A New PC Game Launcher Was So Hated, It Lasted Less Than 24 Hours
A new PC game launcher introduced for Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader and intended to serve as a hub for all titles developed by Owlcat Games was met with intense backlash from players. Within less than 24 hours, the launcher was removed after widespread criticism and frustration from the gaming community.
In a post on Steam from June 22, Owlcat Games explained the reasoning behind adding the launcher to the nearly three-year-old game. The developer cited a need for the launcher as a way to keep its players informed about updates and news related to its various RPGs, including Rogue Trader, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, and upcoming projects like Warhammer 40K: Dark Heresy and The Expanse: Osiris Reborn.
Owlcat noted that according to its research, a significant number of players who had played Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous had not heard of Rogue Trader, even though both are similar CRPGs. This was seen as a problem that required a solution.
"This, upon reflection, is understandable—in this age of information overload, it's incredibly easy to miss even news that might be of interest," Owlcat said. "Therefore, we felt we really needed an effective cross-promotion tool for all our titles."
The Short-Lived Owlcat Launcher
In the same blog post, Owlcat promised to make the launcher as "unobtrusive as possible." They stated that it would be lightweight, would not collect player data, would not require players to register an account, and could be opted out of. An option in the settings would allow players to simply switch the launcher off and launch the game as usual.
Despite Owlcat's intentions, the player feedback was largely negative. The post received no upvotes on Steam and was flooded with thousands of critical comments. The situation worsened once players realized that opting out of the launcher and bypassing it didn't actually stop it from running in the background.
In a post on the Rogue Trader subreddit, Owlcat's community manager Starrok attempted to clarify the situation. He explained that the launcher continued to run in the background to ensure Steam properly recorded game time. Without the launcher, Steam would no longer track the time played, and the decision was made to keep it running in the background as a "Band-aid fix." Starrok admitted they were not aware of this behavior before the update was released.
"If the launcher is turned off, it's supposed to stay off and this is NOT an expected behaviour," Starrok said.
Less than 24 hours after the initial announcement, another blog post from Owlcat appeared, confirming that they would revert Rogue Trader to a previous update and remove the launcher entirely.
"Thank you for your feedback, and genuinely sorry for the frustration caused," the post stated.
Currently, Owlcat Games is working on several different projects, including "multiple new unannounced RPGs already in production," as mentioned in its launcher blog post. A new DLC for Rogue Trader, The Infinite Museion, was released on June 11. The Expanse: Osiris Reborn is slated to arrive in 2027, while Dark Heresy does not yet have a release date.
