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Being locked into Steam because of beta participation


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I thought that a game's EULA always stated that you bought a license for the game, not the game itself. Just because there was no DRM doesn't mean you had the right to do whatever you wanted to the game files.

This is a post-DRM thing.

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I'm sorry but it always amuses me how people go for GoG just because it has no DRM. As if Steam somehow has the worst DRM policy ever.

 

Some people on this site have a weird obsession with GoG.  I'm all for DRM free, and I can understand why they like it, but these people fail to notice that many of the games on GoG are also DRM free on Steam as well.  I just ran both Half Life and Divinity: Original Sin without steam running at all.

 

It's not like I use Gog all that much anyhow even though I have a few games there; they doesn't support my main operating system at the moment.  :getlost:

 

 

I use Steam more or less exclusively, but I'll point out that even games that don't require Stream to be loaded to play still require Stream to be running to install.  With GOG you can take the downloaded file, burn it to a DVD(s), then reinstall it in the future even if GOG goes away altogether, which you can't do with a Stream title (Zipping up the application directory is very unlikely to work, as necessary changes to the registry and other dependencies wouldn't be included).

 

Not a big deal for me, but I can see why some people would be attracted to GOG on this basis.

 

You can backup your Steam games. And Steam has said that if they go away(which is laughably unlikely with the money they make from selling other people's games), they will have measures in place for us to still be able to play our games.

 

Let's not spread misinformation now.

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You will not be locked into Steam because of the Backer Beta.  We're using a separate SKU/product for the Backer Beta for a number of reasons.

Thats amazing news there. So now I am curious of course. Would you mind telling us some of the reasons that made you decide to go for something else than Steam EA (which seems to be rather convinient for most devs as it seems)?

"Jet, do you know that there are three things I particularly hate......Kids, animals, and women with attitude. SO CAN YOU TELL ME WHY WE HAVE ALL THREE NEATLY GATHERED ON OUR SHIP!"

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The two most salient are 1) separating the BB from the actual product means it's easier to separate the product platforms when the full game is released 2) the BB is a beta, so it will be full of bugs, possibly crashy, and generally not fully polished.  It may also have wild balance issues, exploits, and GUI issues that will (one hopes) not be present in the final game.  However, anecdotal data strongly suggests that people playing betas do not evaluate them as betas, but as final products.  Accordingly, they trash the product's ratings and give scathing reviews.  If the beta product is later "upgraded" to the final product, all of the hooting and hollering done about the beta remains part of the final game.  So separating the beta product from the final product appropriately segregates comments and ratings for each one.

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So separating the beta product from the final product appropriately segregates comments and ratings for each one.

 

I doubt this will work. People will still see the beta as final product, and they will bash it for being buggy, unpolished etc.

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The two most salient are 1) separating the BB from the actual product means it's easier to separate the product platforms when the full game is released 2) the BB is a beta, so it will be full of bugs, possibly crashy, and generally not fully polished.  It may also have wild balance issues, exploits, and GUI issues that will (one hopes) not be present in the final game.  However, anecdotal data strongly suggests that people playing betas do not evaluate them as betas, but as final products.  Accordingly, they trash the product's ratings and give scathing reviews.  If the beta product is later "upgraded" to the final product, all of the hooting and hollering done about the beta remains part of the final game.  So separating the beta product from the final product appropriately segregates comments and ratings for each one.

 

Wise decision.  It seems that is more to do with the wide variety of definitions on what early access means and has rubbed a lot of people the wrong way.

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i'm curious to see if POE will have mod support.

 

Every game in the world has mod support, whether the developers want it or not... :p

 

Worst case scenario, we'll have to wait a few months for the hardcore hex editor using modders to apply their black magic and reverse-engineer the data and script formats etc., before the normal modders can come in and create stuff...

 

But I don't think Obsidian will make it that difficult.

"Some ideas are so stupid that only an intellectual could believe them." -- attributed to George Orwell

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I'm sorry but it always amuses me how people go for GoG just because it has no DRM. As if Steam somehow has the worst DRM policy ever.

 

Some people on this site have a weird obsession with GoG.  I'm all for DRM free, and I can understand why they like it, but these people fail to notice that many of the games on GoG are also DRM free on Steam as well.  I just ran both Half Life and Divinity: Original Sin without steam running at all.

 

It's not like I use Gog all that much anyhow even though I have a few games there; they doesn't support my main operating system at the moment.  :getlost:

 

 

I don't know what your main operating system is, but GOG.com now supports Linux for some of its games, and will try to get Linux supported games out there on day 1.

 

Currently GOG.com will deliver the games as .tar.gz files and .deb. This is of course not perfect, but it is a good first step.

Edited by Night Stalker
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