In the past, games were often plug-and-play affairs, with minimal downtime between the time in which one would press play, and they would get into the game. However, things have gotten much more complicated. One should not demonise this perceived complexity, as this is the cost for all the advanced graphics, sounds, and gameplay that one has gotten so used to. It is genuinely hard for some people to get into retro games these days because of the polish of modern games. However, these proprietary launchers sometimes break and require steps like undertaking a vcruntime140.dll download for their proper functioning.
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Why Launchers?
Launchers serve several purposes. Games have gotten increasingly complicated in time, also having a huge community component. Some launchers such as that in Valorant just serve to act as an Account Getaway, where you log in and make sure that the game is working with your account, settings, and customisations in mind. In some cases, launchers are necessary because of different versions of the game, this can be because of a difference between “Live” and testing versions of the game such as different alphas and betas. Alphas and Betas refer to test versions of games, where either gameplay features may be being sampled, or a new tech is being developed in isolation with the release branch. Branch in this context refers to different versions of the game, each in different stages of work, such as a speech, or a medicine. In such a scenario, the launcher aims to be a one-stop shop where different versions can be configured and run with minimum hassle and inconvenience for the end-users. One may easily jump from the test branch to the live branch with zero hassle.
In some cases, and at least in older games, launchers are also used to serve as hubs where different game settings could be changed. This was a convenience factor as well as one having some technical advantage. In several games, changing settings in the game required a restart after changing them, resulting in extra time spent. With the launcher, changes can easily be made, without any disruption, and one can smoothly jump in the game to try it out. These settings can consist of several audios, and video customisations that the end-user can make per their tastes and preferences.
Launcher Troubleshooting
However, often these launchers are extremely proprietary software, which means that there is a good chance that they may not play well with every configuration of a system in existence. This means that in live cases, there will be a lot of cases where the launcher doesn’t boot properly. These can be mostly solved in two ways :
(i) Administrator settings
Lots of times, launchers do not boot up properly because they don’t have the authorisation to run with admin privileges and accordingly be able to make changes in the system. By default, they do not have these permissions. The solution to this is simple, right-click on the application before launching, and select Run as Administrator, and the issue should be resolved
(ii) vcruntime140.dll download
In some cases, these proprietary launchers require specific prerequisite files to run and give errors regarding such files when attempting to launch them, such as vcruntime140.dll, which does not come installed as standard with every system from the get-go. Hence, one needs to initialise a vcruntime140.dll download from your preferred website and put the specific file in the system folder and the root folder of the application launched. This will also solve the issue in case the admin idea fails.