I hate Steam at times

[MSIC]

I took my laptop abroad on holiday recently (middle of french countryside, no wifi, no broadband, no phones etc).
Got all ready to play a few tower defence games that were installed, only to find that steam had decided that i hadnt previously logged in on the laptop in some correct way and refused to allow me to play my games (that i had bought, and were installed).
Very not happy.

[Nomak]

As someone who backs up data using online storage. Having steam is good because it means you don't have to back up games or carry around DVDs. Just get a high speed internet connection.

[dangel]

As someone who backs up data using online storage. Having steam is good because it means you don't have to back up games or carry around DVDs. Just get a high speed internet connection.

Bloody annoying when your using the steam cloud stuff sometimes tho - quit skyrim and then try and go back into it immediately. Oh, you can't because you have to sit and wait for it to sync your game settings up to the cloud. Most of us have pretty slow upload speed comparatively (I'm on a 20mbit connection but it still takes a few mins).

Steam is good because there's nothing better out there. There could be quite easily because on the whole it's pretty buggy and glitchy as an app. Although I did read the beta allows you to *gasp* choose where games are installed!!! A feature i've wanted for ages and currently i'm achieving it with hard links in NTFS to shunt games on/off my SSDs.

[Nomak]

Bloody annoying when your using the steam cloud stuff sometimes tho - quit skyrim and then try and go back into it immediately. Oh, you can't because you have to sit and wait for it to sync your game settings up to the cloud. Most of us have pretty slow upload speed comparatively (I'm on a 20mbit connection but it still takes a few mins).

Steam is good because there's nothing better out there. There could be quite easily because on the whole it's pretty buggy and glitchy as an app. Although I did read the beta allows you to *gasp* choose where games are installed!!! A feature i've wanted for ages and currently i'm achieving it with hard links in NTFS to shunt games on/off my SSDs.

What would be good is if there was some more competition. Two or three other providers like steam, sort of like itunes and play store.

[shaithis]

Personally, I think steam is almost as good as it's going to get for now...

Yes, the install location issue is massive and has confused me for a while....especially when something as terrible as origin allows it......but the save games in the cloud? That's down to game makers to try and keep their saves smaller......or uplink speeds to increase.....although I would like to see incremental save updates while playing if it's possible.

[Willzzz]

I got a free copy of Empire: Total War from Steam when I bought a new CPU. One day on a whim I bought Bioshock. After realising that I actually could have gotten it cheaper if I'd gotten a physical copy from Play.com, I'm completely reluctant to hand over money to them ever again.

And that is their fault?

[dangel]

Personally, I think steam is almost as good as it's going to get for now...

Yes, the install location issue is massive and has confused me for a while....especially when something as terrible as origin allows it......but the save games in the cloud? That's down to game makers to try and keep their saves smaller......or uplink speeds to increase.....although I would like to see incremental save updates while playing if it's possible.

That's a good idea - it'd also be nice if it compressed them - AFAIK it doesn't because upping my skyrim saves (all of them) as a rar takes a fraction of the time of the client (to dropbox for example).

[MattEvansC3]

And that is their fault?

Partially yes because Steam use an anti-consumer method of price setting, the prices are set by both Valve and the publishers meaning Valve can keep their prices high artificially.

[GeorgeStorm]

Partially yes because Steam use an anti-consumer method of price setting, the prices are set by both Valve and the publishers meaning Valve can keep their prices high artificially.

A retailer (or etailer) can price things however they like, it's up to the consumer to buy them, no one forced him to buy the game, it was his own fault.

That's like saying I bought a dvd from amazon, before realising it was cheaper on play.
Consumer's fault.

[kopite]

I seem to remember reading something about Retailers in the UK(Think it was Game) TElling A publisher if they released a warhammer game on steam that they wouldn`t stock their games in the stores.

I think as the Bricks and mortar retailers die off Steam prices will start to come down. Plus Just wait for a steam sale and spend loads of money on cheap games you`ll never play(I still have games I bought a couple of years ago from the christmass Sale that I havent got around to playing yet

[MattEvansC3]

I seem to remember reading something about Retailers in the UK(Think it was Game) TElling A publisher if they released a warhammer game on steam that they wouldn`t stock their games in the stores.

I think as the Bricks and mortar retailers die off Steam prices will start to come down. Plus Just wait for a steam sale and spend loads of money on cheap games you`ll never play(I still have games I bought a couple of years ago from the christmass Sale that I havent got around to playing yet

The game in question was Space Marine and it was just a rumour but as I mentioned earlier Valve use an Agency Pricing method whereby the publisher sets the price in agreement with Valve and Valve get a 30% cut. As brick and mortar store die out there is less competition and less incentive for publishers to cut prices. Games on Steam retain their RRP prices far longer than those at retail.

[Lord Midas]

Loving that this tread is from 2009 and it's in the Xbox section.

Still, I had no problems with Steam ever. Then one day Dawn of War II just would not load. Could tell if it was the install or GFWL. Then I accidently lost hte Steam install folder. After a fresh install of Steam and DOWII it all works fine.

I like Steam.

[tre_peter]

Although I did read the beta allows you to *gasp* choose where games are installed!!!

Wow! I will look forward to that - it makes no sense to me at the minute. I can only have a few games installed at any one time on my old hard drive and I've been too lazy to reinstall Steam on my new larger capacity HDD.

[Saracen]

I never have any problems with Steam. That, though, will be because I dislike the implications of their process sufficiently that I will not use it. The first few posts are examples of one (but only one) of the reasons why I don't, and won't.

The downside, of course, is that there is a very large and ever-growing list of games I can't play.

The upside is that the downside is saving me flipping fortune. It saves me enough to buy a new PC every year or so, if I felt so inclined.

[MadduckUK]

I didn't think I had selected the beta, but on installing Planetside 2 on Sunday I got the option to choose where it should go for the first time, which was nice as I am kind of on the limit of space I want to keep free on the SSD.

[kalniel]

Folder selection has been part of the main release for some time now. This is a rather old thread, in an odd place on the forums (unless Steam is coming to Xbox I guess).