Your thoughts on Steam

MNuTz · 12 May 2007 at 18:48

DaveyD said:
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.

sounds like someone stole his login details, or cheated on his account so they have banned it.

molinari · 12 May 2007 at 18:50

So do I need Steam to play Half Life 2??
If I buy Half Life via Steam, how big is the download file??

Memphis · 12 May 2007 at 19:02

molinari said:
So do I need Steam to play Half Life 2??

Yes.

Armadillo · 12 May 2007 at 19:16

I'm not fan of steam , the crap with hl2 when it came out was so annoying. Buy the game , get it home , can I play it? , no as steam has died and sits on awaiting activation for an hour or so before it finally decides to let me play and gives me the electronic receipt thing.

System goes down like it did a few months back and you can't play any games including single player as it won't authenticate , which then will screw offline mode.

Finally I don't like the fact that if you want to play more than one of your games at same time you have to split them to two accounts. Have say CSS and DODS on an account and want to play css while your brother plays dods , can't do. Will get steam account in use in another location and get kicked. Two totally seperate games , but can only play one unless you split to two accounts

.

Will_3rd · 12 May 2007 at 19:23

never had any problem with itself gaming wise, only played HL2 with it

Weebull · 12 May 2007 at 19:33

As a system itself, I actually quite like Steam. It's a novel concept, and bar the offline problems (which shouldn't happen at all), it's been fine for me.

Valve do annoy me a bit with what they do with it at times though. I still dislike the insistense on adverts in my game, and I don't get their love of complicated pricing and packages for their own games.

Azagoth · 12 May 2007 at 19:44

Don't like it myself! Mainly because it won't allow me to play HL2 offline. For some reason it always wants me to connect to the interweb first!

MNuTz · 12 May 2007 at 19:46

Armadillo said:
Finally I don't like the fact that if you want to play more than one of your games at same time you have to split them to two accounts. Have say CSS and DODS on an account and want to play css while your brother plays dods , can't do. Will get steam account in use in another location and get kicked. Two totally seperate games , but can only play one unless you split to two accounts .

Thats because its illegal.

You are only allowed to install the game on one PC at a time, which means, you should only be playing one game at a time.

You are not even supposed to lend games to people.

JIM_BOB7813 · 12 May 2007 at 20:00

I don't like how you get forced to view the advert page when starting it up. You used to be able to make it startup directly to the mini games list.
Adverts in-game while loading MP servers are annoying too.

Hamoodii · 12 May 2007 at 20:03

was bit annoying when HL2 came out but now is very stable and I quite like it

Psyk · 12 May 2007 at 20:05

MNuTz said:
sounds like someone stole his login details, or cheated on his account so they have banned it.

Yeah thats basically what happened. Except they didnt cheat, they used it with a stolen cybercafe account. Its to do with how cybercafes play steam games, they have an account for the cafe and players use their own login details to play on them, or they can use accounts provided by the cafe if they dont have their own. For some reason someone decided to steal my account to use on a cybercafe account they had previously stolen. It took me ages to figure out thats what had happened because steam support werent very forthcoming because they assumed I knew what happened because I did it myself.

MNuTz · 12 May 2007 at 20:26

Psyk said:
Yeah thats basically what happened. Except they didnt cheat, they used it with a stolen cybercafe account. Its to do with how cybercafes play steam games, they have an account for the cafe and players use their own login details to play on them, or they can use accounts provided by the cafe if they dont have their own. For some reason someone decided to steal my account to use on a cybercafe account they had previously stolen. It took me ages to figure out thats what had happened because steam support werent very forthcoming because they assumed I knew what happened because I did it myself.

i seem to remember the thread, you lost a load of games as well didnt you?

I would just keep emailing them, writing to them. After all, they probably imagine that if you quit harassing them that you are guilty. No way of legal action against them?

weringo · 12 May 2007 at 20:29

MNuTz said:
Thats because its illegal.

You are only allowed to install the game on one PC at a time, which means, you should only be playing one game at a time.

You are not even supposed to lend games to people.

Well then what if you had CS: Source installed on one machine and DODS on another machine, that would be perfectly legal to play both at the same time but its not possible if theyre both in the same Steam account.

weringo · 12 May 2007 at 20:33

MNuTz said:
i seem to remember the thread, you lost a load of games as well didnt you?

I would just keep emailing them, writing to them. After all, they probably imagine that if you quit harassing them that you are guilty. No way of legal action against them?

Effectively Steam have stolen his money, as he paid them for a game(s) and they're aren't allowing him to play it.

MNuTz · 12 May 2007 at 20:36

weringo said:
Well then what if you had CS: Source installed on one machine and DODS on another machine, that would be perfectly legal to play both at the same time but its not possible if theyre both in the same Steam account.

Well, as youve got it, Valve would say that CS was on your Steam account and DODs on your brothers Steam account which is fine.

However, 2 games being played on the same account at the same time means 2 people are playing them which is against the rules. Which is why steam doesnt allow it. I cant see that this is a valid reason to dislike Steam at all.

weringo said:
Effectively Steam have stolen his money, as he paid them for a game(s) and they're aren't allowing him to play it.

yeah, i understand that!

weringo · 12 May 2007 at 20:38

MNuTz said:
Well, as youve got it, Valve would say that CS was on your Steam account and DODs on your brothers Steam account which is fine.

However, 2 games being played on the same account at the same time means 2 people are playing them which is against the rules. Which is why steam doesnt allow it. I cant see that this is a valid reason to dislike Steam at all.

I see that as a perfectly good reason to dislike Steam, is there any need to not allow the user to play two games at once? Not at all.

Armadillo · 12 May 2007 at 21:10

I nver said anything about having the game installed more than once. Go with what weringo said

CSS on one machine
DODS on another.
(both my machines , in same house)

But on same account.

Only one copy of a game installed at a time. Yet steam will restrict me for accessing both. So I've paid for both , installed a copy to one machine at a time , yet can only access one game , unless I serperate them. No need for it at all.

Other games do not do it. Can buy BF2 and 2142 , install one game to each machine and be allowed to use both. Can do the same with cod1 and 2. No problem.

The games are 2 games , I've paid for 2 games , yet can only access one at a time , unless I seperate them to two steam accounts.

.one. · 12 May 2007 at 21:25

MNuTz said:
Thats because its illegal.

You are only allowed to install the game on one PC at a time, which means, you should only be playing one game at a time.

You are not even supposed to lend games to people.

so next time i listen to some music i shall tell my m8 to leave the room yes ?

steam is filth and does not stop piracey at all.

MNuTz · 12 May 2007 at 21:53

.one. said:
so next time i listen to some music i shall tell my m8 to leave the room yes ?

steam is filth and does not stop piracey at all.

What a stupid thing to say, the rules regarding music and games are different. If you read the regs when you first put a DVD in there it usualy states that it is not to be lent out, hired out, used for public viewing etc. There may be some similarities between the media types and there usage rules but there will also be lots of differences.

weringo said:
I see that as a perfectly good reason to dislike Steam, is there any need to not allow the user to play two games at once? Not at all.

Because unless you have 2 heads and 4 arms you cant play both games at the same time. Therefore, its logical to say that if 2 games are being played at the same time then 2 people must be playing them which is not allowed on an account.

Im not saying that Steam is right to do so, but i can understand why it does it. Can you not?

PS. Am i right in thinking that the rules and regs regarding media are called EULA? or is that something else?

weringo · 12 May 2007 at 22:39

MNuTz said:
Because unless you have 2 heads and 4 arms you cant play both games at the same time. Therefore, its logical to say that if 2 games are being played at the same time then 2 people must be playing them which is not allowed on an account.

You have just highlighted another reason to dislike Steam, why shouldn't two people be allowed to use one account?

I am not saying this is illegal, or Valve don't have any right to do this, but the title of this thread is "Your thoughts on Steam" and already several reasons have been highlighted to why many people dislike it and why the program is completely unnecessary for the user to play and enjoy their games.