A lot of businesses are built upon what price the market (ie customers) can sustain, not anything to do with what it costs to make or distribute.

 

And I consider $50 a very fair price for a game that costs millions to develop.

 

The problem is that in Euroland, the games are €50 which is more akin to $65, while in stores the physical copies sell for less (what would be $50 or somewhat lower even).

 

It's not the price itself that is the problem, but that digital games cost more at launch than their physical counterparts.

Edited July 13, 201015 yr by Spider

That, and quite often the physical copies in stores will have "special price off" when released. Nearly everything you get via Amazon these days has between 10-30% off when its first released.. The difference between paying

Nice 'stache.

I'm blaming valve.

It does tell you to do that!

The blog post about it (the "wait a few minutes" message was still showing up two hours later it seems).

Oh well, Steam had a good run.

I do find it ironic that in spite of his protests against companies that don't allow people to properly own their product, he'd even utilize Garry's Mod for his webcomic.

 

He serves his point with his current webcomic. It's too bad he doesn't seem to actually adhere to the very principles he claims to be interested in. By using Garry's Mod and the Source Engine, he financially supports Valve and Steam. A service that does the very stuff he vows to not financially support in other posts.

 

Who needs principles I guess though, right? Especially when he can make some money using Garry's Mod.

Edited July 14, 201015 yr by Thorton_AP

Uh... where does he use Garry's Mod in that comic? or you mean for other days?

It has to do with logon information which is saved to a special file in offline mode. If it can't reach the servers the moment you go off-line it can't write the file and it does that.

 

As long as the file was saved properly you can be offline as long as you want.

 

Yes, it's pretty sucky.

As long as the file was saved properly you can be offline as long as you want.

 

Although, unfortunately, the file sometimes corrupts itself. Nor do all games work with offline mode (at least I've had issues with a few of them).

Edited July 14, 201015 yr by Deadly_Nightshade

Uh... where does he use Garry's Mod in that comic? or you mean for other days?

 

He blamed Valve for the lack of an actual comic because he couldn't get into Garry's Mod to make it.

Tomorrow is experimental Steam day... I will let you all know what happens. I am wearing special protective clothing and Kevlar mittens for the occasion.

I'd stock up on some protective eyeware as well

Because the future is going to be bright!

I'd stock up on some protective eyeware as well

Because the future is going to be bright!

Get off my lawn.

 

...more seriously, at this point in time I may prefer having a CD/DVD of my own, but I don't have anything against the concept of direct-download instead. I just don't like Steam's way of doing it. Especially since I rarely play on-line/multiplayer games anyway.

I like Steam. Its a fantastic piece of software in my lowly opinion. I've never had any complaints or serious problems with its offline mode either.

 

If you don't like Steam I suppose you could go for Impulse Now (Stardock).

Beware that if you put steam on your computer, I'm not sure you can actually ever take it fully off without a complete reformat. Also, it'll be collecting data about your computer and other unspecified things (you have to agree to that to install it).

That's no different than most DRM schemes, including most that use CD checks.

Beware that if you put steam on your computer, I'm not sure you can actually ever take it fully off without a complete reformat.

 

Elaborate.

Beware that if you put steam on your computer, I'm not sure you can actually ever take it fully off without a complete reformat. Also, it'll be collecting data about your computer and other unspecified things (you have to agree to that to install it).

 

*gasp*

 

The horror!

If you don't like Steam I suppose you could go for Impulse Now (Stardock).

Unless of course your copy requires you to use Steam (like F:NV apparently wishes).

 

Wasn't there a game that everyone boycotted because it required to use Steam, even if you bought it at GG or Impulse...

I'm more concerned about the fact that you don't actually "own" the product you've payed solid money for.

 

Physical copies makes so much more sense, and gives you a greater sense of ownership and security.

By everyone you mean companies like Stardock and Gamer's Gate, right?

 

Though unskilled's comment is more directed towards those interested in DD, not so much playing games with Steamworks on them.

I get the whole physical copy thing, I really do. If I'm going to pay $50, I want a nice box and a DVD. But protesting against Steam completely strikes me as cutting off the nose to spite the face. Steam has a ton of great games on it, many for insanely low prices. It has had technical problems, but I've seen a very steady improvement in the software since it was launched. It is extremely successful, so if you are worried about losing the games you have on Steam, that is crazy.

 

It makes it easy to buy and play games. I'm not sure what else you folks need.