If you blinked for longer than usual between June 22nd and today, June 23rd, you might have missed Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader having a shiny new launcher fitted to it and that new launcher subsequently being taken right back off again. In between those two points was a loud chorus of boos from players keen to not have to deal with yet another launcher.

"Introducing the Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader Launcher" the studio announced via Steam post on Monday. "We are Rolling Back the Launcher" the studio announced via a follow-up post today. In between the two were about 1800 comments in response to the first post, which has zero likes in case you were wondering how news of the launcher's arrival went down.

While it was around, Owlcat's launcher was along similar lines to those of other publishers. An extra layer full of news and updates about Owlcat's various games, with the studio having decided they need such a thing in order to try and avoid their games getting lost in the constant noise of a packed medium. "For example, according to our research, a surprisingly large portion of the Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous audience who express a clear desire to play a ‘similar CRPG’ have never even heard of Rogue Trader," they wrote.

Anticipating that "some launchers as a thing could be clumsy and annoying" and being aware of "how people often react to certain products of this kind", Owlcat aimed to make the launcher "as seamless and lightweight as possible" and avoid bothering folks with the likes of mandatory registration. You could even opt out of it altogether by heading to its settings and unchecking a box to go back to launching the game directly.

In the end, that opt out button's been verbally hammered so hard by players that Owlcat have already opted to roll the launcher back entirely into whichever cupboard it came from. "Lord Captains, we hear you and we are rolling back the launcher," they wrote in the short follow-up post. "The game will now revert to the previous patch, completely removing any Launcher-related changes. Thank you for your feedback, and genuinely sorry for the frustration caused."

To be fair to them, the studio had claimed in the initial post that they'd listen to any feedback and have moved to act on the barrage of anti-launcher sentiment very rapidly. Understandably, that move's gone down well, though a few of the commenters on the follow-up post have let the power go straight to their heads, with one very reasonably demanding the studio fire the staff responsible and delay any other games they've got due out in the next 12 months.

Regardless, farewell Owlcat Launcher, we barely knew ye.