Man, you people type too much..
apricotslice wrote:Which totally ignores the fact that a very high percentage of steam sales are only for heavily discounted games during sale periods. And a high percentage of Steam users ONLY buy when prices are heavily discounted.
In which case, the developer is getting much much less than they would from the store sales.
No, you don't understand the way it works. Yes, initially when the game goes on sale there is a surge in purchases. That is after all the point of the sale. What happens after the sale ends though is the interesting part. You're assuming that once off sale that's it, end of story, but what actually happens is that the sales peak persists and tails off only slowly even after the game is back to normal price.
Apparently the reasoning behind it is down to people who bought it on sale on the premise that 'It's only a fiver, it's worth a punt' finding out it's actually a good game and then telling their friends who go and buy it at full price. Word of mouth it seems actually generates further sales. The upshot of all this is that overall the game gets MORE sales and therefore makes MORE profits from being in one of Steams sales than not.
fairywhipper wrote:
ah the download to another computer work around... a few mb would be ok, but 2.5gb + 900mb ish = 3.4gb ish.
however, that might not be solution as you install the game onto another computer with steam, doesnt it mean authentification is based on that computer? i
Steam validation is indeed based by hardware, however Steam provides the ability to register additional machines to your profile so that you can play in more than one location. For example if you own a laptop you can install Steam on there too and take your games with you when you travel. The only caveat is that you may ONLY be logged onto steam from one machine at any one time.
What this means in your case is that yes, you have the option of taking your machine/laptop to a friends house and borrowing their connection to update yourself after which your low-level connection will be more than adequate for authentication.
Alternatively, if moving the whole machine is a hassle, you could just log onto your friends machine with your account, download your updates, transfer them to USB drive and then copy them onto your machine when you get home. Once you've done that you would just need to do a quick "Verify Integrity of game cache" and reauthenticate yourself and you'd be good to go.
apricotslice wrote:I got the distinct impression it came as a shock to Bernd that they would lose any sales because of steam. The way he said what he did seemed to indicate it hadnt occured to him that any of us would refuse to buy because of steam.
Don't kid yourself.
Egosoft were well aware that there would be people who would take offence to Steam, just as they were well aware that people would take offence to the changes they've made in Rebirth (single playership/no piloting capitals) and just as they've been well aware of every other objection the community has made over whatever issue-of-the-week it's currently fixated on. This is nothing new.
Well that would indeed be your double-standard you mentioned then. You're willing to give Egosoft the benefit of the doubt but not Valve. You're arguing against Steam without any basis of understanding of what it is you're against. It's a position that fairly blows your whole argument out the water really.
X2-Eliah wrote:That same clause applies to ALL computer-game media. Including all your fancy titles on DVDs with their DRMs. Don't selectively discriminate - if you hate that stuff, then say goodbye to all games.
QFT +1
xeon_1 wrote:
Sorry but steams bans user all the time because they don't like the software on there system/hardware of the system/payment issues not all banks are as fast/isp quirks
So to say you only get banned for cheating/other illegal stuff is rubbish.
I keep seeing this being brought up. People get banned from WoW etc for cheating, hacking and glitching all the time. Those are legitimate account bans. Kindly provide documentary evidence that Steam regularly, willfully, bans accounts for people that have done nothing wrong or retract your claim.
fairywhipper wrote:if we all opened a steam account, but not buy any games through them, their revenues would drop, and it would be a matter of time before they start charging. ooooohhhh, maybe they will start charging a monthly rent soon anyway?
And maybe your government will introduce a 'Processor Tax'. Anyone who owns a machine with a CPU that operates over 1ghz will be required to pay a yearly ownership tax. Kind of like Car Tax. Sounds silly, but it's about as likely as what you're suggesting