Wednesday, 17 May 2017

Valve is not your friend, and Steam is not healthy for gaming

quote [ This, then, is Good Guy Valve — a corporation which employs precision-engineered psychological tools to trick people into giving them money in exchange for goods they don't legally own and may never actually use while profiting from a whole lot of unpaid labor and speculative work ... but isn't “evil.” ]
[SFW] [games] [+5 Interesting]
[by arrowhen]
<-- Entry / Comment History

spaceloaf said @ 11:20pm GMT on 17th May
This article sounds like a total strawman to me. I don't think Valve was ever a "Good Guy" company.

I recall the days of HL2 very differently from the author. Steam was complete garbage when it first started. The most common gif seen at that time was the animated Steam logo "fisting" into a guy's butt. Steam broke so often that it was viewed as justification for piracy (the classic "pirates have a better experience than paying consumers" argument).

It was only after a very long road that Steam became the reliable platform it is today. The reason it is preferred is because it is competent now while every other company that tries to start their own (Games for Windows Live, Uplay, etc.) starts in the same garbage condition that Steam did back then.

Which is not to say that Steam is flawless these days either. It is still known for horrendous customer service, scam/fake games trying to mine money from card trading, and an exploitable sorting system that can get undeserving titles to the front page. But they are by far the most competent of the available options and deservedly have their dominant position.

Honestly, if you're really concerned about Steam's dominant control of the market, the thing you should really be fighting for is removing DRM. Its the DRM that is tying you to Steam, or Uplay, or any other client. GOG is great because they don't allow any DRM, but unfortunately there aren't that many publishers that will agree to that. If consumers really vote with their wallets that attitude will change.


spaceloaf said @ 11:43pm GMT on 17th May
This article sounds like a total strawman to me. I don't think Valve was ever a "Good Guy" company.

I recall the days of HL2 very differently from the author. Steam was complete garbage when it first started. The most common gif seen at that time was the animated Steam logo "fisting" into a guy's butt. Steam broke so often that it was viewed as justification for piracy (the classic "pirates have a better experience than paying consumers" argument).

It was only after a very long road that Steam became the reliable platform it is today. The reason it is preferred is because it is competent now while every other company that tries to start their own (Games for Windows Live, Uplay, etc.) starts in the same garbage condition that Steam did back then.

Which is not to say that Steam is flawless these days either. It is still known for horrendous customer service, scam/fake games trying to mine money from card trading, and an exploitable sorting system that can get undeserving titles to the front page. But they are by far the most competent of the available options and deservedly have their dominant position.

Honestly, if you're really concerned about Steam's dominant control of the market, the thing you should really be fighting for is removing DRM. Its the DRM that is tying you to Steam, or Uplay, or any other client. GOG is great because they don't allow any DRM, but unfortunately there aren't that many publishers that will agree to that. In fact, I believe Steam even allows DRM-free games, its just that since they don't require it almost no one does it.

If consumers really vote with their wallets that attitude will change.


spaceloaf said @ 11:45pm GMT on 17th May
This article sounds like a total strawman to me. I don't think Valve was ever a "Good Guy" company.

I recall the days of HL2 very differently from the author. Steam was complete garbage when it first started. The most common gif seen at that time was the animated Steam logo "fisting" into a guy's butt. Steam broke so often that it was viewed as justification for piracy (the classic "pirates have a better experience than paying consumers" argument).

It was only after a very long road that Steam became the reliable platform it is today. The reason it is preferred is because it is competent now while every other company that tries to start their own (Games for Windows Live, Uplay, etc.) starts in the same garbage condition that Steam did back then.

Which is not to say that Steam is flawless these days either. It is still known for horrendous customer service, scam/fake games trying to mine money from card trading, and an exploitable sorting system that can get undeserving titles to the front page. But they are by far the most competent of the available options and deservedly have their dominant position.

Honestly, if you're really concerned about Steam's dominant control of the market, the thing you should really be fighting for is removing DRM. Its the DRM that is tying you to Steam, or Uplay, or any other client. GOG is great because they don't allow any DRM, but unfortunately there aren't that many publishers that will agree to that. In fact, I believe Steam even allows DRM-free games, its just that since they don't require it almost no one does it.

If consumers really vote with their wallets that attitude will change.

Edit: Actually, now that I looked there are a surprising amount of DRM-free games on Steam. This article is just click-bait.



<-- Entry / Current Comment
spaceloaf said @ 11:20pm GMT on 17th May [Score:1 Underrated]
This article sounds like a total strawman to me. I don't think Valve was ever a "Good Guy" company.

I recall the days of HL2 very differently from the author. Steam was complete garbage when it first started. The most common gif seen at that time was the animated Steam logo "fisting" into a guy's butt. Steam broke so often that it was viewed as justification for piracy (the classic "pirates have a better experience than paying consumers" argument).

It was only after a very long road that Steam became the reliable platform it is today. The reason it is preferred is because it is competent now while every other company that tries to start their own (Games for Windows Live, Uplay, etc.) starts in the same garbage condition that Steam did back then.

Which is not to say that Steam is flawless these days either. It is still known for horrendous customer service, scam/fake games trying to mine money from card trading, and an exploitable sorting system that can get undeserving titles to the front page. But they are by far the most competent of the available options and deservedly have their dominant position.

Honestly, if you're really concerned about Steam's dominant control of the market, the thing you should really be fighting for is removing DRM. Its the DRM that is tying you to Steam, or Uplay, or any other client. GOG is great because they don't allow any DRM, but unfortunately there aren't that many publishers that will agree to that. In fact, I believe Steam even allows DRM-free games, its just that since they don't require it almost no one does it.

If consumers really vote with their wallets that attitude will change.

Edit: Actually, now that I looked there are a surprising amount of DRM-free games on Steam. This article is just click-bait.




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