Steamy questions

[BleedingCrown]

Theres allot of heated discussion here about Steam. Many think its diabolical, others see it as a great service. The intention of this thread isn't to debate that, there's enough of that already and frankly, I find it boring. Please don't respond with comments about how people who love/hate Steam are stupid and retarded. I'd be interested in approaching the controversy from a less emotional and more business like angle. Imagine that you're attending a board meeting at a major game publisher, and they're debating whether or not they should tie their upcoming release to Steam. They ask these questions.

 

1. Seeing as how there are clearly so many people with strong feelings against Steam, does tying a game to Steam help or hurt a game publisher?

 

2. What benefits does a game publisher get out of its association with Steam?

 

3. Are there alternatives to Steam available to publishers that are less controversial, but allow them to derive the same benefits? If so, what are they?

 

4. Or, is Steam, or something like Steam, necessary in todays marketplace? If so, why?

[darthsloth74]

Well supposedly Steam makes companies feel more at ease with the security of their product. The benefit I suppose is its relatively easy to provide updates to the community.

[HeyYou]

1. Hurt. You are adding another layer of complexity to an already demanding game. Bugs/Problems are a given. Too many problems, and folks pirate the game instead, as the pirates have no such issues. Steam does absolutely NOTHING to combat piracy.

 

2. None, so far as I am concerned. It is just another form of digital distribution, which has the added benefit of killing off the secondary market. (from a publishers point of view, this IS an advantage.)

 

3. D2D, and there is another digital distributor, however, they take the tactic of encrypting the executable, which the modding community won't like. For games that have a large modding community, not a good option.

 

4. No, it isn't 'necessary'. If I go and buy a real disk, from a store, or online, or whathaveyou, I don't need steam. Having the OPTION would be fine, but, having it as a REQUIREMENT is a bad plan.

[sputnik421]

There have been resent reports that the steam network has been hacked! Do you really want your credit card details, in the hands of a company that will not protect your identity and financial data? I'm so glad I did not have enough money to pre-order this game, as I'm one of the steam haters and by the looks of it we are the much safer financially for hating steam. Edited November 26, 2011 by sputnik421

[BarefootWarrior]

To add to this, I am some what concerned about the issue of being 'off line' while you are playing. I have been playing 'off line' since I started and to my amazement, one morning found that my game had been updated...even in the 'off line' mode. This means the possibility of a privacy issue as well.

 

This should be an option, and not required. I prefer dealing with the publisher of the game directly, not someone like Steam. If the publisher can't handle their own security issues, piracy issues, updates directly, then maybe they should not release the game in the first place. Just my thoughts on the subject. :tongue:

 

When I spend this kind of money on any game, I don't want to be dealing with a third party for anything.

[darthsloth74]

To add to this, I am some what concerned about the issue of being 'off line' while you are playing. I have been playing 'off line' since I started and to my amazement, one morning found that my game had been updated...even in the 'off line' mode. This means the possibility of a privacy issue as well.

 

This should be an option, and not required. I prefer dealing with the publisher of the game directly, not someone like Steam. If the publisher can't handle their own security issues, piracy issues, updates directly, then maybe they should not release the game in the first place. Just my thoughts on the subject. :tongue:

 

When I spend this kind of money on any game, I don't want to be dealing with a third party for anything.

 

Thats a really scary piece of information about privacy issues. I might add I don't personally like Steam but with so many publishers moving their products to it, its unfortunately become an evil I have to suffer.

I don't like anything that forces me to have an internet connection to install a game I've just paid for. You might as well stick an empty box on the shelf in a games store with a web address to the Steam site.

 

Plus I think Steam does encourage developers to be lazy in regard to bugs and other potential problems, they simply release and look to the fact that it will be "patched" in an update. Falout New Vegas initial release was somewhat criminal considering its stability issues.

 

I also don't like the fact that I've once again had to change all my passwords due to their foolish security breach. I console myself with the one fact that Steam isn't as bad as recent Ubisoft releases which require you to be permanently online while you play them.

[WarKirby3333]

1. Seeing as how there are clearly so many people with strong feelings against Steam, does tying a game to Steam help or hurt a game publisher?

 

2. What benefits does a game publisher get out of its association with Steam?

 

3. Are there alternatives to Steam available to publishers that are less controversial, but allow them to derive the same benefits? If so, what are they?

 

4. Or, is Steam, or something like Steam, necessary in todays marketplace? If so, why?

 

I'm a longtime steam user. I hated it in the beginning and had a lot of problems with it, but that's because it was a buggy mess when it was introduced. It's come a long way since, in terms of stability.

 

1. I think tying a game to steam helps. Greatly. It has a ridiculously vast community of people, and games on steam are constantly promoted through advertising in the client. There have been scores of indie developers thriving on it. it brings a lot of exposure

 

2. aside from the advertising, they get access to Steamworks. The whole package of net code, multiplayer assisting, community stuff, etc. I have a ton of friends on steam that i talk to regularly, and we've had many discussions about skyrim. I can take a glance at my friends list and see immediately who's palying it. tell them stuff i just saw. I think steam brings a lot of social aspect to a game. Steamworks means a developer doesn't have to do things like making ingame friends lists, messaging systems, etc. It lets steam handle all the metagame stuff that's common in anything multiplayer related, so developers can just make the darned game.

 

It also has DRM built in, as steam games can, at the publisher's discretion, require the user to be signed into steam or not, to play. I can't say or sure whether or not this actually does anything about piracy, but the important thing is that publishers THINK it does. By relying on steam for DRM, they're less likely to include some bulls*** third party rootkit solution that makes you not want to touch the game.

 

In addition, steam provides the marketplace. It encompasses a centralised service for publishers to sell their games. Valve handles the credit processing, and accepts tons of payment methods all over the world. It provides the distribution via digital download servers. This creates a massive saving on a publisher's part

 

3. I highly doubt it. EA has Origin, and Microsoft has GFWL. Services made by two of the most evil companies in history. Valve is jesus compared to them. the important thing for the advertising and social aspects is audience size. The value of such features is directly related to how many people use the service. Steam is the biggest by far, so i'd say any alternative is not viable due to audience size.

 

4. Necessary, i'm not sure. But personally, i've stopped buying physical games, period. I don't need junk lying around my house. With steam i can play stuff on any computer, which i sometimes find use for. It also means that if i get bored with a game and uninstall it, i can come back yers later and fire it up again, whereas with a physical disk, i'd have probably gotten it lost or scratched to death.

 

I don't see any point in clinging to the outdated notions of owning pointless physical property. Whether it be music, games, movies, etc. it's all data. A disc, a manual and a box are all just pointless waste of resources.

[WarKirby3333]

This should be an option, and not required. I prefer dealing with the publisher of the game directly, not someone like Steam. If the publisher can't handle their own security issues, piracy issues, updates directly, then maybe they should not release the game in the first place. Just my thoughts on the subject. :tongue:

 

I'm curious why you think this way. If every publisher handles these issues on their own, then every publisher is duplicating work that everyone else has already done. Every publisher is spending money on creating redundant systems for these issues, instead of on actual games. One of the big advantages of steam is not having to worry about this stuff.

 

Do you have to go and fetch water from a spring every morning? run a generator to make your own electricity? Bad examples if you live rural maybe :P but this is the point of infrastructure. Stuff that everyone needs, might as well be managed by one central party and licensed out. everyone wins in the long run.

[PsYchotic666Joker]

Games that NEED steam to play are stupid and i really hate it, we don't need it period

 

/thread

[darthsloth74]

Is Steam a good thing. Well not after the latest update has completely stopped me from playing Skyrim. I expected update fixes to quests and bugs not more mindless DRM. I mean I paid for this game in a shop, how many hoops do I have to jump through?