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Windows 10's Store Locks 'Call of Duty' Purchasers Into Windows-10-Only Battles (vice.com)
An anonymous reader writes:
Two Call of Duty games have been remastered for Windows 10, but if you buy them through the Windows 10 Store there's a problem. "Windows 10 Store players will be isolated from other PC versions of the game," reports the Windows Central site, noting a statement from Microsoft which implies that the decision was made by Activision.
"For unknown reasons, Windows 10 Store customers are segregated from customers who bought the game from Steam, which is by far the most popular platform on PC," reports Motherboard. "Call of Duty fans who made the unfortunate of mistake of giving Microsoft their cash are left sitting in lonely multiplayer lobbies waiting for games that'll never start."
Motherboard reports that at least one player successfully requested a refund, calling the situation "another black eye for a digital storefront that PC gamers already avoid like the plague."
"For unknown reasons, Windows 10 Store customers are segregated from customers who bought the game from Steam, which is by far the most popular platform on PC," reports Motherboard. "Call of Duty fans who made the unfortunate of mistake of giving Microsoft their cash are left sitting in lonely multiplayer lobbies waiting for games that'll never start."
Motherboard reports that at least one player successfully requested a refund, calling the situation "another black eye for a digital storefront that PC gamers already avoid like the plague."
windows store locks out mods and other stuff that you get with non sandboxed steam and gog games.
Nothing from MSFT or UWP, technically or licensing wise prevents cross platform.
This was a decision by Activision.
If you paid for a PC game, and *DON'T* have a disc in your hand as a result, then you are just a plain old sucker.
Just because you have a disc doesn't mean you own anything, in fact you license the software and that's the way it has worked for decades. So if you think there's a difference between having the game on a physical disc or downloaded to your hard drive then you haven't been paying attention.
The app store model only works for smartphones, but PC owners DEMAND more.
No they don't, the runaway success of platforms like Steam PROVES that.
Yeah, it's kinda crazy how the entire comments section is idiotic Windows 10 bashing when this is all on Activision and Valve. They're using Steamworks for multiplayer matchmaking, and Steamworks doesn't work if the game isn't sold on Steam (which is why most stores just sell you a Steam key). Microsoft sells the actual game rather than a key, so in order to work on their platform, Activision stripped out Steamworks and implemented another matchmaking solution, segregating both platforms. Since the Microsoft stores sees far fewer sales, the people who bought it there get shafted.
There's a ton of ways this could've been fixed, but there's no reason to blame Microsoft here. The fact that Steam has such a hegemony on PC gaming is not good, and that's just one example of why.
yes you can turn it off through a simple switch in control panel
This has been repeatedly disproven; unless you're using Enterprise, you cannot fully disable the telemetry.