Unified Game Library Manager for External Drives

Niche Market Analysis

The user's post highlights a common frustration for many PC gamers: managing a large game library on a device with limited primary storage, especially on laptops. The user is looking for an external drive as a "cold storage" solution, manually copying games back and forth. This manual process is time-consuming, error-prone, and inefficient.

SaaS Opportunity: A Game Storage Management Utility

This is a clear opportunity for a dedicated desktop application that automates the process of archiving and restoring games across different drives and launchers.

• Product Form: A desktop utility for Windows (and potentially macOS/Linux) that acts as a unified game library manager focused on storage.

  • Core Feature 1: Universal Game Detection: The tool would scan the system to find all installed games from major launchers (Steam, Epic Games Store, GOG, EA App, Ubisoft Connect, Battle.net, etc.), presenting them in a single dashboard.
  • Core Feature 2: One-Click Archiving: The user can select an installed game and click "Archive." The software automatically moves the game's files from the fast internal drive to a designated external storage drive. It also updates the original launcher's files to know the game is no longer "installed" in its original location, preventing errors.
  • Core Feature 3: One-Click Restoration: When the user wants to play an archived game, they select it from the utility's dashboard and click "Restore." The software moves the files back to the original primary drive and, crucially, updates the necessary launcher configuration files (e.g., Steam's appmanifest_*.acf) so the launcher recognizes the game as installed and ready to play, without needing a lengthy "verify files" or re-download process.
  • Advanced Feature: Symlinking: For advanced users, the tool could offer an option to use symbolic links (symlinks), allowing a game to be "played" from the external drive while the launcher still believes it's on the internal drive. This is less ideal for HDDs but works well for external SSDs.

• Target Audience: Any PC gamer, from casual to hardcore, who has a primary SSD smaller than their total game library size. This is especially relevant for laptop users and those with smaller, high-speed NVMe drives for their OS.

• Expected Revenue Model:

  • Model: A one-time purchase for a lifetime license is the most suitable model for a utility like this. A subscription would be hard to justify unless it included ongoing cloud services.
  • Price Point: A price of $19.99 - $29.99 would be a reasonable impulse buy for someone looking to solve this persistent annoyance.
  • Potential Revenue (Illustrative): The PC gaming market is vast. If we estimate a conservative addressable market of 5 million gamers who regularly face this storage issue, capturing even a small fraction (e.g., 0.5% or 25,000 users) would result in significant revenue.
    • Calculation: 25,000 users * $24.99 = $624,750
  • This is a strong niche opportunity because it solves a technical, recurring problem with a simple, user-friendly software solution.