Poll: Steam: God's Gift or Piece of S**t
- Thread starter Ledan
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Meh. Its ok. I suppose its good if you want it. However, forcing it on people to even be able to play a game offline is never a good idea.
I'll admit I have minimal experience with it. I used my friends account to play CS 1.6 with him.
It has features I'd never use. In-game chatting(stfu people, I don't want to talk to you, I'm playing a game). I don't care who's playing what. I'd never buy a game from them. So, basically, I used it because I had to so I could play CS.
I'll admit I have minimal experience with it. I used my friends account to play CS 1.6 with him.
It has features I'd never use. In-game chatting(stfu people, I don't want to talk to you, I'm playing a game). I don't care who's playing what. I'd never buy a game from them. So, basically, I used it because I had to so I could play CS.
Love it or hate it you can't fault Valve's business acumen. Offer great games for great prices but require that people use steam. The losses they make from the lower prices are offset by the number of people buying, and by ensuring you get people using Steam it means that they will be more likely to buy more games from them.
Personally I like steam. At first I was skeptical, what with all the horror stories about having to sacrifice a goat in the summer equinox to make the damn thing work. But several years and many games later I cannot imagine not using it, it just makes things so much easier.
Personally I like steam. At first I was skeptical, what with all the horror stories about having to sacrifice a goat in the summer equinox to make the damn thing work. But several years and many games later I cannot imagine not using it, it just makes things so much easier.
From the top down: Man, I run all my games through steam and I seem to be able to install and play them whenever I want, in fact, I can do it at other people's houses without having DRM try to murder me in my sleep.Ledan said:Hey, just wondering how the gamers at escapist feel about steam. Personally I dislike it because it does not allow me the simple act of installing my game and playing it when I want. Managing my updates would be fine, if I could play while downloading, which you can't AND if steam detects an update you can't cancel it to play the game.
I guess gamers with super-fast internet don't mind, but most of us (I assume) don't.
Also, Steam is useless, in my opinion, because most of it's features (except perhaps the digital store) can be found elsewhere:
- The whole "you don't need CD's", can be achieved by downloading legal 'NoCD' patches and cracks.
- Patch updater, simply go to the site to check for updates.
I suppose I might have inflamed some of the fanatic Steam users by now,
but seriously, I'm just interested WHY.
BTW, Why use steam power when electricity is available?
Edit: Oh, and some awesome games are only for steam, "forcing" (not really I know) to use steam.
Downloading updates, I still can't belive people ***** about this, I guess if you have the sort of connection that makes it take a month to download a 56kb lpath then you could complainb, but really, if you can afford games, maybe you should go buy yourself a better connection.
The steam store can't be found online, the overlay (although i've never seen it elsewhere) is certainly the best of what must be out there.
I didn't know "noCD" patches allowed me to run my game after I format, please teach me?
If your going to a site for the same patch as a patch updater automatically does for you... I don't even think I need to explain this.
Steam is DRM+digital distribution+social network, and it's DRM done right, man.
I have had little to no problems with it and it's DRM.
Some have complained that you can't download while playing, well you can. All you really need to do is: when you start up a game, alt-tab or whatever you would do to get to your steam window. The download says it's paused, well you'll have to pause it.. again? And you can start it up again. And download all night while playing whatever.
I love steam, and for many reasons.
The only game stores near me within miles only sells crap like madden and some crappy games for the xbox. And they have a LOT of games, and really good servers, steam is the only place I have been able to get up to 3mb/s download speed.
It's a nice way to manage my games without cluttering my desktop. Especially since I can add non-steam games into the list.
Steam has a really good in-game overlay with a browser, IM stuff, and a clock and stuff. I think there was a clock, I only really use the clock x-fire gives me.
DRM is something that is necessary these days (Unless you're Bethesda, and still making tons of money off of your non-DRM game), and so far, I have had absolutely no problems with steam's DRM.
And I like the gifting thing on steam. Sometimes I want to get some buddies a gift that live too far away, you know? And I like getting them too.. Free games!
I have had little to no problems with it and it's DRM.
Some have complained that you can't download while playing, well you can. All you really need to do is: when you start up a game, alt-tab or whatever you would do to get to your steam window. The download says it's paused, well you'll have to pause it.. again? And you can start it up again. And download all night while playing whatever.
I love steam, and for many reasons.
The only game stores near me within miles only sells crap like madden and some crappy games for the xbox. And they have a LOT of games, and really good servers, steam is the only place I have been able to get up to 3mb/s download speed.
It's a nice way to manage my games without cluttering my desktop. Especially since I can add non-steam games into the list.
Steam has a really good in-game overlay with a browser, IM stuff, and a clock and stuff. I think there was a clock, I only really use the clock x-fire gives me.
DRM is something that is necessary these days (Unless you're Bethesda, and still making tons of money off of your non-DRM game), and so far, I have had absolutely no problems with steam's DRM.
And I like the gifting thing on steam. Sometimes I want to get some buddies a gift that live too far away, you know? And I like getting them too.. Free games!
I've been using steam for a while now and rather like it. I am trying to look at other people's comments for why they don't like it. It seems the updating and downloading seem to be one of the big issues. I never seem to come across that. By that, I mean I've never sat and waited for a game to update on steam. It's probably because I have steam set to start up when I start my computer. I always turn on my computer when I wake up for things like daily system scans and what not. It seems that this is when steam updates everything, and since I don't use my computer in the morning (better things to do...which means work, school or more sleep) I've never actually had to watch steam update.
I also don't expect much from steam since I read how valve describes it. Sure, it's a digital download platform, but what it really seems to be from their description and in practice is just a game/download manager.
I also don't expect much from steam since I read how valve describes it. Sure, it's a digital download platform, but what it really seems to be from their description and in practice is just a game/download manager.
What's the Austalian internet like? I'm in Ireland, and my maximum download speed for any file is 60 KiloBytes a second.Auric said:
Match that, Aussies.
OT: Even with aforementioned internet speed, I adore steam, since it lets us 1: Play PC games without the sort of draconian copy protection that is de rigeur these days, and 2: Have all our stuff together in one package, complete with friends list, clans, and a store that is simply excellent.
So speak not for all with slow internet (your internet is probably 5 times faster than mine anyway), but for only yourself.
I'll address two points here, because I don't think they've really been quite thoroughly trounced yet:
- "I don't like it when the games automatically update."
Right-click the game and select "Properties". There you will find an "Updates" tab, under which is a drop-down dialog box with two choices. Select "Do not automatically update this game". Tada!
- "I can't play the game while it's updating."
Okay, this is a fair point- something of a tradeoff. Can't really play a game while its files are being rewritten, and I personally wouldn't mind seeing a "download the update and apply when I choose" option. However, unless you're playing a game that's updated an absurd amount of times, how often will this actually happen?
I ran into something of a problem with Steam myself this week. My Internet went down while I was playing online, and something went goofy with Steam, forcing it to try to update itself- which it couldn't without the Internet. Steam would not start without updating. Was it annoying? Yes. Did I scream "OMG Steam sux some1 harpoon gaben"? No. Glitches happen. Steam's done enough good for me to where I take the occasional problem with equanimity.
- "I don't like it when the games automatically update."
Right-click the game and select "Properties". There you will find an "Updates" tab, under which is a drop-down dialog box with two choices. Select "Do not automatically update this game". Tada!
- "I can't play the game while it's updating."
Okay, this is a fair point- something of a tradeoff. Can't really play a game while its files are being rewritten, and I personally wouldn't mind seeing a "download the update and apply when I choose" option. However, unless you're playing a game that's updated an absurd amount of times, how often will this actually happen?
I ran into something of a problem with Steam myself this week. My Internet went down while I was playing online, and something went goofy with Steam, forcing it to try to update itself- which it couldn't without the Internet. Steam would not start without updating. Was it annoying? Yes. Did I scream "OMG Steam sux some1 harpoon gaben"? No. Glitches happen. Steam's done enough good for me to where I take the occasional problem with equanimity.
I'm in the "OK" camp. It's a fab games organiser, although the lack of customisation for profiles of non-Steam games at the moment is disappointing, as is the flakiness of Offline Mode. Plus, reinstalling games is very easy. Overall, I like it.
You have some valid points there and I don't really blame you for not liking it, but personally for me, I really like it because it is one centralized place where I can play the games that I have for Steam that Valve updates. Plus Valve updates their games fairly often and the Steam platform is an easy way to keep them updated.Ledan said:Hey, just wondering how the gamers at escapist feel about steam. Personally I dislike it because it does not allow me the simple act of installing my game and playing it when I want. Managing my updates would be fine, if I could play while downloading, which you can't AND if steam detects an update you can't cancel it to play the game.
I guess gamers with super-fast internet don't mind, but most of us (I assume) don't.
Also, Steam is useless, in my opinion, because most of it's features (except perhaps the digital store) can be found elsewhere:
- The whole "you don't need CD's", can be achieved by downloading legal 'NoCD' patches and cracks.
- Patch updater, simply go to the site to check for updates.
I suppose I might have inflamed some of the fanatic Steam users by now,
but seriously, I'm just interested WHY.
BTW, Why use steam power when electricity is available?
Edit: Oh, and some awesome games are only for steam, "forcing" (not really I know) to use steam.
I just downloaded steam yesterday so I could get Portal without having to get Orange Box.
On the plus side, portal was free.
But overall, the experience with steam itself was rather negative. Almost every step in the process of downloading the steam client and then the game, I repeatedly got messages that there were unknown errors and had to retry. Took me 3-4 tries to get steam downloading, then another 3-4 to get portal started. Then the download kept stalling for what seemed like no reason at all. Portal is a big game, so I get that it would take a while, but the download rates were very sporadic and sometimes, as I said, stalled for seemingly no reason. So, all in all, not my favorite game platform right now, despite the fact that portal was free.
On the plus side, portal was free.
But overall, the experience with steam itself was rather negative. Almost every step in the process of downloading the steam client and then the game, I repeatedly got messages that there were unknown errors and had to retry. Took me 3-4 tries to get steam downloading, then another 3-4 to get portal started. Then the download kept stalling for what seemed like no reason at all. Portal is a big game, so I get that it would take a while, but the download rates were very sporadic and sometimes, as I said, stalled for seemingly no reason. So, all in all, not my favorite game platform right now, despite the fact that portal was free.
Hmm, my download speed normally hovers around the 200 KBS mark... Though thats as fast as you can get in these parts, if you have normal ADSL it hovers around the 30-50 KBS mark.killer-corkonian said:
To give you a good indication of speed, average 320P youtube videos download slightly faster than i can watch.
Though, am in awe... Someone with worse than australian internet, and not in a third world country! Amazing.
