Microsoft’s pirate epic, Sea of Thieves, is making the transition to Steam . While it’s currently available on PC via the Microsoft Store, the audience there is limited.
That’s because the Microsoft Store is practically unusable garbage. It’s good to see the company finally come to that realization.
The Microsoft Store is a weird amalgamation of ideas that are executed better everywhere else.
First off, downloading titles on there is a hassle. Sometimes the download will randomly stop or never have started at all. I’ve pre-downloaded games on there only to have to redownload them on release day. Sometimes updates are required, but running them will delete the software entirely.
Users consistently struggle to install games . So much so that guides on how to fix the Microsoft Store are all over the internet. It’s strange, considering the store’s competitors don’t have download problems.
Steam and Origin also integrate extra features like friends and achievements into one application. Microsoft, for some reason, has three.
Screenshots struggle to load, app pages house invasive autoplay videos, and the Store is chock-full of vaporware and scam software.
There’s the Microsoft Store, the Xbox app, and the Xbox Companion App. The Companion App is for friends, achievements, clips, and the like. Game Pass is for new titles on the Netflix-like service, and the Store is, well, the Store.
Why must these be three applications? It makes for a terrible user experience.
Say I want to check out a new game. I can check the Store to see if it’s available on Game Pass. It’s not always clear about this, so I better double-check on the Xbox app, where I can also see if my friends are playing it.
But wait, I can do that in the Companion app already. Oh, and the Xbox app also has a store and shows reviews and other things that the Microsoft Store does as well.
It’s all so unnecessary. The current Windows PC situation is not unlike Games for Windows Live. Back then, players had issues with signing in, keeping their games, and online play.
Of course, Microsoft is launching titles like The Master Chief Collection or Gears 5 on Steam as well. The user experience is far better there. Hopefully, Microsoft wises up and shuts its store down entirely.