Just got the beta today, very cool. Was a little dismayed when i saw that a ‘My Documents/My Games’ had been created. Please don’t do this. It’s MY documents, i organize it and put what i want in there. I can’t stand when other programs think they can just go dumping whatever they want in there. Plus, it’s not needed; there are at least two alternatives that are user specific (Application Data and Local Settings, both under the profile), easy to find, yet don’t clutter up a directory i spend all my time in.
As far as I can see, My Documents/My Games is the place where most games store their things. IMO, it makes backing up save games a lot easier.
The following games on my system use My Documents/My Games:
Civilization IV
Company of Heroes
Dawn of War 2
Demigod
GSB
Titan Quest
There are also a number of games that are less neat, they use My Documents:
Sacred 2
Call of Cthulu
Dungeon Siege
Heroes of Newerth
Osmos
Savage 2
Stronghold Crusader
Hinterland
Application Data is used by:
Nation Red
Magic Online III
Local Settings seems to be used for options, cache data and things like that.
This is just to show that GSB is taking the normal/accepted route of using My Documents/My Games. I’m happy Cliff chose for this.
This is what Microsoft insist we do, especially under vista. from the directx SDK:
CSIDL_PERSONAL
C:\Users\user name\Documents
Read/Write
Read/Write
Per-User
User-specific game files that are read and modified and can be manipulated outside of the game context.
Screen shots. Saved game files with a file extension association.
I agree it’s messy, which is why I copy company of heroes et al, and use the completely undefined ‘MyGames’ folder. I’m just trying to put stuff where I think most people would look for it, which seems to be where other game developers are putting it.
Good ol’ Microsoft, schizophrenic as always. First they tell you to put application-specific data in [User]/AppData/[AppName], then they turn around and tell you to put similar stuff under My Documents. It’s no wonder half the companies just put stuff where they feel like it.
I agree that putting things in My Documents makes it cluttered, but it also means it will get backed up, since most things under AppData can’t be / shouldn’t be backed up. It’s probably a good idea to have this info somewhere under My Documents – as long as whatever directory it finally ends up in is clearly named.
Grrr. This is a pet peeve of mine, too. Why not just put saves in the game directory? It’s data associated with that game, put it with everything else related to the game! Cripes. It’s not that hard to know where to go looking. I dunno, maybe that’s just the MS-DOS legacy still at work in me; I like to keep my filesystem nice and neat, everything compartmentalized in its own directory.
On a related note, I loathe the whole “My Documents/My Pictures/My Music/My Scrapbook/My Fanfiction” nonsense altogether. It’s my Goddamn computer, obviously they’re “My” documents. STOP AUTOMATICALLY CREATING STUPIDLY-NAMED DIRECTORIES, WINDOWS! I NEVER USE THEM. All part of the dumbing-down of computer interfaces. Heaven forfend that someone should have to learn how to organize their files themselves, we’d better implement some stupid one-size-fits-all scheme and make everybody use it.
Ahh. I feel better.
i can tell you don’t have multiple users using your computer… or have had to find game saves from multiple histories of upgrades. the day people started using the user profile area for game state information was a good one.
oh … and don’t even go into the problems you can have when you use a sane computer - that’d be one that doesn’t grant write access to everything. there are good reasons why programs shouldn’t assume write access to their install directories!
You can’t actually go putting stuff in the app directory any more, because ‘limited user’ accounts have issues writing to or in some cases even reading from that directory. It’s a mess isn’t it 
To be fair to Microsoft, they have been lecturing people to use My Documents for this stuff since XP. They didn’t start enforcing it till vista though.
I think the move for a central repository of user based data was a good one, certainly makes doing backups more convenient and yes allows for far better multi-user capabilities. This is definitely not a bug and as a gripe its weak, ‘my documents’ and its children are pre-defined folders meant for these sorts of things and not nearly as personal as OP suggests.
See I just keep this folder hidden until I need it
Would it be possible to let us switch it in the options, and just default it to the My Games folder like it is now?
Not sure if you’re willing to use Vista/Win7 APIs, but CSIDLs have been replaced by Known Folders, and one of the new KNOWNFOLDERIDs is for saved games.
Using that would be much nicer then cluttering up the Documents folder :). Though since it’s for saved games only, the preferences and downloaded stuff should probably go in the Local App Data folder.
FOLDERID_LocalAppData
GUID {F1B32785-6FBA-4FCF-9D55-7B8E7F157091}
Display Name Local
Folder Type PERUSER
Default Path %LOCALAPPDATA% (%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local)
CSIDL Equivalent CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA
Legacy Display Name Application Data
Legacy Default Path %USERPROFILE%\Local Settings\Application Data
FOLDERID_SavedGames
GUID {4C5C32FF-BB9D-43b0-B5B4-2D72E54EAAA4}
Display Name Saved Games
Folder Type PERUSER
Default Path %USERPROFILE%\Saved Games
CSIDL Equivalent None, new in Windows Vista
Legacy Display Name Not applicable
Legacy Default Path Not applicable