I've heard Brad talk about Steam in the past, and discuss the merits and lack thereof.

While I do like Steam, as a tool. If Impulse has the same price point as Steam, I've still gone with Steam. Just being honest.

That said, I do prefer the ethical side of Stardock. And can't even see the remote need for them to branch out into the alternative distribution sites. Just doesn't make any solid business sense. I guess it's a good question, as it got Brad to respond. It just would make no sense, from providing a real alternative to us gamers.

Your Impulse account will keep track of all your keys and registrations, and there are no download limits through Impulse.  You can also use the archive system to keep a backup of the install file so you don't have to download it every time.

Impulse is only required to download, install and update.  It does not need to be running for the games to work, so it definitely fits the 'low resource usage' requirement.

Brad, I like you. You're the kind of developer that warms my heart in a way that I thought only Gabe Newell could, a nerd for nerds kinda guy, geek for geeks. People should not be allowed to participate in the making or selling of games if they don't play them themselves. I understand perfectly the argument for competition, it is something that must exist. Mona Lisa was a nice painting, but it would bring tears to my eyes if the only thing anyone ever painted after that was the Mona Lisa II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, and so on and so forth.. I'm looking at you Final Fantasy (Insert double digit number here). For the love of art, and by that I mean games, don't ever stop what you're doing.

That blatant smothering of affection aside, I'm still going to use steam. Elemental will be my experiment with Impulse however. I'm not looking for a steam replacement, and as far as I can tell it seems Impulse isn't trying to be one. I don't want to have to juggle two social networks, and that's steams biggest value to me. It's intrusive, and sluggish and many times unreliable. If the servers are down, you can't play. But it provides a convenient social network which is integrated with my games, so for multiplayer games it's a boon, as well as automatically patching and filled with related news. The market place is only interesting in so far as the days where they do 75% off cuts on old games, otherwise it's just 20 dollars more for deluxe edition garbage and DLC's digging your pockets.

If Impulse lets me buy Elemental, updates it for me, keeps track of it if God forbid I ever uninstall it or my computer dies so I can download it again assuredly and then gets out of the way so I can use it. Then.. well..   yay!

The less intrusive impulse turns out to be for me the better, because then it's all the more likely that it wont step on Steams big fat toes. I may end up adding Elemental (if at all possible) to steam as a non-steam game if that makes it possible to use the overlay, if not, oh well. Elemental doesn't sound like one of those monster games that falls apart if you ever try to minimize it. Source engine doth not like to be minimized, and I'm on an i7.

In order for Impulse to stay in dependant of and in competition of Steam, Impulse needs to have titles and game makers making games that are Exclusive to Impulse or that can be found for a Cheaper Price then their Steam counterparts. If Impulse can't do that then it will fail as a download service and people will end up using Steam or Direct2Drive. If it can't be competitive there's no reason for it to exist. Frogboy knows this, and hence you won't see Stardock games sold on Steam, ever. As long as Stardock owns and operates Impulse I'm sure things will be as they are now.

What Stardock really needs to do is go out and bribe some major studios, the big Evil Ones like E.A. and Blizzard to make a few games to be sold Exclusively either in a store or online through Impulse only. If they can pull that off for a few triple AAA titles Impulse will become the next Steam and take it's place as the number 1 digital service because of Stardock's golden reputation with it's customers. Steam doesn't have that luxury, quite the contrary in fact, and I think Stardock really needs to monopolize on that.

impulse is  highly unlikely going to be better then steam   and steam is going to be bought out by microsoft soon so even more content for them

it seems to me like impulse is doing the same with mac was doing againist windows 

exclusives always make me laugh the majority of the clan im in  has never heard of impulse  so what came first  steam or impulse 

Its never been about who came first.. (although Stardock was doing business before steam).. Its more about steams business model vs Stardock.  in a nut shell Stardock central and now impulse has never been restrictive to software developers or end users where steam has.. what Stardock is about is options..  and it simply makes no sense for Stardock who oppose steams limiting / restrictive  fees / practices to do business with  those  they view to be the competition.. its like asking burger king to sell wendy's chili, not going to happen..

So you won't be able to patch your retail copy of your game ...

I'm a big fan of both Steam and Impulse, and I see these as two rival companies trying to offer what they feel is the best service on the market. Steam has some positives, like crazy game sales and good community functions built in; however, it also has drawbacks compared to Impulse, like a wonky offline feature, and always having to have the client running to play anything, and it not letting you play anything if it feels it's out of date. Impulse also has positives over Steam, like a lighter weight client, only needing the client if you want to patch or use community functions, and not having to phone home every time you run something and no need for an offline mode to screw with.

This kind of competition is good for the industry, and I'm glad guys like Stardock are around to compete.

Asking Stardock to release this game outside of Impulse is like asking Valve to release their games outside of Steam. Heck Valve games have Steam hard coded into it, and it is impossible to play a legit version without the Steam client, at least Stardock allows you to not use Impulse.

I find your attitude to be quite ironic, well maybe not ironic but definitely contradictory. You say you readily use Steam already because of the deals they offer, and you say it's childish to have a rivaling competitor and not just throw money at the competitor. You also refuse to use Impulse, even though you use a more ominous content client like Steam. Don't you see the double standard you are throwing out here?

In order to effectively smack around Steam, I'd target more independent studios. Not "indie" but guys like GPG, 38 Studios, or DoubleBear Productions. The last I had heard Blind Mind, the guys behind "Star Ruler" were having issues with Valve and Steam as a distribution platform. 

Perhaps, but it's what they need to bring in more business and get others into using Impulse. If there's nothing exclusive to Impulse that people want, they won't use it. Steam does so much business because they have so many games (and hence game publishers) giving them a lot of content. The content is what draws the customers, not the options on how to get it. Options interest people like us, adults who actually think and put thought and effort into things. Steam's customer base is at least halfway populated by kids who are buying games with Mommy and Daddy's credit card. To be successful a business must cater to the widest customer base.

All Impulse needs is one AAA hit that can only be gotten through a physical store or Impulse, and it will take off like a bat out of hell. To Stardock's fans, like all of us here, Stardock games are AAA titles. To the rest of the world and those who aren't Stardock fanboys....not so much. Sadly in todays gaming world strategy games are becoming "niche" titles unless it's a RTS with an already huge following like Starcraft.

Todays generation want instant gratification. They don't want slow paced games where it takes thought and effort to build something and make it powerful, they want to be powerful right from the start. They want complicated games to have a "I Win Button" and to move at lightning speed. Just look at the gaming markets and the changes in game design from back in the 90's to today. Hell just look at Civ 5...how many game mechanics were dumbed down and "streamlined" ? Stardock games can still mostly be considered to be "niche" titles. Until the pendulum of the gaming population swings back to Strategy titles being the AAA titles this is the way things are going to stay and it will only get worse going in that direction. That's just my opinion however. I'm getting old and it seems the older I get the older my views get too.

I was merely listing examples of the types of studios  . Though if I could pick any one of the ones I did list it'd be Blind Mind. Which is 2 like...2 guys.

If you won't buy elemental simply because it isn't on Steam, then it's probably not a game you really want that badly. I have like 200 games on Steam, and I still support Stardock/Impulse. You don't even need to use Impulse to play the game if it's that big of a deal to you... You can also add any game to the Steam client if you have to launch it there or whatever. No matter what you say Stardock isn't allow their brand new franchise to be a money maker for their largest competitor.