At $700 you could build a pretty decent PC that would last a lot longer (3060 12gb, Ryzen 5 5600, 16gb of DDR4), and build a steam library that you’ll have 20 years from now. I’ve had the same monitor, keyboard and mouse for an easy 10; controllers don’t last that long. They’re reaching a point where there’s less and less of an actual argument for owning one.
build a steam library that you’ll have 20 years from now
How do you know that Steam will be around in 20 years?
Use GOG instead. The DRM-free game installers will outlive Steam :)
How many people actually download and store those installers though? I think GOG is awesome too but practically if you exclusively shop there you have the same problem unless you have a massive NAS on hand
I’ve still got my original installers and CD keys for Unreal Tournament 99 GOTY, Need for Speed Underground, Trackmania United, and a bunch of others, and even some DOS games, so there’s at least some of us that keep the installers. I have a few of them on USB hard drives I’ve collected over the last 25 years or so… I really need to move them onto my NAS. :)
I used to buy directly from the publisher though. Some of them still have working download links, for example Ubisoft/Nadeo still have a working download link for Trackmania United even though it’s nearly 20 years old now.
How many people actually download and store those installers though?
… The hundreds of GOG-based torrents disagree with this sentiment. You don’t need EVERY person to store it. Just a handful of seedboxes can feed the world sort of thing…
Edit: But this does risk someone being malicious with the torrent of course…
How do you know that Steam will be around in 20 years?
Use GOG instead, since the DRM-free game installers will outlive Steam :)
How do you know Windows will keep compatibility in 20 years? Valve money partially goes into Proton/WINE development and an evolution of that will absolutely be around in 20 years, just WINE was around 20 years ago already. CD Project doesn’t put any GOG/Cyberpunk money into breaking the Windows monopoly. (Also plenty of titles on Steam come without DRM because DRM is optional.)
How do you know Windows will keep compatibility in 20 years?
I didn’t mention Windows anywhere in my comment? GOG has Linux versions of games too, for games with Linux ports.
plenty of titles on Steam come without DRM because DRM is optional
That’s true - for the DRM-free Steam games, you can just keep a separate backup copy of the game files. They usually run fine without Steam installed.
My GOG games run great on wine, it just takes a bit more work to install them. Wine has better support for early windows games than windows does now.
It comes pretty close to feature parity in terms of ownership. My kids can play my steam library on their own computers, I can play it on any machine I own, I don’t have to pay them any kind of rental fee, and they maintain my software for me.
Only thing I can’t do is what…sell my games to someone else? I don’t do that anyways.
I’m not betting on Steam disappearing in the next ten years. I probably wouldn’t even bet that they’ll disappear in my lifetime. But, they could, anything could happen, and then you don’t have that library anymore. Physical is the only way to truly own.
Replace the 3060 with an equally-priced AMD card and you’ll actually get something decent for your money. Nvidia is horrible at these “lower” price points.
I mean, if you like horrible driver stability; sure. There’s a reason NVidia has like 75% of the market share, and it’s simply because they have a better product. Drivers are more stable, everyone develops for CUDA processing, lots of games only support DLSS for frame-gen, all of the GPU accelerated AI stuff is all NVidia centered, etc.
