Fallout New Vegas Steam?

Hanker109 · July 2, 2011

Hello everyone:

I just purchased Fallout New Vegas from Gamespot and when I tried to install, the game requires that I open an account with Steam. I have Fallout 3 and other games from Bethesda and was never requested to open an account. I don't mind registering the games that I buy, as I always do, but why do I have to open an account for this game. I don't like to play games on the internet and don't like to download games either, so before I install this game I want to make sure of that. Can someone update me on this please?

Besta regards,

Hanker109

tunaisafish · July 2, 2011

Yeah, you can play in offline mode. You will need to register online before you play.

It will be a large download the first time you connect as it will automatically update your game to the latest patch.

A tip when you install Steam. DO NOT accept the default install location under 'Program Files (x86)'.

Create or use a top level folder like C:\Games\

nivea · July 2, 2011

Yup you are forced to make a account to install New Vegas, you must be online and you must download stuff from them for the game.

You can play offline but most the time that does not work, it likes to tell me I need to sign in before I can play offline... and it installs patches when I ask it not to.

So enjoy the "wonderful" program that is Steam.

Hanker109 · July 2, 2011

Yup you are forced to make a account to install New Vegas, you must be online and you must download stuff from them for the game.
You can play offline but most the time that does not work, it likes to tell me I need to sign in before I can play offline... and it installs patches when I ask it not to.

So enjoy the "wonderful" program that is Steam.

Thanks for the info, it seems that there is always someone with a scheme to clean people's pocket. I have other Bethesda games and was never required to subscribe to anything and everything works just fine. Now we have this "Steam" company pocking their noses and requiring you to subscribe if you want to play. What is their purpose in doing that? I hope that the new Skyrim game isn't that way, otherwise they can keep their games for themselves. If people allow things like this to happen, then they will be forced into something else that will be in detriment to them. Take Microsoft as an example, they force the competion out by making manufacturers to install their Windows OS. Now, without the competion, they charge you extra without a problem. I just hope that everyone will be conscious not to allow more and more interventions like this, the end result will be only in benefits for these companies and more restrain for customers. I know where they are going with this, take an example with the Anti Virus Programs.

Thanks again and best regards,

Hanker109

ub3rman123 · July 2, 2011

I like Steam. It's not virus ridden, and it won't cost you an extra penny if all you do is install store-bought games. There are much, much worse alternatives than Steam *(GFWL).

And it was confirmed, Skyrim is Steam-based.

nivea · July 3, 2011

Yeah its a fine program, when its not forced down your throat and your given no choice even when buying a hard copy of a game.

I am very bummed to hear that Skyrim will forced this junk on me again, how disappointing... it really doesnt help stop people from pirating and it makes it hard/impossible to go back to a old patch if the new one screws your game up.

bigv32 · July 3, 2011

Yeah its a fine program, when its not forced down your throat and your given no choice even when buying a hard copy of a game.
I am very bummed to hear that Skyrim will forced this junk on me again, how disappointing... it really doesnt help stop people from pirating and it makes it hard/impossible to go back to a old patch if the new one screws your game up.

I would beg to differ on your statement that it stops people from pirating. While I will admit that if a professional/tech savy person really wanted to priate a game, they could, but for your "average" "pirater" it does.

What I mean by "average pirater" is a person who lets someone else use his/her disk, or makes a second copy for himself/herself to use as a backup. Also, I believe steam also only allows the game to be installed on a certain number of computers. This prevents the long term affects of someone loaning out a disk to ones friends.

Now do not think I personally am calling everyone who loans out a disk or makes a personal copy of a disk is a pirater. In fact, legally, you are allowed to give out as many "copies" of a game as you like to as many people as you like. The only catch is that you can't make any money off of it, AND at no time can two of those disks be used at the same time (two people can not be playing the game at the same time). I have seen/heard this arguement being used at my school with music and other software. The hard part comes in proving that at no time did two instances of the item in question be in use at the same time. However, the argument can still be used because most of the time, it is hard to PROVE that at one point in time that two instances of the item WERE used at the same time.

A very basic example of this,

NOTE: this is just a basic example with several different situations. Different rules/standards at different schools may make this arguement invalide by throwing a "curveball" rule into the mix.

Basically, say person A has a music CD that he/she bought from the store. Legally that person is allowed to make personal copies of that song (This is common sense).

Person B likes one song on that CD, so person A burns person B a copy of the song. So what is legal/illegal?

1. Person A is listening to the song at the same time person B is listening to it.

This is ILLEGAL.

NOTE: It does not matter if the two know that the other is listening to it. It is still legal. This is where the difficulty of proving or disproving simultanious use comes in.

2. Person A is listening to the song, and immediately after it ends, person A listens to another song from a different CD and person B listens to the first song.

This is legal because technically the song is not being used more than one time during the a single time period.

Now here comes a difficult situation to which both sides of the arguement have legitimet cases.

3. Person A is listening to the song on the ORIGINAL CD. The song ends and person A listens to the next song on the CD. After the song ends, Person B listens to the song.

This depends on the personal bias (and yes everyone has a person bias I don't care what you say) of the person deciding the case.

Legal: This situation could be considered legal because at no time were two instances of the SAME song playing.

Illegal: It could be argued that since the entire CD was in use by person A, part of the cd was in use, and therefore two parts of the CD were being played at the same itime.

4. Person A has a burned CD containing two or more songs from the original CD IN A ROW. Person A is listening to the first song in that list. As soon as that song ends, person B starts to listen to that song and person A listens to the next song on the burned cd which is also from the original CD. (Note person A's burned cd is not a complete burn. All it has to do is either contain one song that was not on the original or not contain one song that was.)

Legal: Same arguement as in number 3.

Illegal: Along the same lines as the arguement of number 3, but the fact that it is not the original cd would have to be argued for.

NOTE: This arguement gets even more interesting if the burned cd that person A uses contains two or more songs from the cd, but the song are NOT in a row.

Now for the FINAL and in my opinion most rediculous option/situation.

Person B interviews person A WHILE person A is listening to the song. Person B starts the interview with Person A before the song starts, person A says something in response, person A then starts the song, both people are completely silent through out the entire song, when the song has ENDED person B says something, person A responds, interview ends (NOTE theoretically, they could go on to the next song so long as the pattern of both people saying something before and after each tracks remains). Person B then takes the recording and breaks it up into individual segments in which both people say something before and after each song. Now is this situation legal or not? Both sides have an arguement.

LEGAL: Since the recording was done for an interview, person B has a right to edit the interview however he/she likes. (Technically you could even argue that they have a right to sell it, but this gets very hairy when countered by arguement for this being illegal, so it would be stupid to even try it. See NOTE in the illegal section as to how one could potentially counter the counter arguement, but if you did, it would be like "shooting yourself in the foot" and not be worth your time as you would basically be admitting your guilt lol). Anyway, in this situation, person B would technically be able to listen to the same part of the interview that contained the same song as person A was listening to at the same time. This could be looked at as downloading a youtube video of a song.

Illegal: There are two arguements here which would probably win unless person B worked for a newspaper or something like that.

1. The intent of the interview was to get a copy of the song and thus break the law. (Solid arguement and would probably win any case lol)

2. Since the interview is not "different enough" from the original CD, person B would be violating copyright laws by producing a similar copy, and thus by the same song being listened to at the same time, the law was broken. (NOTE: if the defendent was very lucky he/she could argue that the interview is "different enough" to be considered a different item, but "similar enough" to require the payment of royalties etc. This however would probably be counter productive.)

Finally, throw in any other local/state/or even college rules that involve this topic and the above situations change dramatically. In the cases I have seen, if you go to an actual court, the situations above would be considered illegal. However, for a college/university, you may be able to pull it off if your college has no rules that SPECIFICALLY apply to you lol.

Now you can't do this with steam becuase of the number of installs is somewhat limited, and you can always play in offline mode on a computer that is not hooked up to the internet so technically two intances of the game could be played at the same time. This of course assumes that the steam program does not log you time played and compare them if/when your computer does connect to the internet (I do not know for sure if it does or not, but if you are a conspiracy theorist, you probably would think so lol).

LOL sorry for the length, but that is how steam does not stop your high level/professional. However the average user does suffer from it. In the future, most games will probably require internet access to even be played. Until then, steam is just a pain that must been dealt with because the large corporations do not realize that not all of us are doing illegal things.

I do have one question that me and a friend have argued about for a while now that goes along with the idea of steam and its attempt to stop illegal copies.

Here is the statement that we have been discussing and two slight variations of it we have also talked about.

"IF you can find a way to mod it, then it can be "hacked" (copied)"

"IF they LET you mod it, then it will be "hacked' (copied)"

"IF they LET you "hack" it, then the whole gaming community will learn from it"

nivea · July 3, 2011

@_@ Holy flying monkeys batman....That is a long post, I um read 80% of it then got lost (I blame my A.D.D).

Now I dont trade my games or loan them to friends, cause said friends are all guys... and they break stuff... a lot. I learned to not share my nice things, see this is why you all can not have nice things! :P

By pirating I mean larger named known pirates such as Skidrow, if they want to hack it... well you will see it hacked and put up for download on some torrent site.

I remember doing a search a couple days after the release of NV looking for reviews and info on the game, and found that it was already hacked and put up for download ( I got to play it on a friends computer, someone who BROKE my Sega Genesis >_<...you know who you are then bought it. ).... how did Steam stop them if they did it in a few days?

I am sorry but if all Steam did was stop pirateing then it wouldnt be such a big annoying problem, there are those of you who will say:

But Nivea you can put it in offline mode! Well it is in offline mode... and I need to be online to put it in offline mode... and still it knocks me off my game.

But Nivea your not doing it right, your a idiot! That very well may be that I am a Idiot, but I am following step by step instructions from Steam and its not working.

But Nivea this program is a gift from GOD! Yeah well I dont believe in god, so there.

9Kbits · July 3, 2011

The only real problems I have with Steam are... actually, nothing. It's a wonderful program, and I like having a "home base" for all my games. If I were to switch to a new computer, I would have all my games ready at my fingertips, ready for instant downloading if I so wished. It also includes the "Steam Overlay", which gives you access to a myriad of features that would normally require alt-tabbing. The problem is its criticisers. Would you at least give the thing a chance, or actually try it before you claim it "makes you jump through hoops". I already register ALL my games with steam, hard copy or not (why does it even make a diffrence?).

nivea · July 4, 2011

I suppose the problem is like this:

If you want the services Steam offers you are willing to over look the problems it causes or can cause if your unlucky or do not have a good internet connection.

If you just want to load a game and play it, because you have a hard copy and just want the ease of use of putting a disc into the computer and hitting play only to find you have to deal with all this extra crap you never wanted to begin with.... then your less willing to put up all issues that come along with trying to use the program.

Its not that Steam is a BAD thing, its that there are those of us who dont like strange programs being forced onto us when they are not actually needed.

I got nothing against Steam, they are just like everyone other place trying to screw everyone over just enough to keep their jobs and make money. Its just I shouldn't be forced to use their services unless I want them.