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Facebook Officially Announces Gameroom, Its PC Steam Competitor (techcrunch.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the all-in-one dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: After losing mobile gaming to iOS and Android, Facebook is making a big push into playing on PC with today's developer launch of its Gameroom Windows desktop gaming platform. After months of name changes, beta tests and dev solicitation, Facebook opened up the beta build for all developers and officially named it Gameroom. The app is openly available for users to download on Windows 7 and up. Gameroom let users play web, ported mobile and native Gameroom games in a dedicated PC app free from the distractions of the News Feed. Gameroom will have to fight a steep uphill battle again Valve's Steam platform, which has well over 125 million active users, with millions actually playing at any given moment. Facebook will need to convince developers that Gameroom will share its social network's massive reach and is therefore worth their while. Then it will have to persuade gamers that a more social experience is worth diving into a new platform. If Facebook succeeds, there are plenty of potential benefits to owning a gaming destination. Facebook announced the launch and name change from "Facebook Games Arcade" today at Unity's game development platform conference. Unity 5.6 shipping next year will allow devs to export their games directly to Facebook Gameroom, as well as to the WebGL standard. Facebook's director of global games platform, Leo Olebe, touted how Facebook will feature new games in the Gameroom to give developers a leg up.

16 of 116 comments (clear)

  1. Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers by sinij · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is dead on arrival, as Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers. They might attract casual Facebook gamers, Farmville and the like, but they already have these.

    1. Re:Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers by Shoten · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This is dead on arrival, as Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers. They might attract casual Facebook gamers, Farmville and the like, but they already have these.

      Indeed. My first thought after reading this was, "There's no way I'm going to let those privacy-rapist cunts get their hooks into any part of my life...and Steam works just fine."

      --

      For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
    2. Re:Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers by tripleevenfall · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I'm sure that, as with any new FB feature, we can all expect a tidal wave of unwanted notifications and invitations soonly.

    3. Re:Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers by Ranbot · · Score: 2

      This is dead on arrival, as Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers. They might attract casual Facebook gamers, Farmville and the like, but they already have these.

      Yup. Even with the casual gamers Facebook is missing that casual gamers don't want to be tied to another device... just ask Nintendo! Casual gamers won't take the extra effort to find a PC when they can just turn on a phone or tablet anywhere and immediately be playing Farmville [or alternative knock-off].

      Also most gamers whether casual or hardcore don't necessarily want their gaming connected to their Facebook network of friends, associates, extended family, maybe even co-workers, so that connection would be a deterrent not benefit. I am a gamer with friends on Facebook and Steam, some of which overlap, but I prefer to keep those worlds separate.

      And no exclusive titles or Oculus support that Facebook paid millions for?

      Seems like a half-baked roll-out to sell to shareholders who don't understand the gamer market at all.

    4. Re:Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 3, Interesting

      This is dead on arrival, as Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers. They might attract casual Facebook gamers, Farmville and the like, but they already have these.

      They already have them, but they're not extracting money from them; Zynga and their ilk are. This is a plan to get a hold of the revenue streams that currently goes to Zynga et al.

    5. Re:Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers by supremebob · · Score: 2

      Honestly, it's not all that hard to get hardcore gamers to join a new platform. All you need to do is offer them a few older quality PC games for free (or a highly discounted price), and they'll install the client to download them.

      Hey... it worked for EA with Origin, right? I didn't want to put that crap on my PC, but I did to get those games.

    6. Re: Facebook is poisoned brand with gamers by Cederic · · Score: 2

      Hmm, no. I started using Steam because games I bought wouldn't run without it.

      HL2: Steam exclusive. That alone drew a large audience.

      Me, it was Empire:Total War. Yep, no Steam until 2009, but then it started getting difficult to find games that didn't have "Requires Steam".

      So yeah, Valve did use exclusives to help grow the platform. It's only the last three years or so that services like GOG have started to challenge the 'Must have Steam' PC gaming hegemony.

  2. Because by Luthair · · Score: 5, Insightful

    PC Gamers have had such a glowing response to EA's Origin and Ubisoft's UPlay.

    1. Re:Because by tnok85 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      And we trust Facebook even more than Origin and UPlay! Only thing I'm worried about - does Facebook have enough clout to get real 'exclusives'? The only reason Origin has traction is because of exclusives (Mass Effect, Battlefield games, etc) and UPlay used to force install with games bought on Steam (I think I had to have it installed to play Driver). EA/Origin also produce the games themselves, so they have a lot more clout in restricting them to certain delivery platforms.

    2. Re:Because by mjwx · · Score: 2

      PC Gamers have had such a glowing response to EA's Origin and Ubisoft's UPlay.

      This. I've pretty much stopped buying EA and Ubisoft games because I cant get them without Origin or Uplay.

      To beat Steam, you have to be better than Steam. If you exclude steam and try to force people onto your own crappy platform you'll just drive more people to piracy.

      I usually try GOG first, especially for Indie games, but Steam is a useful, non-intrusive platform that hasn't screwed up on me in years... Unlike Origin that decided to delete my games and force me to re-download them (this is why I uninstalled it and never went back).

      --
      Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
  3. Sign me up! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Just what the world needs.

    Another platform where you pay and pay and pay, and have zero rights post-purchase as a consumer. They don't like you? Your account goes poof, and everything in it. Business not doing so well? Servers shut down. What can you do if any of this happens? Absolutely nothing, because the EULA inevitably says "Service not guaranteed" and/or "We can disable your account for absolutely no reason at all".

  4. That's exactly what I want. by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 5, Interesting

    That's exactly what I want. My real name associated with the games I play, and have ads tailored to me based upon any games I play.

    I only have steam because I have to. I refuse to install anything that requires Origin or UPlay- I sure as fudge won't install Facegames! I don't care if they get exclusive games, I've never been the sort to fall for peer pressure. "Oh you have to play this game that's only on Origin"- no I really don't. There are plenty of games on Steam. More games than I'll ever get around to playing. Exclusives are for idiots.

    --
    "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  5. 125m users? by 110010001000 · · Score: 2

    Steam has 125 million active users? That doesn't seem possible. Pretty amazing if true though!

  6. Dear Facebook by fishscene · · Score: 2

    No. The only thing you do well is sell as much of me as you can to the highest bidder. The less you know about me and everyone else, the better off humanity is. Sincerely, An American with common sense.

  7. It will be oculus users only option by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You can be sure this is to capture more oculus exclusives and force people to use this platform to play them.

  8. Re:Not really competition. by MindStalker · · Score: 2

    Yep, this is about web games only. That said, WebGL is becoming a powerful replacement, its certainly better than Flash. With Unity now providing an export to WebGL option. Its nice in a way to see WebGL take off. Sure this isn't the future of PC gaming, but it certainly can be a great opportunity for hobbyist and small publishers. It would be smart of Steam to support WebGL games to some degree.