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On November 09 2011 12:38 gosuMalicE wrote:
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.
You sound like a hacker and pirate. Good riddance -- go play your game on console.
The only real problem with these services is their monopolistic nature. I can see a future of digital distribution centres for movies, music, and video games.
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-no
-no
-I don't think so? Not really sure.
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On November 09 2011 12:47 Durak wrote:Show nested quote +On November 09 2011 12:38 gosuMalicE wrote:
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. You sound like a hacker and pirate. Good riddance -- go play your game on console. The only real problem with these services is their monopolistic nature. I can see a future of digital distribution centres for movies, music, and video games.
I'm sorry I don't like having to install spyware on my system to play games, regardless of the intent of the software. And I hardly consider wanting to see if a game is any good before i drop $50+ on it to be piracy, some of us are broke students who find it difficult to even fit a game into the budget every few months,so I'm sure as hell going to be positive a game is worth it before spending $ on it. Stop pretending there is no downside to steam because it is hugely important to be aware of if you intend on investing any amount of money at all into the system.
PS. I do have a steam account, I only play free games on it however (TF2, TF:F, Insurgency, etc.) I have a friend who lost a ~$360 account for wanting to see if dead island was worth playing, even after getting bad reviews, the most retarded thing however, is that by the time his account was banned for playing a pirated copy of the game he had actually got around to purchasing a legitimate copy, needless to say there was no refund.
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Steam is a store/digital distribution system/social networking service. It ties all of these features really nicely, to the point where I only buy games for PC on it, unless they aren't on Steam (i.e. SC2). I use the social networking features a lot because I have a lot of friends I make playing TF2. It's a friends list where you can see what people are playing, join their games directly (if you own it obviously), chat (text or voice) with them, etc.
Overall it's pretty nice, and I haven't heard anything about banning of accounts that that guy mentioned (and I try before I buy sometimes as well).
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On November 09 2011 13:10 gosuMalicE wrote:Show nested quote +On November 09 2011 12:47 Durak wrote:On November 09 2011 12:38 gosuMalicE wrote:
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. You sound like a hacker and pirate. Good riddance -- go play your game on console. The only real problem with these services is their monopolistic nature. I can see a future of digital distribution centres for movies, music, and video games. I'm sorry I don't like having to install spyware on my system to play games, regardless of the intent of the software. And I hardly consider wanting to see if a game is any good before i drop $50+ on it to be piracy, some of us are broke students who find it difficult to even fit a game into the budget every few months,so I'm sure as hell going to be positive a game is worth it before spending $ on it. Stop pretending there is no downside to steam because it is hugely important to be aware of if you intend on investing any amount of money at all into the system. PS. I do have a steam account, I only play free games on it however (TF2, TF:F, Insurgency, etc.) I have a friend who lost a ~$360 account for wanting to see if dead island was worth playing, even after getting bad reviews, the most retarded thing however, is that by the time his account was banned for playing a pirated copy of the game he had actually got around to purchasing a legitimate copy, needless to say there was no refund.
Do you have any evidence of this besides a hearsay story from a friend that you admit was breaking the terms of service? If you don't like the service, don't use it. But to download the application and then complain that your account is banned when you break the rules is beyond ridiculous.
It's like the burglar that breaks his ankle escaping the house, and then sues the owner. Ungrateful to say the least.
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steams a good program. Ive got a lot of games that are you cant find in stores from it.
lol the comments about the deal i can remember thinking about paying 99$ for every game some developer ever made
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Haha yeah, Steam is too good at selling you stuff.
Also, there are lots of giveaways (though I've never won), you need Steam installed to take the Dota 2 survey (and play Dota 2 when that comes out).
My only annoyances are it sometimes takes ages to update, offline mode doesn't work properly (ie launch and allow you to play offline games if it doesn't detect internet/internet is down), and the game sales that will make you forever poor and busy.
I have yet to play a bunch of the games I bought, thinking "damn that's so cheap". (Metro 2033, most of indie Puzzle pack, Beat pack, Air pack, FEAR pack, Tropico 3, just to mention a few)
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On November 09 2011 13:10 gosuMalicE wrote:
I'm sorry I don't like having to install spyware on my system to play games, regardless of the intent of the software. And I hardly consider wanting to see if a game is any good before i drop $50+ on it to be piracy, some of us are broke students who find it difficult to even fit a game into the budget every few months,so I'm sure as hell going to be positive a game is worth it before spending $ on it. Stop pretending there is no downside to steam because it is hugely important to be aware of if you intend on investing any amount of money at all into the system.
PS. I do have a steam account, I only play free games on it however (TF2, TF:F, Insurgency, etc.) I have a friend who lost a ~$360 account for wanting to see if dead island was worth playing, even after getting bad reviews, the most retarded thing however, is that by the time his account was banned for playing a pirated copy of the game he had actually got around to purchasing a legitimate copy, needless to say there was no refund.
This is why you either a) create a smurf account to test pirated games, or b) don't add said game to steam (I realize a lot of games now require steam, which is why option "a" is the best one. It sounds like your friend didn't do the research on steam bans when they decided to pirate. I'm not going to hate on pirating here, and I don't disagree with your logic about not wanting to spend the money on a game, but if your going to be dumb enough to not look into the consequences first, you deserve what's coming to you. I was going to buy dead island off a 3rd party website for roughly 50% of retail, but I discovered there's a very marginal chance my account could get banned, and for that, it just wasn't worth picking up the game (although I could have just as easily created a smurf account).
In regards to the OP. everyone's answered your original questions, but to make a constructive point out of malice's post, yes if for some reason you are caught hacking, violating tos, adding pirated game keys to your account, your entire account gets banned, meaning you no longer have access to ANY game in your library. In addition, if your account is banned. Any games you have gifted to others via steam or otherwise will also lock the games on your friend's account as well. Ex. I've gifted my gf every game she has on steam, if my account were to be banned, she would lose access to all of her games, but would still be able to purchase games at her own expense, I would lose full access to my account.
I'd say 99% of people are happy with the way steam does things, I've been using it since beta and its been of the best platforms I've used for gaming. Another thing that hasn't been mentioned is that steam allows you to add games to your library that are non-steam titles like SC2, giving you a central hub to launch all of your games. You can also create categories to group your games however you'd like to make organizing them easier within steam.
The actual steam store is way too convenient, as many said..it can suck you into buying tons of games with the prices and ease of purchase. Some other features include being able shift+tab while playing any game added to steam to bring up an overlay which gives you access to your friends list to chat, a community window to check out different groups, and even an internet browser built right into the overlay, all while the game is running right underneath of it.
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On November 09 2011 13:22 Probulous wrote:Show nested quote +On November 09 2011 13:10 gosuMalicE wrote:On November 09 2011 12:47 Durak wrote:On November 09 2011 12:38 gosuMalicE wrote:
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. You sound like a hacker and pirate. Good riddance -- go play your game on console. The only real problem with these services is their monopolistic nature. I can see a future of digital distribution centres for movies, music, and video games. I'm sorry I don't like having to install spyware on my system to play games, regardless of the intent of the software. And I hardly consider wanting to see if a game is any good before i drop $50+ on it to be piracy, some of us are broke students who find it difficult to even fit a game into the budget every few months,so I'm sure as hell going to be positive a game is worth it before spending $ on it. Stop pretending there is no downside to steam because it is hugely important to be aware of if you intend on investing any amount of money at all into the system. PS. I do have a steam account, I only play free games on it however (TF2, TF:F, Insurgency, etc.) I have a friend who lost a ~$360 account for wanting to see if dead island was worth playing, even after getting bad reviews, the most retarded thing however, is that by the time his account was banned for playing a pirated copy of the game he had actually got around to purchasing a legitimate copy, needless to say there was no refund. Do you have any evidence of this besides a hearsay story from a friend that you admit was breaking the terms of service? If you don't like the service, don't use it. But to download the application and then complain that your account is banned when you break the rules is beyond ridiculous. It's like the burglar that breaks his ankle escaping the house, and then sues the owner. Ungrateful to say the least.
lol? You realize that games that you buy a physical copy of in a store may require steam to run so you agree to nothing when making that purchase, steam being able to deny you access to that product as a result of you breaking the terms of use of another is retarded and unjustifiable.
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On November 09 2011 14:39 gosuMalicE wrote:
lol? You realize that games that you buy a physical copy of in a store may require steam to run so you agree to nothing when making that purchase, steam being able to deny you access to that product as a result of you breaking the terms of use of another is retarded and unjustifiable.
If the game REQUIRES steam to run it, at that point you may want to check the ToS for steam to investigate anything you may run into trouble with. The physical copy of the game just allows for people who may not have a credit card the ability to purchase the game.
^This is both justifiable and not retarded
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When you have slow internet like me, it takes days to dl a game you bought from steam to your HD. I prefer boxed retail version. Unless I'm buying old games, they're small in size and are hard to find nowadays so I go to GoG.
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lol at too much money spent on the deals  I got Amnesia for $4 the other day, and bought a copy for my boyfriend too :D
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On November 09 2011 14:54 Battleaxe wrote:Show nested quote +On November 09 2011 14:39 gosuMalicE wrote:
lol? You realize that games that you buy a physical copy of in a store may require steam to run so you agree to nothing when making that purchase, steam being able to deny you access to that product as a result of you breaking the terms of use of another is retarded and unjustifiable. If the game REQUIRES steam to run it, at that point you may want to check the ToS for steam to investigate anything you may run into trouble with. The physical copy of the game just allows for people who may not have a credit card the ability to purchase the game. ^This is both justifiable and not retarded
At the point that you purchase the game you are not aware nor should you be expected to be aware that a TOS condition like that exists. Buy the time the TOS is presented to you it is already to late to change decision on the purchase of the product as stores to not accept returns of opened software. I realize that under US law that kind of shit flies, but that makes it neither right or justifiable. But that argument has been carried out one too many times, and I'm not keen on repeating it. I don't want to derail this thread any further so I wont reply to any more discussion on this particular topic here, if you feel that I am so absolutely wrong that you need to rebut me even further then do it via pm.
PS. the only purpose of my original post was to inform the OP about the downside of steam, as all previous replys were just covering the positive aspects. If there was already a post talking about the ridiculousness of steam bans I would not have said anything at all, it was not my intent to cause a stupid argument.
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Problem with steam is now I have a job I have money so I buy lots of things in the sales (esp the midweek specials), and now I have a job I have no time to play anything and if I do have time I'm just like fuck it i'll play sc2 or bf3.
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On November 09 2011 12:04 Dingobloo wrote:Show nested quote +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.
The steam advertisements can quite easely be turned of in the options menu.
They're enabled by default tho.
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On November 09 2011 10:36 cursor wrote:
-Does it cost? Is there a monthly fee?
The program itself is free.
There are no monthly costs.
The games bought through steam are gonna cost though.
On November 09 2011 10:36 cursor wrote:
-The account I have to create, does it subject me to email advertising or any sort of Spyware?
Steam does not send out email advertising.
Steam can (upon permission of the user) scan the hardware to integrate the data into their hardware survey:
http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
They state the data is anonymized, but you can't confirm that for sure.
Also you cannot rule out that steam sends information back to Valve. No one discovered suspicious packets or anything as of now, but that can change with updates.
On November 09 2011 10:36 cursor wrote:
-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?
Steam has to run when you play the game. It actually includes a useful overlay (here demonstrated with guildwars: http://louisfortier.ca/upload/gw/steam_overlay_mod_final.jpg) that you can use to message friends (on steam), browse achievements or just browse the web. The webbrowser isn't one of the best though 
On November 09 2011 10:36 cursor wrote:
Is there anything else I should know before Registering and Installing?
If you are very sceptical of Steam (which is fine), you might want to just get the game running for the first time and then completly block Steam from the internet, sending it to offline mode. You will not be able to get achievements or do any multiplayer (but who cares with skyrim?) and will also not get game updates. But you can be sure to play even if Steam goes out of business and doesn't unlock the games ... given you don't change your PC down the line somewhen.
------------------------------------- PERSONAL OPINION AHEAD -------------------------------------------
I like Steam. It's quite useful (overlay) and my main process of launching a game. Plus they have sick deals almost regularly. I can understand that some people don't like it and the reasons for that, they don't apply to me however
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I remember the old steam and then the new steam thingy came. I've disliked it ever since. The old steam was so simple and nice 
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So instead of opening a new thread, I'm going to post my question here.
A couple of months ago I was very interested in Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood but I wasn't sure if I wanted to buy the game outright. So I figured I'd try it out for a couple of days using third party solutions and then decide whether I wanted to buy it and continue playing it or not. Sure enough I loved the game and bought the whole Creed Pack on Steam (they even had a sale at the time - lucky me!).
After firing up my newly downloaded Steam version of Brotherhood, I found that my story mode had carried over from the "pre-Steam" version. I didn't particularly care at the time, but now that it seems I might be using Steam for most of my game purchases in the future, I'm concerned about my account - my concern is that for whatever reason 3 years down the line my Steam account with god knows how many games on it get's banned because of this one potentially compromising title. Does the scenario I'm describing even make sense (should I be concerned at all)? And if yes, is there anything I can do - short of making a new Steam account - to ensure something like this can't happen?
Lastly, I'm well aware of TL's view on "third party solutions" in this context and if this post is deemed inappropriate, feel free to remove it. That said, I believe I am within the boundaries of the acceptable here.
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On November 09 2011 22:01 RyN wrote:
So instead of opening a new thread, I'm going to post my question here.
A couple of months ago I was very interested in Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood but I wasn't sure if I wanted to buy the game outright. So I figured I'd try it out for a couple of days using third party solutions and then decide whether I wanted to buy it and continue playing it or not. Sure enough I loved the game and bought the whole Creed Pack on Steam (they even had a sale at the time - lucky me!).
After firing up my newly downloaded Steam version of Brotherhood, I found that my story mode had carried over from the "pre-Steam" version. I didn't particularly care at the time, but now that it seems I might be using Steam for most of my game purchases in the future, I'm concerned about my account - my concern is that for whatever reason 3 years down the line my Steam account with god knows how many games on it get's banned because of this one potentially compromising title. Does the scenario I'm describing even make sense (should I be concerned at all)? And if yes, is there anything I can do - short of making a new Steam account - to ensure something like this can't happen?
Lastly, I'm well aware of TL's view on "third party solutions" in this context and if this post is deemed inappropriate, feel free to remove it. That said, I believe I am within the boundaries of the acceptable here.
youre fine
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On November 09 2011 13:10 gosuMalicE wrote:Show nested quote +On November 09 2011 12:47 Durak wrote:On November 09 2011 12:38 gosuMalicE wrote:
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. You sound like a hacker and pirate. Good riddance -- go play your game on console. The only real problem with these services is their monopolistic nature. I can see a future of digital distribution centres for movies, music, and video games. I'm sorry I don't like having to install spyware on my system to play games, regardless of the intent of the software. And I hardly consider wanting to see if a game is any good before i drop $50+ on it to be piracy, some of us are broke students who find it difficult to even fit a game into the budget every few months,so I'm sure as hell going to be positive a game is worth it before spending $ on it. Stop pretending there is no downside to steam because it is hugely important to be aware of if you intend on investing any amount of money at all into the system. PS. I do have a steam account, I only play free games on it however (TF2, TF:F, Insurgency, etc.) I have a friend who lost a ~$360 account for wanting to see if dead island was worth playing, even after getting bad reviews, the most retarded thing however, is that by the time his account was banned for playing a pirated copy of the game he had actually got around to purchasing a legitimate copy, needless to say there was no refund.
I think illegally downloading games, no matter how much you try to justify it for yourself, is inherently piracy and thus a bad thing to do
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EPT
