Part three of Steam debate - split and archived.

[Nova Scotia]

Right now I cannot afford to install a phone line and get broadband simply to be able to play pc games.

More importantly IMO- a single player game.

[Michael5188]

Been a lurker here for a while but I had to offer my 2 cents.

So Steam requires internet to install/download the game, and install updates. Beyond that it requires nothing but the client to be running. I can play all my Steam games offline, I don't know where people get he impression Steam requires a constant connection. Are people really that hard up for internet that those two small moments are a hassle? The internet I have here is actually pretty horrible, but I've never felt it hindered my gaming on Steam. I just install games overnight.

I hear about people complaining they don't have internet (on an internet forum, which is weird...) and all I wonder is that person is willing to dish out hundreds for a computer that can run the game, but not for internet? Is it that internet can't easily obtained in the area they live in? If that's the case, that's probably the only valid, completely understandable complaint towards Steam. Even if it does seem like a rare situation.

Beyond that I move around quite often, and I can't tell you how nice it is that I don't have to keep track of my games. Wherever I go, I just install Steam, login, and all my games are there.

And this whole concept of owning the physical copy being the only way to truly own a game is interesting... especially since I can't play my Monkey Island floppy disks, or countless other games I bought on floppy. Certainly doesn't feel like I own those games anymore... Not to mention the many cds I've had over the years that suddenly failed to work or got scratched.

Oh, and did I mention moving my cd's to a collective case and forgetting the serial code for some of them was on the jewel case (Why not put it on the cd?), so now I can't install those either. Sure that was dumb of me, but just another example of the frustration that comes with physical media.

To be honest, physical media changes so often and is so fragile in the grand scope of things, where do people get the impression that it's somehow more stable than a cloud server of a giant company? I for one absolutely love Steam, if only for it's incredible sales (just got Civ V for 15 dollars!) but because all my games are in one place, and it's one less thing I have to worry about.

Anyways I understand people want a choice to install without Steam. Even though that actually costs more for Egosoft to do, but sure, I understand wanting it. I just don't understand the hate for Steam so common on the internet. (especially from people who have never used it)

Sorry, I'm sure what I've said has been said countless times in this 100 page thread...

[David Howland]

Well Michael5188, at least you are sorry about it?

[Michael5188]

Haha, ok fair enough. But come on, any thread past 5 pages is normally all repeated points, so for 90 pages people have been repeating same as me.

Anyways sure, probably could have stayed silent, just felt that urge to post.

[David Howland]

Not to worry Micheal5188, we understand your urge to hold forth and support it, if not why are we here?
You mention the last 5 and 90 pages but there are hundreds of pages archived, that are largely repetition.
What Steam supporters need to realise is this poll/thread was started by a reluctant Steam user and was allowed wisely by ES to assess strength of opposition to their new exclusive steam policy. Right from the beginning of this thread Anti Steamers knew they were on a hiding to nothing, being outnumbered and trying to persuade a company wishing we did not even exist. For you there there is no real reason to read or post on this thread as there is nothing at stake, X games will be on steam anyway but for us we have to read and express our objection just in case ES decides not to throw us in the rubbish bin of history after all. <Provocative hyperbole about 'you steamers' removed. Alan Phipps>
(Nice One Alan, I forgot to mention the bit about our views getting cut to ribbons and some of us getting banned!)
If you really want a short explanation of the position against Steam read my post at the bottom of page 92! It is not exhaustive but should give you a reasonable idea. WARNING; you will not agree with a word of it.

[Slashman]

And even with a DVD version of a Steam based game you DO NEED to be online to install. The EXE file for the game IS NOT included on the DVD, it MUST be downloaded from the Steam servers. Also, when Steam downloads the EXE file, it will also download "any and all" updates for the game. So, installing on a PC that has NO connection is impossible, and a PC with a slow connection to the internet is nearly impossible.

So, yes even with a DVD you still need to be online to install a Steam based game.

There is no getting out of that.

That's pretty much true. You'll need to download something if it is activated via Steam. With the prevalence of day 1 patches these days, the download is unlikely to be negligible for someone with dial-up or equivalent internet speed.

Which is downloading an update, not the install. :B If it's anything like Skyrim for me you will not need to be online to install. Activate and play yes, update yes, install no.

Not saying you are wrong. I'm just saying that full install or not, to someone with dial-up connectivity, a small 150 meg update which is required to play the game could as well be a complete install.

The disk you get from the store is static. It won't come with the latest version of the software unless Egosoft continually revises its game versions and presses new disks. That might happen some months down the road if they do a bundle deal...but for the first 6 -8 months of the game's release where patching is frequent(because we all know there is no way Egosoft will make a largely bug-free X game), that would pretty much shut down people who have limited internet connections.

[angrytigerp]

If you really want a short explanation of the position against Steam read my post at the bottom of page 92! It is not exhaustive but should give you a reasonable idea. WARNING; you will not agree with a word of it.

Yeah, about that...

1. We simply wish to play the game on our computer anywhere, anytime WE WANT, independent of the internet, in short we enjoy the old fashioned concept of owning the games we play not being enslaved by a DRM rental system.

You can say "OH BUT IT WAS NEVER ENFORCED", but as has been said many times in response to you and anyone else with the ''rental" bit, you have never owned ANY of the games you ever played, except maybe back in MS-DOS days if you were playing games then. You have ALWAYS purchased a license to use games. The likelihood of Valve ever capitalizing on this and just taking your games away is about as likely as Rockstar telling every owner of GTA games before IV to please delete their copies of the game and destroy their disks. It's very much possible and within their legal rights, but it will NEVER happen, and in the unlikelihood that Steam somehow collapses, Steam's devs have already said they would patch the games to not need Steam (on top of many game devs saying the same thing independently in their own forums).

Some of us do not even have an internet connection available to allow Steam usage, others simply have such a love for the computer, that we do not wish to treat this wonderful machine as a mere telephone receiver, which is what, a computer permanently tethered to the internet, is!

First point granted, but the second would be like refusing to install a DVD drive because you don't want your computer to be "treated as a DVD player". The internet isn't a "telephone receiver", it has so many functions (even basic things, like say updating what programs you have installed or even the OS, so that it runs more effectively, or new drivers for your hardware.) The internet is a critical part of modern computing, if you don't like it then... well, tough. It's a step forward.

2. We wish to play these wonderful games limited only the game itself, our computers limitations and our own abilities. We do not wish to be controlled by a Big Brother, over ambitious, dictatorial rental company. Bear in mind that Steam not only controls the way the game runs but also the operating system around it and if steam do not approve of any software on you computer, will forbid you to use it with their system.

This is outright bull, made up on the spot by you. Steam can't access anything on your computer unless you let it. Now, EA's Origin does, but the contract you enter with them allows it; Steam has no such clause. Doing so would bring a nice juicy class action against Valve by all of Steam's users.

By the time you have entered the necessary exceptions for DRM to run, you may as well have no internet security running at all.

Do... do you even know what you're saying? ALL programs have their own firewall exceptions; hell, if you were as much of a good ol' gamer as you pretend to be, you would remember that playing games online was a matter of tampering with your security settings, such that every game was a risk. Steam is no more nor less risky than ANY OTHER internet program; however, as stated above, if you're going to be a technophobe and refuse to connect to the internet, then you're probably convinced you'll NEVER be secure.

For the record, 2 years of Steam, not one virus, bit of spyware, etc. Maybe you should get better security software.

Also if you fall out with Steam, they will pull the plug on your membership and all those hundreds of pounds you have spent on 'your' precious games will be wasted!

Describe what you mean by "falling out". If you pirate games, and are then stupid enough to run those games through Steam, yes, they'll see that your account is running a cracked EXE (because you're running it through Steam!) and ban your account. I think this is a rightful forfeit for pirates, if you're a software thief then I guess I see part of your Steam issue right there. If you want to share the story of a legitimate user who was just spontaneously banned from Steam, now's your time to shine.

3. There is the infectious nature of the DRM Big Brother control. For instance have you not thought it odd, that ES says this system is so wonderful, that they want all players to use it for their latest games BUT they are so ashamed of steam they will not allow it to be freely discussed throughout these forums, or allow players to buy these games on a STEAM FREE alternative?

As was already said by someone else replying to your post earlier, how do you figure they're "ashamed" by Steam? There's this massive thread which has had (going by the poll) thousands of viewers. Posts about Steam as related to Rebirth are redirected to this thread, for that sake of organization, and the only other discussions about Steam are technical issues (which are shunted to the tech support forums). You're here saying anything you want about Steam, and with the exception of your ad hominem "you steamers" attacks and insults, you're completely uncensored.

As for question of shame, you're really missing the bigger picture here. Is THQ 'ashamed' for using Steam? 2K? Ubisoft? Rockstar? ID?

http://store.steampowered.com/browse/publishers/

Dozens of 'big name' companies are unashamed to use Steam because, for gamers not literally unable to connect to the internet reliably, it offers a great central service for distribution, and then the userbase can share their enthusiasm for particular games resulting in free advertisement.

Now, with all that post, you're probably going to dismiss me as one of those "steamers", because clearly I can't defend Steam unless I'm a rabid fanboy who never played a game before Steam (protip: I have). It's an innovative new service, and if EA's own Origin service is any indicator, it's a trend that is here to stay. I won't say that I hope media distribution doesn't occur, as much as you wish we did to make "steamers" look selfish most of us want to see all distribution methods covered; but I will say that, if Egosoft maintains its Steam-only policy, then this is likely something you're going to see happen more and more often. If that goes against your moral codes or whatever so much, you have thousands of games in video game development's long history that will remain available in hard copies. But suggesting that Steam, or any digital distribution system, will fail is like saying that DVD drives will never take off -- no one will ever adopt them! Or CD drives will never take off -- my floppy disk can hold everything I would ever need! I'm not saying Steam itself is THE next iteration, but rather the concept of digital distribution in general (and Steam isn't the only player on the block, much as you think otherwise -- there's the aforementioned Origin, and Green Man Gaming, and Good Old Games, and Gamestop's Impulse, and Gamefly, and...)

[David Howland]

Thank you for all your attention angrytigerp,
It seems to me, and forgive me please if I have missed some major point but it strikes me the biggest point of difference between us; is that I do not mind in the least that you and ES luv to use steam, whereas you and ES think it a capital crime that some of us would like to play X without it!
I wish you many happy years playing X under Steam domination!

[Deleted User]

Yeah, about that...

1. We simply wish to play the game on our computer anywhere, anytime WE WANT, independent of the internet, in short we enjoy the old fashioned concept of owning the games we play not being enslaved by a DRM rental system.

You can say "OH BUT IT WAS NEVER ENFORCED", but as has been said many times in response to you and anyone else with the ''rental" bit, you have never owned ANY of the games you ever played, except maybe back in MS-DOS days if you were playing games then. You have ALWAYS purchased a license to use games. The likelihood of Valve ever capitalizing on this and just taking your games away is about as likely as Rockstar telling every owner of GTA games before IV to please delete their copies of the game and destroy their disks. It's very much possible and within their legal rights, but it will NEVER happen, and in the unlikelihood that Steam somehow collapses, Steam's devs have already said they would patch the games to not need Steam (on top of many game devs saying the same thing independently in their own forums).

Total fallacy.

Purchase any software on physical media and you do own that media. That includes the right to transfer the license, by sale or gift. You cannot do this with account binding systems. This has been mentioned before.

If you wish to sign up to a third party which requires an account to play that is your own business, but do not dismiss the fact that Steam takes this fundamental right away from you, the consumer.

Also, in the 'unlikelihood' that Steam or Ego collapses, you have nothing but hearsay to suggest anything will be patched out. I see no guarantees in line with that possibility in the Steam EULA and Egos position is that they would 'endevour' to patch out.

So I would advise that you 'endevour' to hope that situation never arises.

[greypanther]

I have a new issue with Steam since installing AP.
I have set Steam to NOT auto update AP; problem is it keeps resetting to update automatically!

Anyone any idea whats going on, before I download the no steam exe.?

I find I am still on the borderline, positive at the moment to some use of Steam, it could go the other way real easy.

[Deleted User]

I have a new issue with Steam since installing AP.
I have set Steam to NOT auto update AP; problem is it keeps resetting to update automatically!

Anyone any idea whats going on, before I download the no steam exe.?

I find I am still on the borderline, positive at the moment to some use of Steam, it could go the other way real easy.

Try offline mode. Otherwise steam will try to keep your game up to date.

[Pesanur]

I have the same issue with the steam cloud, I have disabled it in the options, but when I close the steam client it says "synchronizing with steam cloud".

[Deleted User]

I have the same issue with the steam cloud, I have disabled it in the options, but when I close the steam client it says "synchronizing with steam cloud".

Ahh, the cloud. Future of gaming innit

From what I have read, you need to be careful how you shut down the steam client. It seems it doesn't like being shut down 'improperly'.

[angrytigerp]

Yeah, about that...

1. We simply wish to play the game on our computer anywhere, anytime WE WANT, independent of the internet, in short we enjoy the old fashioned concept of owning the games we play not being enslaved by a DRM rental system.

You can say "OH BUT IT WAS NEVER ENFORCED", but as has been said many times in response to you and anyone else with the ''rental" bit, you have never owned ANY of the games you ever played, except maybe back in MS-DOS days if you were playing games then. You have ALWAYS purchased a license to use games. The likelihood of Valve ever capitalizing on this and just taking your games away is about as likely as Rockstar telling every owner of GTA games before IV to please delete their copies of the game and destroy their disks. It's very much possible and within their legal rights, but it will NEVER happen, and in the unlikelihood that Steam somehow collapses, Steam's devs have already said they would patch the games to not need Steam (on top of many game devs saying the same thing independently in their own forums).

Total fallacy.

Purchase any software on physical media and you do own that media. That includes the right to transfer the license, by sale or gift. You cannot do this with account binding systems. This has been mentioned before

I strongly suggest you go and read those licenses (LICENSES, IT SAYS IT RIGHT THERE) you hurriedly click through to install a game. The fine print says that you have the RIGHT to USE the software provided, in this case a video game. If you violate the EULA, e.g. resell a game that isn't licensed to be resold (some are, some aren't), they have the right to revoke your license, again not that it ever comes down to it.

It's not a fallacy, it's fact. Steam is a more visible manifestation of this long-standing tradition of reducing gamers' freedom to resell the game in the interest of profit, but the problem is by no means relegated only to Steam.

EDIT: Since I'm sure you're gonna claim I'm making stuff up:

http://i.imgur.com/y45dU.png

My Starcraft 2 LICENSE (was looking through my game folders, never thought I'd actually have to find a EULA, this was the first one I located).

Note the bits I highlighted:

All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and to the Game and all copies thereof (including without limitation any titles, computer code, themes, objects, characters, character names, stories, dialog, catch phrases, locations, concepts, artwork, structural or landscape designs, animations, sounds, musical compositions and recordings, audio-visual effects, storylines, character likenesses, methods of operation, moral rights, and any related documentation) are owned or licensed by Blizzard.

As I said, you never really "own" games. You license them from the developer.

No Transfer or Sublicense. THE GAME IS LICENSED, NOT SOLD. NEITHER THE GAME NOR THE LICENSE GRANTED IN SECTION 1 MAY BE SUBLICENSED OR TRANSFERRED TO ANY OTHER PERSON OR ENTITY, AND ANY ATTEMPT TO DO SO SHALL BE NULL AND VOID.

An example of the clause I was talking about preventing resale. Obviously, this one is more heavily enforced given Starcraft 2's Battlenet account requirement.

Termination. This License Agreement is effective until terminated. You may terminate this License Agreement at any time by providing notice to Blizzard customer service via email at support@blizzard.com, at which time Blizzard will remove your license to use the Game from the Account. Blizzard may terminate this Agreement at any time for any reason or no reason. Upon termination, all licenses granted herein shall immediately terminate and you must promptly remove the Game from your hard drive.

Wait, weren't you telling me that me saying companies will tell you to delete games from your hard drive was a 'fallacy'?

As I said, EULAs have said exactly the things you accuse Steam of pioneering for years now.

PS: Yes, I did buy my copy of Starcraft 2 on disk.

EDIT: My Supreme Commander 2 EULA:

14. TERMINATION. Without prejudice to any other rights of THQ, this License Agreement and your right to use the Software may automatically terminate without notice from THQ if you fail to comply with any provision of this Agreement or any terms and conditions associated with the Software. In such event, you must destroy all copies of this Software and all of its component parts.

[NUKLEAR-SLUG]

As I said, EULAs have said exactly the things you accuse Steam of pioneering for years now.

It's not the actual EULA itself that people are objecting to, it's Steams ability to actually enforce that exact same EULA that they've been so casually clicking 'yes' to all these years in the comfortable assumption that they could just ignore whatever it said.

[the old one]

As it is well known i think steam is akin to a virilant pox.Now that is out of the way there is a way around steam,let egosoft use steam but instead of haveing the steam client on your pc buy a code from egosft which would allow you to download the game with out the pox attached.as for updates you could use your code to authenticate before downloading any patch,then i think every body would be happy,the old one ps looking forward to some interestig comments

[David Howland]

The words of common sense from NUCLEAR-SLUG!
Of course creators have always attempted to retain control of their intellectual property despite having taken money for handing it over!
The license agreement printed on the back of game disks do not mean much when sold around the world across different legal systems, the courts of most countries recognise that over exploitative license agreements are not enforceable anyway. So once I have activated the game on MY disk it is mine to do as I wish in practical terms.
DRM changes all that though, they can stick any unreasonable conditions they like in their terms, such as having to run a separate account for each of your computers to run it on and they CAN ENFORCE it! 'Your' games are THEIR games, all those hundreds or thousands of pounds you spend on amassing a fine library of games will be snatched away if you have a dispute with them. If this happened in the real world it would be challenged in court, but the internet is a fools paradise, whoever controls the server has the power. The more of your money you give them, the more powerful they become and where power is gained by money, corruption usually follows!

[quase]

Hello once again,
ever and ever again in this thread I read about the Steamers that they „only” ever correct the bland lies that are told about Steam, but I feel that it is on me now to correct or better bring the „facts“ into a better light.

It may be true that the traditional EULA always said that you do not own anything, but are only personally allowed by a limited license to use a software. As stated by some others already, this was never a problem as long as the license could not be permanently be controlled by rights holder, but with Steam or other account binding systems (e.g. Origin, GfWL, uPlay, Battle.net) the rights holder remains in control of the license I purchased.
In my opinion the holding back of the owning rights for your copy of software violates the exhaustion principle for immaterial goods. It is said (by local law) that when an immaterial product is sold for the first time the owning rights of the original rights holder exhaust to prevent the creation of an artificial monopoly. You have to differentiate between copyrights and owning rights. I own the license, the data and everything of one copy of the software and I can do whatever I want with it!

Steam and other account binding systems prevent this and cut off my owning rights which is the reason some people call this system “renting”.
On top of this story, they also twist the burden of proof in favour of the initial rights holder. I should not be the one dragging a multi-million Dollar publisher to the court to get my owning rights back. That would be out of proportion and that's why there are customer protection laws around. The fact that Steam and others are not applicable to my countries laws because they do not have a legal address here would not help my position in the court of course and I could not effort to spend thousands of Dollars to sue them in the USA.

What remains to me is to not buy in the system at all, unless the policy changes. In case of Steam the people in this thread have opened my eyes and I decided that I will only use Steam for independent titles in the future. Many thanks to those who taught me this lesson.
See I am not against the digital distribution at all, but I want a system like GoG.com where I remain the owner of the software in the way I always was. We as the customers have the responsibility to prevent the gaming industry from becoming an oligopoly controlled by the big publishers.

I am sick of it. Screw you Deep Silver, you totally lost me as a costumer for all your nice titles (e.g. King Arthur 2, Risen 2). Hopefully you will come to your senses soon enough before you close down like THQ my soon have to do. Best luck Egosoft!

[NUKLEAR-SLUG]

As it is well known i think steam is akin to a virilant pox.Now that is out of the way there is a way around steam,let egosoft use steam but instead of haveing the steam client on your pc buy a code from egosft which would allow you to download the game with out the pox attached.as for updates you could use your code to authenticate before downloading any patch,then i think every body would be happy,the old one ps looking forward to some interestig comments

Your proposal still requires Egosoft to patch and support two different product channels which is exactly what they're moving away from. You're just recycling an old argument and adding nothing new to it.

Of course creators have always attempted to retain control of their intellectual property despite having taken money for handing it over!

Incorrect. They have not handed over their intellectual property rights, they have sold you a licence to use their intellectual property. Substantial difference.

The license agreement printed on the back of game disks do not mean much when sold around the world across different legal systems, the courts of most countries recognise that over exploitative license agreements are not enforceable anyway.

Over-exploitative is a very subjective consideration. To date the EULA system has remained largely unchallenged to any degree in the law courts so you're on very shaky ground trying to claim the law is on your side. It's not.

So once I have activated the game on MY disk it is mine to do as I wish in practical terms.

Incorrect. Once you have activated the game you are free to use THEIR software from YOUR disk provided you abide by the licensing agreement that YOU agreed to. The physical media itself is owned by you and if you wish to use it as a coffee coaster then you have that right. The software on your new coffee coaster is and remains the property of the software company and you have no rights over it.

[quase]

Incorrect. Once you have activated the game you are free to use THEIR software from YOUR disk provided you abide by the licensing agreement that YOU agreed to. The physical media itself is owned by you and if you wish to use it as a coffee coaster then you have that right. The software on your new coffee coaster is and remains the property of the software company and you have no rights over it.

You Sir with your vehement defense of the way Steam and the other big publishers are trampling on customer rights, are one of the people that made me aware that the concept of account binding is absolutely wrong and it is on me to stop supporting this system. Thanks again for that.
Do not take this personally, but I do not understand how one can willingly side with the big corporations rather than be on the customers side. It is like trying to understand Apple users and their same attitude towards people that say there are other, maybe even better products and ways to do something.

Maybe you have not read my post from he last page, so I will quote the main thing from it again in response to your post.

"In my opinion the holding back of the owning rights for your copy of software violates the exhaustion principle for immaterial goods. It is said (by local law) that when an immaterial product is sold for the first time the owning rights of the original rights holder exhaust to prevent the creation of an artificial monopoly. You have to differentiate between copyrights and owning rights. I own the license, the data and everything of one copy of the software and I can do whatever I want with it!"

I would not have a problem if Deep Silver would publish the game on any digital platform available. I hear even Origin is open for third party publishers. Maybe use GfWL which is in my opinion also the better client than the Steam client because it is not as intrusive. As long as you can use an offline account which is really an offline account, not like Steam and its offline mode.
In my humble opinion the DVD version of any single player game should never need any account binding or online verification! There is absolutely no reason to have it for a product except for DRM and customer control.