I loathe "steam"

[sparkomatic 7]

I enjoy the "Total War" series of games...until they switched to Steam. I abhor steam so much, I refuse to play New Vegas because it uses steam.

 

But Shogun 2 just came out, and the original is one of my top 5, all time. So it is a 16 Gb install, which took 17 minutes, plus registering, blah blah...then this:

 

an f'ing mandatory update screen, which BREAKS the game (see posting on steam's website) and despite the "do NOT update my game" selection in the options, it updates/breaks it anyway.

 

Sure, some people like steam, some people like broccoli. I paid for the game, I installed the game, I would very much like to f'ing play the game, but thanks to steam, that is a no-go.

[Panama Red 22]

What you said above is just one of the reasons that I do not own a single Steam game and have no intentions of every buying one.

[Slartibartfast 153]

I have 2 steam games and loath the thing Vegas is one of them the other is Metro 2033... and it fecking downright annoys me as over the past 3 months I have rebuilt my PC 4 times due to OS issues... and here I am with the DVD's of the game and what does it do downloads the game from Steam WTF is wrong with the DVD's ??? I could rant all night but wont I am off to play Vegas thats if steam lets me...

[+Viggen 523]

I got Grand Theft Auto IV off of Steam on Monday. Won't start the game, not even a main menu. That's $40 and several hours of my life I won't get back. I got my laptop to play games (GTAIV, Fallout 3, etc) that are on consoles, but with all the fun mods. If this is how Steam works, then I'll stick to SF2.

Edited March 17, 2011 by Viggen

[+Gepard 10,433]

I had massive problems with Steam when i bought European Total War. Never got it to run. So i gave back the game to retailer. And from then i never bought again a Steam game.

Steam is S H I T.

[+Gocad 26]

I have 2 steam games and loath the thing Vegas is one of them the other is Metro 2033... and it fecking downright annoys me as over the past 3 months I have rebuilt my PC 4 times due to OS issues... and here I am with the DVD's of the game and what does it do downloads the game from Steam WTF is wrong with the DVD's ??? I could rant all night but wont I am off to play Vegas thats if steam lets me...

 

While Steam does start to download games you just registered, you can still install them from the DVD if you have it.

 

Steam KB link

Edited March 17, 2011 by Gocad

[xclusiv8 35]

I own 23 games on Steam. Never had any problems.

[Lexx_Luthor 57]

I never had a problem with Steam.

 

I never will have a problem with Steam.

 

I have never considered buying a "steam" game, and I never will.

 

I have always purchased and supported ONLY independent developers or small publishers that avoid Steam like behaviors.

 

I miss out on alot of games, but looking around, I see I'm not missing anything out of life because of it.

 

Starve the beast.

[SayethWhaaaa 245]

I own 23 games on Steam. Never had any problems.

 

Same here. Own 32 games and never ever had a problem with Steam. For the ones I have a DVD for, I can always reinstall with those when I need and it's much quicker than re-downloading again. Spark, I don't know what your specific problem with the automatic upgrade toggle is, but I've never had that problem and even if a game you own begins updating, you should be able to pause the update and continue to play it. I've done that a tonne of times with my games. AFAIK, it doesn't actually apply the patch until you go to play after the patch has finished downloading. If the update is a game breaker, it may be on the Dev side, not necessarily Steam. Double check their product websites as I know Dev updates not being 100% compatible with Steam have been an issue in the past (COD 4 springs to mind).

 

Come to think of it, I tell a lie. The only game I've had an issue with in regards to Steam was Wings of Prey, and that was a Yu-Play issue anyways.

[FastCargo 412]

Have plenty of games on Steam and it works like a champ. Play online/offline, easy as pie.

 

You can even backup the games locally, save the gcf files to a DVD. If your computer goes TU, on your new machine, reinstall your Steam client, then copy the gcf files to your folder, and Steam reauthenticates them and you're good to go.

 

Or, if you're lazy like me, same situation but you didn't back up your gcfs, simply reinstall the Steam client, log-in, tell it which games you want to reinstall, and walk away...get some sleep and you're good to go the next day.

 

No muss, no fuss, and no damn DVDs/CDs to carry around...a big deal when on a trip.

 

FC

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

A while ago...I would have agreed with you guys 100%....however, as I now 'have' to use it, because of various games (such as Total War)...I've got it...and it's ok.

 

I would certainly prefer not to use it...but when compared to Ubisoft's DRM version...it's not too bad

Edited March 18, 2011 by UK_Widowmaker

[JediMaster 451]

I have close to 100 games on Steam and I've only had 2 incidents of trouble with it in almost 7 years of use.

 

Can't say I have that success rate with any other form of DRM, disc checking, or what-have-you.

 

Just remember, while YOU may have had issues with it, not all those other millions of people using it are or else it wouldn't have that many millions of users.

[+SkippyBing 8]

I have always purchased and supported ONLY independent developers or small publishers that avoid Steam like behaviors.

 

You know Steam releases games by small and independent developers don't you?

 

Oh yeah, never had any problems with Steam either, certainly made my life easier at times.

[Lexx_Luthor 57]

Skippy::

You know Steam releases games by small and independent developers don't you?

I can assume that easily, but I didn't know that explicitly, because I don't care. Its off the radar, so to speak.

 

One of the big problems I see is old games are not releaced from the "invasive" DRM -- or are they? What if Steam goes out of business and then the games don't work? Or is that not a problem?

 

The real problem for me is is lack of time and interest. I have neither for any game except TK's SF -- the only game I have -- although I do play Master of Orion 1, from time to time, when I plug in my DOS 6.22 hard drive and boot from that. What's cool is all that still works. I still work and run Fortran 90 stuff I make, and it runs under a 32 bit extender. So I run a 64 bit processor (AMD) using 32 bit software on a 16 bit operating system. The old grafix cards won't work though since they changed the voltage on the PCI slots, but it doesn't hurt much for what I do.

 

Master of Orion 1 does have an early form of DRM, but its not invasive. During gameplay, the player is asked to identify the name of one of the ship models used by the game. If you have the paper manual, you look it up. Obviously this isn't very secure, but it came on maybe 4 floppy disks, its that old.

[CowboyTodd41 133]

The only time I've ever had a problem with was when it was in beta and used to so people could try it out and download the pre-release of Counter-Strike 1.6. I had never seen a download say it would take five years until that day lol.

[SayethWhaaaa 245]

CS 1.6...? Jesus... That was a long time ago.

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

 

 

One of the big problems I see is old games are not releaced from the "invasive" DRM -- or are they? What if Steam goes out of business and then the games don't work? Or is that not a problem?

 

 

 

Must admit, thats always worried me!....Steam is showing no signs of it..But certain other rubbish DRM's (such as RoF)..though that is no longer an issue...and that Awful yuplay thing...the WORST DRM EVER!!!...I wouldnt trust yuplay not to go out of business..and leave everyone is the sh*t

[sparkomatic 7]

Just remember, while YOU may have had issues with it, not all those other millions of people using it are or else it wouldn't have that many millions of users.

 

 

Not saying that it is worthless, just that I personally loathe it. But come one JM, "million of people cant be wrong" argument is beneath you...just asks Communists and fans of Bieber.

 

However, I am still stuck with the "Thou Shalt Download this Update". Yes, I went in to options and told it not too, then hit "play", it IMMEDIATELY starts downloading again and wont play until it updates. Please tell me how to get it to stop that.

 

And I have traveled quite a bit with me laptop, maybe FedEx likes to put people in 5-star hotels, but we do not always have Internet connections for personal laptops in some of my locations, thus rendering steam (and whatever Dragon Age is on) out of the question.

 

Never managed to get either GTA4 or Total War Empire to work, and if you check the various forums, they are replete with people that feel the same.

 

Cheers, and death to steam!

[SayethWhaaaa 245]

You tried simply disconnecting you puter from the web when you want to play? In the past (before I knew what I was doing with Steam) occasionally I'd have a game that would look for updates before starting, disconnecting bypassed that 10 minute wait for it's stupid, badly written patching program to work. I know it's a principle of "you shouldn't have to", but it should work.

Edited March 21, 2011 by Say What?!

[JediMaster 451]

The difference is with communism you only have to approve it once and then you're stuck with it no matter how much you might hate it. Steam users can easily give it up, no one forces you to buy games there or keep using it! Bieber fans...um...they're not even going to understand what communism is, so I say just put the padded helmets on them so they don't hurt themselves and walk away.

 

Of the 2 incidents I mentioned, one was an update pushed to Arma 2 just before I was ready to play MP one night with a group. I was stuck as the DL took a good 90 mins and once it starts it zeros-out the files it's replacing so you can't even cancel and play with the old version, once it starts you have to let it finish.

I did know the patch was out, but I thought Steam was going to take longer to put it out there so I'd already patched it myself (the arma2 patches let you do that)...but I forgot to turn off auto update.

 

I have never seen a game that pushed a patch anyway even though Steam's settings said do not update. Of course, I've never owned any of the Total War series, in Steam or otherwise, so I've no idea how it works.

 

Generally speaking, Steam is best when the game itself has none of that stuff--no auto-updating, no DRM, no fuss. I know Company of Heroes on Steam is a bit of a pain because CoH has its own auto-updater built in, but since Steam does it for it instead there's a bit of a tug of war there.

 

 

[sparkomatic 7]

Bieber fans...um...they're not even going to understand what communism is, so I say just put the padded helmets on them so they don't hurt themselves and walk away.

 

Ha ha! Now that is the JM that I know, solid reply!

 

For me, steam completely ruined the Total War series, it made Empire unplayable and it has managed to repeatedly break Shogun 2. I do not enjoy the "steam is updating your account"...why? Looks the same as before, maybe you are updating the spyware? Maybe updating the mandatory ads? And as far as Shogun 2, I clearly tell it to NOT download updates, but like a bad puppy, as soon as I hit the "play" button (rather a necessity) it begins "updating".

 

Maybe I am doing it wrong; but unchecking the "download updates" in the "settings" menu and then hitting the "play" button should arguably be all that I need to do.

 

Will try the unplugging it from the wall trick, maybe that will fix it.

 

I did notice that one can purchase older games through steam, and maybe it works well for those, supporting that the newer games have some sort of built-in auto-update case. Also, for Shogun 2, it just came out and I know that there are always issues with a game then (which is exactly why I usually wait a few months post release to buy a game, but this was Shogun 2, and my eagerness overpowered my natural caution).

 

Cheers!

[xclusiv8 35]

I wonder why i got a vote down for saying I own 23 steam games and never having problems with them

[JediMaster 451]

Tough crowd?

 

I have seen some other games that do the mandatory update thing, although usually it's because of MP reasons ie Sins of a Solar Empire you can leave at whatever patch level you like UNLESS you go online to play in which case it forces you to update or won't let you connect.

 

Many RTS games are heavily MP-based now so perhaps that's what they've done here except it's at the start instead of waiting for you to go online. Oh, the aforementioned CoH will force an update as soon as you start the game I just remembered.