Epic Games Launcher appears to collect Steam friends and play history
I bought Metro Exodus on Epic Games recently. It was my second experience outside of playing Fortnite on PC.<p>I completely understand why people do not want to pay the Steam tax, but the Epic launcher is a scummy experience. Steam is popular and has a loud following because it does not make unethical choices that annoy users. I have no issue installing multiple launchers, either, but I don't want something running on my system that operates in an unethical manor. And it's tiring how common it is for companies to operate in this way, so we, as users, have to scrutinize their behavior heavily.<p>For example:<p>1) By default, the Epic launcher appears to advertise "free games" via Windows notification (popups). I never deliberately opted in to this. When I first saw the notification, I was certain I had some sort of spyware on my system. It looked like a spammy advertisement you see in free mobile games. I don't believe even EA/ORIGIN has been gutsy enough to try something like this.<p>2) Epic launcher defaults to starting when Windows starts. I never explicitly opted in to this. I'm sure I "affirmed" this somehow via some kind of user agreement, but I don't ever remember seeing an explicit option.