Twitch hack reveals Amazons Steam rival could be cheekily named Vapour

Date:
Thu, 07 Oct 2021 11:46:53 +0000

Description:
There may be good reasons for Amazon to do this, so should Valve start worrying now?

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The big Twitch hack that just happened also came with an interesting revelation in the form of leaked details that seem to indicate that Amazon ( which owns Twitch ) is building a Steam rival.

The would-be online games store is codenamed Vapour (or Vapor) presumably a cheeky dig at Steam rather than a serious candidate for a final name and according to the info spilled in the hack, itll integrate Twitch features as you might expect. This was uncovered by data miner Sinoc on Twitter. Grabbed Vapor, the codename for Amazon's Steam competitor. Seems to intigrate most of Twitch's features as well as a bunch of game specific support like fortnite and pubg.Also includes some Unity code for a game called Vapeworld, which I assume is some sort of VR chat thing. pic.twitter.com/4KeeEOspyQ October 6, 2021 See more

Think of Twitch but with a built-in games platform where you can buy the latest titles, and have your games library in the same place that you do all your stream viewing. Best Linux distros for gaming These are the best PC
games of 2021 And check out the best graphics cards

Sinoc also discovered code for whats apparently an app by the name of Vapeworld, which would appear to be some kind of VR chat app complete with various assets including 3D emotes. Presumably this could be integrated with Vapor within Twitch, given the reference in the name.

The (claimed) presence of this stuff in the leaked material does not necessarily mean its anything beyond concepts and potential ideas for the future, of course. Analysis: Could this happen, or is it likely to be Vapourware?

Vapour or whatever it may end up being called, if anything ever comes of it makes sense from Amazons point of view, given that Twitch represents an instant community as a purchasing audience on tap. With some clever strategy and exclusive games or content, maybe its not difficult to imagine how this could be a way of very quickly building a compelling rival to Steam .

Such a platform would, of course, add to Amazons gaming strengths, with Prime Gaming ( previously Twitch Prime ) already offering free in-game goodies (and freebie games for that matter).

Whether Vapour will end up on the pile as a missed (or perhaps that should be mist) opportunity, or if itll actually ever come to anything, obviously remains to be seen. Although PC Gamer , which spotted the above tweet, points out a piece of evidence which seemingly reinforces the likeliness namely an Amazon patent filing from 2017 describing an interface for joining games from a spectating system, with the ability to order, purchase, or otherwise obtain demo or full versions of games.

There are a few digital dots here, as it were, but wed be foolish to be too hasty to join them. Epic has, of course, already gone toe-to-toe with Steam for years now, backed with a ton of cash for exclusives, and Valve has
managed to weather that storm thus far How to stream on Twitch



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/news/twitch-hack-reveals-amazons-steam-rival-could-b e-cheekily-named-vapour/


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