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Originally Posted by Homey_V
My apologies for offending. I really dislike Steam and Im used to reading the Steam forums, which if anyone else who has read them knows, are largely filled with sanctimonious ignorant pricks. There are some good members on them, but they are few and far between.
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Rest assured I'm not a Steam/Valve fanboy who posts on those forums.
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I was well aware of that, but that wasnt the kind of hard copy I was talking about. I was talking about the actual disk that I bought so that 2 or 3 or even 4 years down the line I can go, "Hey, that sounds like fun to me, lets play it again". Then I can just pop in the disk and install away. However, If steam dies anywhere in the future, Im SOL. It doesnt matter if I backed up my game from STEAM, Im still SOL. Now, that borders on another complaint, but Im going to confine it to this one for now. Assuming I backup with STEAM, that would imply that I A) have multiple Hard Drives or B) have a cd or DVD burner. Now what do I do if I have neither of those and bought the game via STEAM? Whoops, looks like Im SOL again.
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Good point about Steam/Valve disappearing in the future. All too often it seems the good game companies vanish, never to be seen again (Looking Glass Studios comes to mind). And having another medium to back up PC data is pretty standard these days. It may not be feasible in your situation, but CDRs are awfully inexpensive nowadays.
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I was able to play the game without being connected before too, however, I shouldnt have to worry about problems like that for a Single Player game, and a large number of people did and still do have that problem. Its unacceptable. Now, I may not need the internet to play, but I still have to turn on STEAM so it can patiently sit in the background and drain my memory. If I was a company making a new game, I would want to make that experience as enjoyable as possible for my customers. All STEAM does is suck memory and create hassles, not for everyone, but for a large portion of people.
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I don't find Steam to be that big of a drain on my system. I can run the game perfectly fine and my gaming rig is not exactly the newest out there.
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Convienent? Maybe. I imgaine it took quite some time to download the game. Probably just as long as it would have taken you to walk/drive/bus/teleport/whatever to the store and take it off the shelf or even order off Amazon. Personally, I'd still rather go to the store and buy it. Why? One, I get the box, which I like having. I keep every game box I have. They sit on a shelf and look impressive. Two, I have more of a feeling of actually buying something. I have a copy of the software right here all prettily labelled and boxed up and everything. Now thats just personal, but I think its an issue for alot of people. Three, If I buy over STEAM, I miss out on a trip to the local EB! Come on! I love going to EB. I can drool over the games on the shelf and maybe find some good bargains while Im at it. If I buy from STEAM all I accomplish is to tie up bandwidth and improve my monitor tan, which I do not need to do. Buying the game from the store is part of the enjoyment of getting the game, to me and to many people I know.
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The download took approximately 3 hours or so. I downloaded it overnight, while sleeping. And since it could be done before the game was released on retail, I could play it immediately. I imagine there were quite a few people at the store buying box copies while Steam users were at home already playing the game. I do not keep the game boxes, so I guess that part doesn't bother me. The CDs however, I do keep.
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So I should wait until Valve does nasty things before I stop trusting them?  No. I dont trust Valve, and I dont trust the gaping hole in my firewall that it creates so that it can function properly. When it comes to security Im fairly lax, but STEAM just makes me shudder with fear at the possible damage that could be done. Besides, I've stated before and I'll state it again. I dont want Valve to arbitrarily download patches and whatnot to my computer with no explanation or reason. Several times already has my game been broken by a download that I didnt want. Fileplanet exists and is well organized. Its easy to find patches and easy to download them. I dont know why everyone complains so much about doing it.
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To each their own. I prefer one place/method to patch my game, and you have yours. I do agree that there should be an option to turn off auto-download/install on Steam.
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I never said that STEAM was useless, although Im starting to think it is. If any company follows the amount of complaints and hassles that users have had to put up with the play HL2, I doubt many will think trying STEAM or something like it is such a good idea. The idea was interesting, the execution was horribly flawed. If STEAM was only used to download games and content and wasnt required for gameplay, I might have less of a problem with it, however, in its current state, I hate it and will continue to hate it.
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I agree about the verification, it's bothersome. But I find it easier to work around than popping a CD into my drive to play the game. I play far too many games for this method to work for me.
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It may be just a game, but gaming is my hobby, and when a game or company can ruin the enjoyment of my hobby, I see no reason to not voice my opinion of it.
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Gaming is my hobby too. And voicing opinions is good! It helps others out there who may not have bought the game yet to know what they're potentially in for. Thanks for not turing this into a flamewar.
