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OK, it is possible to make a separate Steam account for every game. This would allow you to sell your game by selling your Steam account, but
- if Valve finds out they will block your accounts because this infringes the EULA.
- being required to manage 20 Steam accounts is awkward.
- it requires you to make the decision whether you want to keep the game (in which case you put it on your main Steam account) or sell it (in which case you generate a new account) on the first installation of the game. Clearly such a decision can only be made *after* playing a game, not before.
2 - Valve may block your account for any reason and claim you infringed their EULA.
They already block accounts for the only reason that they are bought in one part of the world and used in another. So if you buy a Steam game while on holiday in India, your account will be blocked once you want to play it in Europe. So in effect they can put anything they like in the EULA and, unlike with other games, they have the means to enforce compliance.
3 - If Valve goes bust your games are gone too.
Much bigger companies than Valve have vanished from the face of the earth in a matter of days, so what would make Valve immune?
4 - Your ability to play the game depends not only on the system requirements of the game, but also on the system requirements of Steam.
E.g. Steam no longer runs on Win98. So you may end up having the proper platform for a game and still not being able to play it.
5 - If either Valve or yourselves are offline, you cannot even play your single player game.
I read reports of some people claiming Steam defaulted to off-line mode when they were off-line, but my experience is different.
6 - Patches are not optional.
If a patch makes a game incompatibel with your system, you cannot go back to the previous version.
Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2009 5:05 pm
Pogma9
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I don't bother selling my games, but the value of Steam is it's special offers and demo's.
Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2009 5:25 pm
puk
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Steam is a pain in the ass. I don't even know what its appeal is. Is it cheaper?
You want pain in the ass, I forgot my steam user name, and the e-mail address I registered under is no longer mine, so I'm basically fucked.
In fact, anythin that involves user names and passwords is a pain in the ass, cuz they always have fucked up rules like 6 characters minimum, with at least one number and one capital, and the batman symbol. It's my password, and if I'm stupid enough to set it to 'password', then that's my choice.
Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 1:50 am
berzerker
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Pogma9 wrote:
I don't bother selling my games, but the value of Steam is it's special offers and demo's.
Well, Steam as a shop may not be too bad (other than that it is usually expensive) but as a DRM system it sucks even more than other DRM systems.
And what's the appeal of letting games you will never play again collect dust? Trading a few would allow you to buy a new game and frees up shelf space in the process.
Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 2:34 am
berzerker
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puk wrote:
Steam is a pain in the ass. I don't even know what its appeal is. Is it cheaper?
Usually Steam games are a bit more expensive than retail versions of the same game in the shop. The appeal of Steam as a shop is that you are not required to interact with ordinary people; you can download the game from behind your computer while watching porn or whatever.
Steam as a DRM system does have some appeal too: it allows you to download and play your game anywhere without being required to physically have a DVD with you, provided you have a broadband internet connection of course (and provided you do not upset Valve, e.g. by doing so in an improper region). Since your save games are stored locally however, this would seem of limited value to me BTW.
An additional advantage may be that you are no longer screwed if you lose your DVD or serial. However, now you are screwed if you forget your account name if your email address has changed, as you already pointed out. So this 'advantage' boils down to the swapping of one disadvantage for another.
Last edited by berzerker on Mon Feb 09, 2009 7:19 am, edited 1 time in total
Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 3:53 am
puk
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berzerker wrote:
...you can download the game from behind your computer while watching porn
That does make for efficient time management.
Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 9:15 am
berzerker
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More evidence that Steam sucks:
A Google search for "steam sucks" gets 14.100 hits, whereas "steam rules" gets only 2.330 hits and "steam rules supreme" gets a measly 6 hits (searches performed including quotation marks).
Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 10:02 am
puk
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more proof:
If you do a search for "steam super amazing chimmy chunga calamity jane" you get zero hits.
Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 10:09 am
berzerker
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OK, that's settled then.
Next topic!
Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2009 6:11 pm
berzerker
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Steam sucks even more when coupled with games not specifically designed for Steam.
I have Fallout 3 on my Steam account so I thought to install it to see if it actually runs on my PC. So after downloading the game I get a window giving me a CD-key, instructing me to write it down so that I can fill it in later during the installation.
So even if you use Steam, which is a copy protection mechanism in itself, you are still left with the original copy protection of the retail version of Fallout 3. So you get the hassle of Steam plus the hassle of the retail CD-key, and as a bonus an additional hassle (being required to write down a CD-key).
If the installation process is so secure /trusted that it can present me a key, why can't it use this key itself?
Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2009 6:29 pm
puk
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The steam team was probably too lazy to modify the game and remove the verification process, just like how the EA team was too lazy to fix the C&C: The first decade such that we got that kick ass install screen from the first C&C
Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 5:22 pm
berzerker
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puk wrote:
more proof:
If you do a search for "steam super amazing chimmy chunga calamity jane" you get zero hits.
You get one hit, so your 'proof' fails miserably .
Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 5:41 pm
puk
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Location: Southampton, UK
that's hilarious, one of the links is actually this page.
Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 5:48 pm
berzerker
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puk wrote:
that's hilarious, one of the links is actually this page.
Yes, if you make a claim on the web that a certain phrase cannot be found on the web, that will essentially be a self-denying prophecy.
Posted: Tue Mar 17, 2009 11:05 am
berzerker
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An interesting article about Steam here. [Warning: lots of text]
A quote:
Quote:
We never accepted any traditional publishing deals, because they were rubbish," says Introversion's Mark Morris. "Then Steam came along.
Darwinia had been out for more than six months at this point, and we
released it on Steam and had a massive sales boost. What Valve says
is, "Put your game on our system, we'll deliver sales to you, and
you can have two thirds of the returns". They don't want any IP,
or sequel rights. Valve saved the company, really".
So Valve gets one third of the loot, that does not seem too unreasonable to me.
BTW anyone played Darwinia? It is supposed to be quite good.
Posted: Tue Mar 17, 2009 8:40 pm
captnPugwash_halabalobale
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i played the demo a couple of years back. it gets my approval for originality.
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