If you hoard video games and aren’t selfhosting GameVault yet, you’re missing out!
from alfagun74@lemmy.world to selfhosted@lemmy.world on 20 Oct 22:04
https://lemmy.world/post/21078847

Hey everyone,

it’s me again, one of the two developers behind GameVault, a self-hosted gaming platform similar to how Plex/Jellyfin is for your movies and series, but for your game collection. If you’ve hoarded a bunch of games over the years, this app is going to be your best friend. Think of it as your own personal Steam, hosted on your own server.

If you haven’t heard of GameVault yet, you can check it out here and get started within 5 minutes—seriously, it’s a game changer.

For those who already know GameVault, or its old name He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, we are excited to tell you we just launched a major update. I’m talking a massive overhaul—so much so, that we could’ve rebuilt the whole thing from scratch. Here’s the big news: We’re no longer relying on RAWG or Google Images for game metadata. Instead, we’ve officially partnered with IGDB/Twitch for a more reliable and extended metadata experience!

But it doesn’t stop there. We’ve also rolled out a new plugin system and a metadata framework that allows you to connect to multiple metadata providers at once. It’s never been this cool to run your own Steam-like platform right from your good ol’ 19" incher below your desk!

What’s new in this update?

Things to keep in mind when updating:

For a smooth update and a guide on how to use all these new features, check out the detailed migration instructions in the server changelogs. As always, if you hit any snags, feel free to reach out to us on Discord.

If you run into any issues or need help with the migration, feel free to join and open a ticket in our Discord community—we’re always happy to help!

If you want to support our pet-project and keep most upcoming features of GameVault free for everyone, consider subscribing to GameVault+ or making a one-time donation. Every little bit fuels our passion to keep building and improving!

Thanks for everything! We’re more than 800 Members on our discord now and I can’t wait to hear what you think of the latest version.

#selfhosted

threaded - newest

Gradually_Adjusting@lemmy.world on 20 Oct 22:44 next collapse

Saved for when I get my home server back up and running. This sounds way better than keeping everything on an external SSD.

just_another_person@lemmy.world on 20 Oct 23:12 next collapse

Gotta say, I love the idea behind this project, and it’s great you’re reaching out to this community here. I haven’t run it myself yet, but it looks great, and the feature list is massive.

Couple questions really stopping somebody like myself from setting up an instance though.

  1. It’s not “just” a launcher, and it’s not quite a distribution platform. Is this mostly geared towards people playing the same game on multiple machines?

  2. It seems like this is setup as a Steam replacement, but only for a DRM-Free games, so why would you (as a creator) suggest I use this instead?

  3. This also seems like there’s a world in which this is set to be a decent game hosting platform. Plans?

Thanks for showing up.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 20 Oct 23:54 collapse

  1. It’s for groups, mostly. Families & Friends.
  2. It’s not really a replacement. It is a way for you to have a steam like experience for games where you would not have one. Games lying on your server.
  3. No, not at all at the time, but maybe in the future

Thanks for looking into it

MossyFeathers@pawb.social on 20 Oct 23:19 next collapse

Does this run on a raspberry pi 1 or 2? I can’t remember which one I have, but I barely use it so it’d be cool to have something to use it for.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 20 Oct 23:51 collapse

It does, it needs about 120mb of ram I think.

loganb@lemmy.world on 20 Oct 23:44 next collapse

Any progress on the plans for a native Linux client or Web Interface? Last I checked there was only a Windows client available (although it could be ran within proton to be fair).

While Windows is no doubt the popular gaming OS ATM, I think you’ll find a much higher population of Linux users amongst the self-hosted crowd.

Your service is exactly what I want for my GOG library, so I’d love to give it a spin!

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 20 Oct 23:50 next collapse

For now we gave up on it but we may look into it in the future. I’m sorry, we’re just two guys and it would mean to redevelop the entire client.

loganb@lemmy.world on 20 Oct 23:53 next collapse

Understandable! I’ll keep an eye on the project for the future!

I might try running it in bottles and see what the experience is like.

loganb@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 02:20 collapse

I having one of those things… Ya’ know a picture with words…

Heroic Games Launcher could be the answer. The GameVault devs wouldn’t need to reinvent the wheel with a Linux client dealing with all the proton sand boxing. Just add to the heroic launcher.

Looks like someone has already had a similar thought too…

github.com/Heroic-Games-Launcher/…/2951

AlexanderESmith@social.alexanderesmith.com on 21 Oct 00:11 collapse

I don't have Windows on any of my gaming machines, so I can't really use something that depends on it.

Now, if you also target Wine during unit tests as a compatible base system, I could get into that.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 06:17 collapse

we don’t have any unit tests, yes shame on us. But dozens of users are running this using linux wine and for instance steam deck already, its a community effort but hey, it works. See here.

AlexanderESmith@social.alexanderesmith.com on 21 Oct 09:35 collapse

Good enough for me. Just remember to keep us in mind 👍

r00ty@kbin.life on 21 Oct 01:46 collapse

Just post that you think it'd be impossible to port to rust and linux. Then someone is bound to do it :P

Mugmoor@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 21 Oct 00:18 next collapse

Your client is still Windows Store exclusive? That’s a hard pass from me.

catloaf@lemm.ee on 21 Oct 00:37 next collapse

It’s open source, so you could compile it yourself if you wanted.

Looks like it’s targeting .NET 6.0 though, which ends support in less than a month. I don’t know if it’s easy to change, so it might be worth it to the devs to start work on a cross-platform and currently supported client.

Banichan@dormi.zone on 21 Oct 01:09 next collapse

Linux bootsectorlicker

sunzu2@thebrainbin.org on 21 Oct 02:35 collapse

That's the sort of licking I can get behind!

MajorMajormajormajor@lemmy.ca on 21 Oct 03:15 collapse

I’m doing my part!

Valmond@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 10:29 collapse

But what’s the Catch?!

warmaster@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 04:19 next collapse

Instant letdown. I’ve switched my 4 PCs to Linux.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 06:50 collapse

it is not exclusive to Windows Store. We also provide Windows Releases directly on GitHub, and there are guides on running this on linux aswell.

Mugmoor@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 21 Oct 19:29 collapse

Then why does the link to download the client lead to the MS Store instead of Github?

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 19:42 collapse

Because we decided its the main distribution platform. But there are multiple.

dragonlobster@programming.dev on 21 Oct 01:17 next collapse

Will it store my ROMs

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 06:15 collapse

it is mostly optimised for pc atm. it will save them perfectly fine and you can download and browse them using this as well, but its still on our roadmap to build in a web based emulator, native emulator support and auto-install for roms. See details here

linearchaos@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 02:07 next collapse

I’m kind of apprehensive to open up a really small projects on my home network to the outside world. Kudos for maintaining unraid as a platform though.

I might consider running it at my house but my wife is Mac I’m Linux it would only help my kids.

Could It handle mod packages for Java Minecraft or something?

Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 02:31 next collapse

That’s a terrible romcom.

“She was a Mac user, listening to The Beatles on her iPhone. He was a Linux user…probably using one of those custom modular built cell phones with an open kernal or something. This Holiday season, watch cultures clash as two different technology mindsets clash. When governments threaten to censor pornography in their state during the stressful holiday season, they turn to each other for support and, they fall in love! Courtney Cox, and Jerry Lewis star in…Different Worlds!”

I wouldn’t watch that.

linearchaos@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 02:33 collapse

Lol, That’s why I self-host so much crap. The only way I can give it to everybody is to make it a web app, or maintain three separate sets of clients.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 06:58 collapse

It could handle modpacks, thats even an example on the site. You dont need to open it up to the internet, it works perfectly fine in LAN and VPN aswell.

corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca on 21 Oct 03:53 next collapse

feel free to join and open a ticket in our Discord community

Yeah, honestly, kinda fuck off a bit.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 06:07 collapse

we do have Github aswell. it’s just most people find discord easier. Here you go, trooper:

github.com/Phalcode/gamevault-app/issues github.com/Phalcode/gamevault-backend/issues

knova@infosec.pub on 21 Oct 05:08 next collapse

Don’t want to pile on but the lack of a web client in favor of a Windows Store client really kills this for me. I mean, I’m not even on windows so it’s a deal breaker anyway. Would love to get this talking to Lutris somehow.

Also going to pile on a bit about your use of Discord, it is walling off information in a proprietary communication channel. Support tickets should be handled on the web so others can easily tack on if they are experiencing the same issues etc.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 06:21 collapse

There are ways to run this on linux.

Sorry if there were any miscommunication: We have github and email support aswell, its just lots of people find talking in real time easier.

github.com/Phalcode/gamevault-app/issues github.com/Phalcode/gamevault-backend/issues

Oha@lemmy.ohaa.xyz on 21 Oct 07:43 next collapse

A native linux client would be nice

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 07:56 collapse

We had fantasies about it but its just too much work for us two, there are community clients for linux natively in development tho.

github.com/Phalcode/gamevault-app/issues/284#issu…

Sunny@slrpnk.net on 21 Oct 08:23 next collapse

Love the idea of this project, exactly something I’m looking for. Though as others have stated, a more native way for Linux or an integration with Lutris or Heroic Launcher would truly be helpful for this project. Believe it would get a lot more traction in the selfhosting community if this became a reality.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 08:30 collapse

We’ve contacted heroic regarding a collab but they never wrote back. You can do this as a fallback though.

TCB13@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 20:19 collapse

It’s so hard to have a SMB share with one folder per game. The solution is obviously to run 4000 docker containers.

alfagun74@lemmy.world on 21 Oct 20:40 collapse

yeah browsing that 4000 game folder list sure is the same fun.