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I'm only looking into this now because of the requirement for Skyrim...
I'm obviously not up to date on what has been a big issue in the Gaming community for a while now. Steam is the program/website that companies use to register games, prevent piracy, and provide updates and even upcoming software promotions and announcements with. That I get.
Tell me about how it works please. The website itself has some pretty stupid descriptions that basically revolve around how great it is and all the things you get from it. Obviously trying to sell it.
The main questions I have are:
-Does it cost? Is there a monthly fee?
-The account I have to create, does it subject me to email advertising or any sort of Spyware?
-The Program I have to download, is it a 1 time use thing to "launch" launch the game? OR... is it a background app that has to be running as I play the game?
Is there anything else I should know before Registering and Installing?
Thanks in advance for any responses, I appreciate your time. I always appreciate the wisdom that comes from the TL community, the brightest and smartest internet community I've come across.
TY
 
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No cost, subscription, fees or spyware. Ive never had an email from them that I can remember, ever. Have had steam for at least 4 years I imagine. You leave steam running while playing the games, but it doesnt have to be an open window, can just be in the system tray. Pretty simple program, no need to stress for it.
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no cost
no spyware or anything emails are opt out
yes you have to keep in running in the background
and if you register expect to lose money to epic deals every week!
EDIT ninjad 
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steam is free, no email bs that i know of, its a background app
add friends yadayada buy games off steam etc
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There is no fee for creating an account, and it doesnt cost anythnig up front. The account also does not subject you to advertising (though you might want some as they have great sales). The steam program runs in the background, think of it sort of like being on xbox live, you have a friends list and can access the steam mainframe in game. One thing to note is that buying a game on steam means that you can only play it when logged onto your steam account. So if you lose the account you lose every game on said account (similar to having a b.net account). Also AFAIK you cannot play any games offline. Other than that its a pretty good service.
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You can play offline, there's an option right under the steam drop down menu.
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It is by far and away my favorite digital distribution platform. They give you PC and MAC releases of the same game for the same price. They have a cloud storage feature for developers who can enable your game saves and preferences to be synced between all computers that use steam. You can delete and re-download games you own whenever you want no questions asked. (You do need to be logged in to play though, which requires you to be online, but who in the US who is buying skyrim isn't on nearly 100% of the time?)
I've had it around since HL2 came out and its gotten much better. Valve really wants to make a solid product for the consumer and steam is certainly a fruit of that labor.
EDIT: Right offline mode! Not sure how that works but it probably does what it sounds like.
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Occasionally after exiting a game a steam window will pop up advertising their latest deals, but other than that there is no advertising/emails.
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Katowice25011 Posts
I got an email from steam once. FUCK THOSE GUYS.
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The biggest risk of Steam is the weekend sales and the rarer seasonal super sales. They will coerce you into buying a ton of awesome games for cheap but soon you become addicted and find yourself with more games than you can possibly play and no money left.
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Watch your wallet. Sometimes Steam has game sales at ridiculously LOW LOW prices. As in $20 and $30 dollar games being 50% or even 75% off, as well as bundles being much cheaper than the sum of their parts. Tons of fantastic deals can be acquired through Steam, but be careful as you may find yourself spending tons of money on even more tons of games that you may never play.
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On November 09 2011 10:49 heyoka wrote:
I got an email from steam once. FUCK THOSE GUYS.
lol
I knew this was the place to go. You guys all fucking rule. Questions answered. Feel free to discuss or add anything though.
<3
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On November 09 2011 10:58 cursor wrote:Show nested quote +On November 09 2011 10:49 heyoka wrote:
I got an email from steam once. FUCK THOSE GUYS. lol I knew this was the place to go. You guys all fucking rule. Questions answered. Feel free to discuss or add anything though. <3
lol yea, what somebody said up there ^ you WILL lose a lot of money to epic steam deals It's a horrible thing. WHY WOULD THEY SELL GAMES FOR 75% OFF THATS FUCKED UP STOP MAKING ME EMPTY MY WALLET TO YOU STEAM
this thread has some of the past deals in it: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=198372
anyways steam does deals daily/weekly, and every one in a while they do epic weeks/months of deals. Like they have "ubisoft week" and stuff like that where you can get games like Assassins Creed Brotherhood for 75% off and crazy stuff
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Steam is amazing, but they will also make you want to kill yourself. Like people posted before they have RIDICULOUS sales on games like 75% off Bioshock 1-2. Or even older games like age of empires, its a great way to get games you never wanted to get because you didn't want to pay for. Or if you want to try new games.
But overall steam is really amazing.
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Someone tried hacking my steam account and they emailed me. I DIDNT WANT AN EMAIL
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On November 09 2011 10:53 eviltomahawk wrote:
Watch your wallet. Sometimes Steam has game sales at ridiculously LOW LOW prices. As in $20 and $30 dollar games being 50% or even 75% off, as well as bundles being much cheaper than the sum of their parts. Tons of fantastic deals can be acquired through Steam, but be careful as you may find yourself spending tons of money on even more tons of games that you may never play.
This. My friend and I groan every time Christmas and July roll around because Steam has ridiculous ten day sales and inevitably we're buying at least one game, resulting in money lost.
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On November 09 2011 10:49 DCLXVI wrote:
Occasionally after exiting a game a steam window will pop up advertising their latest deals, but other than that there is no advertising/emails.
Yeah this deserves a mention, it's easy to put up with, but on the whole it's the worst part of the experience considering everything else is pretty good, the overlay that works over most games reguardless of if you're on steam or not, the chat features and voice on the same codec as skype, the group and community stuff and the sales ;_; I've bought so many games I'm never going to be able to play because of those sales.
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On November 09 2011 12:03 SandwichApoc wrote:Show nested quote +On November 09 2011 10:53 eviltomahawk wrote:
Watch your wallet. Sometimes Steam has game sales at ridiculously LOW LOW prices. As in $20 and $30 dollar games being 50% or even 75% off, as well as bundles being much cheaper than the sum of their parts. Tons of fantastic deals can be acquired through Steam, but be careful as you may find yourself spending tons of money on even more tons of games that you may never play. This. My friend and I groan every time Christmas and July roll around because Steam has ridiculous ten day sales and inevitably we're buying at least one game, resulting in money lost.
Oh the irony in having games be "too cheap".
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Its pretty much awesome. No spyware/adds/any of that crap, you can buy games on there from pretty much every dev, and it has a community section. All PC gamers should have steam in my opinion.
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Realy bad system, Installs "Anticheat" spyware onto your system that is a minor resource hog and checks info on running process/etc. Asshole staff, huge track record of perma-banning accounts with $300+ of paid games (which also permanently disables cd keys of all said games even if you purchased them physically), and for reasons that are stupid (ie, you download a game "illegally" to try before buying it, steam sees you have an unauthorized copy of the game, then removes access for every game you legally purchased as well). I advise buying skyrim on xbox/ps3 and saving yourself the hassle.
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EPT
