96 replies to this topic

[Rusty]

I'm starting to question why this thread was created. You guys do know you all agree on the fact that it is not a good action, you just disagree on why Steam does this... And occassionally blast at each other about how much Steam sucks and whatnot that has nothing to do with the topic at hand.

You haven't been at the GMC long have you?

[Omega Metroid]

There are plenty of advantages to Steam, heck, I really don't see these issues you're complaining about.

Are you guys suggesting a game isn't allowed to try and deter piracy? Lets be honest, if you're going to have any form of DRM at all, which publishers really find attractive, then Steam is probably the best way to go. It's well designed, user-friendly, and supports commercial and indie games alike. It's pricing can be sketchy, but they offer great deals seasonally. It's performance can be spotty, but it performs well enough that their user base isn't up in arms constantly. And it works as a great way to interact with friends, the community, and sometimes even the developers themselves.

There are other methods, but CD keys are defunct, dongles failed outright, and server authentication can be spoofed or circumvented easily. As of right now, one of the best methods to deter piracy is by making it more comfortable to use legitimate software.

if you've got a better idea, the industry would really like to hear it.

[Bytewin]

I'm starting to question why this thread was created. You guys do know you all agree on the fact that it is not a good action, you just disagree on why Steam does this... And occassionally blast at each other about how much Steam sucks and whatnot that has nothing to do with the topic at hand.

You haven't been at the GMC long have you?

Just because it's a usual occurrence doesn't mean it's not stupid

[Rusty]

I'm starting to question why this thread was created. You guys do know you all agree on the fact that it is not a good action, you just disagree on why Steam does this... And occassionally blast at each other about how much Steam sucks and whatnot that has nothing to do with the topic at hand.

You haven't been at the GMC long have you?

Just because it's a usual occurrence doesn't mean it's not stupid

I'll give you that one!

[negative1]

if you've got a better idea, the industry would really like to hear it.

it's not necessarily better..
how about.. as an OPTION
---------------------------
1 NO INTERNET CONNECTION needed for single player

2 NO NEED TO INSTALL A CLIENT for the game for single player

3 NO DRM for single player

do whatever you want with multiplayer, online, etc.

is that hard to do?

later
-1

[makerofthegames]

1 NO INTERNET CONNECTION needed for single player

[...]

3 NO DRM for single player

1 There is an offline mode, although, there isn't really a very large number of people without internet, at least, without internet and buying video games.

3 That's not a great idea. Who ever said people only pirate multiplayer games? Why would there be no DRM for single player games?

[negative1]

1 NO INTERNET CONNECTION needed for single player

[...]

3 NO DRM for single player

1 There is an offline mode, although, there isn't really a very large number of people without internet, at least, without internet and buying video games.

3 That's not a great idea. Who ever said people only pirate multiplayer games? Why would there be no DRM for single player games?

1 your point is irrelevant.. whether i have internet or not.. i don't always have access to it,
so why should i be tethered to sign in, to validate single player?

3 people pirate ALL games, single or multiplayer... in fact, some games on steam have 2 layers of DRM,
the one with the game, and steams....

not to start yet another debate... the person wanted to know ALTERNATIVES to what was out there now.

these are alternatives.... put a serial number on the game (sticker) or in a booklet, have me call a number.
there are ways to do it, WITHOUT HAVING TO REQUIRE AN ACCOUNT BE CREATED ON THEIR SYSTEM..

later
-1

[makerofthegames]

1 your point is irrelevant.. whether i have internet or not.. i don't always have access to it,
so why should i be tethered to sign in, to validate single player?

3 people pirate ALL games, single or multiplayer... in fact, some games on steam have 2 layers of DRM,
the one with the game, and steams....

1. You must have internet to log onto Steam, while you have internet, you can activate offline mode and now when you get offline you can play your games. Your argument is invalid.

3. That has absolutely nothing to do with my point. You said to remove DRM on singleplayer games, and now it seems we both agree that that's stupid. If you're against DRM, be against it on all fronts. Why would only singleplayer games be easy to pirate?

[negative1]

1 your point is irrelevant.. whether i have internet or not.. i don't always have access to it,
so why should i be tethered to sign in, to validate single player?

3 people pirate ALL games, single or multiplayer... in fact, some games on steam have 2 layers of DRM,
the one with the game, and steams....

1. You must have internet to log onto Steam, while you have internet, you can activate offline mode and now when you get offline you can play your games. Your argument is invalid.

3. That has absolutely nothing to do with my point. You said to remove DRM on singleplayer games, and now it seems we both agree that that's stupid. If you're against DRM, be against it on all fronts. Why would only singleplayer games be easy to pirate?

1. you're arguing in circles...
read it again.. I DONT ALWAYS HAVE ACCESS TO THE INTERNET..

don't you see how that prevents me from playing the game?

also... your basic premise is flawed... the poster wanted to know ALTERNATIVES TO STEAM,
not use steam, or make it mandatory...

3. in that case, remove DRM FROM BOTH single and multiplayer.. the reason i didn't care
about multiplayer or online, is because i don't play any games that require it.. and single
player games are easier to pirate, because you don't need to replicate all the tricky online
stuff, and fake server things/accounts/etc..

final point : there are alternatives to tying games to internet accounts or activations,
companies choose not to do so because of laziness

later
-1

[makerofthegames]

1 There is an offline mode, although, there isn't really a very large number of people without internet, at least, without internet and buying video games.

1 your point is irrelevant.. whether i have internet or not.. i don't always have access to it,
so why should i be tethered to sign in, to validate single player?

1. You must have internet to log onto Steam, while you have internet, you can activate offline mode and now when you get offline you can play your games. Your argument is invalid.

1. you're arguing in circles...
read it again.. I DONT ALWAYS HAVE ACCESS TO THE INTERNET..

don't you see how that prevents me from playing the game?

What the heck are you talking about? Do you stop reading my arguments once you see the word 'internet' in them? I'm giving you the answer to your problem here, and you're pretending that I'm not. The first time you register and get into steam you must be on the internet. So, activate offline mode and then you'll never have to have access to the internet again.

I never said you ALWAYS HAVE TO HAVE ACCESS TO THE INTERNET, I said you must have access to it once then every other time YOU MAY PLAY WITHOUT YOUR ACCESS TO THE INTERNET. You just have to activate that mode, once.

If you don't understand even this time, I'm not going to say it again.

Edited by makerofthegames, 28 January 2012 - 11:16 PM.

[lmbarns]

lol I was looking at steam "hardware statistics" considering it's highly useful for game developers to see what people are actually using, and saw that under their "Applications, services, or suite" that 29.41% of their users have utorrent installed, 10% more than have internet explorer installed haha. http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey about 2/3 the way down

Edited by lmbarns, 31 January 2012 - 12:45 AM.

[Rusty]

Don't you think it'd scary how they have access to that kind of data?

[lmbarns]

Don't you think it'd scary how they have access to that kind of data?

But that's the modern age. Heck, you can do almost the same thing with any website by comparing a list of sites with a user's css selector a:visited to distinguish which sites the user has been to. (some browsers starting to stop supporting this though)

Edited by lmbarns, 31 January 2012 - 02:05 AM.

[Rusty]

Don't you think it'd scary how they have access to that kind of data?

But that's the modern age. Heck, you can do almost the same thing with any website by comparing a list of sites with a user's css selector a:visited to distinguish which sites the user has been to. (some browsers starting to stop supporting this though)

And that is good. Steam letting me know that it knows what I have installed on my computer is bad. In the wrong hands that data could easily be used against me and if Sony has taught us anything, it's that putting important data on a high risk network is fundamentally a bad idea.

[Bytewin]

Don't you think it'd scary how they have access to that kind of data?

But that's the modern age. Heck, you can do almost the same thing with any website by comparing a list of sites with a user's css selector a:visited to distinguish which sites the user has been to. (some browsers starting to stop supporting this though)

And that is good. Steam letting me know that it knows what I have installed on my computer is bad. In the wrong hands that data could easily be used against me and if Sony has taught us anything, it's that putting important data on a high risk network is fundamentally a bad idea.

Ohgodno...
Steam knows I have Utorrent installed. What if LulzSec gets ahold of it??? They will know that I use torrent files!

[Rusty]

Don't you think it'd scary how they have access to that kind of data?

But that's the modern age. Heck, you can do almost the same thing with any website by comparing a list of sites with a user's css selector a:visited to distinguish which sites the user has been to. (some browsers starting to stop supporting this though)

And that is good. Steam letting me know that it knows what I have installed on my computer is bad. In the wrong hands that data could easily be used against me and if Sony has taught us anything, it's that putting important data on a high risk network is fundamentally a bad idea.

Ohgodno...
Steam knows I have Utorrent installed. What if LulzSec gets ahold of it??? They will know that I use torrent files!

Then it's a good job that it's only the vast majority of torrents that are illegal?

[Bytewin]

@Rusty
1. What's that got to do with anything?


2.What makes you think I didn't just use it to download Humble Bundle games? Or legit free software that just uses bittorrent so their servers don't get overwhelmed with too much traffic and crash?