Your thoughts on Steam

LLBDTiberio

LLBDTiberio

LLBDTiberio

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Joined
8 Jan 2007
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Glasgow
Hi everyone,
didn't think this belonged in the GD so if i'm wrong please move ;)

What is everybody's thoughts on Valve's steam program, is it good/bad, has it influenced your gaming for good/worse?
After having read this article I ended up thinking about Steam and how it's changing the way some of us game.
But I would argue that the implementation of Steam is pretty good as it allows independant developers to have a big medium in which to reach players, Introversion are one of the hottest independant developers at the moment solely due to Steam's distribution of their games.
What I've found brilliant is for example updates to the games you have, Steam updates your games automatically and I love that because i'm a lazy git. :D
What does everybody else think?
 
I like steam.

Advantages:

- Easy to update
- Easy to purchase new games in a safe environment
- Most of your games can be accessed instantly in one window

Disadvantages:

- Problems gaming offline
- The lack of reduced prices for games

It certainly beats WON :)
 
I think Steam are heading in the right direction, they have the ideas there, they keep it free and fun, what more could you ask for......

They could do it the wrong way and start doing things how EA or MS do things... i for one support Steam and their efforts.
 
only problems i see atm are:

its very pedantic about offline play
security might still be questionable after that credit card thing
 
I'm a big fan - I often lose CD keys and stuff so not to have to worry about that is a Good Thing. It was a bit ropey when it started out but now I'm very grateful for it.
EA Link on the other hand...grrr.
 
The only thing I don't like is the offline mode thingy. I only use it for Half Life related games so can't really comment on anything else.
 
I think it's a good idea, and it seems to work in practice a lot of the time. But I think there are security problems. I had my entire steam account stolen. It had maybe up to about £70 worth of games on it. They refuse to reactivate my account since whoever stole it used it with a stolen cybercafe account. I still don't have a clue how they got my password.
 
I love steam. Keeps all my hands in a handy to use system. I can see what friends are playing, chat to them and join their server.

Plus, if I lose a disc I can just start steam and it will download the game.

IMO Xfire sucks. In my experience there's always problems getting it to work with different games.
 
weringo said:
Its good for online games, but games like half life 2 you should NOT need to have steam for.
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yes they should, its designed to hinder piracy, and as far as im aware this is happening. Perhaps if there was less piracy then more games companies would be able to stay afloat and not decide to sell up.

I for one am for it, however, the prices of the games are a joke. £20 for a game that you can get for a tenner in the shops. People say its because of convenience, however, i can get in the car, drive the the nearest games shop (25 miles), buy it and get back for less cost, and in a fraction of the time it takes to download.
 
MNuTz said:
yes they should, its designed to hinder piracy, and as far as im aware this is happening. Perhaps if there was less piracy then more games companies would be able to stay afloat and not decide to sell up.
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They should think of ways to prevent piracy without inconveniencing the user.
 
The problem with piracy on Steam is that it's often more like theft. Due to 'piracy' I can no longer play the games I paid for. I have a boxed copy of HL2 which is now completely useless as the serial key has been disabled.
 
weringo said:
They should think of ways to prevent piracy without inconveniencing the user.
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how does it?

I bought HL2 from the shop, installed it and steam, verified HL2 was authentic and started playing. I can play in online or offline mode and had no trouble with it at all. In fact its been easy really because i havent got to hunt around for updates, all the mods i want are easily accessible through steam.

Other than having to authenticate it at the first install, whats the problem?

Psyk said:
The problem with piracy on Steam is that it's often more like theft. Due to 'piracy' I can no longer play the games I paid for. I have a boxed copy of HL2 which is now completely useless as the serial key has been disabled.
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This does seem to be a problem with it, however, if you keep emailing them with photos of the box, instructions, serial key and CD then they should provide you with a new serial for it.
 
MNuTz said:
This does seem to be a problem with it, however, if you keep emailing them with photos of the box, instructions, serial key and CD then they should provide you with a new serial for it.
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No they won't. My case is quite unique because the person who stole my account used it for more serious "crimes". They probably just think I did it myself and there's nothing I can do to prove otherwise unfortunately.
 
Psyk said:
The problem with piracy on Steam is that it's often more like theft. Due to 'piracy' I can no longer play the games I paid for. I have a boxed copy of HL2 which is now completely useless as the serial key has been disabled.
Click to expand...
Why has it been disabled? If you own HL2 with the official box / CD key then there is no reason you can't play it.
 
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