Surface of Me
I'm not an NPC. And neither are we.
Ah, "fuck you I've got mine"
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Accounts that have spent less than $5 on Steam now have limited access
- Thread starter Sendou
- Start date
Ah, "fuck you I've got mine"
BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
Fair enough, but you're not asking for help I'm offering it because I remember when I was in your shoes and this would've pissed me off too. Offer still stands but I understand if you don't want it.
Dude, you can still chat with your friends using the Steam client.
flatearthpandas
Member
Legitimately not sure. I don't really care that much for AAA games so it has never mattered how cheap they get. I've browsed through the steam sales but not sure if I ever bought anything. It is possible I have.
It counts if you use steam cards to put in cash to your wallet, it's right in the OP.
Pellegri Testament
Member
You can't sell things on the marketplace if you haven't bought anything though.
But you can't chat with them on mobile is the thing. That's a whole different thing though where if you're paying for a data plan to use online so you can chat using the steam client...well, you obviously have some disposable income somewhere.
Somehow I missed that one.
Anyway, I understand why some people are upset, but I think it's a good choice. And who knows? Maybe in the future you will find a game that you can have fun by paying 5 dollars.
Quadraphonic
Member
"Oh look! I got an invite..."
<Player Level 0>
*block*
"Oh look! I got an invite..."
<Player Level 0>
*block*
"STOP SPAMMING ME!"
To be honest, I have no clue what happens if I accept. Do they try to sell me bullshit?
Also, I feel sorry for anyone who has a Bill's Hat for TF2. You get bugged all the fucking time by idiots.
How is this negatively affecting you personally?
He's a Steambot. Gaben has killed his whole family with this move!
Care to tell why? Because the limitations listed here don't really affect the people that some claims this affects. A guy who only plays F2P has no use for 95% of the features listed here. And they still have access to the Steam chat, just not on the website or on mobile(and you know, there's several hundred programs on mobile and websites that allow you to chat with your friends anyways)
We're talking about an online video games store. Of course it will cater to the users who are paying, what else would you expect? To Valve, non-paying customers are worthless, especially if they already decided they aren't going to buy games on Steam, no matter what. Also, you're forgetting that this is not a for-profit measure, but a much needed one to combat the ever increasing scam and phishing attempts.
Besides, if you're on a phone you have other means of communication, such as WhatsApp, Facebook, text messages or even phone calls. If you have access to the Steam app, you also have access to the first two.
This seems to be an extremely remote edge case: no games bought through the Steam store (or the price of all of them combined amounts to less than $5), no spare money to reach $5 total spent on Steam, no means of communication with friends other than Steam chat, and the need to talk to them via cell phone or web browser (the web chat will also require a full access account) instead of through the desktop Steam client. I'm pulling numbers out of my ass here, but I'd bet those who meet all 4 conditions are less than 0.1% of all Steam users.
Geraldo_Ray
Member
Whatever helps with dealing with spam...I guess. I've been lucky enough not to get those types of messages.
Probably not the best solution (especially for those who buy from other sites), but even then $5 is nothing these days.
Probably not the best solution (especially for those who buy from other sites), but even then $5 is nothing these days.
Theanine3D
Member
Most if not all of my Steam friends have already spent far more than $5 on Steam games they've never even played (and honestly, may never actually play.) That's how trivial the $5 is. Valve knows what they're doing.
Bravo.
I don't get too many spam bots; but I also have my profile/inventory set to friends only
ieptbarakat
Member
As a person who kept getting random friend requests by private profiles or spambots every few days I am glad to finally see this happening.
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
That's apparently false, given that you're complaining that you can't use Steam to chat with your friends thanks to this change. So you do have a use for Steam other than playing TF2: chatting on your phone and browser. And that's now paywalled. Which is why you're angry. The mere fact of your anger suggests there's value in the service they're locking behind a paywall, which is in turn how they're justifying the paywall.
SneakyStephan
Banned
People are crazy acting like this is some kind of ripoff
They aren't charging you 5 bucks to unlock those features, they are locking those features for anyone who never spent a dime on steam (aka 99.999 percent botters, scammers and people with alt accounts used to cheat or idle for drops)
This is something they should have done years ago.
It doesn't lock you out of playing any games, it doesn't pose any arbitrary restrictions. The only thing it's for is to try n stop the spammers, bots and phishers.
There's literally a million ways valve could rip people off , but this is not one.
This can get rid of hundreds of thousands of bot/scam accounts while not affecting regular users.
I don't even understand how anyone can use steam regularly yet somehow never spent a single euro.
Even if all you play is valve's f2p games you'll have made like a 50bucks in drops by now that you 'd have spent on the steam store.
And even if you've somehow never spent a cent, well tough shit now you have to pay 5 euros to buy a game (oh the horror) so the other 99 percent of users can use steam without a million spammers , bots and phishers shitting up the steam community features.
They aren't charging you 5 bucks to unlock those features, they are locking those features for anyone who never spent a dime on steam (aka 99.999 percent botters, scammers and people with alt accounts used to cheat or idle for drops)
This is something they should have done years ago.
It doesn't lock you out of playing any games, it doesn't pose any arbitrary restrictions. The only thing it's for is to try n stop the spammers, bots and phishers.
There's literally a million ways valve could rip people off , but this is not one.
This can get rid of hundreds of thousands of bot/scam accounts while not affecting regular users.
I don't even understand how anyone can use steam regularly yet somehow never spent a single euro.
Even if all you play is valve's f2p games you'll have made like a 50bucks in drops by now that you 'd have spent on the steam store.
And even if you've somehow never spent a cent, well tough shit now you have to pay 5 euros to buy a game (oh the horror) so the other 99 percent of users can use steam without a million spammers , bots and phishers shitting up the steam community features.
toddhunter
Member
Out of interest, This is just a trading/inventory thing right?
I have never had a spam friend request in like 10 years.
Free game too!
BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
Yeah, if you have nothing of note in your inventory nobody will bother you.
toddhunter
Member
System shock 2 wallpapers on blast
adamantypants
Member
Why are people upset? Steam is a STOREFRONT. You go to stores to BUY STUFF
InvaderZimmer
Member
Only five copies of bad rats.
Felix Lighter
Member
Perfect, effective way to deal with the problem. I can't take anyone upset by this seriously. Thankfully, it's only a small few.
I picture these people complaining about the five bucks as the guys that sit on the floor in bookstores reading manga.
gigantor21
Member
Just the first two points make the pool of affected people so small as to make the controversy absurd. The notion that such a low threshold is a burden for someone who plays games extensively on PC is ridiculous outside of a small handful of hair-splitting cases.
flatearthpandas
Member
Maybe if it's at a bookstore where you're not allowed to take books out of the building, even if you've purchased them.
The complaints are the people at the bookstore who sit in the cafe and use free wi-fi but have never spent a dime on books or coffee.
ieptbarakat
Member
Probably, even though my inventory is private. I run a semi populated Steam group and have a greenlight collection in the top #13 space so random invites come from all sources really.
jaundicejuice
Member
If I hadn't been browsing the GAF Steam threads off and on since their inception I wouldn't be aware of the Spambots and I've been using Steam since the old DoD1.3/CS1.6 WON servers were shut down and I was forced to use Steam if I wanted to continue to play either game. Is this apparent epidemic of bots related to your profile privacy settings?
You have to play the games at Valve HQ, do ya?
oh no those poor spammers. if they were legit, they would pay more than 5 dollars on steam sales.
Not sure what kind of games you are into but Binding of Issac is awesome, runs on mac and is $5 (i'm in CDN$ so it might not be exactly $5).
Yeah, that's not too cool if it times out on you.
Pretty sure that limitation has nothing to do with this one, and a 20 cents purchase would lift it.
It's other, separate limitation, AFAIK. Just requires you to have at least one purchase on Steam (no matter the value) in one year. And it only affects Steam market functionality.