Bits Running on Steam

Steam is great. But, if there is no direct competitor, Steam can get away with controversial product prices.

Side note: I will buy X3: Reunion via Steam.

 

Why? I've just told you that if you buy it on Steam it is more expensive and your can re-sell it....

 

To compensate for me not-so-legally having it already. Plus, none of the local retailers sell the DVD anymore. Besides, I won't resell it since it takes a really long time to learn and understand the game, making for some great replay value.

 

i like steam for automatic updates for your games, but when it comes to buying them I'm afraid I'm just to old fashioned and like to go to the shop and buy the disc

 

Not that it helps you Amon, but I saw it in PC World in the UK at the weekend for tenner (£10)... not sure what that is in Canadian Dollars.

 

I picked up X3:Reunion GOTY edition for £6 a month or so ago, I forget the store now, it wasn't one I usually go in (Might have been whsmiths but I'm not sure, was a similar type of general store)

Also wether you can register a game you've bought elsewhere on steam seems to be a publisher decision : steam had no problem with me registering Prey through it for example (I haven't tried X3)

 

I like going to a store, geeking around there for a while, and buying something.. Why would you replace that?! And you cant collect downloaded games.. Sure, you can put the games on discs, but it's just not the same thing!

And someone said that cds and dvds break after a while, but you can always download the stuff from steam. That's just ********! If you take care of your cds and dvds, they dont break. And I bet that they'll remove stuff from the steam servers in a few years.

Retail is the way to go. Steam is good for some stuff tho.

 

Will they? I doubt it

 

I agree with the game selling part of Steam. It is a big problem for a lot of people. The best and easiest wy to solve this on Steam is to have an option in Steam to generate a "Sale Code" for a game. You right click the game in the steam list and select the "Sale Code" option. Steam would then generate a unique code for that game on your account. When you sell the game to someone (physically or however) you give them the "Sale Code" which they can then input in to their Steam account. This code will be recognised by the servers and it will then transfer the game from the sellers account to the buyers account. I am pretty sure this could be extremely easily implemented. It would also save a lot of hassle for the Steam admins getting through all those emails about s/h games with game codes.

Some games allow you to buy the physical disc and then add it to the Steam library. Quite a few in fact. For some reason some will not, but this is not down to Valve/Steam otherwise it would be the case for all games. It is definitely a publisher/developer decision.



I have a few other points that i would like to be addressed by Steam in the near future:

- Default settings for all games based on the same engine, including mods.
I get really tired of having to change the default setting of ALL my HL2 mods. Every time i install a new one i have to change all the settings. It is a right pain. They should take the default settings from those of the HL2 installation. You could then tweak it at will if you wanted but most people probably wouldn't.

- Offline mode
A comprehensive offline mode that worked properly. So many people have problems with this. I never used to but have not tried it in 2 years so couldn't say if i now have problems too. It is a big gripe with a lot of people.


If these issues can be addressed then I can't see any distribution system ever catching up with Steam. In my mind it would be about as perfect as you can expect (aside from the pricing issues, but that can't be helped by Steam/Valve).

 

Everytime bit-tech promotes the absolutley horrible Sam&Max series in anyway on this site I die a little bit inside. There is a reason that the entire series of 6 games is available on Steam for $8.95. I love everything else about this site, but everytime something with Sam&Max comes up I cringe in horror. so please stop promoting the series.