To be fair it's widely used now, it just took a while to adopt because of compatibility issues.

Finding the directory requires new APIs introduced in Vista and Server 2008. See SHGetKnownFolderPath

Sure but in the non-game software world we'd do a runtime check to see if the OS was Vista or later and fallback if not.

You can't do it as a runtime check. You have to compile the software with the flags to import and link to the latest windows library. The program will hard crash if run on an older version.

I just tried to use the API. I literally couldn't find a working example on the internet in 2 hours so I guess noone figured it out in a decade.

Wrote https://stackoverflow.com/a/54499257/5994461

What's wrong with calling IsWindowsVistaOrGreater[0]?

[0] https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/api/version...

You won't have the chance to call anything. If the executable is statistically linked to the latest API, the executable won't be able to load on older systems.

I'm surprised that these new IsWindows...() functions claim compatibility down to Windows 2000. Doubt microsoft knew how they would name their next release 20 years ago. A Google search indicates that they are in fact broken.

You won't be able to compile with the function imported using the modern lib (because it doesn't exist on XP) but you can conditionally link it at runtime with LoadLibrary/GetProcAddress.

If IsWindows... doesn't work then you can use the VerifyVersionInfo function directly.

Why did they have to narrow it down to games? Could just go with "Saved config (and data)", so other apps could just dump small config files which can be effectively backed up.

And here I am, still wanting my save files to reside next to the games exe...

Fair enough but on multi-user systems you can surely see the value in separate save game folders?

when was the last time a gaming machine is a multi-user system?!

Since when every person in a house has their own gaming PC?

I'm currently typing this on a machine that's used for gaming by more than one person.

There's no reason there couldn't be separate per-user folders within the game's installation path for that.

Do you also store your birth certificate in your car's glovebox?

What a misleading comparison...

I don't even get what you want to say.

A game's exe dir is a long-lived but potentially replaceable thing, like a car. Saved games may be persisted across game versions, so you don't necessarily want them to be in the same directory. Admittedly not the best analogy, but was just observing that it's strange and incongruent to store the 2 together.