[Rational Debate Thread] The Anti-Steam Pro-Steam Thread

Duh. I fully admit to that. I'm BORED while my latest steam purchase downloads. Luckily, it downloads faster then I could drive to Best Buy and get a hard copy.

 

This is a good example of your problem. You state these absolutes that are anything but and expect us to take you seriously. AAA executives such as the folks who put out the latest Wolfenstein? Last I checked I had to use steam to play that.

Careful, or you will find yourself on the wrong side of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect

 

It is so sad that people fail to grasp how those with integrity don't have to have personal experience to object to unethical business practices.

I have never been negatively effected by DRM (not that much anyway), because I both do my research on games before buying them (especially if the game is made by Ubisoft) and I have enough knowledge to simply get a crack for any game I buy. Steam has never wronged me in any way. Not once.

It is a big deal to me, because thousands upon thousands of users are inconvenienced by an idiotic (completely ineffective) practice, all while vendors with significant influence encourage the practice.
It is a big deal to me, because tens of thousands of people are scammed into buying "WAR Z" and then "Infestation: Survivor Stories" which are advertised on the front page. I have never been effected personally by WAR Z or Scams. Others have though.

You think it's not a big deal. That is just YOUR opinion.
We wouldn't have seen so many people burned with Sim City if people made DRM a bigger deal.


You can agree to disagree, but I am passionate about everything that is anti-consumer, anti-people, anti-populous. I am just as passionate in politics while big business controls our democracy.

Perspectives like yours prevent positive change. There's nothing we can do right? Wrong. If everyone made a big deal about corruption, we could resolve it. If everyone made a big deal about scam games, we could get better quality control. If everyone objected to DRM with their wallets because they were better educated on why things like U-Play are awful or how Steam's offline mode isn't perfect, we could get rid of them.

Instead, we have apathy. Instead, we have selfish entitled jerks who think "It didn't effect me, so I don't care!" Instead, we don't even have Steam doing what it can to make a better offline mode. Even for people who register their game, confirm hundreds of times they own it, Steam still will force them to go online to play the game in offline mode.

There are thousands of people who buy games, who aren't hardcore gamers like YOU, who try to play their games offline and end up simply wasting their money never playing because of DRM. You think "It is so easy. Just log on." But what of people who are away? What of people offline? What of when internet goes out? What about 70 year old casual gamers who have trouble going online?

You say F*** them by your apathy. I say F*** Steam for its anti-consumer policies.
You can disagree, but you can't deny that people are effective by DRM, by scams, by broken games and a no refund policy, but a lack of quality control, by a near monopoly business.

"Oh, it's not a big deal. It's just video games."

So we should just sit back and take it in the ass while ALL businesses screw us? Why does it matter when or where you take a stand? Why does it not only matter that we just do?

Raising awareness to unethical practices or anit-consumer policies such as DRM or No-Refunds, lets people become aware what is happening to other people. Steam has treated me great, and I have enough experience to never have much of a problem. I do not care myself. However, I am invested in opposing bad policy because I actively think and care for other human beings outside myself. I know that is strange or rare, but like I keep reminding people: that's what people do who have integrity, who have ethics, who stand for basic values we can all agree on. Values like "Don't mistreat the consumer who funds your business."

It is easy to ignore the tens of thousands of dollars Steam makes every year selling games people never play, people give up on, people are disappointed in, people literally cannot play because of bugs, or one of the top selling games in a specific category which is actually a scam.
(According to Steam's filters, War Z has sold more copies than most Indie titles have. Even the ones we love. That is so fair right? That's good right? Indie Devs are less important than money right?)

 

I don't expect young people who are probably frothing with white privilege to understand what it means to stand against unethical businesses.
You may think now, "This guy makes a big deal out of nothing." but our entire society is plagued with the worship of money over people.

In a few decades, hopefully we will see some more regulation against these big businesses.
What is pathetic, is the people who say here it isn't a big deal, are living in the past. People in more liberal nations have already passed laws to protect consumers. Yes, that includes those video games which are "not a big deal".
Yes, there are many people who have had to quote EU law to force Steam to become ethical. You think they are in a minority, but they aren't. There is a reason these laws were created in the first place. You say "it is not a big deal" but law makers say it IS a big deal. Big enough to create laws regulating businesses like Steam.

I may be seen as a hateful troll today, but in the future those looking back (after DRM is eliminated entirely, after laws are passed to force refunds on broken games, after Steam is no longer the monopoly it once was) the only trolls here would be the ones apathetic to anti-consumer policy. Either that, or the world will become Shadowrun. As horrible as that will be. All thanks to you apathetic types.

 

Ok, so why don't most developers sell their games on GoG?

 

Agreed.

 

My take on Steam is:

1. I think its the main online store. It's a good place to sell if you do well in it. Therefore developers support it.
2. DRM - I'm pretty sure it works up until a point. It depends. Not going to bother arguing.
3. Steam is introducing friends & family, where you can share games you're not currently playing with friends and family. That's something you don't get elsewhere.

You could argue that removing DRM would mean that you can share with friends and family, but there's no balance there. In life, if you lend someone your car you paid for, you can't use it at the same time. Developers do need to get paid.

So overall I'm not anti steam. Sure I don't like how aggressive it is as a money making machine, but it's obviously something that people want.

 

How DARE you have a sensible reply with valid arguments and reasonable discussion.

Where are the insults? Where is the beratement? Why the rational thought in your reasoning?
Why are you not saying I'm a hateful troll for having a different opinion than you?
If we learned anything from this thread, you can't be on the Pro-Side without that.

This isn't a mature forum. This. IS. THE INTERNET!!!!!!!!!

 

Also, this is my favorite part:

If you like Steam, you're a racist!

 

Yeah I think most people like the idea of an online shop for games but Steam have let me down so often I finally lost patience with them. They are greedy tyrants.

 

If you don't like Steam, it would make sense to also not like Microsoft, Apple, or the Android store (except that you can pretty much get a hacked/cracked version of Android apps easily enough). Forget about Sony and Nintendo too. Oh, and how dare HumbleBundle even charge for anything, let alone be in cahoots with Steam!

That leaves us with... aw nuts. LFS Linus. But to truly not be hypocritical, make sure you're on truly open source hardware made by a non-monopolistic company that doesn't do anything bad ever. ;-)

Basically it comes down to being Richard Stallmann living in the woods.

 

Care to elaborate?

I have only good experiences with steam actually. Maybe because i've never bought into any scams yet, thus never having to apply for a refund yet.

The point on DRM is, steam does it well. Steam gives you the option to play offline if you want that, steam's drm is never invasive or bothering, because you hardly even notice it is drm. I've been through the launch of SimCity, Settlers7 (first always-on by ubasoft), so i know how annoying a-o drm can be... Steams DRM is a good one, and i can imagine developers being happy it is there

 

I don't hate on Steam for no reason, or even for moral reasons or anything like that, its just that I don't think Steam do a good job - at all.

Problems include:
-Denied access of games where game is installed on another machine.
-Cannot access/play any games offline at random because Steam demands to go into Online mode.
-Over one month wait for some keys and no refund offered. Support gave stock responses and did not fill us with confidence.
-Buggy client app that has tucked over Spec Ops game so I cannot play it anymore. Maybe if support were any good I could fix it.
-Support don't want you contacting them. They make it extra hard to lodge tickets.
-Greedy and nefarious motives of Gabe Newell who just cares about making money and not games.
-Ridiculous idea of selling Steam O/S boxes. When I stopped laughing I realised they were dead serious.

So for those reasons I prefer Origin:
-Refunds given.
-Ever increasing selection of games available.
-Curt and helpful support.
-No client app side effects so far.

 

You know, in a world where every business is unethical and everyone is anti-consumer, unfair, greedy, whatever the term you wish to discuss, you're right in that it comes down to living in the woods off the grid (which is probably illegal and will get you shot by cops who lust for blood).

However, there are times when you get to fight the good fight.

You may not be able to boycott food because you would starve. You may not be able to fight the government because you'd goto prison for the rest of your life for being too brown.
You may not be able to do anything against a monopoly in technology, slave exploitation in third world countries, or the fact the computer you're using was made through the exploitation of what are basically abused slaves who feel it is better to suicide through jumping than to continue living making ipads.

However, sometimes it is more convenient to oppose something. Sometimes you can actually get away with opposing it, without being shot, being imprisoned, starving, or otherwise dying.

I do oppose Microsoft, EA, and other big names. I do not oppose some of the lesser evils. When you have no choice but to choose between two people who exploit our planet and don't care for consumers, you can still pick the one that does it less, or in the way you think is less bad or with more good.

I legitimately do not care if someone likes, loves, or uses Steam. I agree with many Pro-Steam users, such as hippocoder, who give valid reasons for their support of Steam.

What I oppose, are the mindless fanboys, the needless troll kiddies, the weird irrational obsession to defend Steam by denying there is even a problem (a.k.a. normal fanboyism).

It is fine to disagree, as long as people acknowledge the unethical practices I discuss. Living in denial of them or pretending they are fine, is just lunatic.



In the end, do we have a choice? When it comes to game vendors, we do. We can support small steam-like businesses like Desura, get even cheaper deals on Steam-like sales on GreenManGaming (which gives us Steam keys), or if the game is on GoG then support them first and foremost because of their significantly improved customer care policies and altruistic business policy. I mean, you don't see Steam going around to other countries whose currency is less and telling them they will suffer the difference in price by giving them a more fair price without hurting the developers nicome. You don't see Steam enforcing a No-DRM policy like GoG does. Want your game on GoG? It can't have DRM as far as I know.

So no, we don't have to live in the woods, off grid like some sort of jungle survivor. We can simply choose to oppose bad policy when we are given the chance to. GoG gives us the chance to. Desura & GMG give us the chance to. HumbleBundle gives us the chance to. Sure, all but GoG we might end up with a Steam key, but at least we're trying.

Unless you're like the rest of the fanboys who wish Desura/HumbleBundle/GoG would die off so the altruistic Steam who can do no wrong will take over and tell us what to think. The latter is an exaggeration, but there are thousands of fanboys who actually would like that...

 

This is only true for you.

Tens of thousands of other people, including people in this very thread (showing how common problems are) result in people who have played games hundreds of times before, even in offline mode, and are suddenly unable to play them without logging on.

Not to mention that anything that requires you to log in and start software will inevitably give you problems if it is required to play singleplayer offline games.

Never invasive? You have to install Steam and log in anytime you want to play.
Never bothering? That is purely opinion. The fact it loads so slowly compared to similar software is very bothering to many. The fact it is forced on you to have is bothering enough.

You hardly even notice it is drm? False. Only people who don't know Steam is DRM fail to notice. Anyone who knows how Pro-DRM Steam is notice it everytime they're forced to sign in just to play games. Which is anytime they want to play games. Most of the time, I have to go online just to enter offline mode...it's that often a problem for me and many others. You probably don't notice, because you are always online, with just one account on one computer.

Just because you don't experience any problem with Steam, doesn't mean tens of thousands of other people do not.

Steam might do DRM better than most other DRM, but that doesn't excuse the fact it is DRM. Anyone who thinks DRM is even a tiny bit effective has some extreme problems with ignorance on piracy v. DRM. The entire concept of DRM is one of the most backwards things in gaming. There are hundreds of articles explaining why, if you're interested. I thought it was common knowledge how backwards DRM is, how ineffective, how useless. Yet apparently people think it actually works to some extent. What a naive world we live in...

 

Those darn kids and their white privilege! Honestly, no joke, that is the most ridiculous claim I've heard this month.

The percentage in new generations other than Caucasian that are educated is increasing rapidly. Just a couple generations back black people weren't allowed into schools; if they managed to get in they faced abuse or a lot worse. Can you imagine that happening today without the world going crazy? Nope, "political correctness" is at an all time to a dizzying high point.

Back then Gandhi openly talked about how important it was to make a distinction between the "dirty" Indians and the "proper" Indians and how horrible he found black people. Can you imagine an icon for peace making a statement like that today? Probably not.

I can't tell if you're a troll,have a sad superiority complex or just don't get out enough.

 

I think we're done here, you are not auditioning for the debate team.