[quotemstr]

> Games avoiding the Windows API and performing system calls directly is an increasingly common occurrence by modern Windows games, seemingly in the name of Digital Rights Management schemes and similar protected modes.

Yuck. Windows system call numbers are not contractual. At all. Microsoft should try harder to kill any code outside ntdll.dll that makes a system call. It's obnoxious for a developer to deliberately use unstable interfaces and then demand indefinite compatibility.

[lxgr]

> demand indefinite compatibility.

Not infinite – long enough for the game to bring in most revenue is enough.

Who cares that it stops running one or two Windows updates later for totally avoidable reasons? Definitely not the publisher. (In fact, isn't it about time for an HD remaster again?)

[quotemstr]

Microsoft cares, though, because if a game stops working when you upgrade Windows, you blame the Windows upgrade, not Microsoft. So now Microsoft has to maintain these legacy system calls even though they never signed up to do that.

[ronsor]

Microsoft does not. This is the one area where they don't compromise: system call numbers regularly change between Windows builds.

[int0x29]

There is now at least one public windows kernel call listed on MSDN: __fastfail

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/cpp/intrinsics/fastfail?vi...

[quotemstr]

I'd call that a special ABI feature, not a stable system call. Note that it's a software interrupt, not a regular SYSENTER. But sure. Maybe I'm splitting hairs.