Why steam is a bad idea

(LyndonL) #41

Tapirs probably.

(BioSnark) #42

How do you know? It really sounds like wishful thinking.

(LyndonL) #43

I don’t know… but it’s logic. It’s not 100% of cases, but a good large percentage.

If it weren’t available to them via illicit means, I doubt that they would buy it through legitimate means. But since it is, they do. And it doesn’t cost the company any money since there is no physical media, and if they weren’t going to buy it anyway it’s not a lost sale.

I in no way condone piracy, but I’m just saying… it’s not the plague on PC that the big publishers would have you believe. They just spin that line because they want to focus their money on consoles since the market is a little bigger.

(tokamak) #44

The fact is that nobody has a clue where pirates would spend their money if there wasn’t an illegal, free, alternative.

Publishers act like each stolen copy is one lost sold copy, but of course that’ as much nonsense as saying that each pirated copy is one that wouldn’t be bought anyway.

(system) #45

I wonder what will happen if developers will get so pissed off one day and all move to cloud based gaming systems.
Let’s see how those pirates will never buy a game after that, seing there’s no way to pirate without hacking a server which we all now you can’t get away with, and there’s no hidding after that.

That being said, why do developers keep these 50-60E price tags? What’s stopping Bethesda from selling Brink at 7E for example. Lots of these guys here who never bought a game in their lives bought Bad Company 2 when on Steam sales it was only 7E. You may argue, yea, but people should have flocked and buy millions of game copies. Yea, but there wasn’t any big advertising for Steam sales was there?

(Herandar) #46

[QUOTE=Etek;265963]Look at the left side of the page, PC players: 2 526 331, Xbox: 2 762 792 PS3: 2 226 478
Even though you can have more than 1 character for one account on PC and PS3, hardly anyone does it, it’s not like having 10 characters in wow, having another character in BC2 is like reseting your stats, so not many people have more than 1[/QUOTE]

Not arguing your point here, but the numbers listed are misleading. Any player that logs on to play online is not automatically updated to the third party stats website. And I think it is rather logical that a greater percentage of PC players go to the website (it currently takes about six hours for the PC player stats to update, and about 10 seconds for console players) to check their stats.

The following is accurate (updated about 21 minutes ago), pulled from the BFBC2 website’s global stats pages:

Total Hours Played:
360 - 109.0 million
PS3 - 104.3 million
PC - 78.6 million

(Herandar) #47

The large market of people that will pay the full price, probably.

(BrigandSk(A)) #48

I’m still convinced that if I don’t have internet connection I will be able to play Brink if I have the box DVD original that comes along with a steam installer.

(Herandar) #49

You have 112 posts here. You have an internet connection.

(tokamak) #50

It’s not about the distribution, developers will try to reinforce the online connection, making the offline content less and less viable/fun to players.

(CVIChEK) #51

Well, my thread got derailed again.
Now, I didn’t know bout the offline capabilities, but I thought you need net to play, as I once tried to play portal and I couldn’t log onto steam. So don’t call me an idiot.
I have internet, but once, I was at my grandparents for a week and their net went out for some reason. All I had was bloody Crysis and I was so bored after completing it, I started playing on delta using only my fists (I made it to when the alien freezes the doc and the guards, then stopped since I went home).
And about the crashes and stuff like that, yes it happens. I mean, it’s developed by valve. I could not play 5 rounds in a row of tf2 before I got kicked out. I couldn’t complete alien swarm since I got kicked out. I couldn’t even bloody chat! And I wasn’t the only one, most people on my friends list or that I knew had similar problems. And my net is fine, Wolfenstein Enemy Territory and other online stuff worked without problems. Just steam and steam only.

(n0guns) #52

[QUOTE=wazups2x;265912]Never had a problem with crashes and I’ve only had a couple times where Steam servers have been offline.

And no, you do not need to be connected to the internet to play singleplayer. Steam has an offline mode that allows you to play without an internet connection.[/QUOTE]
but you still need stream to play the game if you ordered it off stream

(BrigandSk(A)) #53

I’m sure the DVD will have the steam installer inside.

(SockDog) #54

Steam has an offline mode. If there is no net connectivity I believe it give you the option to switch. If you know you’re going offline you select it in the menu and restart steam to play without net connection.

Obviously any online functions at that time wouldn’t work but I’ve yet to hear of a game that won’t run in offline mode after it’s been installed and played at least once (downloading doesn’t count as steam activates and installs the game proper on first run not download).

While I know Valve isn’t a perfect company don’t you think it a little dubious that the issues you are having aren’t seen by a vast majority of other users? PCs do suffer from weird quirks that can cause crashes, it’s not something unique to Steam or Valve games although people seem to enjoy holding them up to a higher standard than any other software company.

In my experience Steam has been a pretty solid platform and certainly wouldn’t be labelled as buggy or system damaging.

@Apples. I regularly fondle Steam’s naughty bits with my dollars but I get what you mean. I’d hope they see the value of a free platform and use licensing/publishing to keep it going. But your point is totally valid, They may sell or change direction and charge a fee for features. hell I have so much software on there right now I’m pretty much locked in already. Given past history I treat all digital purchases as things I may lose at some point.

(SockDog) #55

AFAIK steam games all come in encrypted installation packages. They need to be decrypted when you first run the game and that is the part that requires you to be online.

(DonkeyDong) #56

[QUOTE=wazups2x;265912]Never had a problem with crashes and I’ve only had a couple times where Steam servers have been offline.

And no, you do not need to be connected to the internet to play singleplayer. Steam has an offline mode that allows you to play without an internet connection.[/QUOTE]

Actually, it takes the internet to startup. But if startup fails for internet you can then start offline mode. Maybe what would be nice is to share with people a method to launch steam in offline mode right from the shortcut.

I found this link. Would probably help people confused on the requirement of starting up in offline mode.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=3160-agcb-2555

(DonkeyDong) #57

[QUOTE=Etek;265945]Liar liar, pants on fire!
Crashes? Are you stupid? I’ve NEVER had crashes related to steam, connectivity issues? It’s steam problem you live under a rock? You don’t need an internet connection to play the game once you activated it (once).

Posts like yours make me think stupidity should be illegal and punishable by death.

[/QUOTE]

Posts like yours make me think you’re not only stupid but should be put to death for wasting all our tax money, air and natural resources.

He has a problem and he has an angle to resolve it. And if you google how to accomplish it
https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=3160-agcb-2555
you’ll find this will satisfy his very need without affecting you and how you play.

All I gotta say is wow. So what is someone is a minority. Figure out how to help him without phasing you should be the intention of the thread.

Flamers should be put to death. Or moderators should do the job of preventing posts like his making it up and continueing. Why not nurture people not the opposite.

(Herandar) #58

[QUOTE=DonkeyDong;266101]Posts like yours make me think you’re not only stupid but should be put to death for wasting all our tax money, air and natural resources.

Flamers should be put to death. Or moderators should do the job of preventing posts like his making it up and continueing. Why not nurture people not the opposite.[/QUOTE]

You say that like you’ve never had an ignorant post before…

[QUOTE=DonkeyDong;262666]Ya right! you guys are all going to be using noob-tubes (grenade launchers)…

On that note, I wish they had a pub-mode that eliminates all spammy weapons, ie, rockets, grenade launchers, and limits the use of heavy machine guns or LMG’s. Hence it’d be closer to a competitive mode, which would allow players who wish to ascend past the level of one hit kills and “those kind” strats.

I only put it out like that because it’s true that many times when I played quake wars or still play bad company, I hate pubbing because of the lack of re-playability. The only satisfaction I get no a days (sad to say) is playing comp in bad company because pubbing just makes me feel dumber.[/QUOTE]

(beute) #59

Steam is no longer a DRM.
It’s a platform, a service.

I try to get all my games on steam, it’s an awesome all in one service and I honestly cant see a single problem with it.

The best thing about it is that you never have to install your games, just download and play.
Ingame friends list, ingame browser, cloud storage for save files/settings and screenshots, all games just one click away.

I always have to reinstall non steam games as they require the registry entries that got deleted by formating your windows drive.
Steam doesnt need them, If you start it, it automatically makes a new entry and all your games are playable.

awesome awesome service and Im happy that splashdamage chose steam.

on the other hand there is GFWL, now that is some pretty ****ed up **** and here some people concerns are legit.
Microsoft tried it once to charge people for using GFWL and and they will do it again.
If they ever manage to aquire a fanbase as big as steams, they will charge instantly.

(BioSnark) #60

since you bring that up again, it seems lot of people in that thread missed the sarcastic tone in “Ya right! you guys are all going to be using noob-tubes (grenade launchers)…”