Over the months having gotten Sins of a Solar Empire, and thusly downloading Impulse, i have been browsing the forums a good amount. What i keep running into is discussions about whether or not Impulse is better than Steam. I use both, Steam since 2005 (got it for HL2) and Impulse since this year for SoaSE. When i had fisrts gotten Impulse i was somewhat weary, i def likes steam better but that was just because I was used to Steam. But since the recent update to impulse i have come to like both of the equally. To have options on who you buy your games from keeps prices down and creates compitition, which generated benifits for the PC gaming community. And at the same time they both offer very different gaming selections at varying prices. While it is not truely balanced on both sides in terms of options and support etc, they are still much better, much much better, then any large department store or Videogame specality stores that focus more on consuls then we the PC community. While it may seem that i am riding the line here on this "issue" but that is my honest to goodness opinion, that they are both great and any gamer that Downloads directly should probably use the different options to their advantage and try to save some money here and there. Hope to hear some good discussions, have at it!
This again? Didn't we discuss this like 5 minutes ago?
As is the case with apples and oranges, the two are not mutually exclusive.
apples and orangse are both fruit, steam and impulse are both content-providing-shopping-centers-via-digital-conveyencealso, apples>oranges
Impulse have so far never given me a i wanna strangle the shit out of this software so impulse have a score of 10/10 so far. while steam continue to to have 0/10 for me. steam have never ever given me something i wanted and always been a reason for headaces.
Impulse has been a good influence on Steam. One example:
Steam is now doing the DRM listings that Impulse does, you can see it on their store under 3rd party DRM.
When Steam first game, I disliked it. I didn't want to install any additional programs on my computer just to play the same Half Life mods I'd played before. It also took long time for a patch to arrive for Desert Crisis, if I remember right, and the mod was pretty abandoned for a longish time. When I heard lots of people having problems with Steam, I simply uninstalled HL1 and went for other games.
I haven't gotten over this. As long as Steam needs to be on to play games, and there's checks that require internet connection, I won't be touching Steam. Just recently a friend bought Zeno Clash via Steam, a game I really wanted to play. But, as long as it needs Steam, I won't. I didn't really want to install Impulse at first, either, since I put some value on owning game manuals (when they're good manuals. Like in Arcanum) and packages. But since I liked Stardock to begin with, and after reading about Impulse and Stardock's policy concerning DRM, it wasn't that big deal to download a game digitally. Well, excluding some problems with payment methods.
It's like OP said, it's good there are options. Many shops simply won't seem to bother with PC games nowadays, and with digital downloading eliminating much of the distribution costs (and pollution, too), it is a good choice. Impulse is pretty much what made it possible for me. There are some games in Steam I'd like to play, but there are lots of good ones in Impulse too.. atm I'm already looking forward to Elemental.
Though I still do miss good manuals with some background story and art. But whatever, as long as the games are good, and computer gaming stays alive
I never ever want to be FORCED to be connected to my internet connection to play a game. So Steam is out.
When I am at my camping and I want to play X3 I do not want to see no internet connection game does not load message. Dang that!!!
Impulse is a bit more stable for me, and quicker to start. It's also prettier - you can tell that it was designed by experts on user interfaces. Lastly, offline mode is much, much more reliable with Impulse.
Which is not to say that Steam is bad: for the most part it does it's job pretty well and doesn't give too much grief. Try using it with a slightly flakey internet connection, though, and it's becomes a real pain.
I like the clients equally. that being said
the in game overlay for impulse looks and functions terrible. that thing needs an upgrade asap, the one for steam is much better
Yeah, Impulse is faster, more compatible(Steam doesn't work in the DMZ of all things), uses significantly less system resources, has a cleaner interface, and is vastly more useful on the information front. Having information on how large a patch is for instance...
Although niether of them function well on satellite at all...
Things I hate about Steam:
It screws up mods
It required to be on to play games, and doesn't turn off when you stop playing them.
It's not one-click shutoff
Give me a choice, I'll take Impulse, then Gamersgate, then Steam. (except for Paradox developed game, where I'll go Gamersgate to support the devs 100% if I get one of those)
I think there's a misconception that Gamers Gate is owned still by Paradox. Check out this interview with GamersGate CEO Theodore Bergquist, over here (http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/the-gate-keeper). Specifically:"Q: Historically GamersGate was part of Paradox Interactive - do you still maintain that relationship?Theodore Bergquist: Yes, it's both ways. GamersGate is a completely separate entity with separate management, budget, goals and so on, but it did start as a project under Paradox because their community demanded some downloading services, because they couldn't buy the games.The first traffic came from the Paradox community, and they're still into GamersGate, but as we grow their relative size is getting smaller. Certainly there are fans still buying Paradox games on GamersGate though. "
I,m in same camp as Keemosi. I wanna go buy a game and its mine, not have xtra program JUST to play my game that I just payed for. But it seems to be the way things are headed. I purchased Empire:Total War and got steam(I forgot it came with it) Game installed I played turned comp off. The next day I go to play and click the icons and they wouldnt work, go to all programs and select from there and nothing. So I restart comp and error comes up saying program not responding. It was steam.exe, so I had to hit "end now" no biggiy right. So I figure to just uninstall and reinstall steam and it should be fine, NOT. It uninstalled my game and steam grrrrr. ok so Ill just reinstall game, WRONG now my disk wont install, I have to reinstall via steam....15 GB @600kbs is ohh about 3 hrs of my time. So now the game I payed for is useless frisby cause I gotta use them to play it or install it, 3rd party is just crazy. Oh BTW I have to use task manager to turn steam.exe off then it restarts itself and I can play. Their support took 6 days to get a bad fix for me that included uninstalling steam again,haha not doin that again. I found the taskmnger fix on youtube lol their support was wrong. Steam I dont care for steam to much.
Impulse I like much better and Ive been reading here more than the net lol. But I really dislike having to have a 3rd party app just to play a game I payed for. But as a gamer what can I do, nothin I guess but to convert. Demi-God FTWin
Rather than Impulse vs. Steam, I'm more curious to compare Impulse to Steam to salesforce.com AppExchange to Apple iStore. In general, there seem to be a lot of competing distribution platforms for various types of software. I'll be curious to see in a few more years what people generally think works vs. what doesn't, and in what field.
Interesting point. I don't have Steam, but I have no complaints about Impulse at all. I really like how it compresses your downloads and auto-extracts them.
Hate them both...can't give any valid or such arguments..it is just me.I hate pay/download..pay/view and so on.Like it better when i go to the shop,pick it from the shelf,pay for it.Go home and enjoy the box,the dvd,the manual,the posters and so on.
Steam and impulse can't give me any of that.
So you would rather pay alot more for a game just to get a shiny box rather then pay/download at a lower price?
Yes...I always would rather pay for something that i actually hold in my hand.I will never have to download the full game,i do not need internet connection to play it since i own the dvd i can install it wherever,whenever i want to.Because it is mine,i own the game.With impulse it is just a bit(lot) different.My only game i payed for via steam was cs source,and i hate it to this day.Not the game itself,but the way you need to download and then play.
Could not install it on my laptop.Maybe i do not feel like playing online 24/7,maybe my laptop is not ment for online games,maybe i just wanted to have a little fun while playing cs,i was 300KM away from home,no internet available,so i could not play the game i payed for,that just sucks.
Even if i know i pay more,i own the game,no need to download all kind of stuff,and no need to connect to the internet every time.As said in the matrix,"the problem is choice",well i choose to do with my game whatever i want to,i do not like when i am obligated to stick with something like impulse,otherwise i will never be able to play the game.And every time on every pc/laptop i need to redownload the game.That is just crap.
It isn't about the shiny box,it is about what is in that box.And it is about the choices i have,with the ownership of the game i can do with it whatever i want to,with download via impulse,my choices are limited
You don't need an internet connection to play an impulse game. Only to install it and patch it. However, you don't need to patch it to play it, unlike Steam.
You still need the internet to download patches whether you have impulse or not. Impulse makes those patches smaller and faster. Thats can only be a good thing.
You need to install the game if you wanna play on a different PC. It is no big deal.
Having a physical copy is in no way superior to a download.
Are you referring about Impulse or Steam?
But generally in that case, you have the latest version ....
well i know stardock offers to send you a physical box and manual etc. as an option. I dont think it comes with the disk but they will ship it to you and i do not believe steam offers this service at the moment
Umm, i used steam for a few games. It's easy and when I wanna play my friends I click them in my buddy list and hit join game or something. I don't see a buddy list or anything with impulse so is there any way to play games? For demigod I have to voice chat over aim and TRY to hit fight at the same time and pray it puts me in a match with him. Is impulse ancient or something?
I was told that custom games have more hackers... but maybe a rumor. I will def do custom if that's how you're supposed to play with your friends. I'll check that out this weekend, thanks dood. +karma
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