keep dedicating development time to support >1% of their userbase.

If you care this much you should have swapped to Linux a while back.

 

[Pissmaster]

Someday, all software will refuse to work unless you have at least three RGB components blasting away at maximum brightness, and I will laugh and declare victory over all the basic bitches that don‘t have zoomer raveboxes for computers.

 

[std::string]

Valve isn't going to keep dedicating development time to support >1% of their userbase.

1.4%, which is slightly more than the number of linux users

Which, actually, I was surprised at.

 

[Kermit Jizz]

1.4%, which is slightly more than the number of linux users

Which, actually, I was surprised at.

I wonder if that's an international number. Can changs use linux?

 

[Cpt. Stud Beefpile]

You spin wheels for around a decade and wake up in 2020 where all your talent's left and the remaining developers are all tranny stragglers.
It's telling that they had to hire some random team making a we wuz kangz walking sim to write the next half-life.

The FAN SEQUEL to their original game surpasses literally anything the 'official' studio has done in decades. By miles.

 

[Avtistic 'gert]

>service stops supporting a 14yo OS
>this is something to be upset about apparently
I really don't see why this controversial. I get not wanting to use Win 10/11, but you're kind of retarded if you didn't expect this to be coming down the line eventually. Valve isn't going to keep dedicating development time to support >1% of their userbase.

If you care this much you should have swapped to Linux a while back.

>"buy" digital product
>it gets stolen from you

 

[sadrefrigerator]

I suspect a combination of kickbacks, tech debt, sheer laziness and Millenial/Zoomer graduates from the public school system. To most anyone under 40, thinking of not using Chrome for everything is practically a galaxy-brain moment these days.

This is a calculated move that was a long time coming. Why would Steam, Google, or anyone else care about the 1.8% of users still on windows 7? Its very expensive to support old OS. It costs tons in developer man hours deploying fixes for every OS and making builds that work with legacy systems. It tons of support manhours dealing with issues from older systems. It makes no sense from a financial point to expend so much resources to support such a small userbase. In one of my previous jobs, I worked on an app where the CEO wanted to support old devices that could barely run our app. We didn't have nearly the resources needed to actually support our SLA, and as a result, we spent most of our time fixing stupid bugs that only appeared on ancient devices that affected a few users, and no features ever got finished.
Furthermore, nothing can beat the development speed of working in chromium or electron. You can build for all majors OS from one codebase and a lot of times share code from your webapp with the desktop app. Desktop app development is extremely niche nowadays, and the talent and frameworks available are very limited. To not build off chrome, you would have to build off Microsoft Visual C# and do something equivalent for Mac or make a shitty Java app, which means you would have to hire double the headcount for 2 teams working on two very different codebases and achieve feature parity with both of them. All for a frontend product that is an afterthought in terms of complexity and value compared to their backend system handling game purchasing and distribution.

 

[Pee Cola]

There's still Mr. Goldberg's Steam emulator, and steamcmd doesn't need much besides libc and networking. There's also Win10 LTSC, but that's just until 2025.

Normie Win10 i.e. Home, Pro etc EOLs on 14 October 2025 (A).

If you have Win10 Enterprise LTSC 2019, mainstream support ends in 2024, but EOL isn't until 2029 when extended support is due to finish (A).

Win10 Enterprise LTSC 2021 mainstream support ends in 2027 (A). Looks like Microsoft won't offer extended support for LTSC 2021, though (A).

All of the above assumes that Microsoft doesn't do anything fucky wucky in the meantime, such as bringing LTSC EOL forward to try and push Windows 11 onto enterprise customers.

 

[The Ugly One]

Any software that doesn't run on MS-DOS 3.3 is stealing money directly from my wallet.

 

[std::string]

I wonder if that's an international number. Can changs use linux?

Yeah it has everyone. There aren't many Linux users in China.

 

[The Ghost of Kviv]

That brings me to ask a question here. Since you can cross link steam and GOG could this potentially be a bypass until GOG also drops support?

"GOG Support" meaning official support from CDP? That's per-game and listed on the store page. It's likely that GOG will drop customer support for old Windows anyways, as it saves them money.

Unless you mean Galaxy. IMO it's useless and broken. Why use a launcher for a store that gives you binaries to install?

Can changs use linux?

They have their own special flavor of Ubuntu: https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=ubuntukylin

 

[Agent Abe Caprine]

Unless you mean Galaxy. IMO it's useless and broken. Why use a launcher for a store that gives you binaries to install?

I'm lazy.

 

[Maggots on a Train v2]

I honestly don't get it. With the end of XP support that made perfect sense since XP is a security nightmare (even still what I am about to say still applies). But, Windows 7 and 8.1 are relatively solid and they are still usable even 15 years later. I fucking hate how usable OSes are being dropped for no reason and there's no plan to fork the code for that userbase. It's not like you need much to run a Steam storefront nor are people that use Windows 7 or 8 going to play games that require Windows 10 or 11. I really hate this nonchalant attitude towards dropping OS support.

My Windows 7 laptop needs a new motherboard ATM, but it ran much faster and better than the Windows 10 loaner laptop I'm using ATM. And I gave it the upgraded RAM out of my machine, and turned off all the flashy crap, so it's a fair comparison. Whenever I buy a new mobo, I guess I'll just play my games in offline mode forever.

 

[WelperHelper99]

I honestly don't get it. With the end of XP support that made perfect sense since XP is a security nightmare (even still what I am about to say still applies). But, Windows 7 and 8.1 are relatively solid and they are still usable even 15 years later. I fucking hate how usable OSes are being dropped for no reason and there's no plan to fork the code for that userbase. It's not like you need much to run a Steam storefront nor are people that use Windows 7 or 8 going to play games that require Windows 10 or 11. I really hate this nonchalant attitude towards dropping OS support.

I do have to ask... who is using 8.1? 7 is a sad loss, but 8 was Vista tier (though I grew up with a Vista Lenovo, so I have some warm memories of it)

I have never been more glad of holding on to my physical copies of PC games.

Got nearly all of the command and conquer series on disc, I'd just have to build something like a little ITX with XP or 7 on it so it isn't shitting bricks trying to chug 10 or 11

 

[seri0us]

I do have to ask... who is using 8.1?

Probably a lot of "computer normies" who bought it on a machine preinstalled nearly a decade ago now and haven't needed to upgrade since. I knew one individual who was savvy enough to work at a data center that kept using it at home because it kept working and felt comfy...

 

[WelperHelper99]

Probably a lot of "computer normies" who bought it on a machine preinstalled nearly a decade ago now and haven't needed to upgrade since. I knew one individual who was savvy enough to work at a data center that kept using it at home because it kept working and felt comfy...

I mean if it works, I just find that out of all of them, 8 isn't really a loss. I wouldn't want to play games on it, even if I upgraded the pre-built hardware.

 

[Miller]

I wonder if that's an international number. Can changs use linux?

China also has their own Steam (once they got the tech from Valve, they kicked them out of the country) and since they have the Great Firewall, I doubt that the data is shared with Valve.