7 ms·

Steam is the only place I ever actually pay for software. They earned my trust where so many others have lost it.

serf 5y ago
I pay for software on Steam, too -- but it makes me incredibly nervous consolidating lots of purchased goods with a single walled-garden vendor who holds the keys ; and they never really earned my trust, they're just the only game in town for most titles now. The internet is filled with stories about locked accounts, lost libraries, games being pulled out of the library due to 'low quality of gameplay' while people are actively playing them on Steam, DLC and in-game currency sold that can never be redeemed or used in the game it's bought for (see: 'Wizardry Online' debacle, Steam/Valve continued selling in-game currency far beyond the point that it was being discussed to remove the game from the library all together.. then removed access from the game for Steam users after making a tidy profit. This was a current/active/new game with a bad launch, not an old title.) So just to re-state: Valve never won my trust with their behavior with Steam and associated acts. There is just no one else; let's call this phenomenon 'Walmart Syndrome', perhaps?
- bbabaraba 5y ago
  If you're concerned about losing your games, you can easily do backups from the Steam application, copying game folders, or using something like SLSK https://github.com/skyformat99/SLSK https://github.com/skyformat99/SLSK Bypassing Steamworks basic DRM is easy. Other DRMs obviously require special workarounds.
  - joveian 5y ago
    Or you can buy games on GOG instead and support DRM-free (I think they are unfortunately the only fully DRM-free store at this point).
    - account42 5y ago
      Valve are a lot more serious about Linux support though, going as far as employing graphics driver developers. GOG (and CDPR) on the other hand can't even be bothered to port their own client and games. Also, GOG is not 100% DRM-free anymore, even if they want to advertise themselves that way. [0] [0] https://www.gog.com/forum/general/drm_on_gog_list_of_singleplayer_games_with_drm/page1 https://www.gog.com/forum/general/drm_on_gog_list_of_singlep...
      - Wowfunhappy 5y ago
        > Also, GOG is not 100% DRM-free anymore, even if they want to advertise themselves that way. [0] I'm not happy about these features requiring an internet connection, but they seem pretty minor. The alternative would probably have been that those features were left out of the GOG versions completely.
        lupire 5y ago
        That doesn't make it OK to lie.
        Wowfunhappy 5y ago
        It's not quite a lie, though. The games are 100% playable offline; some optional features are not.
      - handrous 5y ago
        > Valve are a lot more serious about Linux support though, going as far as employing graphics driver developers. > GOG (and CDPR) on the other hand can't even be bothered to port their own client and games. To be fair, I'm pretty sure GOG has a hell of a lot less money than Valve. They don't benefit from any of the gambling-mechanics or multiplayer game "bling" sales that bring in so much of Valve's money, aside from having a much smaller share of PC game sales than Valve does. Valve's got to be way more profitable plus have much higher income, so have the margin to play with stuff like this—which is in their interest, because the weaker alternative operating systems are, the more Valve operates only at the pleasure of Microsoft.
  - samtheDamned 5y ago
    Also I'm pretty sure steam has a clause in its TOS that will open the DRM on all your steam games if steam shuts down
- Rastonbury 5y ago
  We can just call them a monopoly!
- amatecha 5y ago
  Yeah, they definitely don't have my trust at all. I have something like 600 games on my account, but unfortunately I'll never play any of those on my "old" Mac anymore because it runs OS X 10.10 ("Yosemite"), and Steam no longer supports that version. If I even launch Steam, the application will auto-update to a version that doesn't run anymore. Of course most of the _games_ run on versions of OS X as far back as like 10.2, but no, because Valve decided to lock me out, I can just never play Steam games on that Mac again. Cool, right? Of course everyone's response to this is "update the OS, it's free!", but I have software I need that doesn't run on newer versions of OSX. I mean, all they had to do is let users disable automatic updates and keep running the old version of the client "without any guarantees" -- if the Steam APIs end up changing enough that I can't log in anymore, well, so be it. But to permanently lock users out simply because of a forced update… seriously uncool.
Abishek_Muthian 5y ago
And thanks to the availability of differential pricing, Publishers can ensure many around the world can get a chance to enjoy their work.

serf 5y ago

I pay for software on Steam, too -- but it makes me incredibly nervous consolidating lots of purchased goods with a single walled-garden vendor who holds the keys ; and they never really earned my trust, they're just the only game in town for most titles now. The internet is filled with stories about locked accounts, lost libraries, games being pulled out of the library due to 'low quality of gameplay' while people are actively playing them on Steam, DLC and in-game currency sold that can never be redeemed or used in the game it's bought for (see: 'Wizardry Online' debacle, Steam/Valve continued selling in-game currency far beyond the point that it was being discussed to remove the game from the library all together.. then removed access from the game for Steam users after making a tidy profit. This was a current/active/new game with a bad launch, not an old title.) So just to re-state: Valve never won my trust with their behavior with Steam and associated acts. There is just no one else; let's call this phenomenon 'Walmart Syndrome', perhaps?

bbabaraba 5y ago
If you're concerned about losing your games, you can easily do backups from the Steam application, copying game folders, or using something like SLSK https://github.com/skyformat99/SLSK https://github.com/skyformat99/SLSK Bypassing Steamworks basic DRM is easy. Other DRMs obviously require special workarounds.
- joveian 5y ago
  Or you can buy games on GOG instead and support DRM-free (I think they are unfortunately the only fully DRM-free store at this point).
  - account42 5y ago
    Valve are a lot more serious about Linux support though, going as far as employing graphics driver developers. GOG (and CDPR) on the other hand can't even be bothered to port their own client and games. Also, GOG is not 100% DRM-free anymore, even if they want to advertise themselves that way. [0] [0] https://www.gog.com/forum/general/drm_on_gog_list_of_singleplayer_games_with_drm/page1 https://www.gog.com/forum/general/drm_on_gog_list_of_singlep...
    - Wowfunhappy 5y ago
      > Also, GOG is not 100% DRM-free anymore, even if they want to advertise themselves that way. [0] I'm not happy about these features requiring an internet connection, but they seem pretty minor. The alternative would probably have been that those features were left out of the GOG versions completely.
      - lupire 5y ago
        That doesn't make it OK to lie.
        Wowfunhappy 5y ago
        It's not quite a lie, though. The games are 100% playable offline; some optional features are not.
    - handrous 5y ago
      > Valve are a lot more serious about Linux support though, going as far as employing graphics driver developers. > GOG (and CDPR) on the other hand can't even be bothered to port their own client and games. To be fair, I'm pretty sure GOG has a hell of a lot less money than Valve. They don't benefit from any of the gambling-mechanics or multiplayer game "bling" sales that bring in so much of Valve's money, aside from having a much smaller share of PC game sales than Valve does. Valve's got to be way more profitable plus have much higher income, so have the margin to play with stuff like this—which is in their interest, because the weaker alternative operating systems are, the more Valve operates only at the pleasure of Microsoft.
- samtheDamned 5y ago
  Also I'm pretty sure steam has a clause in its TOS that will open the DRM on all your steam games if steam shuts down
Rastonbury 5y ago
We can just call them a monopoly!
amatecha 5y ago
Yeah, they definitely don't have my trust at all. I have something like 600 games on my account, but unfortunately I'll never play any of those on my "old" Mac anymore because it runs OS X 10.10 ("Yosemite"), and Steam no longer supports that version. If I even launch Steam, the application will auto-update to a version that doesn't run anymore. Of course most of the _games_ run on versions of OS X as far back as like 10.2, but no, because Valve decided to lock me out, I can just never play Steam games on that Mac again. Cool, right? Of course everyone's response to this is "update the OS, it's free!", but I have software I need that doesn't run on newer versions of OSX. I mean, all they had to do is let users disable automatic updates and keep running the old version of the client "without any guarantees" -- if the Steam APIs end up changing enough that I can't log in anymore, well, so be it. But to permanently lock users out simply because of a forced update… seriously uncool.

Abishek_Muthian 5y ago

And thanks to the availability of differential pricing, Publishers can ensure many around the world can get a chance to enjoy their work.