Its the end of an era folks.
Quoting Yarlen, reply 41The Steam client will be required for Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion for initial install, updates and Internet multiplayer, regardless of purchase location. You can choose to play in offline mode via the Steam client after initial install, though ICO features and achievements will no longer be available.
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8. Gamers have the right to use their games without being inconvenienced due to copy protection or digital rights management.
Now its debatable whether this news actually goes against the PC gamers bill of rights Stardock pushed forward 3-4 years ago, but it certainly seems an ominous change of pace for the company to me. Are the other Stardock gaming communities concerned? Will other Stardock titles follow suite? Does this symbolically show the finalization of the Steam monopoly, short of the self sufficient EA and Blizzard titles? What does the wider community think, and what can we do about it?
Crap, here we go again...
twice today I thank you, Seleuceia.
How are things going to go for people who want to play mods over Steam?
As far as I know they should be supported. It only checks the Checksum on whether or not you can connect to the host's game or not. As far as auto-downloaded mods / etc I do not know.
IDK what universe OP lives in but Stardock sold Impulse to Gamestop last year and many of their games have been made available on Steam since which only makes sense from a marketing/every sort of view. As far as the "steam monopoly" goes, maybe competitors should stop trying as hard as possible to deter people and make a user friendly client that doesn't act as spyware *cough* EA Origin. Stardock is probably going with the convenience + user goodwill strategy to deter piracy over the intrusive DRM like TAGES that makes the game most likely to work if pirated exclusively.
Impulse is about the same as Stardock left it with new label, but Steam is far more popular, proven effective, has steamworks, with the plus side of being great for advertising your game on the market. When somebody brings something to the table that can actually compete with Steam then developers might choose the better alternative if it exists.
tl;dr Steam rocks, MSLive, Origins, etc are poop
^Did you even read the first page? I want Steam to be one of the options for people to get their games at, just not the only one. As Sins uses steam works, where ever you buy it, you have to use steam.
Even worse, the Rebellion Beta doesn't seem to use the good Steam features for anything. Multiplayer features are as basic as always, steam friends would be there even on a non steam works game. What benefit is there to using steam works over the system trinity used, where you could use impulse/steam/stardock store for DRM?
Those are my second hand observations of the beta too. I have never seen the benefits to using Steam for Sins, Impulse::Reactor from Trinity seems comparable to Steam for Rebellion so far, without being completely tied to the service.
Errrr...millions of potential customers over thousands?
No, I mean tying everything to Steam, not selling the game on Steam, that's completely understandable.
To be perfectly honest, I don't think very many people look at a game and say "This game is sold on Steam, but doesn't use Steamworks? *GASP* Screw this, I'm not buying it."
But maybe I'm wrong...
As for why SD has failed to make use of the steamworks features...perhaps they haven't gotten to that part of the beta....I mean, I really don't think the decision to make Rebellion a steamworks game was taken lightly, and I would be very surprised if these features aren't included by the time of the final release...
Frogboy has stated that they will likely not improve any of the multiplayer UI or Steam features beyond what they currently are at.
I dont know I looked thru the forums and I don't understand why people are complaining about steam,I my self been using steam for years i got few dozen games on it and it has great interface it brings your games anywhere you go with you it has the steam cloud support that carries your save files to other computers,has f12 simple screenshots u can upload online on your profile,comes with a simple chat and you can join any of your friends in game.On top it has sales and specials on new games that let you buy brand new games for a fraction of the price,heck for 50 buks you can buy one game in gameshop or that same game and 10 like it on steam,and gives out free games on holidays by the 1000'sAnd to people concerned about loosing all their games for being banned,well don't scam people online and your pretty much safe,they don't ban people for no reason just cause they feel like it.As an alternative,there is also Origin i guess,but it cant even compare to what steam became.So why miss out on a pretty great community and more players to play with over some odd grudges.I personaly prefer my games on one provider rather then 10 different once i have to login on to.
That's a pretty neat trick you got going there for you, seeing as steam games require internet access to play...
Absolutely 100% irrelevant...buying a game on steam (as opposed to buying it on impulse) is one thing...that a game requires steamworks is another...this is the argument that has been reiterated approximately 5,000,000 times (+ or - 1 million) by the OP and others..the problem is not that it is sold on steam (just as Trinity is)....the problem is that it is Steam exclusive, and even worse, it requires steamworks just to play...
Stop crushing my dreams! On a slightly more serious note, one can only hope....
@Stardock & Ironclad
This is just an idea. Maybe stupid, technically impossible or economical suicide but think about it please.
Now that GOG.com also sells newer games, would it be possible to release a single-player version of Rebellion there without steamwork?
I'm not complaining about steam per say, I'm complaining that steamworks doesn't give us any choice. Every Stardock game prior to this one I can now download directly from Stardock's website, no third party required. People who wanted to use steam could, and people like me who don't want to use it could work directly with the publisher. Now we don't have that choice, and we don't have an obviously better product because of it.
I completely agree.
You know what your problem is Goa? You aren't posting in size 100 font! Maybe if you did that, people would actually read your posts instead of assuming you are the devil incarnate who seeks to destroy the evil Steam...
Its sad but true, Seleuceia, no one is taking what Goa is saying seriously, because they don't seem to be reading it.
How the average user tends to react to any dissent on using steam is an amazing study in conformity in the internet era. Its as if the very act of one choosing not to use it somehow is attacking their deepest set beliefs.. and is tend to be met as such.
There is an amazing Zealot faction at play with many steam users, its almost cult like. Its as if they must assimilate everyone. Oh wait they are borg it all makes sense now.
I know right? On another board after the distributions were mentioned I asked a fairly innocuously phrased question...
"Will it be possible to get this game without Steam?"
Before the devs could answer (and their answer was perfectly fine with me) I had a bunch of "What's wrong with Steam??" "Why would anyone not want to use Steam???" posts.
I think I may just do this on random game boards just to see if the responses are always the same.
No Seleuceia...
Its not shinny enough! Or maybe its uncolorful.
Humans tend to show that behavior on many things they take seriously but are really trivial.
MY NAME IS GOA, AND MY POSTS REALLY ARE QUITE REASONABLE ONCE YOU ACTUALLY READ THEM!
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