this post was submitted on 09 Jul 2026
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Frankly, I despise all launchers, Steam included. The only reason it gets a pass is because it's one of the two somewhat reasonable ones, and the only one that makes gaming on Linux simple and convenient.
It's still slow, ugly as hell, and entirely unnecessary. Makes me want to pirate more, but then I'd have to set the games up from scratch.
The only use case for launchers is console gaming. It makes perfect sense on a Deck, Switch or a PS5. But absolutely no sense whatsoever on a desktop PC.
Again - Steam has features that make it tolerable (achievements, screenshot sharing, workshop, etc.), but I'd still prefer to just play my games without anything in the middle.
I think some games on steam you can just launch from the executable file. I rarely have, because my process is usually "open steam.. stare at list of games.. pick one", so steam is already open.
But yeah, at least it adds some value (proton magic, recording and screenshots, the overlay used to be real useful when i only had one monitor...)