GameRoom client launched - a single client for all of your games

[Bouzoo]

 

I know many people who don't feel like managing their games in a million clients, Steam, Origin, GOG, uPlay, Battle.net, it's easy to lost in them sometimes, and the possible solution for them may be here. It's called GameRoom and its purpose is to make your life easier. 

What it does, is that it takes all the games you own into a single client, where you can have the complete list. It does it on its own, so theoretically you don't have to do anything. Of course, if you want to remove or manually add another game, you are free to do that as well. 

Quote

Automatic import

Nothing to do. At all.

Great, isn't it? GameRoom automatically scans and imports games from launchers like Steam, GOG, Origin, UPlay, Battle.net. Of course, you can also manually import any game manually, and also specify a folder to be watched for new games.

But what if you don't want this or that game in your library? Fine just click on ignore it, GameRoom won't ask you to add it anymore. You can of course edit the ignored games/folders in the settings.

 

It also does a bit extra, you can write your own commands for what you want to happen before or after the game. Perhaps start some program, or kill it, or put the PC to sleep, it's all up to you:

Quote

Does more than just launching your games

In advanced mode, you can set args for the game to start, along with command lines to execute before starting the game and after the game's end. For example here, a game I own won't display properly in fullscreen when a monitoring software is launched; but I need to make sure this software is on when I'm not playing. Easy, just kill the software before starting the game, and restart it after the game's end!
An other functionnalities is Gaming Power Mode : when enabled, you can select which power mode should be used while playing. This is useful when you are on a laptop that you want to use in saving power mode for common tasks but needs to be in full performance power mode to game properly!

 

I don't have an issue with having many launchers, but regardless, I've always wanted to try something like that.

Just for the sake of writing this, I have downloaded and tried it and there are a few issues I would like to point out. Mind you, it's still in alpha. 

First of all, it uses Java and you can't run it without it, so if you don't want Java installed you'll want to skip this one. Because of that, my CPU usage from Java was going from 6%-18% when doing nothing. Even though it says it scans all clients, it scanned only Steam for me, it didn't scan either Origin or Battle.net. The UI was kind of... confusing to be honest so I didn't feel like fiddling with it since I won't be using it. When you're browsing games it looks quite good but it's sluggish, but again, alpha. 

Security. You can probably see where I'm coming from, considering it can use Java and with it being a new, untested client that scans your whole PC. 

 

This is what it looks like, more or less:

 

What do you think about this? Have you wanted something like this? Feeling like trying it? 

 

EDIT: Seems that the CPU usage drops a lot after it's finished with all scanning.

 

You can check more info on GameRoom.

Sources: 1, 2

 

 

Edited September 16, 2016 by Bouzoo

[Sauron]

You can do this manually with steam already.

[Bouzoo]

6 minutes ago, Sauron said:

You can do this manually with steam already.

You can't add games from other clients that are not installed on your PC.

[Bazadar]

As Sauron advised you can do this already with Steam, And many other applications also have this feature. 

 

But I just prefer to boot up what ever program has my game in it and run it from that

[ADM-Ntek]

what is the point of this now now you have to run another program ontop of all the other garbage.

[Damikiller37]

Or you know... add Non-steam games to Steam and get the Steam overlay for games like Battlefield? Considering that most peoples games are on Steam with a few exceptions it seems like a reasonable solution.

[Sauron]

25 minutes ago, Bouzoo said:

You can't add games from other clients that are not installed on your PC.

You can't do it in this one either. This finds installed games and you can't install those games without origin, uplay, etc. Uplay, steam and origin are a form of DRM, you can't circumvent them that easily - unless you crack the game.

[TetraSky]

40 minutes ago, Bouzoo said:

First of all, it uses Java and you can't run it without it

aaaand it's dead on arrival to me.

[Bouzoo]

21 minutes ago, Sauron said:

You can't do it in this one either. This finds installed games and you can't install those games without origin, uplay, etc. Uplay, steam and origin are a form of DRM, you can't circumvent them that easily - unless you crack the game.

You can, at least for Steam. As I've said, it didn't scan other clients for me, but it listed all of my games that I have on Steam, which isn't that hard to find if we're honest. Of course you can't install them without using the client, that's obvious. 

I've seen the writer on Game-Debate wrote:

Quote

If you’re anything like me then you often forget what games you’ve got lurking in GOG, Origin or Uplay, or in the case of Battle.net I forget the client even exists. GameRoom hopes to sidestep all this by plugging into practically all clients, tracking what games you’ve got, how long you’ve played them and you can also launch a game using it.

So either it's bad wording, or it scanned almost everything for him. I'm waiting for more people to try it... if anyone even bothers. 

16 minutes ago, TetraSky said:

aaaand it's dead on arrival to me.

Yeah, my biggest issue with it as well. 

[zMeul]

the idea that it allows you to run command parameters before the game launches is neat

but ... being on Java - deal breaker

[Misanthrope]

I liked Gog's solution better: Activate games you already own on steam on gog for free. Many publishers would resist that but for me it was a good idea to get me more invested in their platform.

[Bouzoo]

5 minutes ago, Misanthrope said:

I liked Gog's solution better: Activate games you already own on steam on gog for free. Many publishers would resist that but for me it was a good idea to get me more invested in their platform.

Sadly that only applies for a very small number of games, and I'll bet many games will never come on GOG due to it being DRM-Free. 

And can't really compare the two, since GOG actually sells games. 

[Misanthrope]

1 minute ago, Bouzoo said:

Sadly that only applies for a very small number of games, and I'll bet many games will never come on GOG due to it being DRM-Free. 

True but even big publishers like EA let old titles go DRM free eventually (i.e. Simcity, 2000, 3000 and 4) and that goes well with their "good old games" niche.

 

Ideally publishers should recognize "DRM already verified this person paid for the game, let him activate on gog" since the "lost" revenue is small if they keep a reasonable timeframe (say, a year)

[n0xew]

Hi there! I'm the (really new and learning) dev of GameRoom!
I'm interested about what you said, especially about the UI, could you tell me what you thought to be non-intuitive? As I'm alone for this project, it's really hard to get input on this kind of things, and for this 2 months old project I must admit I knew that not everything was perfect before releasing it! Thanks for pointing out it's alpha also, not everybody always get it
About java, I'll just let you know that a JRE is bundled with it now, I understand the reticence that installing java can cause. If its about security concerns, well nothing I can do, java may not be the most secure, but it did suit me for knowledge reasons, my later projects will surely be in other languages
Also about the CPU usage, this is due to controller support : the only lib that I could find does polling on devices, therefore it is CPU intensive. But when GameRoom looses focus, this support is desactived, so that there is no impact on games of course. If you find that there is still useless CPU usage while GameRoom is not focused, please let me know. Controller support can also be desactivated, which solves the problem once and for all
For the video library, I went with plex too, I didn't like Kodi's interface much and found it really long to configure!

[n0xew]

7 hours ago, Bouzoo said:

it scanned only Steam for me, it didn't scan either Origin or Battle.net.

Also, can you tell me what are the installation paths for those clients?

[Bouzoo]

2 hours ago, n0xew said:

Hi there! I'm the (really new and learning) dev of GameRoom!
I'm interested about what you said, especially about the UI, could you tell me what you thought to be non-intuitive? As I'm alone for this project, it's really hard to get input on this kind of things, and for this 2 months old project I must admit I knew that not everything was perfect before releasing it! Thanks for pointing out it's alpha also, not everybody always get it
About java, I'll just let you know that a JRE is bundled with it now, I understand the reticence that installing java can cause. If its about security concerns, well nothing I can do, java may not be the most secure, but it did suit me for knowledge reasons, my later projects will surely be in other languages
Also about the CPU usage, this is due to controller support : the only lib that I could find does polling on devices, therefore it is CPU intensive. But when GameRoom looses focus, this support is desactived, so that there is no impact on games of course. If you find that there is still useless CPU usage while GameRoom is not focused, please let me know. Controller support can also be desactivated, which solves the problem once and for all
For the video library, I went with plex too, I didn't like Kodi's interface much and found it really long to configure!

Oh hello, this is unexpected. 

I didn't mean non-intuitive, I meant confusing. I tried to do download a game from Steam, more specifically Alan Wake, and it added it below the games list to Recently added and All games which is kind of confusing, 2 separate rows. Shouldn't it be added on the top of the list with other downloaded games? I wasn't sure what to do, so I deleted it (irreversible), just to see what will happen, and the game disappeared, until I deleted the GameRoom folder and extracted it again. I tried to download it on purpose again just to see if I can get it back up and I've no idea how to do that.  And a few 

Also few minor bugs, not all Icons are loaded, for all games that is, and some games are misplaced, like Resident Evil 4 which is the last game, right behind Warhammer 40k. It should be just right in front of RE5. It didn't load 1 Deus Ex from my Steam library and should search only be searching from all games and not the complete list?

Nice touch on including java, you were right, it uses barely any CPU after some time, but it uses from 1.3 - 1.5 GB of RAM the whole time, until I minimize it that is.

Also do you intend to do add a font size option in the future? A bit of customizing. 

 

2 hours ago, n0xew said:

Also, can you tell me what are the installation paths for those clients?

All of my game clients are located in C:\Program Files (x86) in their default install folders for Steam/Origin etc. 

 

You might have noticed I took the logo from your website for the thread, if it bothers you I can always delete it. 

 

Nice touch reaching out to the community. 

Also nice work, considering you're the only one working on this!

[Doobeedoo]

Looks neat and good at glance. Though ditch Java seriously.
While in perfect world everything would be nice having on one place without any problems and all, I personally don't mind multiple clients. Yes it can cluttered, depends and all what you use. If you have SSD they load fast, if you have much ram you can also always have them in tray.

I have Steam, Origin, Uplay, GoG, Battle.net, Epic Games Launcher so yeah 6  of them.

Battle.net one is really great one, I like it, also Epic Games one is good.

[RagnarokDel]

Is that project ascension?

[AlTech]

13 hours ago, zMeul said:

the idea that it allows you to run command parameters before the game launches is neat

but ... being on Java - deal breaker

What's wrong with Java?

 

Please enlighten me.

[Theorak]

Question (before having tried it) with the Steam Controller active, does it launch Steam games in Big Picture mode?

 

In general I like the idea, but for me the need for a combined client is not that big. Even games without clients I have organized with Stardocks fences already.

 

I even had an issue once when adding all games to Steam, lost view what could be downloaded again.

[Bouzoo]

Just now, Theorak said:

Question (before having tried it) with the Steam Controller active, does it launch Steam games in Big Picture mode?

 

In generel I like the idea, but for me the need for a combined client is not that big. Even games without clients I have organized with Stardocks fences already.

Haven't tried if you can set Big Picture but no, on default it launches "normal" Steam. 

[Castdeath97]

Interesting definitely will be taking a look at it, I'm still not 100% convinced about how is this better than having all my steam and non steam games in my steam library, but I can see some of the advantages. I hope it matures well.

 

18 hours ago, ADM-Ntek said:

what is the point of this now now you have to run another program ontop of all the other garbage.

You can have all the games in one place, I already do this on steam. All my wargaming games are in the steam library, and even Runescape is there. Sometimes you have to go to another launcher, regardless something about having everything in one library feels satisfying and organised (I'm that kind of person).

 

17 hours ago, Misanthrope said:

I liked Gog's solution better: Activate games you already own on steam on gog for free. Many publishers would resist that but for me it was a good idea to get me more invested in their platform.

Does GoG let you have non-GoG games in its library like steam?

 

4 hours ago, AluminiumTech said:

What's wrong with Java?

 

Please enlighten me.

Oracle is one I can think of, they seem to be slowly sucking the life out of it. 

[Murasaki]

java..

[ADM-Ntek]

5 hours ago, Castdeath97 said:

Interesting definitely will be taking a look at it, I'm still not 100% convinced about how is this better than having all my steam and non steam games in my steam library, but I can see some of the advantages. I hope it matures well.

 

You can have all the games in one place, I already do this on steam. All my wargaming games are in the steam library, and even Runescape is there. Sometimes you have to go to another launcher, regardless something about having everything in one library feels satisfying and organised (I'm that kind of person).

 

Does GoG let you have non-GoG games in its library like steam?

 

Oracle is one I can think of, they seem to be slowly sucking the life out of it. 

couldn't you just make folder with a bunch of shortcuts in it does the same thing without java. and probably less resource intensive.

[wrath]

I don't have that many games anyway and I don't really play that much.