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Is Steam the savior of PC gaming??
- Thread starter Brandon F
- Start date
evilchicken
Member
Yes. I probably wouldn't have bought a single PC game all year if it wasn't for steam.
evilchicken
Member
faceless007 said:
I don't fully agree with this. What games have modability on the disc version but not on the Steam version? Also, you count the loss of a tangible good as a bad thing, I am fully decided that it is a great thing. I can't tell you how many times I've had to buy Starcraft or Diablo because I was itching to play it but couldn't find my copy (or I only had the disc and not the CD key). I love having my games (and CD keys) stored on their servers, so I don't have to keep track of every game I've bought in the last 15 years. Also, being able to download and play your entire steam library anywhere without limits (other than an online connection) is nothing short of amazing. You can't do that with a disc version of a game so easily.
If someone walked up to me and offered me "brand new game X" on my choice of disc or steam, I'd take the steam version without even needing to think about it. I do understand why people would want physical copies though. I realize that Steam isn't necessarily "better" because of the reasons I described. Rather, it just fits the way I like to do things more. If you prefer your games on discs, I think that's an equally valid choice.
carbonbased
Member
don't forget that Steam is better for the environment.
plastic is made from petrol, which is going the way of the dinosaur. the sooner we move away from producing physical media the better.
plastic is made from petrol, which is going the way of the dinosaur. the sooner we move away from producing physical media the better.
Trying to install FEAR 2, get told Steam servers are too busy to "process my request". Finally get it installed and it insists on downloading a mandatory 900mb update and won't let me play until I do. Steam's nothing but stealth DRM. Anyone who pirated it got a far better product than what I'm stuck with.
It's gotten to the point where Steam/Impulse/GoG are over half of my game purchases. I just can't fathom wanting to clutter up a shelf when I can download a game as many times as needed without having to worry about keys and such. It's also an excellent way to grab indie games on the cheap, and have them all in one place. Compare that to four years ago when I rarely played a PC game that wasn't Battlefield, and it's a pretty easy case to make that it has completely reinvigorated my interest in PC gaming.
Unfortunately, there's still no System Shock or System Shock 2 on any of the Digital Download services, and I'm unwilling to pay the steep premium to get discs of those, so I get to wait for one of the stores to add it. And the old LucasArts adventure games.
Unfortunately, there's still no System Shock or System Shock 2 on any of the Digital Download services, and I'm unwilling to pay the steep premium to get discs of those, so I get to wait for one of the stores to add it. And the old LucasArts adventure games.
kinoki
Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey.
Between Steam and Battle.net I think PC gaming will be a very cool place to be this gen. Consoles are missing out.
Personally I've been jumping ships every generation (PC -> SNES -> PC -> PS2 -> PC) and I think this is the right direction the market is taking. But this also means I'll be a supporter of the PS480 or whatever they end up calling them.
Personally I've been jumping ships every generation (PC -> SNES -> PC -> PS2 -> PC) and I think this is the right direction the market is taking. But this also means I'll be a supporter of the PS480 or whatever they end up calling them.
gregor7777
Banned
Not to say you don't have a legitimate beef for not being able to play your game right now, but this is the busiest Steam has ever been.
crimsonheadGCN
Banned
I'm not quite sure if it's the savior of PC gaming, but it sure did a lot to get me into it. A few years back, I was mainly a console gamer who played PC occasionally (mainly Counter-Strike and Civilization), but now I'm mainly a PC gamer who only plays consoles when there is a big exclusive.
faceless007
Member
Hard drives are still physical media and take energy to produce, you know.warbegins said:
Zenith said:
as cautious as i am of monopolies and intrusions on digital freedoms, a claim as reductionist and flawed as "nothing but stealth drm" relegates your dissent to old-man-yelling-at-clouds territory.
a shame, since steam opens alot of debates that both sides need representation of, something i'm having trouble doing as practically everything steam does, i want it to do. the lack of leverage over publishers is my main concern (leading to some frankly fucked up european pricing), but if anything can be taken from the accelerated abundance of steam sales, the market seems to be taking care of that on its own.
and we've already got one merrick.
ZombieSupaStar
Member
evilchicken said:
off the top of my head morrowind (graphics extender), and kotor (widescreen mod).
basically anything can needs to futz around with the .exe depending on circumstances (but the script extenders that dll hook onto the exe for oblivion and fallout 3, work fine on the steam versions).
turnbuckle
Member
I wouldn't have bought a single game this year if not for steam. Because of Steam, I've bought probably close to 80 games. Then again, more than half of those were part of a bundle, but it still counts! I just finally started playing King's Bounty, and although the very first battle with a Dragon kicked my ass I'm already having a ton of fun with it.
If the download services for the consoles were close to comparable to steam, I wouldn't be nearly as afraid of a DD only future. MP3 players quickly got me over my need to have a physical copy of media, and now Steam makes me wish I never had to use a disc/cartridge again. I love it.
If the download services for the consoles were close to comparable to steam, I wouldn't be nearly as afraid of a DD only future. MP3 players quickly got me over my need to have a physical copy of media, and now Steam makes me wish I never had to use a disc/cartridge again. I love it.
faceless007
Member
The other day our Internet was down and I wanted to play Braid. I started Steam in Offline mode and tried to launch Braid. Error: This game is not ready to play in offline mode. Steam literally prevented me from playing my purchased game because I wasn't online.
Just sayin'.
Just sayin'.
I think you need to launch the game at least once so Steam fully updates it before it'll work in offline mode.faceless007 said:
I've tested offline mode a few times and I've never run into that problem but I've heard about it from others.
Good thing this sort of thing doesn't really bother me one way or the other. I can't remember the last time I didn't have an internet connection.
Wickerbasket
Member
So? It's not like you don't need a hard drive if you have the CD as well. It's better for the environment if you use Steam because you don't need the CD or packaging. You still need a hard drive either way, so that point is kind of moot.faceless007 said:
faceless007
Member
The point is saying we should move away from physical media is dumb because there's no such thing as non-physical media. There is no metaphysical higher form of existence on which your games can reside that isn't an object somewhere in the world that takes energy to make. It's a red herring.
And if you really want to help the environment, not buying mass-produced consumer electronics out of Chinese factories would probably be a better move than giving up CDs.
And if you really want to help the environment, not buying mass-produced consumer electronics out of Chinese factories would probably be a better move than giving up CDs.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
faceless007 said:
I'm guessing the CDs have to be manufactured too. Probably in China.
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
warbegins said:
i wonder which one has more of an environmental impact. Housing enough servers capable of providing thousands of gigabytes of downloads to over 13 million users ends up producing emmissions (thats why Google is doing the green offset stuff because 200 million Google searches per day ends up releasing a considerable amount of CO2).
With physical media you have the production factories that produce a run and then eventually stop. The plastics used in making games probably has less impact than say a box of cereal, bottled water or tubes of toothpaste because afaik most people dont throw their games into the garbage when done.. i cant find exact numbers but it seems reasonable to me that most unwanted games are eventually sold until they make their way into somebodies collection.
faceless007
Member
I'm not the one who said we could actually move away from producing physical media.TheExodu5 said:
Wickerbasket
Member
You ever heard the phrase 'the better of two evils'?faceless007 said:
Think of it like this, you can either produce a hard drive that can hold 100 games or produce 100 dvds with manuals + dvd case, which do you think causes the most pollution to produce?
Edit: what the hell, now I'm being stupid too, you'd need the hard drive even IF you produced the dvds. Not producing the DVD games, manuals and boxes would still be a big benefit to the environment.
Number 2 said:
Well you should also add up the shipping costs (energy requirements) and power costs to the stores that sell the games. Sure, server farms use up a lot of energy but if we are going to speculate I would say DD uses less energy overall. Remember all those storefronts also have servers running 24x7 for online purchases.
faceless007
Member
Wickerbasket said:
I'll repeat what I said earlier: If you really care that much about making an environmental statement, you might not want to indulge in a hobby predicated on buying mass-produced power-hungry electronics from Chinese factories. This entire hobby is in no way amenable to living a green lifestyle. There are good reasons to prefer digital distribution over DVDs, but wanting to reduce your carbon footprint really isn't one of them.
epmode said:
so friendly I can't play my game. I can't think of a DRM system that's more restrictive. At least EA's authentication service means you can download a crack if you can't get access.
and besides I'm past the authentication phase, it wants to download the damn updates. How stupid is that to make it mandatory? Doesn't matter that I don't want to download 2 bonus MP maps, doesn't matter that with some games their patches add new problems, doesn't matter that games have worked just fine for years with people using different versions. Total PoS.
Thanks for the assist but it's still bringing up the download bar when I hit launch even though the games status list claims it's not downloading anything.
Slavik81 said:
...
You have heard of the concept of other countries right? It's mid day over here. And it's not about being able to buy, it's about being able to play. I could play any of my non-steam games at 5am.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
Slavik81 said:
:lol
Please, for the sake of my faith in humanity, please tell me you were joking.
A friend just gifted me Kings Bounty Gold Edition on Steam, and it did the thing where servers are too busy, but finally took after the 15th try. In my opinion though, if it wasn't for steam, I wouldn't be much of a PC gamer at all, I was never into PC games until I got my new laptop, then just mostly played WoW but got tired of it and had no other source to go to, until my friend told me about Steam, now I play it more than my PS3 or 360 most days. Steam rules in my opinion.
Baron Doggystyle von Woof
Member
Even tho I only have the Orange Box (shitty PC) I think its awesome 