This blog was originally used as a backup to the feed function that "used" to be on Twitch, it is now the primary means of a "feed" for my channel since that function was removed in 2018. This later started including updates for my YouTube channel in 2021 when Bing decided to blacklist my personal site & this blog from their search engine results.
Finally managed to get back into the Epic Games launcher today (attempting to troubleshoot it again after Epic Games opened a new support ticket with me in response to the BBB complaint against them for not being able to connect for over a month), however I had to use the 2 year old installer & patch back up as can be seen in this video. This installer is being provided through this blog to allow others that may still be experiencing this problem with being able to connect (seeing as installer v10.19.2 won't connect for those getting hit by it).
Despite being able to now connect, I'm still waiting to see if they are going to allow me to gain Clip in Fortnite (seeing as their connection issue prevented me completing the final one-fifth of the task necessary to get her when the launcher patch on 10/28/2020 prevented me from being able to log into the launcher for well over a month), I'm not willing to go back to purchasing from their platform otherwise (all other steps in the boycott has been dropped however, only this one remains).
In addition to the remaining point of the boycott (if they don't decide to give me what I got ripped off for), this still affects who I'm supporting on Twitch when they are streaming Epic Games exclusive games, but no longer when an Epic Games developed/published game is available on other platforms, nor does it affect games created with the Unreal Engine anymore.
Regarding the emotes that were removed from my channel, I am going to reinstate the Fleshpound (Killing Floor) emote, however the Raven (Fortnite) emote will not be reinstated until I've managed to gain Clip in Save the World). This ultimately means that the Fleshpound emote that was gained at 5000 bits on the channel will be moved to 1000 bits & vice versa for the Raven emote (provided I don't put something else in the 5000 bits emote slot first, depends on how long it takes to acquire that Hero, which could be never if Epic Games gives me the finger on getting her due to their technical issue with the launcher).
EDIT: I've been told that the mirror on Google Drive isn't working, so I've created a secondary mirror using my personal site. For the time being, this file type (MSI) is not restricted, but I may change that later if I find download sites are defrauding my website of credit for hosting a mirror again (this has already been done with RAR & ZIP files, which can only be downloaded if the originating traffic is from the website itself).
In response to Epic Games' lack of commitment to keep their
client functional & refusal to even give a response to the launcher
connection issue on their Facebook page (or even provide a new installer that might connect to
their servers to complete an initial installation), it's been determined that
it was time to file a BBB complaint against them for funds lost on purchases
over their platform that are no longer accessible (this was already determined
once it hit the 1 month mark if not resolved by then).Additional complaints will be filed to the
FCC at 2 months, then to Internet Crimes at 3 months.Further details about the BBB complaint will be published later
to my personal site once I have time to add it to the site as a new review of Epic
Games.
Additionally, it was determined that it was time to retire
both the Raven (Fortnite) & Fleshpound (Killing Floor) emotes from the
channel (the Killing Floor emote being removed due to the fact the game uses the
Unreal Engine, meaning they paid Epic Games a licensing fee to be able to use
it in their game).These may come back
in the future, but only if the launcher ever becomes functional again
& only if I managed to obtain anything that was released new while this technical
issue kept me from getting back into Fortnite to acquire them (that means there
will need to be another StW birthday event, which I don't particularly see
happening, so I don't expect I will be ending my boycott against them either).
I've decided I've put my gaming life on hold for long enough waiting for Epic Games to fix their launcher, I WILL be running some other games & considering they will likely be single player, I will be streaming them on Twitch to boot (given even with the lower upload rate after I had to make cuts to my expenses, single player games shouldn't be affected by streaming taking the majority of my bandwidth capabilities).
Some (if not most) of the games that I was considering streaming unfortunately use the Unreal Engine, so I'll either need to not stream those games or make it a point that I don't recommend those games & point out why it is. One thing I do make sure is done when I'm doing a boycott against a company (which in this case, not only targets any games developed or published by Epic Games, but also any game using their engine, as those companies have to pay a fee to Epic Games to be able to use their engine) is that any direct links in the Now Playing section of my channel that would result in a purchase of the game are removed; I suspect this is what I'll be doing should I attempt to stream games like Scourge: Outbreak or XCOM, along with details why that information has been removed & what needs to happen before I am going to recommend these games again. Tomorrow I'm expecting to start streaming again while waiting for Epic Games to fix the mess they made in their 10/28/2020 launcher update (which is no longer limited to just login issues on operating systems before Windows 10; additional reports on their Facebook page has confirmed that some people can't even log in on Windows 10, there's an issue with logging in with linked accounts since the removal of the Apple login option & Uplay activations are currently broken if you try to play them over the Epic Games launcher).
I received a rather extensive email from Twitch today regarding DMCA takedowns over their service. Seeing as I haven't been able to access my Epic Games account since they 10/28/2020 launcher update (confirmed to be a compatibility issue with operating systems before Windows 10) & it's unlikely there's going to be a fix to this issue any time soon (the lack of responses on their Facebook page making it clear they have no interest in fixing it), I decided I would spend some time in addressing this email received from Twitch:
Today, we published a blog post that addresses creators' questions and concerns about the recent uptick in DMCA takedowns from music rights holders. While this may not affect you directly, it's important that every creator understands what DMCA is, how to ensure your streams don't infringe on the work of others (and what to do if they may), and what changes we're making to help make navigating DMCA (and similar laws) easier for everyone. Our full message is included below.
Creators, we hear you. Your frustration and confusion with recent music-related copyright issues is completely justified. Things can–and should–be better for creators than they have been recently, and this post outlines our next steps to get there. Moving forward, we’ll be more transparent with what’s happening and what tools and resources we’re building to help.
Copyright law and the DMCA are not small or simple topics, so this won’t be a brief post. We’ll do our best to keep the legalese to a minimum, though there’s bound to be technical terms here and there.
DMCA and Twitch
First off, a quick review of what DMCA actually is. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”) is a set of US laws that allows you to create and share content on digital service providers like Twitch. We comply with the DMCA and similar laws worldwide. Part of complying means that when a copyright holder thinks a streamer has used their content without permission, we have a process in place for them to be able to request the content be taken down.
When we receive a DMCA notification, we process the notification in accordance with our DMCA Guidelines. This includes removing the content, sharing the details with the channel owner, and tracking the allegation.
DMCA takedown notifications can affect your ability to stream because we, as part of our efforts to comply with the DMCA and similar global laws, issue and track copyright strikes and ban the accounts of those who repeatedly infringe the copyrights of others.
This policy is important because we respect the rights of all creators, including those who create or record music, as well as the rights of those who own and control copyrights. As a company that is built around a community of people who create content, we take allegations of copyright infringement seriously.
Recent DMCA notifications
How did we get to this moment? Until May of this year, streamers received fewer than 50 music-related DMCA notifications each year on Twitch. Beginning in May, however, representatives for the major record labels started sending thousands of DMCA notifications each week that targeted creators' archives, mostly for snippets of tracks in years-old Clips. We continue to receive large batches of notifications, and we don’t expect that to slow down.
This means two things: 1) if you play recorded music on your stream, you need to stop doing that and 2) if you haven’t already, you should review your historical VODs and Clips that may have music in them and delete any archives that might.
We were as surprised by this sudden avalanche of notifications as many of you were. We also realized that we needed to provide streamers with more educational programs and content management tools to help you deal with this unprecedented number of notifications coming in all at once. So, while we continued to remove content targeted by these notifications as required by the DMCA, we understand VODs and Clips from years ago may not necessarily reflect your current approach to music. Therefore, we also paused the processing of strikes associated with these batched notifications in order to give you the tools, information, and time that you would need to deal with them.
We have analyzed the notifications we received during that period from the end of May through the middle of October. What we found is that more than 99% of the notifications were for tracks that streamers were playing in the background of their stream.
The point of the DMCA is to strike a balance between the interests of rights holders (the major record labels in this case) and creators. Because of this, we were compelled to delete the VODs and Clips that were identified in the notifications. This showed our commitment to upholding our obligations under the DMCA, while affording us the opportunity to sort out the best way to handle issuing strikes in these circumstances. Under these extraordinary circumstances, we recognized creators should have a reasonable chance to understand that content created in the past was being targeted as allegedly infringing and be given an opportunity to change their approach to music use before they got hit with strikes.
This led to the current situation, which is understandably frustrating and worrying for many of you. Given the circumstances, the warning email many of you received didn’t include all the information that you’d typically get in a DMCA notification (normally, when we receive a DMCA notification against your channel, we send you an email that includes information about the allegedly infringed work, who the claimant is, how the claimant can be contacted, and possible penalties under our repeat infringer policy, so that you can make an informed decision about whether to submit a counter notification or seek a retraction). We hear your feedback about how frustratingly little information we provided, and we should have made that warning email a lot more informative and helpful.
Over the last several months, we have done our best to manage this situation on behalf of both rights holders and creators. One of the mistakes we made was not building adequate tools to allow creators to manage their own VOD and Clip libraries. You’re rightly upset that the only option we provided was a mass deletion tool for Clips, and that we only gave you three-days notice to use this tool. We could have developed more sophisticated, user-friendly tools awhile ago. That we didn’t is on us. And we could have provided creators with a longer time period to address their VOD and Clip libraries – that was a miss as well. We’re truly sorry for these mistakes, and we’ll do better.
How to avoid DMCA notifications
One important question we’ve heard from you is: how can I stream safely and confidently on Twitch without having to worry about getting DMCA notifications from music use?
Most importantly, don’t play recorded music in your stream unless you own all rights in the music, or you have the permission of the necessary rights holder(s). Doing this is the best protection for your streams going forward. If you’re unsure whether you own all the rights, it’s pretty likely you don’t. If you want to include recorded music in your stream, use a fully licensed alternative like Soundtrack by Twitch, or other rights cleared music libraries such as Soundstripe, Monstercat Gold, Chillhop, Epidemic Sound, and NCS.
While we haven’t received more than a handful of DMCA notifications targeting in-game music, if you’re playing games with recorded music in them, we recommend you review their End User License Agreements (that wall of text at the beginning of a game) to see how the terms cover streaming with that music. One way to do this is to search for a game’s official EULA online and then do a ctrl+f (Command+f on Mac) search for words like “stream,” “licensed,” and “music” to point you toward the correct sections. If you’re unsure about the rights, some games allow you to turn off music when streaming, or you can mute the game audio yourself. If neither of those apply, consider turning off VODs and Clips.
For your stream archives (VODs and Clips), right now your only options, if you think they contain unauthorized music, is to either go through them one by one, or, for Clips, use the “delete all” tool we’ve provided. We understand both of these options have downsides, and we’re working to provide you more and better options as soon as possible. These things will take time to get right, and new challenges may appear in the future. Regardless, we’re committing here and now to investing in building better tools and keeping you posted on our progress.
New products and tools
Ever since the influx of DMCA notifications began, we have been working on building new (and improving existing) tools to help creators (such as the Clips mass deletion tool). This work is still happening. Many of these changes won't be visible to the community, but we’re focused on three areas where we heard you need more support from us:
First, you don't have enough control over the recorded content on your channel. We have made improvements to enable you to mass delete Clips, but in addition, we will (1) expand the use of technology to detect copyrighted audio, and (2) give you more granular ways to manage your archive instead of just a “delete all” option.
Second, we’ll make it easier for you to control what audio from your live streams will show up in your recorded content. Soundtrack by Twitch has some of this technology built into it, and we’ll work to make it available for everyone regardless of whether you want to use Soundtrack, for which we’ve cleared all necessary rights, or music from others that provide rights-cleared music.
Third, we need to give you the ability to actually review your allegedly infringing content when you receive a DMCA notification, in addition to the details already provided in our takedown notifications - that is, information about what copyrighted work was allegedly infringed, who the claimant is, and how the claimant can be contacted. We also need to help you more easily file counter notifications if you believe you have the rights to use the content–for example, because you’ve secured a license, believe the use is a fair use, the claimant does not control the rights, or believe you have the right to use the music without permission.
Some of you have asked why we don't have a license covering any and all uses of recorded music. We are actively speaking with the major record labels about potential approaches to additional licenses that would be appropriate for the Twitch service. That said, the current constructs for licenses that the record labels have with other services (which typically take a cut of revenue from creators for payment to record labels) make less sense for Twitch. The vast majority of our creators don’t have recorded music as a part of their streams, and the revenue implications to creators of such a deal are substantial. We’re open-minded to new structures that could work for Twitch’s unique service, but we must be clear that they may take some time to materialize or may never happen at all. In the meantime, we’re focused on building tools to better help you manage VODs and Clips and providing licensed music options like Soundtrack, while we explore all options.
And just so there’s no confusion, to music creators: we pay public performance licenses in order for you to perform music live to your communities. You should also avoid using pre-recorded music, and disable VODs and Clips, unless you have the rights to the music and compositions.
Ways to stay educated
We’ve got work to do, and at the same time, we urge you to keep learning about copyrights. They are important, not only because of the issues we've covered in this post but because they are created every single day by songwriters, recording artists, authors and other creators like you. While you can take helpful steps to manage your existing content, you run the risk of getting a DMCA takedown notification whenever you use someone else's copyrights in your channel without permission.
In order to help with continuing education around this subject, we’ve added in a “Copyright and Your Channel” Creator Camp page and hosted a follow up livestream where we answered community questions live. Moving forward, our goal is to continue to provide more insight and resources to our community. Starting November 18, we’ll host the first of four additional Creator Camp live sessions. Topics will include a DMCA Overview, Musicians on Twitch and DMCA, and Copyright & Managing Your Twitch Content. These sessions will go deep with insights both from internal and third party experts, and we hope they’ll be useful for you. Be sure to follow Creator Camp to ensure you receive notifications when sessions are live. We will plan additional sessions as needed, informed by the response to those sessions and the ongoing needs of the Twitch community.
Transparency going forward
We know there are probably still many questions that we didn’t get to here. We’ve started to compile some we’ve received from the community and have drafted this FAQ. We always appreciate additional feedback, so we have created a UserVoice forum around this topic as well.
Finally, please remember to check your security settings to confirm the email associated with your account is up to date as soon as possible and allow email from dmca@twitch.tv to ensure you’re receiving relevant communication. We send reminders and notices here periodically and want to ensure you are getting the information. We’re looking forward to continuing the conversation.
So it's primarily past broadcasts & highlights that are being targeted, meaning this could be dealt with either by deleting those videos, disabling video archiving or setting your videos to subscriber-only (being unlikely they would subscribe to your channel just to hit you with a DMCA complaint).
I for one make it a habit to check my videos after a stream & delete videos that were hit with mutes, seeing as the video's purpose can become negated when the audio in a video is destroyed anyways (one of the reasons I started recording my own copies while streaming so I would have an unmuted version I could upload to my personal site if necessary). While I rarely stream music outside of the game's soundtrack while streaming a game, I've noticed that even the game's soundtrack can get hit fairly regularly (if not definite), showing that those games would almost NEVER have an archived video (always be deleted within 24 hours of a stream) because the audio would always be destroyed when muted by Twitch (those particular situations are listed in my Copyright Confusion review).
Many streamers allow song requests during their streams, which appears to be a primary problem when it comes to lawyers for music artists going after channels that are allowing their music to be played during their streams. I for one do not allow them, however it's for a different reason other than fear of a DMCA takedown; I use many of my highlights in violation reports in the games I play, so I can't risk them getting muted when voice may play a factor in the report (again, another reason why I record to my computer while streaming, so I have a backup in case an unmuted version is necessary). Unfortunately some games have their own soundtracks that can get videos muted (as can be seen in my review previously linked, games like Dragon Ball Xenoverse & Salt even had misdetections; this audio many times can't be disabled, the situation in Salt was just game audio that somehow got detected as being a track from a nature album).
The bigger question & concern I have is regarding whether the soundtracks in the games we play (that may include targeted music) is going to result in penalizations of our channels as a result of music artists that don't consider the fact that the games we are playing has the rights to play that music, the rights to stream that music should transfer from the rights to play the music if it's a part of the game's soundtrack. While I do have a little concern about this in games from series such as Saint's Row, Need for Speed, WWF/WWE Smackdown, Grand Theft Auto & so on, the real concern is in rhythm games such as KickBeat & other games with their own soundtracks. A DMCA takedown attempt would be all but guaranteed were I to attempt this in rhythm games where I'm importing my own music, this is why I don't stream them on Twitch (more because I know they will be hit with mutes after the stream is done) & usually stream them on Steam or Discord instead (of course Discord streams can only be seen by those on my Discord server, where the userbase is extremely limited anyways, don't know that anybody has actually seen them since I started doing them). I don't particularly like streaming over these other platforms because there's a limitation in customization of your stream layout (such as overlays), which is one of the reasons why I still stream KickBeat on Twitch regardless of knowing the video is going to get muted & will have to be deleted anyways (only when I have somebody come in to cause problems & I have to highlight the video to use it in a report against them does anything remain from one of those streams, but then again, this is why I started recording my own videos & not relying solely on past broadcasts), because people have accused me of cheating due to my placement in the leaderboards (which technically don't mean much when people can hack in their own scores anyways, around the top 20 users have all hacked in bogus scores), using a hand cam to show legitimate gameplay (even if the video for the hand cam did lag a little behind the gameplay).
While I don't expect anything to come out of it, Viivavantii64 insisted I should file a support ticket with Epic Games to get the issue resolved. It was a last resort, even if the expected result was going to be another dead end (the last time I attempted to create a support ticket with Epic Games regarding the frozen Recent Players list, they closed the ticket after 2 months of waiting for a response & told me to create a ticket on their support forums), I did so just to see if anything would come of it... I filed a ticket with the following details:
I have been unable to log into the Epic Games launcher since the 10/28/2020 update (and apparently I'm not the only one based on comments I have gotten on the various online publications regarding this matter), the launcher appears to be unable to connect to the your servers after that update. I have attached a screenshot of the error I am getting after attempting to log into the launcher (there is also a video version I can link if necessary). I have attempted to reinstall & even uninstall then reinstall, which has been unsuccessful; the newest installer downloaded from your site can't even connect to your servers to finish the installation of the launcher, but an older installer I had from 2 years ago (downloaded when FortniteLauncher.exe was crashing directly after clicking on Launch in the launcher, this issue continuing for 3 weeks & prevented me from getting the Rat King AR from the event store until the next birthday event) can connect to servers to "update", only resulting in the same issue you see in the screenshot after it updates. I can still log into my account through Firefox & other web browsers, but the launcher appears to not even attempt to connect to servers after the update.
After filing the ticket, I got a javascript popup stating that there would be an email with more details. I waited several minutes for the email while going over other emails & getting a few other things done around the house, it didn't look like the email was coming, so I decided it was time to start updating the boycott against Epic Games with further details. It was only after refreshing the support page that I noticed the following:
It looked like the support ticket had been auto-closed (as I stated to Viivavantii64 before when I was in his channel earlier today discussing this matter) without receiving a follow-up email... I took a screenshot of it to be added to the boycott page on my personal site.
As I was prepping to have this new information added to the boycott on my personal site, I got an email from Epic Games requesting the log files for the launcher:
Hello,
Thanks for contacting the Epic Games Player Support! My name is Mike Charlie and I'll be your Support Agent today.
I understand you've been facing connection issues at the Epic Games Launcher and I'll be glad to help you with that!
To diagnose and best assist you with your issue, we need information about your computer. Please provide the requested file below, depending on your computer type.
After you generate the requested files, please zip and attach the files in your reply to this email. We’ll review your issue and get back to you with next steps.
NOTE: Only attach a zip file with the requested files.
For Windows PC Please provide the following file listed below. See the linked FAQ for detailed steps on how to get it.
Once you reply, I'll be more than happy to continue assisting you.
Regards, Mike Charlie
I did as stated in the email respone (although the support ticket still remains closed when I look at it on their support site), we'll see what comes of this...
UPDATE: As I was still getting the information together to publish this post, I got another response stating that the zipped files needed to be in TXT format:
Hello there,
Thanks for gathering the requested information!
In order for us to check your files properly, please send them as .txt files.
Once you reply, I'll be more than happy to continue assisting you.
Regards, Mike Charlie
I find it ironic that he couldn't just do this himself, it would have been quicker & more simple that just contacting me back telling me to do it & resend them over another email response. At the very least the fact that I got a new response does tell me that they are looking at it (despite the indication on their site stating that the ticket is closed), so something is still being done about it, I'm just not going to hold my breath on it, can't wait forever for them to fix a problem that is preventing me from getting my stuff in Dauntless & Fortnite (Save the World) done (I'll already be at least 3 days behind on it even if it does get fixed today, that's not including time it's going to take to redownload the games once I'm able to connect again).
UPDATE: After sending the second set of logs & getting ready to publish this post, I decided to refresh the page with the message stating that my ticket was closed to see if the status had changed, it now reads Open:
Well I guess this is a positive sign that maybe something will be done, but I still have my doubts... We'll wait & see if anything gets done about this any time soon, I stand by my decision to continue boycotting Epic Games if this issue causes me to miss my change to get another thing in my armory that I would have been restricted to getting otherwise.
UPDATE: And once again it dropped to the Closed status after refreshing the page again. Either their status reporting on support tickets is extremely buggy on their site or they can't decide whether they are actually going to make an effort to correct this problem...
UPDATE: It became clear that the person attempting to help (if that's even accurate) doesn't know how to read the logs I'm sending him, as I received another email again asking for another form of the logs:
Hello again!
Thanks for your efforts, but I'll have to ask you to send the files as .zip or .txt please.
I'll be waiting for your reply!
Regards, Mike Charlie
I've been through the logs many times (mostly to update names on video evidence of why I have people on my Epic Games block list, those videos originally being used as video evidence in report against those individuals for various violations in games, which no longer serves that purpose in Fortnite after they removed functional reporting from Save the World) & I knew which one they needed, so I just sent them the most recent log with debugging information. Not long after I sent them the singular log (after changing the extension on the file from LOG to TXT), I found that the issue had been transferred to another support rep. (hopefully one that knew what they were doing this time).
Unfortunately I ended up getting the response that I knew I would eventually be getting, that was that they were going to make the statement that the issue was on my side:
Hello there,
Thank you for reaching out. My name is Alfa Tango and I'll be assisting you today.
I understand that you're having trouble signing in to Epic Games Launcher. As a fellow player, I understand how frustrating this can be. No worries, I'm here to help you out!
We appreciate you're patience in reinstalling the Launcher and for sending us your Launcher log. It seems that there's a connection issue with the Launcher. Kindly follow the troubleshooting steps in this link to fix connection issues in the Epic Games Launcher.
If you continue to experience the problem, kindly let em know.
Should you have any other questions or concerns, feel free to reach back. We're always here to help. Have a great day!
Regards, Alfa Tango
While I knew that the issue was with the latest update & not on my side, I attempted steps on the page that I had not attempted previously, even though I knew that I would not be able to fix this issue through my own means (as I wasn't able to fix the issue when the Rat King AR was in the event store). Additionally, I attempted another step that was not suggested, which was using the ipconfig /flushdns command to see if I could get a connection afterwards (could be possible I still need to reboot my computer after using that command, but that's not always the case, so I doubt this made any difference).
I decided it was time to make a new video showing troubleshooting I have been attempting to do to get this matter resolved:
I already knew there was a high probability that I would not be able to fix this issue on my own side even after clearing out all files, folders & registery keys on my system related to the Epic Games launcher, but I expected that if I could get it on video that the older installer was at least able to connect to their servers to download the update (unfortunately to a version that can't connect to their servers), it might expedite a fix to the Epic Games launcher (unfortunately it's pretty clear that that update will only be possible through a manual download & reinstall of the launcher, hopefully not requiring a full uninstallation of the launcher & forcing a redownload of every game that was previously downloaded when it gets uninstalled).
With this video being uploaded, I am now ready to contact back their support reps again to use it as evidence in differences between installers (specifically, the fact that the new launcher is not able to even connect to their servers to download the initial patch to complete installation, where the older installer can connect to servers to download & install the patch, but results in the same issue as if you had done a recent update from a working version of the launcher, which is my first encounter of this particular issue after the launcher patch on 10/28/2020).
UPDATE: I received a new response from them fairly quickly after sending them the reply with a link to the video, which was kind of surprising for the time of night that I sent the email & received a response:
Hi there,
Thank you so much for the clarification! You are awesome!
Now, as the next step, our Team is going to investigate your issue further and will contact you when our research is completed, or if we need more information.
Thank you for your patience in advance! It really means a lot to our Team!
We will get back to you as soon as possible!
Regards, Echo Victor
Now it's more of a matter of seeing where this goes. At the very least, it seems they are aware that the problem is not related to my system when the older installer can at least connect to do initial patching, but we'll still have to see how long it takes to have a resolution to the issue.
UPDATE: I received another email from yet another support rep which gave the indication that they still are expecting the issue is on my side:
Hey there,
This is Yankee Sierra and I will be assisting you today.
I am very sorry to hear that you are having connection issues.
Some network issues can be resolved by simply flushing your DNS. To do this please do following:
1. Click ‘Start’ button and type “cmd”
2. Right-click on ‘Command Prompt’ and select ‘Run as administrator.’ The ‘Command Prompt’ window opens with a black screen.
3. Type “netsh winsock reset” and press the Enter key.
4. Restart your computer.
5. Repeat steps 2 and 3 to re-open the ‘Command Prompt’ window.
6. Type “ipconfig /flushdns” and press the Enter key.
7. Then, type “ipconfig/release” and press the Enter key.
8. Then, type “ipconfig /renew” and press the Enter key.
Please also make sure to restart the router you are using for your internet connections.
If there is anything else I can assist you with or these steps do not resolve this issue, do not hesitate to reach out again. I would gladly help you further.
Kind regards, Yankee Sierra
It became clear that they aren't looking at their software to get the issue resolved on their side yet, so we're looking at a longer time to actually see a fix for the issue...
In my response, I got very technical, showing just how much I knew about computers, giving nearly every step I had attempted in troubleshooting this issue:
ipconfig /flushdns is a command I was already aware of & have already tried (this is actually one I have saved in my run dialog for regular use when being unable to access certain sites, sometimes it works, but most of the time it doesn't make a difference). As for the /release & /renew parameters on the ipconfig command, they always throw the "The operation failed as no adapter is in the state permissible for this operation." error when I try to use them. As for the "netsh winsock reset" command, it's not one I've tried, however attempting it still makes no difference in the connection issue of the Epic Games launcher (at least not the latest version of the launcher, this particular issue was never a problem prior to the latest launcher patch on 10/28/2020).
As for retarting the router & modem, this is something I attempted when I first started running into this problem (as well as disabling both software & hardware firewalls), nothing I have attempted or have been suggested so far has resolved this issue.
The video I provided a link to in the last email response shows that the newest version of the launcher is unable to connect even during the initial installation when attempting to patch, while an installer from 2 years ago is at least able to connect to download the patches & give a login screen after patching, but is unable to connect to servers once updated to the latest version. If an older installer is able to connect (until it's updated to the latest version anyways), this does not explain why the newest version would not be able to connect to even download a patch to finish initial installation (unless you're attempting to direct the login & download requests to another web address, which would only be a DNS issue on my side if the DNS routing was recently mapped).
I've gone through the logs I provided prior & it appears that the HTML requests are not receiving the expected response from servers (or not receiving a response at all), therefore not allowing the login to complete or patches to download with the latest version of the launcher.
I have 3 DNS servers manually assigned to my network adapter, the first one calling for the DNS server assigned to my router by using 192.168.1.1, the last 2 being Google DNS servers (8.8.8.8 & 8.8.4.4).
If necessary, I can enable a process monitor to log what the launcher is doing to determine where HTML requests are being sent to, those logs are an extreme hassle to go through however, not something I really want to deal with, but I can if necessary (I was able to determine the cause of an issue with black videos on the Unreal Engine 4 for an indie developer on Steam using this method by monitoring invalid file name requests on the game's startup, which apparently they sent to you to get fixed).
I don't have much hope in seeing a fix for this any time soon unless I do the legwork myself & use a process monitor to grab logs of where HTML requests are being sent (not that I expect Epic Games will even use them), unfortunately this is a normal trend with companies that think they have more knowledge then a customer could, but it's still painfully obvious they lack the troubleshooting skills to be providing support (even on their own software)...
UPDATE: I got another email from yet another support rep apparently taking me up on my offer to get domain logs through my process monitor
Hello there,
Thank you for the detailed update.
We will really appreciate if you can get us those logs where we can see where the HTML requests are being sent to. As you have said, it might take an extra effort, but you will really help us if you can get that information.
Please let me know if you have any other doubts or concerns. I'll be waiting for your kind reply.
Regards, Lima Alpha
Of course I didn't expect they would know what to do with them once I had them if they couldn't even do simple troubleshooting when the video shows it's a problem with the new launcher, not with older ones (until it patches up to the current version).
Almost immediately after sending that email, I got another contact from yet another support rep (or possibly 2 when you look at the greeting, going back to wanting me to provide the debug logs from the launcher again:
Hi there,
Thank you for getting back. Romeo here and I will be taking over your case today!
I udnerstand that you're having difficulties connecting to Epic Games server, allow me to look into this for you. Upon investigation, I'm unable to view the compressed file you provided due to file format restriction on my end. We are unable to browse compressed files using the format .rar. In order for me to investigate the files, please send me a .zip instead.
Hope to hear from you soon.
Regards, Romeo Delta
I'd bet money the next response states they can't read the logs again...
UPDATE: Another response going back to old steps they've already given me:
Hi there,
Thank you for providing me with those files.
If you haven't tried yet, please try to unblock all of the following ports 80, 433, 443, 3478, 3479, 5060, 5062, 5222, 6250, and 12000-65000.
To do this, follow the steps indicated on this link: https://www.epicgames.com/help/en-US/epic-games-store-c73/launcher-support-c82/how-to-unblock-ports-to-connect-to-the-epic-games-launcher-and-fortnite-a4656
If you're still getting the same result, please let me know so that I can continue assisting you!
Regards, Romeo Delta
It's clear they are going to just keep repeating steps & wasting time rather than looking at their own software or traffic logs to find the actual problem...
UPDATE: Another contact from another rep, at least they are asking for something new this time:
Hi there,
Thanks for getting back.
We appreciate that you are providing the information that we need to investigate the issue. Currently, we still need more information to provide you the best troubleshooting steps to resolve the issue.
We need the MSInfo file - https://www.epicgames.com/help/en-US/technical-support-c90/general-support-c91/what-is-a-system-information-msinfo32-file-and-how-to-generate-one-a3654
I will be waiting for your response.
Regards, Alpha Zulu
After sending them that info, I went to bed to get some sleep.
UPDATE: By morning, they sent me a new email, starting to get into steps that are difficult even for normal people, much people that have disabilities & can't even drive like myself:
Hello there,
My name is India Mike and it is really nice to meet you. I hope you are having a good day!
I
will be assisting you further with this case and I am sorry to hear
that you are still experiencing the same issue as you are unable to
successfully start and login into Epic Games launcher.
Upon
checking the provided information, it does seem like there is a
connection issue that is not allowing you to successfully start the
launcher and log into your Epic Games account. I see that you mentioned
that you have already tried all the provided solution from the official
FAQ page and that you have made sure that firewall and antivirus
software's are disabled and that correct ports are not blocked.
I
would kindly ask you to try redownloading and installing Epic Games
launcher using a different network if this is a possible option. If
possible, could you please try maybe even connecting to the mobile data
and trying to download and install Epic Games launcher to see if the
same issue will occur or you will be able to successfully download,
install and login into Epic Games launcher.
Once
you have tried this please reach back to me with some additional
information and results so I could see if this allowed you to start Epic
Games launcher or if you are still having the same issue and launcher
is being stuck at certain point.
Thank you for your patience and understanding, and for being a part of our awesome community!
I look forward to hearing from you soon!
Regards, India Mike
Originally, I just wanted to chew them out & say it wasn't possible, but I tried a few others things prior to leaving a response, one being attempting to install the launcher for the first time on my secondary (guest) computer & laptop. Both of those computers resulted in the same problem as the main computer, at which point I called my father to see if he'd be willing to let me bring my laptop over & attempt to connect through his wifi.
Later in the day, I managed to get to my parent's house to test the launcher over their internet using my laptop; as expected, I got the same result as before. It was at this point I asked my father if I could install the software on his computer to see if this would allow connection to servers through his PC; this test came out positive, which showed that the issue was an OS issue, the newest version not being able to connect if installed on older OSs. This new information was sent to Epic Games support reps over another email, pointing out that while I could connect to servers through the launcher on my father's Windows 10 computer, all my computers were Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit & that would likely explain why some of us were getting blocked by this issue. They responded again & wanted me to do something that wasn't within my ability:
Hi there,
Thank you for your response. This is Charlie, and I will be the one who will assist you from now on. I hope you're staying safe.
I'm sorry to hear that you're unable to run Epic Games Launcher properly on your own devices, and I really appreciate you letting us know what happened after you tried using your father's device and network to access the launcher.
Moving on, I would like you to please try to update your OS to Windows 7 to Windows 10 if possible. Doing so will let us know if the issue is with the OS.
Once done, please let me know if the issue persists so I can assist you further.
I'll be looking forward to your response.
Regards, Charlie November
This response just pissed me off, at this point going off at them about the boycott I had already put in place because of this technical issue that was preventing me from accessing what I had already legally purchased:
That upgrade would be money I don't have, so changing to Windows 10 would not be an option in my case. I will wait for an update to the installer that will make it compatible with my OS again. In the meantime, I will be avoiding any new purchases of any Epic Games software, definitely any more games over your platform, any other games that are designed with your technology (i.e. Unreal Engine) or any other products promoting your franchises and go back to playing/streaming to Twitch games from other platforms, as well as advising against purchases of software over the Epic Games platform until resolved. It is unlikely with this current situation that I will be able to obtain Clip in Fortnite and I do not expect the issue to be resolved before the event is over, so unless I am able to obtain her during the next birthday event (as was the case with the Rat King AR when I couldn't get the game to run), consider this boycott permanent.
I really wasn't expecting a response after that & it took them some time before they eventually did response, but again they're trying to find a way to fix (or at least stall a public boycott, not realizing I already have one published with the same details I just gave them) the launcher as it is, where it's not going to be possible to fix without a new installer to get people past the current OS restriction imposed (perhaps unintentionally) on 10/28/2020:
Hi there,
Thank you for your response.
I understand that you're unable to update your OS for now. Let me further assist you with this by giving additional troubleshooting steps.
First, I would like you to please use your own device to open the Epic Games launcher. After that, Clear your launcher's web cache by following the steps below:
1. Exit the Epic Games Launcher by right-clicking on the system tray icon in the bottom-right corner, and then click Exit. 2. Press Windows key + R and type “%localappdata%” to open a File Explorer window. 3. Open the Epic Games Launcher folder. 4. Open the Saved folder. 5. Click the webcache folder, and then delete it. 6. Restart your computer and start the Epic Games Launcher.
If you're still getting the same error after clearing your launcher's web cache, please let me know right away so I can further assist you.
I'll be waiting for your response.
Regards, Charlie November
This was something I already tried when I cleared all the files & registry keys from my main computer prior to reinstalling (which was also mentioned in the last video recorded, prior to the uninstall & reinstalls displayed in the video). Despite knowing this wouldn't work, I tried it regardless, only to run into the same problem as before...
I responded back to point out that I had already tried that & this was mentioned in the last video I linked to them (which gives a pretty good indication that they probably never looked at it). I also pointed out that regardless of doing it 2 days ago (prior to recording that video), I still attempted it, only giving me the expected result. On that note, I explained this is an OS issue that has been caused by the launcher update on 10/28/2020 & the only way it's going to be fixed is if they provide a new installer to be downloaded from their site (seeing as the launcher can not connect to servers as it is now on older OSs) & reinstall a compatible launcher for their OS from a new installer (the current version won't ever update otherwise).
UPDATE: This appears to be the final response I'm going to get from them, looking like they are ready to throw in the towel, but more putting blame on me for making the decision to end contact on this matter:
Hi there,
Thank you for your quick response.
I appreciate you letting me know that you're done performing the troubleshooting steps, and I'm sorry that it didn't work on your end. I do know how important for you to have this issue fixed, and I apologize for the inconvenience this issue has caused.
Since we've already tried all of the possible troubleshooting steps that we can perform for this issue, the last thing we can do for now is to wait for the next update for the Epic Games Launcher.
Thank you for your kind consideration and understanding, as well as your patience and cooperation, as we assist you with this.
For anything else you may need or if you have any other issues, feel free to contact us again.
Stay safe.
Regards, Charlie November
I never actually said that I was done troubleshooting, but I do know that it's not going to matter how much troubleshooting I do, this issue will not be fixed unless I'm willing to upgrade to Windows 10, that is a bigger step than I'm willing to take at this point (especially when the costs of Windows operating systems have a history of costing upwards of $200, that's money I don't have). Ultimately, the best thing I can do at this point is just to watch for an update to the installer so I can attempt to reinstall the launcher again & hope that it will be compatible with my OS in the next version. Until resolved, I'll stand by my boycott against Epic Games with the restrictions published here. If this negates me of too many things in Fortnite that I am not able to make up for because of the technical issues introduced on 10/28/2020, that boycott may never end (depending on whether there is another birthday event & whether I'm able to make up for what I lost the opportunity to gain during that time that doesn't get filled out in my armory).
At this point I will be looking to play (and perhaps stream on Twitch) other games from other platforms. Normally I provide information about the games I am streaming in the Now Playing section on my channel, however if it ends up being a game that has something to do with Epic Games (developed/published by Epic Games or developed using the Unreal Engine), I will make sure to remove pages that could result in a purchase of those games prior to streaming them. Additionally, I've replaced the !epic command on my bot used on my Twitch channel with one that details the problem with logging into their launcher & provides a link to the playlist of videos related to this particular problem, that won't be changed back to the command that gives my Epic Games display name until I'm able to access my account in a launcher compatible with my own PC again. Additionally, auto-hosting will remain off, only manual hosts will be done & only if I can verify that a game is not being run over the Epic Games platform (likely lurking those channels as well to make sure that the host gets cut if they switch to a game that fits under those guidelines, really no different than other boycotts of game companies that have been in effect for years to decades already).
After several hours of attempting to connect to servers, I decided it was time to start troubleshooting the issue. Uninstalling the Epic Games launcher & reinstalling with the latest installer from their site did nothing (it couldn't even connect to servers to complete the initial installation with the new installer), I did however find I had a backed up installer from 2 years ago (this would be when I was troubleshooting the issue back during the 3 week period the FortniteLauncher executable was crashing & the Rat King AR was on the event store in Fortnite Save the World, which I ended up missing while it was in the store as a result of that issue, only getting lucky enough to get it during the next birthday event). This old installer was at least able to connect to servers after the initial installation & updated to the latest version, but again resulted in the same issue of not being able to connect to servers after being updated.
At this point, I have republished the boycott against Epic Games as a result of the issue they have caused, this publication can be found here. Whether I remove the boycott this time around will be dependent on whether I'm able to acquire Clip or not (this is looking to be another repeat of what happened with the Rat King AR 2 years ago). If I am not able to acquire Clip, then the boycott page will remain even if the issue is resolved & only removed if I managed to acquire her during the next birthday event (provided there is another birthday event, which is doubtful when you consider the game no longer even has functional reporting anymore, the game is more likely to be killed before it sees another yearly event).
Additionally, seeing as a boycott is now active against Epic Games, I have disabled auto-hosting on my Twitch channel & will not be re-enabling it until at least the connection issue is resolved, this will be so I can prevent games developed or published by Epic Games, games run over their platform or games devevloped with the Unreal Engine from getting auto-hosted on my channel. Once the connection issue is resolved, I may re-enable the auto-hosting, but whether I allow games that have any affiliation with Epic Games to continue being hosted will be dependent on whether I'm able to acquire Clip (the new Outlander) or not. If not acquired by the end of the event, auto-hosting will be disabled again & any game published or developed by Epic Games (regardless of platform), any game being played from the Epic Games platform (regardless of developer or publisher) or any game that uses the Unreal Engine (regardless of developer or publisher) will be treated the same as I have been treating games from other boycotted companies, which means removal of those channels from my auto-host list & disabling "going live" notifications from those channels (they can be added to auto-host again later, but it's a temporary removal based on streaming of games from companies I am boycotting).
On the flip side, because this is preventing me from playing the online multiplayer games that I would be playing if not for this issue, I may started streaming to Twitch again, but those streams will be limited to single player games (due to lack of decent upload rate since the ISP switch). In each of those streams, there will be an indication as to why I'm not playing anything over the Epic Games platform (not to mention a command & auto-response set up in chat giving details why streaming of those games won't be an option if I can't even connect to their launcher, or rather, to their servers with the update they did to the launcher) until resolved (boycotted companies typically have spam filters set up on links to their sites as well, which will cause comments by thsoe viewers to get auto-purged when placed in chat).
On another note, it's been over 3 years (if not closer to 3.5) since I've gained affiliate status on Twitch & still have not been able to reach the minimum ($100) for a single cashout through Twitch (at least there's been success in this regard over Patreon). It's been determined that if what has already been gained towards the channel is negated & Twitch takes the full amount of the gain, any bonus points that were gained through subs, cheers or affiliation status gains will be revoked (this is one of the reasons I keep track of all cheers & subs I get, I've had to ban 1 person that reversed a sub after they subbed). Points that were gained through viewing or sub multipliers on subs will remain, those won't be removed, but with the revocation of bonuses for cheers & subs, this will also affect who I have on auto-host, as well as who has VIP status in the channel (not to mention this could also affect your role on my Discord server).
Outside of bonus points on my own channel, I've started becoming active with Amazon Prime (for the fast delivery & less spent on delivery costs), this means that I'll be getting prime subs I can throw around each month that I'm paying for it, which is more than I've been doing in supporting channels through just hosts, auto-hosts & lurks (lurks now being limited due to limited bandwidth after the ISP change). This won't be every month, only when I need to order more from Amazon than I think I can cover with free shipping, however I have already paid for one month & intend on another, so that will be a second prime sub I will have to toss next month (provided I haven't decided I won't need it before the next renewal period). Which channels I support is usually based on the support those channels show to my own & if Twitch does choose to revoke any gains that may have made towards my channel, that will also removal special statuses I may have previously given (let's face it, what's in my StreamElements store was acquired through my own money, I can't really be throwing that away when I'm not making anything to replace it); the points are a way to compensate the good nature of people who show support to my channel & allow me to at least be successful to some point (which so far the only success I have had was gaining affiliate with the help of 3 larger Fortnite StW streamers, no real success over Twitch itself beyond that point & 2 of those streamers no longer even stream Fortnite).
While I haven't had the option to stream games like Fortnite or Dauntless since switching to CenturyLink (not having enough upload rate since switching from Comcast after they raised my monthly bill when I moved my phone number to another service), I've still been playing it & people who have joined through my Discord have the option to join me through it if you are on my friend list (focusing mainly on V-Bucks missions & dailies; gaining Clip has become a priority after those other tasks, prehaps the first real task that has given me any reason to have interest in the Ventures mode in Fortnite StW).
Today I found that I had been logged out of the Epic Games client & was not able to log back in, despite how many attempts I made to log back in:
Video version
Because of this, I may be looking at doing a stream for games on another platform to pass the time until Epic Games can correct this issue (while streaming of online multiplayer options will not be an option until I have decent internet again, streaming of offline games is still an option & there's been a number of games on my backlog to play or complete with other games that I haven't gone back to because of spending most of my waking hours in games like Pokemon GO, Fortnite & Dauntless).
Outside of what I've been doing in my free time (gaming mostly, when I'm awake or not resting anyways), I am still dealing with the same health issues that limited my game time almost a year prior to stopping my streaming on Twitch (fully stopping on online multiplayer games when I no longer had internet capable of being able to stream those games at a decent quality without a significant hinderance on latency), something I still need surgery for to correct (which has also been put on hold due to the corona situation, so we could be looking at over a year before I get back to even normal gaming, much less streaming).
CenturyLink was going door to door in my neighborhood stating they were putting in fiberoptics lines maybe 3 or 4 years ago when I moved to this neighborhood, which I chewed them out on because at the time I had switched to Comcast due to their poor customer service (bouncing me back & forth between departments 10 times before I decided I was done with them in 2014). As of yet, CenturyLink still has not followed through with their statement of getting fiber internet in our area... When I was with CenturyLink before, they offered an upload rate of 20 mbps, now they only offer 3 upload rate (which is down from the higher priced 10 mbps upload rate I had with Comcast, but it was only 2 mbps if I didn't pay for the "boost" speeds). I am hoping that sooner or later Google Fiber will get off their butts & work towards making their service available in my area of residence, at which point I'm intending on switching to their service; this will also end the boycott I have on putting my payment information on any of their services (such as Google Play) that started when they allowed Bandai/Namco to abuse the report system to hit my YouTube channel twice over a 2 month period (the second time also being the Live page on my channel, this time being when it wasn't even active, meaning they would have had to access it by entering the address manually into a browser, which constitutes as internet stalking & harassment as far as I'm concerned).
There's a new scam going around on Discord claiming to give you a free month of Nitro benefits, I received 2 messages from this alleged bot today:
Screenshot has been edited to remove invite ID to prevent triggering it through manual entry of URL
Of course only being a month, I didn't really intend on claiming it anyways, but having experience as a Computer Technician, knowing the magnitude of those with malicious intent (and the many different methods of phishing account information, as well as through various forms of malware) & being a constant target of phone, email & messenger scams/extortion attempts, I chose to do my research on it before going any further (originally seeing the message on my Android), this thread was at the top of the search results.
If you get these messages (and it's fairly likely EVERYBODY has gotten one if you are on a fairly populated server), do NOT click on these links, block the account (block them on your server as well if possible) & delete the messages (unfortunately Discord does not give an easily accessible report function, if one at all, so the best you can do for now is to block it), maybe add your comments to the thread that's already been supplied.
Twitch recently made changes to their embedding API, which screwed up all embedded videos both on this blog & my personal site (I would suspect on other external sites as well). I've been attempting to get this fixed, but as of yet, have been unsuccessful; I may eventually just need to resort to embedding YouTube versions instead & only providing a link to the video on Twitch if chat played a part in the video in question (which is usually done anyways, so ultimately it will only be the YouTube versions being embedded or no embedded version if it hasn't been uploaded to YouTube; uploading to my personal site is another option, as well as a number of other sites I have used in rare situations, even other sites I haven't used could be used, even if I need to create new accounts for them).
Ironically, Twitch keeps making changes that drives people off to using other sites for what they cut off; first it was the PlayStation 3 & PS Vita apps (YouTube still has theirs running without problems & it's not required to stay logged out of it for it to work, only the PlayStation 4 app still remains on PlayStation systems), next it was descriptions on videos, now we're looking at recorded & live video embedding on external sites biting the dust... Shall we start making predictions on what they'll cut off next?
Shortly after making the following post to my Patreon creator page, I got an email from Patreon linking to this site. It seems that our grievances have been heard, while I'm not going to hold my breath on it, it's possible that they are going to make changes in the future to stop misdetections & false classifications as has happened in the past. I still will not be seeking to remove the misclassification of my creator page as previously stated, I will wait to see if they are going to do it themselves & show any relevance as to why I received this email. Back when I attempted to appeal the decision, I made a suggestion that non-adult content creator pages should allow specific posts to be self-flagged as adult-only so those posts would be restricted & not the entire creator account; we'll see if anything like this happens now that it's become obvious they are aware of the problems with their auto-flagging system.
One other thing to note is I did a whois on the domain for this site that has the video on it, it appears this domain was only registered in February of this year (updated March 20th), it's only now that people are coming forward that they are making it a point to state that what's happening is unacceptable & unfair to those that spend their time creating content & getting shafted by penalties as a result of faulty heuristics that will misclassify their pages & expunge them from any method that would still give them a findable existence on the web. We'll just have to see if anything happens in the near future to correct this, Patreon has made changes in the past to try to adapt for these shortfalls (some good, some REALLY bad), only time will tell...
Occasionally I streamed to Twitch from my PlayStation 3, however I recently found that I was running into an error when attempting to change the game name in my Elgato Game Capture HD software stating that I was getting a 404 error from Twitch regarding no response on the ingest server.
This particular issue might very well put the nail in the coffin in being able to continue streaming games on console systems in general (not just the PS3) until Elgato is able to fix this problem...
Up until now, I have been very adamant that Elgato was the way to go if you were going to be recording or streaming console games, but as you can see here (and apparently a number of people have been complaining about this, I found a long thread of replies with this same complaint on their Facebook page started back in 2013), I'm afraid I can't suggest Elgato as the optimal video capture device anymore, we'll just have to see if it gets fixed sooner or later... I'll give it some time to see if the issue ever gets fixed, but I am intending on publishing a negative review against Elgato if the issue doesn't get resolved after a few months. Of course this could very well be an issue on Twitch's side also, I wouldn't put it past them to have destroyed this software's streaming capabilities after what happened to the PS3 Twitch app (I suppose I can always stream console games to another site until it's fixed with Twitch)...
I ran into this a few days ago, decided to wait a few days before doing anything about it, but ultimately I determined I was going to have to record a new video to add to the Broken Twitch app playlist on my YouTube channel & re-submit the petition that was previously used to get the app fixed. On further inspection however, I found that rather than just breaking the app & not removing it from the store (as they previously did), they have actually fully removed it from the PSN store this time around, basically a big "fuck you" to all PS3 users that used to use the PS3 Twitch app... So at this point it was no longer a matter of sending a petition their way to fix it, it was more a matter of seeing if there was any way to salvage the app in it's current condition.
There is a way to bring back functionality of the PS3 Twitch app, but in order to do so, you have to remain logged out & only use it as a visitor (save a list somewhere so you search for your favorite channels & consider setting up email notifications of when they go live). You might be saying, "but I can't log out with this error locking the screen", well that's accurate, but there's still a way around it & I'm going to give steps on how to do this here.
First step is you have to remove the app from your PS3, this should be a fairly simple step for most PS3 users, just highlight the Twitch app, press ▲, highlight Delete & press X.
Remember I stated that the app had been removed from the store, so you won't be able to download it from the PSN store anymore. There is still a way you can download the app however; to do so, go to Account Management, then Transaction Management, then Download List, you will find the download for the Twitch app somewhere in this list if you had downloaded it prior on the PSN account you may be logged into on your PlayStation 3.
Once installed, you are going to need to run it, this will update (if you can call it an update in it's broken state) it to version 1.07.
After installing the update, it's going to restart the app & as you can see in the screenshot below that this will at least give some functionality to it.
This will at least give some functionality, but there will be no personalization & no ability to report channels as being logged into the app is what causes the Oops! Something wrong happened. error you were getting before (in other words, the app is still functional, but access to account data appears to have been intentionally broken...as if removal of the app from the PSN store wasn't enough indication that they are sticking to their guns on not fixing it this time around).
It's a shame that we DID manage to get it fixed shortly after submitting the petition to their suggestion boards on their instruction after we had over 100 signatures, only for it to ultimately be killed regardless of it already being fixed...
On 3/3/2020, I decided to run some tests with my new internet connection to see what I would be capable of on my encoder without causing too many problems with the games themselves (provided the game was online multiplayer). Keep in mind with my 10 Mbps upload rate with Xfinity, I was able to stream with no bandwidth problems at 3000 kbps (probably could have even gone higher). What I found was that in Fortnite, I had to lower the encoding bitrate a whopping 2000 kbps (this was a mere 1000 kbps left) to play the game without lag while streaming & the videos when I went back through them were blocky as hell (even in the recorded versions). At this point it's been determined that streaming multiplayer games while I'm stuck with this shit upload rate with CenturyLink just is not an option, however recording & uploading to YouTube is still optional (not to Twitch while uploads are tied in with premiers). On the other hand, I should still be able to stream single player games at 2500 kbps, but as it is now, I can't see streaming blocky video that nobody wants to watch is an option, I will have to wait until Google Fiber because available in my area, I can't really go back to paying over $100 per month on disability income alone with Xfinity & I wouldn't while they are still claiming there's an early-termination fee on my closed account (I was told there wasn't an active contract only 4 days prior)...
The attempt to switch to CenturyLink for the time being has
been unsuccessful, the technician not only leaving before the order had been
completed, but the modem currently is getting no connection to the internet
after recycling the power on it. Until
the order is completed, it looks like I'm still stuck with Xfinity. Using the connection I still have with
Xfinity, I spoke to 2 representatives to get this matter resolved over the phone for close to
1 hour & 36 minutes, looks like CenturyLink is still incapable of being able
to tell who is supposed to fix what & they are still bouncing customers
around like ping pong balls (this is what originally got me to switch from them
back in 2014)...
I still don't know where this is going or when I'm going to
have a stable internet connection with a new ISP, ultimately it's looking better to just
remove the boost option from my Xfinity bill & eat the lower speeds with
higher costs if CenturyLink can't get their shit in order... Most of my day today has already been wasted
with what CenturyLink has been dragging out & the installation technician
leaving with the statement of, "That's on you" when I stated we
needed to figure out why the modem wouldn't work with my router (attempting to
put the modem into bridge mode, which made the administration interface
inaccessible & an internet connection completely lost after recycling the
power).
Currently the status of streams regarding my Twitch channel
are up in the air as I'm not certain where the status of my ISP is going,
temporary or not, I can't get anything affordable that is dependable & this
is killing my ability to do anything online worthwhile... I'll give another update when I know better
where this is going, but I currently don't have anything concrete, I may end up
abandoning this switch & just lowering my speed with Xfinity to get the
bill down a bit or actually considering going with a satellite provider as a
temporary solution until I have something dependable to switch to...
On 2/27/2020, I started to get fed up with changed made to make Fortnite StW more like BR & because I needed to file a bug report anyways, I made a very detailed Feedback message to Epic Games regarding all the changes they are making to make StW more enjoyable for BR player, but as a result, are pushing away StW players that don't care for BR. This feedback message was as follows:
After the interface rehash, I've noticed that the tracking function has become near useless due to removal of the overlays that show mat availability for whatever is being tracked; the only thing "tracking" a schematic does at this point is pins it at the top of that section when you have your inventory visible. I always wanted to see this function updated to allow tracking of mats for crafted down versions of that schematic, but seeing as this overlay has been removed, I'm going to assume this function is going to be retired anyways...
I was one of the original Fortnite players, never a fan of BR, only sticking to StW. Every change that is made to StW to make it more like BR only makes me lose further interest in the mode that I stick to. One might say I am biased against BR, which wouldn't be too far from the truth; harassment from a single BR streamer rallying others to join him on his retaliation movement to a report filed against him in StW (with evidence video) on 2/19/2018 targeting any online profile of mine he can find for over 2 years would do that to anybody (and that bugger is still able to access BR today, despite my attempts to make his aimbotting activity over multiple games more visible, especially in Battle Royale; Twitch even "rewarded" his poor behavior with a Partner status). The more StW is made to be like BR, the less enjoyment I get from it & I may eventually stop playing Fortnite entirely if it goes much further.
I know that BR has a higher priority than StW does & much of what StW players say will go unheard, so as long as this trend continues, StW players will continue to stop playing the game (most of the larger StW streamers I followed for StW have already stopped playing the game or play it very minimally) & I may be following suit in the near future as long as StW continued to take functions & visual perspectives from BR, a mode I will never be able to get into because any possibility of enjoying it has been ruined by a single individual & those he recruited to do his bidding... Sooner or later the only people that will be left playing StW will be the BR players & they only care about the V-Bucks they can take from that mode to purchase BR skins, is this really what StW needs to be degraded to, a V-Buck farm for BR players?
In all honesty, I don't see this as making any difference other than maybe seeing a change in that now dysfunctional tracking function, the rest of it will likely get ignored, I would be more expecting to find myself on the receiving end of a ban for speaking my mind (that would be the end of all Epic Games purchased for me in the foreseeable future if that happened, a full boycott along with any other game that use the Unreal Engine, an engine developed by Epic Games, where they receive royalties from companies for using it in their games). I don't expect anything will happen, but I will certainly give an update on this blog if something does come out of it (or further publications on my personal site if it does turn into a full boycott).
The purpose in making this statement public is so that it doesn't go unheard, even if Epic Games chooses to ignore it & the outcome is more personally unfavorable than beneficial to pure StW players (if "pure" can even be used at this point, StW has already been tainted by BR mechanics & it just gets worse over time), at least what was said will still be heard to those with open minds & others that have also had the same discrepancies against changes to make StW more like BR.
