lhelper VS itch

I have made my own tool to solve this problem:

https://github.com/franko/lhelper

It is currently used by nobody except me but it serves me well.

Its strong points are:

- it works on macOS, Linux and Windows

I agree, for their use case they should have linked to SDL2 as a static library. It was the best option instead of patching the binary with patchelf.

I think many developers don't know about static libraries. For some reason they think they have to use a shared libraries. This is probably due to many tutorial saying something like: download the SDL2 library from there, it is provided as a shared library, here the instructions to use it with Visual Studio.

The way I do is with static libraries, I ship a single executable, all the third-party libraries are linked in as static libraries. The only dynamic libraries the exectuable will use are the standard libraries that are part of the OS.

I do this very easily with the help for lhelper:

https://github.com/franko/lhelper (I am the author)

that has recipes to build many libraries including SDL2. It builds the library on you system using your compiler and your settings. By default it will build static libraries so you don't have to bother distributing additional dynamic libraries.

Itch has their own app and so I presume they want folks using that instead of rolling their own.

Man, I can't even get the itch client to launch normally anymore. It just quits. This nonsense: here and here.

ITCH.IO: -Install Itch.io launcher: https://itch.io/app (just download and run the installer) -WORKAROUND: Itch.io launcher not working on gaming mode: https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/ufr30h/itchio_app_in_gaming_mode/ -WORKAROUND: Itch.io doesnt allow you to install Windows games through Wine/Proton: https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/tynrsh/installing_windows_games_via_the_linux_itchio_app/ -If you still have problems with thr launcher you can download the games from the web browser or use a PWA to download the games ans then manually add them to steam ans use some tool like BoilR, SteamGridDB Decky Plugin or SGDBoop.

Then, depending on the game it may not open unless you move it out of the downloads folder. You might also have better luck using the itch app: https://itch.io/app

Many of the games under the category of “web” on itch io arent mobile or browser friendly. The exceptions are the pico 8 games and the few developers that take the time to make proper browser bindings and use supported webgl. If they dont inherintly make it run with wasm, try this https://itch.io/app

You can download it with https://itch.io/app , then you can resume the download. :3

itch.io does have an official launcher: https://itch.io/app

Itch.io is cool, but I just installed Xubuntu 22.04.1 and now the itch client crashes on launch. That's almost a year old. Just recently I made a comment about how "if itch can make a functional launcher for Linux, so can GOG!" Well. Stupid I have to launch a program from the terminal and not be able to use sandboxing.