The Discord Store global beta launches today

The Steam-like Discord Store launches its global beta today, so everyone can try it out.

Discord's store cupboards are nowhere near as full as Steam's - there are only around 20 games to straight-out buy - but there are some nifty initiatives which make Discord stand out. These are First on Discord, Discord Nitro and Universal Library features.

First on Discord is what it sounds like: games with timed exclusivity to Discord. The handful of signed games aren't juggernauts but do include Bad North, which Christian Donlan Recommended in his review.

• Sinner: Sacrifice for Redemption (Another Indie)
• Minion Masters (BetaDwarf)
• Bad North (Raw Fury)
• At Sundown (Versus Evil/Mild Beast)
• King of the Hat (Hyroglyphik Games)
• Last Year: The Nightmare (Elastic Games)

Discord Nitro, meanwhile, is like Netflix, or the Xbox Game Pass: a subscription service which gives you access to a catalogue of games for a monthly fee. Discord recently announced it was bumping the price of Nitro from $5 to $10 a month, to reflect the growing number of games available with it. There are only 50 games there but some good ones nonetheless.

• This War of Mine
• Last Day of June
• Ticket to Ride
• RollerCoaster Tycoon 2
• 140
• Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun
• Pony Island
• Lost Horizon
• Metro: Last Light redux
• Unleash
• Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition
• Brutal Legend
• Psychonauts
• The End is Night
• Seasons After Fall
• SOMA
• Trine 2
• Trine 3
• Trine Enhanced Edition
• Slime-San
• The inner World
• Bridge Constructor
• Bridge Constructor Medieval
• Dead Age
• Risk of Rain
• Wasteland 2
• The Metronomicon: Slay the Dance floor
• TowerFall Ascension
• Nidhogg
• System Shock: Enhanced Edition
• System Shock 2
• Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty
• Out of the Park Baseball 18
• Hob
• Torchlight
• Torchlight 2
• Inside
• Limbo
• Monaco: What's Yours Is Mine
• Tooth and Tail
• Dandara
• Gonner
• Kathy Rain
• Kingdom: Classic
• Kingdom: New Lands
• Tormentor X Punisher
• Chaos Reborn
• Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation
• Galactic Civilizations 3
• FTL
• Super Meat Boy
• Super Hexagon
• VVVVVV
• de Blob 2
• de BlobSpellForce 2
• Darksiders 2 Deathfinitive Edition
• Darksiders Warmastered Edition
• Red Faction 1
• Dungeon Defenders

Subscription-based game-streaming services are on the rise. It's in streaming we may see the next big battleground in gaming, with Microsoft and Google already investing heavily in it. Forget OnLive and Gaikai, this could be the real thing.

Anyway! Discord's Universal Library is a feature which launches any game on your computer - handy, given increasing amount of launchers (Epic, Battle.net, Steam, GOG, etc.) out there now.

Could we, in Discord, be about to see the rise of the next major gaming platform? There's certainly already a large community there.