DRM too is also a pain.

The new Alder Lake CPUs apparently breaks a bunch of games, since their DRM thinks that the new Intel efficiency-cores are a second PC trying to play on the same license.

Some games will only work if you upgrade to Windows 11, and all games should work if you find a BIOS option and enable it, but only some CPUs support that BIOS option.

Source: https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/11/faulty-drm-breaks-doz...

And there's also all the other older horror stories of DRM, like the Denuvo DRM adding a huge performance hit on some games. Or not being able to play your offline single-player games at all, since the Denuvo DRM servers have temporarily offline due to a DNS issue.

(Disclaimer, despite all the issues, I do personally prefer PC gaming over console gaming, but I'm biased that I already have a powerful PC for CUDA/C++ programming and development, so I've already spent a bunch of money and time into PCs already).

> you want to play a game on steam but your friend has bought it on the Microsoft store how do you play together? How do you voice chat?

Both services support adding non platform games through their shortcut/executable.

They also support voice chat for groups and players not in game.

> What do you do when the Xbox services don't work when docker is installed?

File a bug report? Or you just came up with some hypothetical issues?

> Both services support adding non platform games through their shortcut/executable.

The multiplayer services are independent and crossplay is an exception, that's what I think they were getting at. Being able to launch an executable from a different store doesn't matter if your copy uses Steamworks for multiplayer and the copy from the MS store doesn't support that.

> File a bug report? Or you just came up with some hypothetical issues?

It's not a hypothetical issue or a bug, it's a common problem for games that use anti-cheat software. Refusing to run when virtualization features are turned on or virtualization software is installed/present is a common tactic they use and if you file a report it'll usually get immediately closed as wontfix, because it's a tradeoff they decide to make. E.g. https://support.faceit.com/hc/en-us/articles/360019809319-Yo...

> The multiplayer services are independent and crossplay is an exception, that's what I think they were getting at. Being able to launch an executable from a different store doesn't matter if your copy uses Steamworks for multiplayer and the copy from the MS store doesn't support that.

But that’s not the case from the games I’ve played unless you’re getting into hypotheticals.

I’ve played on Xbox live with my cousins on steam in F1 2020, age of empires, gta 4, halo.

The only friction is initial invites from the specific platform but once we’ve played in the same server, it’s very easy to send in-game invites.

As for the issues with virtualization, it’s an understandable issue with concerns around cheating in pc multiplayer games. COD4 was absolutely ruined because of it. Virtualization isn’t very widespread but I’m sure they’ll be more accommodative soon as WSL and Android ship by default on Windows.

> But that’s not the case from the games I’ve played unless you’re getting into hypotheticals.

No need for hypotheticals, Deep Rock Galactic [0] doesn't support play between the MS store and steam. Minecraft [1] has two versions that say they support cross play, except you can't play between the two (and depending on how you purchase the version you're playing, this is not clear, e.g. [2]). Marvel vs capcom Infinite doesn't supoort play between the MS Store and Steam [3]. You mentioned Age of Empires and F1 2020, but googling for those two seems to suggest that both of those games suffer from the same issue; [4] [5]

> As for the issues with virtualization, it’s an understandable issue with concerns around cheating in pc multiplayer games.

I understand the issues, virtualisation was an example of an issue I faced. (and it's actually not even a virtualisation issue, it's a virtual network adapter issue!) In the last few years I've had issues with Graphics drivers that are apparently too old, drivers that are too _new_, crashes when changing audio devices, windows update blocking game installs, anticheat failing to install/update, problems with performance on a very high end PC due to third party software (chrome). They're the issues I've had, and in my group of 8 or so friends that I play with regularly, the above are common, and everyone has their "own" set of issues.

[0] https://www.deeprockgalactic.com/crossplay-info [1] https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/get-minecraft [2] https://www.microsoft.com/store/productId/9NBLGGH2JHXJ [3] https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/marvel-vs-capcom-infi... [4] https://www.reddit.com/r/F1Game/comments/i3th2e/steam_x_micr... [5] https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgaming/comments/dyk1ut/the_crossp...

I'd never heard of Deep rock, looking at data they have 8k players with a 40k peak - how likely is that this constraint is from their developer resource and not a platform limitation?

Minecraft is inherently different here because they went for a re-write and chose to have two different "editions" of the game.

As for F1 and Age of empires, I play it with my cousins weekly - you're welcome to join us through live or steam (I'm UranicAlloy580 on xbox live). Links you posted are questions/troubleshoot from 1+ year ago.

> how likely is that this constraint is from their developer resource and not a platform limitation?

Of course it is, but that doesn't matter to a player who owns the game because microsoft say "Play anywhere" and "Crossplay" on their official marketing materials [0]

> Minecraft is inherently different here because they went for a re-write and chose to have two different "editions" of the game.

It doesn't really matter _why_, the fact is that it's the reality of being on an open platform that doesn't enforce these criteria. Being on a console you have to play by the rules of the platform which means that a bunch of things "just work", and those rules _mostly_ apply on PC, except when they don't.

> Links you posted are questions/troubleshoot from 1+ year ago. The AOE2 one, sure. F1 2019 doesn't work between the MS store and Steam still. That doesn't change the fact that these issues exist on PC, and they don't on console.

[0] https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/08/19/preview-deep-rock-gal...

> Both services support adding non platform games through their shortcut/executable.

That only launches the game through the correct store. If the game doesn't implement cross play, you can't play together.

> They also support voice chat for groups and players not in game.

But you're trying to be in game with the person, and again if the game doesn't do in-game voice chat, you have to find alternatives. On a console you join a party and the software correctly handles the cases around "do I want to put you in a voice chat channel for your game" (because it has to to pass certification).

> File a bug report? Or you just came up with some hypothetical issues?

Really helpfully closed after 30 days of inactivity. https://github.com/docker/for-win/issues/42. (I didn't make this bug, but I found it, and just logged onto my xbox instead).

PC games don’t need “cross play” FYI, you create a server and it is visible for anyone who purchased the game regardless of platform.

I haven’t used in game voice for more than a decade now. discord, teamspeak, steam chat, Xbox live all work well and are used by quite a lot of people.

Can’t comment on that single issue, but it does look like there was barely any information provided to repro the issue.

> PC games don’t need “cross play” FYI, you create a server and it is visible for anyone who purchased the game regardless of platform.

That is very much game specific. As an example, Deep Rock Galactic doesn't support playing between Steam and the MS store [0]

> I haven’t used in game voice for more than a decade now. discord, teamspeak, steam chat, Xbox live all work well and are used by quite a lot of people.

All of those options require you to coordinate your play outside of the game and the platform. If you are playing Sea of Thieves on Steam with friends using steam voice chat, and one person joins via the MS store, you need to figure out out how to get them into the correct place. If you're all on xbox, they just join your party.

> Can’t comment on that single issue, but it does look like there was barely any information provided to repro the issue.

So it's not just file a bug report, it's file a bug report and provide follow up information. As a programmer, that's fine, but what if my kids want to play minecraft with their friends?

[0] https://www.deeprockgalactic.com/crossplay-info

> So it's not just file a bug report, it's file a bug report and provide follow up information. As a programmer, that's fine, but what if my kids want to play minecraft with their friends?

I’d say your kids pc doesn’t need docker on it.

You can’t eat the cake and have it too. If you’re technically skilled to be using containers and virtualization, least you could do is file a helpful bug report.

>I’d say your kids pc doesn’t need docker on it.

I have nephews who are tinkering with Java and python, and I assume will be hitting docker at some point.

You're being incredibly nitpicky over a reasonable example of why PC is not as plug-and-play as a console. On a console, the game will work. On a PC, there are a lot of factors that may prevent it from working.

The entire "use a PC" premise is that the PC can be useful for gaming as well as for non-gaming uses, and the counter-argument is that those non-gaming uses can easily cause problems for the gaming uses. Docker is not the only example, tools like fiddler or wireshark or ghidra could cause problems. But heaven forbid that a gamer on hackernews be a tech enthusiast, right?

> Docker is not the only example, tools like fiddler or wireshark or ghidra could cause problems. But heaven forbid that a gamer on hackernews be a tech enthusiast, right?

No, heaven forbid they want to tinker then complain but don't want to spend 5 minutes to file a bug report or follow the hacker way of actually figuring the issue out and proposing a fix.

So now my kids need a separate PC? I thought the point of this was that my PC could do everything?

"my" "personal" computer, Yes I'd expect your kids to have their own.

And docker misconfiguration causing issues in unrelated services is one another reason why I'd suggest they have their own.

So now the kids need a PC to game, and the parent needs a second PC to game, and I'm wondering how this is more reasonable than a single dedicated appliance that costs less than half of the two PC setup.

Docker blocking Xbox chat is not a platform issue but a docker issue and OP doesn’t even want to take time to file a proper bug report so yes kids would be better off using a pc or their own.

Same would go for any console, phone etc. You can’t just install stuff with known issues from 3rd parties, not file report with any diagnostics and then blame it on the platform. Would you blame iOS for a badly behaving app that makes it hard for the kids to use the iPad?

If I am understanding correctly, it is an Xbox issue because game systems do not like virtualization / emulation / containerization functionality because of its potential for enabling cheats. Many test proctoring systems are the same way-- the presence of a virtualization service, driver, or hypervisor will trigger a red flag.

So again, for the huge number of people whose life involves technology there are a lot of things that can throw a wrench into that PC for gaming, and in those cases a console makes a lot of sense. It's a little odd to me that this bothers you so much; surely it is expected that consoles have a good usecase given their popularity?

No the issue here is Docker creating an improperly configured network interface.

xbox apps on Windows do not care about virtualization, in fact they probably can't - because xbox os is essentially a subset of windows as host and guest.

If you are saying that a Windows application cannot tell if virtualization is in use, you are incorrect. It can both tell whether you are in a virtualized instance (e.g. if you have Hyper-V on) and if you are running a hypervisor. In the former case, a simple hardware inspection would suffice, and there are a dozen other methods to tell such as used by virt-what.

None of this is relevant. Maybe Docker's interface is "improperly configured" for the gaming use case. It remains a headache, and using a console is a viable solution that allows you to work with buggy instances of Docker without disrupting your gaming.