GFWL will be shutting down on July the first, 2014

[ríomhaire]

http://community.pcgamingwiki.com/page/news/_/news/games-for-windows-live-to-close-july-1-2014-r56

In a couple of days the Games for Windows Live storefront will close meaning and you won't be able to buy anything further from it. In eleven months' time it looks like the entire service is going away. Good, you might say, but a lot of games require that shitty service to run. Do you like?

• Arkham Asylum
• Arkham City
• Bioshock 2
• Dark Souls
• Dawn of War II
• Dead Risings 2
• Fallout 3
• Gears of War
• Grand Theft Auto IV
• Halo 2
• Resident Evil 5
• Universe at War

You'd better hope the developers bother to patch them. At the very least it looks like the Batman games and Bioshock 2 will get patches, but there's no guarantee that the others will. I imagine most companies won't let their games entirely die, but I think this is going to cause a very interesting shock to the gaming world as we watch the first big DRM system to completely crash and burn, possibly stranding the games. I think how companies and users react to this will be very important.

Also if you care about Gamerscore you'd better plan to get those achievements before devs start patching GFWL out or the service goes down.

 

[Krynn72]

Good riddance.

Most of those games will be patched, I'm sure of it. The ones that won't are probably Gears, Halo 2, and RE5. The rest, I think the developers would pay attention to their screaming fans.

GFWL made installing Arkham City the biggest ****ing nightmare I've had in my 20 years of gaming on PCs. Any collateral damage experienced is worth it to prevent this garbage from being used in the future.

 

[Stigmata]

To be replaced by OneLive in early November.

Seriously though this took way too ****ing long. Bunch of buggy bloatware.

 

[Bad^Hat]

I found it interesting that this happened right after the former head of Steam joined Microsoft.

http://www.gameplanet.co.nz/news/g5...es-to-Microsoft-will-focus-on-Windows-gaming/

 

[BabyHeadCrab]

In game services will still work, and the web-based store front is relaunching this fiscal year. Expect a new client with a different name soon.

 

[sixteenth]

They better patch GTA IV.

 

[bobtheskull]

I'm glad it'll be gone and hope they do patch the games. Fallout 3 ran perfectly on my rig until I reinstalled on a new HD and it wouldn't let me proceed until I installed GFWL. From that point on I could get about 30 mins play before it crashed. Always GFWL that did it. Arkham Asylum was almost unplayable for me for same reason.

I do think it'll just be getting relaunched as something else though, unfortunately.

 

[ríomhaire]

Good riddance.

Most of those games will be patched, I'm sure of it. The ones that won't are probably Gears, Halo 2, and RE5. The rest, I think the developers would pay attention to their screaming fans.

GFWL made installing Arkham City the biggest ****ing nightmare I've had in my 20 years of gaming on PCs. Any collateral damage experienced is worth it to prevent this garbage from being used in the future.

Let's hope they remove ****ing SecuROM while they're at it. Anti-customer piece of crap.

 

[Omnomnick]

I found it interesting that this happened right after the former head of Steam joined Microsoft.

http://www.gameplanet.co.nz/news/g5...es-to-Microsoft-will-focus-on-Windows-gaming/

Not related. This thing has to be planned out waaaaay in advance, Holtman didn't join Microsoft and instantly blow up their entire operation. Microsoft "dropped" Games for Windows Live sometime last year after finally identifying how badly the system had failed. They then decided they were "fully embracing Steam", so every game they've released on PC since has used Steam for matchmaking, achievements, etc (see Age of Empires 2 re-release).

 

[Bad^Hat]

Right, but he might be working on something to do with that, potentially a not-shit-arse replacement.

 

[BabyHeadCrab]

Xbox One is steambox confirmed

 

[ríomhaire]

Both Arkham games have had GFWL and SecuROM removed from them. Retail CD keys should now or shortly activate on Steam and there's a 75% sale on both games. As a result both games' concurrent players have jumped up rather hugely for old enough games. Save files from the GFWL version will have broken though as GFWL encrypts save files.

 

[Lubci50cal]

so maybe Ill be finally able to play GTA 4 that I have on steam

 

[-=Plzwork1122=- Sloth]

I might be able to SAVE my Batman Arkham city now!

 

[Omnomnick]

Both Arkham games have had GFWL and SecuROM removed from them. Retail CD keys should now or shortly activate on Steam and there's a 75% sale on both games.

 

[-=Plzwork1122=- Sloth]

Had to replay that video three times... It feels that good...