News Valve brings game guides to Steam

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2010/05/21/valve-brings-game-guides-to-steam/1

 

prima guides have always been iffy at best, think gorified expensive game manuel for those who have not actually played the game and you're pretty much there

 

totally useless, especially now that they've improved the speed of the overlay browser after moving away from IE

 

Its a brilliant idea, but the fact you can just load up a free guide online is sorta a muted point.

The one feature that would be cool is if they kept the page open relevant to the area your in... play a game get stuck on a puzzle clicking open to instantly fall on the correct page would be epic to say the least.

 

I don't see the point in paying for an eguide.

If you have a guide it's better to have the printed version to flick thru while you play the game.

If you're just going to read it on a PC all the info is freely available on the internet anyway!

 

12.99 for a digital copy of something that you can get for free anyway. Something tells me this may not work.
Guides have done better for the console market where a lot of people may not use a PC much so will buy the guide.

 

google... gamefaqs... done, nice try though

 

Exactly. £10+ for a game guide - I don't think so.

 

The problem is that most people only resort to game guides for one or two sections they might be stuck on, depending on the game. You'd have to be really stuck to pay £13 for a bit of help to get though it.

Or, y'know, you could actually try beating it yourself and get the satisfaction of doing that as well as saving yourself some cash.

 

Unless they include some sort of hax I can't see how they can justify even £6.50 over the free guides on the internet. Especially as they seem to be mainly for popular games which have plenty of resources on the internet already.

 

I buy guides for games I love, like some JRPGs, but I steer clear of Prima Guides. They are often low quality, missing details, and full of useless rubbish. Piggyback do it SO MUCH BETTER.

 

Or as it's through steam you don't evn need to alt-tab just use the overlay

 

There is a huge market for strategy guides and this is a good thing for PC gaming. Some of you can't see beyond your own noses.

 

Meh, whats the point selling it especially when you can get it all free?
Just another Valve money grab-technique. Dont get me wrong I love Steam and all but comparing the prices to retail is crazy. A mark-up for running costs is fine but come on!!

 

Could they just keep this stuff (along with DLC) on the individual game's store page? The store is clogged up with Railworks addons as it is.

 

£13, wow thats a rip off for a digital guide that you can get the same information for free elsewhere, I've just had a look at the same paperback guides are £5-£9 from Play.com.

I'm still not seeing the promised pricing benefits to digital distribution, no boxed product to make, store and ship, should give us some price savings? Why can I get Steam games, cheaper anywhere but steam then? I pay for a CD Key in a box basically and don't even have to use the CD/DVD!

 

It's nothing a million free websites don't give you already.

 

Valve again proves that it is the Premiere gaming service provider.

All Hail Chairman Newell!

@ Tom@ccl : The saying is "moot point", muted point doesn't exist in English.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/moot

Enjoy gaming through Valve (at least until OnLive revolutionizes Life as we know it),
Star*Dagger

 

i usually use this:
http://guides.gamepressure.com/

not sure what more do you need.

 

Actually, just Shift+Tab. Done. Plus the browser is like 1,000 times better than the old one.