The Discord Store is Open

AlphaAtlas

[H]ard|Gawd
Staff member
Joined
Mar 3, 2018
Messages
1,713
Discord launched a beta version of a gaming storefront back in August, but it was limited to 50,000 people in Canada. Now, the Discord Store Beta is open to everyone. While they don't mention competitors by name, Discord seems to be pitching a more organized approach to shopping than Steam, offering a " curated selection, editorialized content, and surfacing of social information" as opposed to browsing "endless lists of anime titles." And, in addition to their store exclusives, Discord is adding a selection of free games for Nitro subscribers.

Discord Nitro now includes a growing library of critically acclaimed games that we think you and your friends should play. Subscribing to Nitro now costs $9.99 a month. As of today, there’s over 60 curated games for you to download and play at a total value of over $1000. We are going to add games at a regular cadence to keep the Nitro library fresh and growing. Games may sometimes leave the Nitro selection (due to our contracts with the developers/publishers expiring without renewal). With our cloud saves, your save data will remain even if games rotate out of our library. We also want an option for those looking to support us but don’t want games. Enter, Nitro Classic. At $4.99/mo, get access to a slew of chat perks like animated avatars, ability to choose your tag (the #0000 next to your username), higher quality screen share, custom emoji anywhere, animated emoji, larger file upload limit (50mb from 8mb), and a badge to show how long you’ve been supporting us.
 
If they can give Steam some competition and drive them to improve and innovate this is a great thing.

This will not make me reconsider my Steam as my sole source of games policy, however.

Discord will never find it's way on to my computer. Nor will Twitch or any of that other garbage.
 
If they can give Steam some competition and drive them to improve and innovate this is a great thing.

This will not make me reconsider my Steam as my sole source of games policy, however.

Discord will never find it's way on to my computer. Nor will Twitch or any of that other garbage.

I see your join date so im guessing this is related to age but what do you hate about twitch/discord etc?
 
I see your join date so im guessing this is related to age but what do you hate about twitch/discord etc?


1.) As far as discord goes, I don't play multiplayer games very often anymore (i just don't have the time) but when I do, while I do like to be able to communicate with my team, etc, I refuse to use a service that resides on someone elses servers/cloud for that. I'll use the built in voice chat in a game, or run my own Teamspeak (or previously, Ventrilo) server. The fewer cloud based services, the better. Part of it is also, I don't use games to socialize. If I am going to socialize I am going to do it in person, so I don't like to "shoot the shit" as it were, while playing. If I am playing a game, I want 100% of communication to be focused and game related, no chatter.

My biggest problem with Discord though is the fact that it is a service. I don't want a service. I want to run everything myself. In fact, I wish we could get rid of all game servers run by the studios who release the game, and all automated matchmaking, and revert to the good old days when if you were playing online, you were playing on a community server run by an individual.

2.) As far as Twitch goes, to me playing a game is about enjoying the game. I don't have some narcissistic need to broadcast what I am doing, or some follower need to watch someone else do so. Streaming gameplay is completely pointless to me. I just don't understand people who stream or those who watch the streams. I wish people would just stop treating games as an opportunity to stream and show off, and just focus on playing the damned game. If never see another video with some kid introducing themselves by saying "hey guys, today I'm playing..." it will have been too soon.


Cloud services, official servers, automated matchmaking, and streaming are all things I think are ruining gaming, and I want no part in them.


More so than that though, I use Steam exclusively, because that's where I have all my games, and I do not want more than one distribution service installed on my system. Thus, if a game is not on Steam, I will never buy it.

Thus far, this has been easy, as no title I have wanted has been an exclusive of any non-Steam platform. I don't play console titles like Call of Modern Battlefield, Star Wars or that twitchy nonsense that is Overwatch, or any of that MMORPG garbage on Battle.net.

If a game I was actually excited about were to become an exclusive of one of these non-Steam platforms, I'd have more of a decision to make, but I'd like to think I'd stand on principle, and stick with only Steam.
 
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what do you hate about twitch/discord etc?

This wasn't directed at me but I've just read too much shady shit that Discord does as a company, to ever trust them with giving them my money for anything. Their chat client isn't bad, but they're shitheads.

Valve does drive me nuts that they won't announce their new names, but they don't creep me out and I have trust that I won't lose access to my purchases games.

The other problem is Discord hasn't demonstrated doing anything measurably better than Steam - they haven't answered the question "why should I buy a game from Discord instead?"
 
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This wasn't directed at me but I've just read too much shady shit that Discord does as a company, to ever trust them with giving them my money for anything. Their chat client isn't bad, but they're shitheads.

Valve does drive me nuts that they won't announce their new names, but they don't creep me out and I have trust that I won't lose access to my purchases games.

The other problem is Discord hasn't demonstrated doing anything measurably better than Steam - they haven't answered the question "why should I buy a game from Discord instead?"

So I completely agree i have 0 desire to buy video games from discord I was just curious why people dont like it as a chat/voice chat client because it seems really great in that aspect.
 
1.) As far as discord goes, I don't play multiplayer games very often anymore (i just don't have the time) but when I do, while I do like to be able to communicate with my team, etc, I refuse to use a service that resides on someone elses servers/cloud for that. I'll use the built in voice chat in a game, or run my own Teamspeak (or previously, Ventrilo) server. The fewer cloud based services, the better. Part of it is also, I don't use games to socialize. If I am going to socialize I am going to do it in person, so I don't like to "shoot the shit" as it were, while playing. If I am playing a game, I want 100% of communication to be focused and game related, no chatter.

My biggest problem with Discord though is the fact that it is a service. I don't want a service. I want to run everything myself. In fact, I wish we could get rid of all game servers run by the studios who release the game, and all automated matchmaking, and revert to the good old days when if you were playing online, you were playing on a community server run by an individual.

2.) As far as Twitch goes, to me playing a game is about enjoying the game. I don't have some narcissistic need to broadcast what I am doing, or some follower need to watch someone else do so. Streaming gameplay is completely pointless to me. I just don't understand people who stream or those who watch the streams. I wish people would just stop treating games as an opportunity to stream and show off, and just focus on playing the damned game. If never see another video with some kid introducing themselves by saying "hey guys, today I'm playing..." it will have been too soon.


Cloud services, official servers, automated matchmaking, and streaming are all things I think are ruining gaming, and I want no part in them.


More so than that though, I use Steam exclusively, because that's where I have all my games, and I do not want more than one distribution service installed on my system. Thus, if a game is not on Steam, I will never buy it.

Thus far, this has been easy, as no title I have wanted has been an exclusive of any non-Steam platform. I don't play console titles like Call of Modern Battlefield, Star Wars or that twitchy nonsense that is Overwatch, or any of that MMORPG garbage on Battle.net.

If a game I was actually excited about were to become an exclusive of one of these non-Steam platforms, I'd have more of a decision to make, but I'd like to think I'd stand on principle, and stick with only Steam.
For anyone who didn’t read:
Cliffnotes:
GET OFF MY LAWN
 
1.) As far as discord goes, I don't play multiplayer games very often anymore (i just don't have the time) but when I do, while I do like to be able to communicate with my team, etc, I refuse to use a service that resides on someone elses servers/cloud for that. I'll use the built in voice chat in a game, or run my own Teamspeak (or previously, Ventrilo) server. The fewer cloud based services, the better. Part of it is also, I don't use games to socialize. If I am going to socialize I am going to do it in person, so I don't like to "shoot the shit" as it were, while playing. If I am playing a game, I want 100% of communication to be focused and game related, no chatter.

My biggest problem with Discord though is the fact that it is a service. I don't want a service. I want to run everything myself. In fact, I wish we could get rid of all game servers run by the studios who release the game, and all automated matchmaking, and revert to the good old days when if you were playing online, you were playing on a community server run by an individual.

2.) As far as Twitch goes, to me playing a game is about enjoying the game. I don't have some narcissistic need to broadcast what I am doing, or some follower need to watch someone else do so. Streaming gameplay is completely pointless to me. I just don't understand people who stream or those who watch the streams. I wish people would just stop treating games as an opportunity to stream and show off, and just focus on playing the damned game. If never see another video with some kid introducing themselves by saying "hey guys, today I'm playing..." it will have been too soon.


Cloud services, official servers, automated matchmaking, and streaming are all things I think are ruining gaming, and I want no part in them.


More so than that though, I use Steam exclusively, because that's where I have all my games, and I do not want more than one distribution service installed on my system. Thus, if a game is not on Steam, I will never buy it.

Thus far, this has been easy, as no title I have wanted has been an exclusive of any non-Steam platform. I don't play console titles like Call of Modern Battlefield, Star Wars or that twitchy nonsense that is Overwatch, or any of that MMORPG garbage on Battle.net.

If a game I was actually excited about were to become an exclusive of one of these non-Steam platforms, I'd have more of a decision to make, but I'd like to think I'd stand on principle, and stick with only Steam.

AMEN!
 
So glad my chat app is trying to turn into a entire shitfest ecosystem..

That's why I built my own web chat. There is no black jack, and sadly no hookers too, but the web server, socket server, and DB all run on a single Raspberry pi. Not great but good enough for home use. Still not sure whether I should add sound notifications. VLC full screen overlay is on top of pretty much everything which prevents me from getting my sandwiches if she's watching a movie.
 
That's why I built my own web chat. There is no black jack, and sadly no hookers too, but the web server, socket server, and DB all run on a single Raspberry pi. Not great but good enough for home use. Still not sure whether I should add sound notifications. VLC full screen overlay is on top of pretty much everything which prevents me from getting my sandwiches if she's watching a movie.


I have a VM on my server dedicated to TeamSpeak which I fire up if I want to have a private chat server amongst my friends.

I rarely use it any ore though. I just don't have time for multiplayer gsmes. Only time I play games is after my (future) stepsons bedtime if my fiance also happens to be tired and goes to bed early.

At this point it's usually too late to break out a multiplayer game with my few friends who still play them. I have a few online community servers I occasionally hop on to, but mostly I play single player campaigns now, and only an hour or two before bed a couple of days a week when everyone else in the house is asleep.
 
I like a few points:
1) "No need to browse endless lists of anime titles — we make it easy to find something great to play."
Man Steam has a ton of complete crap. Sticking to a curated selection would be nice. I know Steam keeps improving with curators, and the recent review thing is fantastic. Just wish they could cut the crap. Maybe move graphic novels into a whole different store.
1) "Enter our Universal Library. If you want, Discord can scan your computer for games. Then, you’ll be able to launch any of your games through Discord even if they require another launcher (Discord will boot the other launcher and game)."
Steam can't do this that I know of. Just found a few non-steam games on my computer I totally forgot I wanted to play. Actually bought one on steam I already owned cause I forgot :)
 
This is frustrating to see. I won't say that Discord doesn't have some potential good features, but even "just" as a chat app it has been instrumental in moving yet another aspect from the generally open, disparate, distributed gaming chat / gaming VOIP ecosystems (ie XMPP, IRC, Mumble/Teamspeak/Ventrilo etc) to a single proprietary centrally controlled and for profit company! This is NEVER a good thing when it comes to the overall health of the Internet and discourse as a whole.

I've long been suspicious of Discord's tons of venture capital and "we'll get to it later, better just to get everyone addicted an onboard...but we promise it won't be evil!" business plan, but Discord Nitro / Nitro Classic are probably what I consider the most innocuous and best options - I'd rather have them make money from voluntary contributions rather than less scrupulous data mining and whatnot. However, I am as disappointed to see yet another proprietary, incompatible game store "platform" tacked on to Discord . I hated when Twitch did it (after absorbing Curse and rebranding their launcher and adding a new game store despite having Amazon itself selling keys which would have been a better option to hook into ) and it doesn't seem any better here. Like Twitch's launcher/game store, one issue that is even more disappointing about the new Nitro store is that it seems games are advertised as Windows only (at least for the Nitro subscription titles I've seen thus far). This includes even games I know to have Linux / OSX versions via Steam! I have to give Discord credit for at least offering a Linux client (despite it being an Electron app. However, Twitch with all their fortunes don't offer Linux on the client), so it is even more annoying this doesn't extend to the Nitro games store. Thus, purchasing a game from the Discord store means getting less for what is usually the same price compared to Steam, as you won't have access to Linux/OSX versions. Furthermore, I am concerned about every disparate platform when it comes to both online multiplayer and other sorts of features (ie the Steam version has a thriving Steam Workshop/Mods integration), as usually this means that each game store becomes a little fiefdom and often the experience is sub-par compared to Steam.

I really wish that Discord would have just opened a key-selling store instead of their own platform. Another platform only fragments the entire ecosystem and means one more damn launcher or whatnot that has to be run. While Steam can certainly continue to improve in certain areas, it is undeniable that they have earned my trust and viability as an actual platform/launcher. This goes beyond just selling games, but the decade+ of community features, pioneering significant sales of digital PC game titles, elements like Steamworks offering "drop in online multiplayer/matchmaking/account" support options accessible even to indie devs that would be hard pressed to maintain their own separate ecosystem, Big Picture mode, Open/SteamVR, the Steam Controller and all the various controller config options for any gamepad, Steam Workshop/Mods, a full featured native Linux client, support for Linux games, and most recently Proton which is another great leap forward for compatibility. Many of their assets and standards are open source and extensible as well and all of this is done by a company not at the behest of public shareholders! There's a reason they're the dominant platform and its more than simply bolting on another launcher and gamestore!

Discord should stick to their core chat features rather than become an all-encompassing platform, but if they're going to add a game store it would have been much better if they just became a reputable keyseller. With time, quality discounts and other features they could earn their way into the market like Humble, GMG and a few others have done. However, another incompatible proprietary, Windows-only-even-when-games-are-not launcher is not the right direction.
 
I have a VM on my server dedicated to TeamSpeak which I fire up if I want to have a private chat server amongst my friends.

I rarely use it any ore though. I just don't have time for multiplayer gsmes. Only time I play games is after my (future) stepsons bedtime if my fiance also happens to be tired and goes to bed early.

At this point it's usually too late to break out a multiplayer game with my few friends who still play them. I have a few online community servers I occasionally hop on to, but mostly I play single player campaigns now, and only an hour or two before bed a couple of days a week when everyone else in the house is asleep.

I'd say IRC and TeamSpeak are pretty much perfect for their intended purposes. Not sure why everyone went the big data way. Every form of chat has gotten objectively worse over the years.
 
I'd say IRC and TeamSpeak are pretty much perfect for their intended purposes. Not sure why everyone went the big data way. Every form of chat has gotten objectively worse over the years.

They are lazy and/or not sufficiently technically competent to set up their own TeamSpeak server. So, in the name of convenience/incompetence they cede control to big data, just the way everything else is going.
 
They are lazy and/or not sufficiently technically competent to set up their own TeamSpeak server. So, in the name of convenience/incompetence they cede control to big data, just the way everything else is going.

I think people just go where "everyone else" is
 
So I completely agree i have 0 desire to buy video games from discord I was just curious why people dont like it as a chat/voice chat client because it seems really great in that aspect.
Their attenuation feature is buggy AF on windows 10. One must regularly fix individual application sound levels via the audio mixer. It's like its own little minigame you get to play if you use discord. Sadly all my friends are on it. One day I'll start up my own mumble/murmur server again.

Also, the bloat of monitoring your games and shit always annoyed me about discord. Turned that shit off fast
 
Discord will be replaced if it falters and at this stage the main thing it has going for it is that it is FREE. Take that away and I bet many will balk at using it, especially with more games including decent voip and chat functions. At that point its only benefit is text chat, link sharing and mobile phone integration. I'm not surprised they want to go big app/data route, possibly a good way to actually make money on the project. I do notice that many seem to have issues with it are on on win10. I've had some here and there on win7 but overall its been decent.

I have no interest in buying games through them though.
 
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