I've beaten some free games with achievements, and I can see them in BLAEO even though I can't on Steam, even games I've uninstalled years ago before I joined BLAEO.
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I can't find them on BLAEO at all - in fact, it was me unable to move one into 'currently playing' that made me start investigating in the first place!
I don't want my shit to get out of sync, though - I like having it be all equal across all three platforms (helps me check myself, too, bc my dumb ass can't count).
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I just added a free game to my account (Emmeline Burns, by going through like I was going to play it then cancelling instead of installing) and it's in my list of games on BLAEO: https://imgur.com/rDGzUVw. My BLAEO account shows I have more games than my Steam account does. I also was able to put two free games in this BLAEO list (How to Cope with Boredom & Loneliness and Raven Monologue): https://www.backlog-assassins.net/lists/3lzerxl
That's kind of weird if you aren't getting the same behavior. I use the Steam website to get games, not the client. I don't know what other factors there would be.
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Emmeline Burns is pretty old, and the other two games have been out longer than that update had been (I think they started it in the summer or fall of 2018?)
Games that were on the store already were grandfathered in, I believe.
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Oh, damn. I didn't know about the update. That sucks. I'm the one over there with a million lists and liked being able to include free games in them, too.
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I asked mandrill about it in the Discord, but he said his hands are tied - it's about how steam presents the information, I think, how it's shown on the profile that's where BLAEO takes it's information from.
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We just had a small discussion regarding F2P games the other day. https://www.steamgifts.com/go/comment/wtXgnpQ
It's an interesting question, and only Valve knows which criteria are required to fully approve a game. The sales figures are definitely part of these considerations, but of course these are not applicable to free games.
When Valve makes no exceptions for newer F2P titles, they are doomed to stay on limited status forever.
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Thank you for linking to the discussion! It really is such a shame. What went on in the discussion is some smart ideas - for F2P games, number of times downloaded, number of positive reviews, and maybe user engagement - people posting in the forums, taking screenshots, etc. should count in place of sales.
You'd THINK Valve would've accounted for this...
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After that talk the other day, I also have been wandering if they differentiate game bought on Steam or 3rd party sellers for the number of reviews cause I know it makes a difference as to how the reviews are seen and that would be a real shame for taking off the "Profile features limited" because it would mean that when a game is sold as part of a bundle all the reviews that comes from it don't count. Anyway it was just a thought, maybe I'm totally wrong?
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https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/marketing/profile
"Q. What metrics are used to qualify a game for profile customization features?
A. Our confidence metric is based on sales and player engagement figures. We do not include data from user reviews, wishlists, total playtime, or any other judgment of the "quality" of the game. We're simply looking for a broad player base."
So reviews and playtime are out. "Player engagement" from my view could mean amount of total unique players, 24hour peak concurrent player count, user uploads (screenshots, videos, workshop levels, ...), forum posts, maybe also traffic on the points shop items or the market items (trading cards, emoticons, backgrounds, avatars, ...), but I think that the amount of total unique players and the 24h peak concurrent player count should be the components with the biggest influence.
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I know you meant well, but what you did is usually suspension worthy on these boards. I would advise you to read the guidelines of Steamgifts and it is always a good idea to check when was the last activity in any thread you're participating in.
This thread has been inactive for 3 years and the OP hasn't been on Steamgifts for 6 years (so who knows when they might even see your reply)
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read those your novel reviews at BLAEO, kinda tempted even if really not into VN.
but still, very interested in these profile features ones. where did you find/ what made you think this:
restriction lifted is high enough sales
how and when the restriction is lifted is still very unclear to me.... paid or free, old and new...
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I'm not exactly sure what you're asking - I found these games just by normal steam queue, and I was going to start playing one night, hot springs when I noticed I couldn't find it on BLAEO.
Even if you ultimately decide VNs aren't your thing, I'm glad at least I could expose you to them and maybe you give one or two of them a try!
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The ambiguity is higly intended by Valve as a means for obfuscation.
I do not believe that they didn't consider F2P titles in their policies, so either they deliberately want to degrade those free games to limited profile features or maybe they approve them manually after a reasonable amount of time or when devs are requesting a verification.
Maybe someone else can shed more light on that.
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You know what? That's the ticket. You get a blueheart for that.
If the achievements weren't going to "count" anyway, I might as well play them without it. Thank you so much!
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I've been wondering the same thing and it would be really nice to know even just for curiosity's sake.
A day ago I finished Hello Pollution! and it was really disappointing not to be able to add to my list of complted game on BLAEO. I'm not exactly obsessed with achievements but I do like to finish games to a 100% as much as possible and I rather enjoyed seeing them all in one place on BLAEO.
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Yeah the profile limited is still stupid for certain things. Brought it up with space pilgrim academy year 3. Year 1 and 2 including the normal 4 space pilgrims are normal so year 3 should also be normal but no! Not enough people have reviewed it for it to count as a real game even though at this point it clearly is.
Just checked your stats and very impressed. I get why you would want your free games to account to since even if you do 100% it, it will look like you did nothing and feel like you just wasted however long it took
Oh and I know you liked pub encounter but 176 hours seriously XD You and your idling
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OH MY GOD NOW I GET CLOWNED ON SG FOR MY IDLING, TOO???? GODDDDDDD
Thank you for the compliment! It's not even about 'wasting' time, necessarily - I do play games w/out achievements, even if it's not very often (and my bar for them is higher; on the flip side, I do drop them more quickly). I just don't want my stats to be different on different platforms!
Valve just Very Much needs to have real people handle this shit
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I only just noticed so I had to bring it up! I don't think I've ever seen it so high so it just amazed me how the idle master become an idle goddess on that game.
Also the wasted time was more of how I would have it. Like if I don't want to play a profile limited but it has achievements I'm stuck since part of me doesn't want to leave the achievements not 100% even if they wont show and could never show. So it just looks and ends up like a lot of wasted time trying to 100% a game where no one know you did such a thing
I also prefer achievements it wasn't until final fantasy x had achievements i could drag myself through the whole game even if its my favourite game. However these some like dandelion where I want achievements for the sake of grinding out that game 5 times or to remove them in sunrider academy since its such a boring grind to get those achievements if you don't go into the stats and cheat the system into thinking 1 visit = 400
I agree they need a better system in place for certain games like the space academy I brought up where other games are normal or a certain amount of playtime and copies owned to decide if it is acceptable
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tsuper!! I had no idea these games were not synced with BLAEO, it's very annoying bc BLAEO lists are very useful and customizable :(
I don't see Valve changing this API behaviour thing anytime soon -- it seems to be their only half-assed way to do any kind of control -- the ONLY way for me not to lose any record of having played these is vndb, but obviously it's only for vns, other free games will be lost in a limbo.
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giselle! it's really a shame, and it makes these games - good, WORTHWHILE games - like second-class citizens of a sort for no reason. Half-assed really is the operative word here.
Having a record of having that game, spending time with it - even beyond achievement percentage, just being able to track it places is...
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hey tsu, was googling aand... found this thread! i might have found a somewhat clarifying page, few quotes (bold is mine):
https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/marketing/profile
Games that have achieved broad player engagement and some commercial success are eligible to create content that players can use in their Steam Community profile
We will automatically check whether your game qualifies several times per day
Our confidence metric is based on sales and player engagement figures. We do not include data from user reviews, wishlists, total playtime, or any other judgment of the "quality" of the game. We're simply looking for a broad player base
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Huh! That's more clarity, for sure!
Icaio, thank you so much for doing this digging c: So player engagement (minus sales) is the way to get them off the Limited train... but not the most common ways of engagement like writing reviews or wishlists or actually playing the game.
....
(deep sigh) Valve.....
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you're very welcome also because was my intention to ask a dev for this... was very curious...
re-reading it, sound really funny that "simply", like, "hey! we're just doing that, we're good guys"... :D
We're simply looking for a broad player base
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No wonder games are bundled... so they can get that imaginary player base thats required to approve a games's features, when in all actuality, steam should be reviewing games before they even go for sale on the steam store. Just my opinion.
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even if your a truly good -and honest- dev, with a truly good new game, you still need some luck. thinking about Glass Masquerade, bundled at otaku... or many others that, instead, disappeared ...
"bundle" might be a way, tho (indiegala being the most interesting bundler, imo)
as per Valve, i like chaos and very few rules, so the less they "review", the better... (+ the more the fun :P)
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I agree somewhat with what you're saying about genuine devs, but for the few good devs and publishers that produce stuff, there are even more devs and publishers just trying to make a quick buck that Steam SHOULD be stopping at the gate, rather than letting them through in the first place.
I have given up looking at the Steam store due to the sheer amount of junk. How can the good devs get recognised...
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get recognised
that's also "our" work, players can do that. maybe is something a little rare on SG (cause of its nature, not saying it's negative) but "we" can still do something good for them (so to have better games ...!)
also depends on dev, tho. Adriaan of Hidden Folks, for example, has been huge for his game, just huge. players helped a lot, sharing the love. but love too, comes after some little good old marketing :P
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HF is weird as example cause pretty unique (btw, what you see, comes from this magical pen) also cause he did everything, from mouth sounds to speaking to a class of students, to publishing his (their) game.
i always thought he would never bundle it, tho (like is a game that don't needs it). but, again, as your saying you didn't heard of before, he did the right thing, "marketing-wise".
all this after 4 years on the make, and only once it was complete. he then got "lucky" and it's permanently bundled at Steam with other few -very- good "black and white" (iirc) ones.
Glass Masquerade, instead, started bundled, but still a good choice, imo.
and, btw, is one of the games that convinced me more to come back at buying at Otakubundle... :(
:P
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
So Glass Masquerade got successfully promoted by Otaku, lol, wow. That's for sure a pretty unique case, cuz the majority of games that gets cheaply bundled will more likely disappear from the spotlight sooner than later.
Also, as you said, you definitely need a bit of luck as dev.
But to be honest, a fair amount of luck is always needed if you try to establish something, even with a good product it's highly possible to flop.
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Good you brought this up and that others have dealt/noticed the same! I have a BLAEO profile too and there's one free game, What Never Was, that I finished and 100%. Yet it's not included the on list of 'All games' I have. It sucks Steam's showcase also doesn't seem to include Free games with 100% completion?
And omg excuse my interest, but I noticed you've recently played Heaven Will Be Mine? How is it?
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Thanks for bringing up What Never Was - I have that game, myself! It's another case of, well, I think I'll try to play it elsewhere. It does suck indeed.
Heaven Will Be Mine is very good! I didn't like We Know the Devil all that much, but this one pulled my opinion around. It is VERY metaphorically dense (moreso then a good amount of shit I've read for college) and it's thrilling to slowly untangle what everything means. I can't relate directly to a lot of what's going on - it's a queer game in respects to gender identity and considerations of the body rather than queer in respects to sexual identity and interpersonal relationships, and the former isn't something I've had to really grapple with - but the writing is great and weird.
Reading it makes me feel, I dunno how to say this, "smarter" in the sense that it makes my brain lift off where it normally is and float a couple feet up and to the left. Seeing similar things a different way. Does this make sense?
It's going to go right onto my VN Recommendation list, though, for sure.
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I did watch a bit of videos on Youtube of it before and you are correct, it's pretty dense. Much more writing and visuals than We Know the Devil had, that's for sure! Also interesting how you say it makes you feel "smarter", which is I can see why with the context of this game. Which is good I suppose, especially for it being a VN.
Thank you for your personal input. :) I haven't come across many or any folks on SG with this game, so I was intrigued.
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Yeah, smarter in the sense where it helped my brain open up and see in the next couple of dimensions!
You're welcome! Thank you for asking. I sure do love talkin' about shit, especially VNs.
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The reason free games have "the metrics" too, even if they are not sold, is actually very simple. Any dev can at any time ask Valve, "hey I wanna move my game from free to paid, please set price to $4.99", so if not for these restrictions - and with history of very bold and willing to exploit any good thing bad actors - you'd soon have people releasing free games to amass downloads/reviews, then simply switching them to paid once they unlock achievements and such "additional value".
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Huh! That's fascinating.
Even so, there should be an alternate route for free-forever games to move out of that, or the 'profile features limited' could reset like the game had just been released.
(also I see you re: I just woke up and I'll post online immediately. me too pal!)
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Well, yes. In theory. If they were building the pipeline right now and planned ahead. As someone who built things in the past without precognition, I can confirm that sometimes it's easier to "apply dirty fix" than to destroy existing infrastructure that works just so something would have a cleaner solution.
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You mean Valve goes the easy and dirty fixing way instead of a complete restructuring? Yeah that doesn't sound too surprising.
Thanks for sharing your wisdom as a dev yourself. ;)
So recent free games are deliberately put on a low level and can only lift their status by becoming paid.
Oh Valve! :o
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Yes it's almost impossible to capture all potential loopholes and scenarios beforehand.
But even if the pipeline is working like a charm and certainly in favour of Valve, I still see a lot of room for improvement.
It cannot be true that a minority of bad actors are ruining and aggravating the business environment for honest and hard working devs. Valve's metrics also don't take account of F2P games, and that's wrong in my opinion.
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They do take them in account. It's just that metrics doesn't look for downloads, but for involvement. Just because we'd expect it to work differently, doesn't mean it's set up wrong. After all, Valve has more experience with these things than any of us.
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I have a couple of free VNs I've downloaded - all legit, for real - and I'd like to play them... but one thing gives me pause.
I'm an admitted achievement whore, and I've put a lot of time and effort into lifting my ratio and count as high as it is, and I also use completionist.me to keep track of my progress, as well as, of course, recording reviews on Backlog Assassins. Everything is synced and lined up perfectly... but if I play these games, it won't be. completionist.me, I believe, will record the achievements fine, but my steam profile won't and these games won't show up in BLAEO—because these games have the profile features limited.
I did a little bit of digging and it seems the gate into having that restriction lifted is high enough sales. What happens when the game in question is free? Is it download amount? Length of time? One night, hot springs is a year old and has 50k downloads - if that's not enough to lift it, what is? Has there ever been a free game that had this restriction lifted, or is this the fate of all newer, micro-indie free games?
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