Discord has announced today that it will no longer function as a game launcher moving forward, along with other changes. These changes come as Discord states that they are always looking to keep the user experience "fast and clean".
Using user feedback as well as their own internal data Discord took a look at things like the game launcher function as well as Activity Feed and saw they were underutilized or redundant and ultimately contributed to bogging down the experience. As stated in the update post Activity Feed was originally meant to let users keep up with game news and check out what friends were doing which had become overshadowed by the new Channel Following feature that came out last fall. This meant that when it came down to it Activity Feed was just cluttering things up and not really showing users things they cared about with its lack of customizability.
The Universal Game Launcher feature has fallen into a similar boat, but more on the side of most users simply not finding it a useful one. Do not worry though, you will still have full access to your games that you already have or will get on Discord. The post states:
Improving also means removing features that our users aren’t finding useful, like the UGL and Library tab. We’re removing both of these to keep your Discord experience fast and clean. If you have bought or will buy a game from Discord, your games will always be accessible. The Library tab will stay for you, and you’ll have the option to disable it from User Settings > Appearances.
Discord remains one of the leaders in the game communication service industry and hopefully, these changes enable it to improve performance and free up internal talent to work on new, more useful features for the future.
How do you feel about these changes coming to Discord? What would you want to see as the next big feature coming to the service?
