The Gaming News Thread

[Monk]

Well it's not news, just one gamer's opinion on the current state of steam distribution, but whatever i'll bite.


I think he raises a good point with the current state of Steam and how much my library is currently tied into it, and what might happen if Valve suddenly changed their business practices for the worse. Just look at how Activision has evolved over the years and you will see where this line of reasoning is going.

If Valve ever decided to become more and more restrictive in how they conduct business, release games or their DRM, exactly what are we as consumers going to do to fight them? Stop using Steam? For some of us that might be an option but for me it isn't. I have hundreds of dollars of software on steam - i'd be an idiot to just walk away from that. I'm pretty much at the mercy of Valve and i've got no one but myself to blame for that.

The line I draw on this being I don't see the devil in Valve's eye in the current state of gaming or their business practices. Obviously changing TF2 to a Free-to-play impacted the market significantly but to then turn around and say "Ah-hah! See? They knew all along this would happen!" is giving them way too much credit. If anything, i see it as the industry forced to evolve as a response to Valve and Steam's standing as a whole. On one hand evolution is good so long as it breeds positive innovation, and in recent years that has most certainly been the case. On the other, that one company can have such a dynamic and profound impact on the video game (and specifically PC) community is kinda scary.

So yeah, some good points by TB but i can't fully agree with his assessment.

[Husar]

I'd stop buying games on Steam.

If I'm the only one doing that it won't hurt them, but if more people do, it will, even if they have a monopoly.

I do the same with UbiSoft games because of their horrible DRM.

And if I'm really honest, I don't play old games that much anymore or even not at all anymore so it wouldn't be that much of a "loss".

His point is valid, yeah, but it's not "scary" as he says because Steam games aren't the most important thing in life.

[johnhughthom]

Latest Paradox newsletter has a beta key for some random game I've never heard of and don't like the look of. If anyone wants it, give me a shout.