Steam

[Belgolas]

Steam match making is just like any major online servers. And yes steam can more than handle graphical intensive games. Steam has the most graphicall intesnive online multiplayer game call Crysis Wars. Now a bit of topic but Crysis wars is Crysis online with up to 32 players. You can't get more demanding than that. Oh and if you want to know there are 559 games on steam right now and about a few dozen a month added. There are also some very old games released on steam like Commander Keen(CA PPPPPLLLLLLLLEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSEEEEEEEEEEEEEE put Shogun and all Total War games on Steam). Steam already has RTW and M2TW and their expansions.

Anyways steam can more than handle ETW. Plus there will be new modes like Quick Match were it matches players to similar levels of skill. Also steam alows ranks and well hopefully easy clan matches too. So Steam is probably the single best online community for PC.



Steam also has plenty of Games for Windows games on steam. There are games like GTA IV on steam that still needs to be connected to Microsoft Live for online play. So any game that works for windows works for Steam.

Steam is also great for very small companies that don't have the money to market their games. Have you ever heard of I-Fluid, Mount and Blade, Defcon, Darwinia, and so many others and then there are the arcade type of games?

[Nelson]

I’ve been using Steam to play Left for Dead it has worked very well including the voice connection.

[Ituralde]

So, is there already a Total War Community on Steam or even a Orgah Community? If not, why haven't we made one yet. I think this would be a great way to battle against all my fellow Orgahs!

[AussieGiant]

From the description of how the Steam client will behave on someone's PC, I'd say this is the best of a "not so happy - not so happy" solution for Developers and End Consumers alike.

It doesn't invade your machine, it sits in the task bar if you let it (you can tell it not to fire up at start up) and if you don't want it there you can exit it from your processes and play E:TW off line.

You can then fire it up every now and then when you come onto the Orgh and see there is a new update to be down loaded.

It will then do it's update thing, you will then say things like 'oooh' and 'haaaa' as the new patch from CA fixed a few bugs and balancing issues.

You can then turn it off and play E:TW to your hearts content.

Me likey likey!!

[tgi01]

I would never ever allow anything by Microsoft to autoupdate .... ( never did and never will ) ...
( and I m not a big fan of autoupdate in general .. )

Steam on the other hand is another matter ...

I ve been using steam since HL2 got released on several machines both under xp and vista and

never had any problems with it ...

so dont worry about it ...

TGI

[knoddy]

So, is there already a Total War Community on Steam or even a Orgah Community? If not, why haven't we made one yet. I think this would be a great way to battle against all my fellow Orgahs!

the steam Empire total war community seems to be a bunch of kids whining about paying extra money for special editions of a game. i mean really, its a special addition if u dont want it dont buy it, but dont whinge about paying extra to get more.

Cheers Knoddy

[pevergreen]

Steam is also great for very small companies that don't have the money to market their games. Have you ever heard of I-Fluid, Mount and Blade, Defcon, Darwinia, and so many others and then there are the arcade type of games?

Check the arcade for the Mount and Blade thread. Steam won't accept my CD key for it.

Defcon has been out for years before a physical version hit the stores, or came to steam.

[Tomisama]

Old news, but still an encouraging re-read to me

October 28, 2008, 7:18 am - Alden Kroll - Product Release
SEGA Europe Ltd. today announce that Empire: Total War™ will incorporate Steamworks™, a complete suite of publishing and development tools that offers PC game developers and publishers access to the game features and services available through Steam.

Steamworks will support both the retail and electronic versions of the Empire: Total War game giving players game updates, downloadable content, friend-list support and achievements. To play single-player Empire: Total War, players need only to connect to the internet once via the Steam client after installing the game.

Steamworks will serve as Empire: Total War's multiplayer backend, providing server browsing and match-making functionality, bolstering Total War's new level of commitment to multiplayer game modes and features. Further details on multiplayer will be announced soon.

“We are delighted to be working with an infrastructure as effective as Steam” said Mike Simpson, Studio Director at the Creative Assembly. “Having their matchmaking and support systems on board for Empire; Total War makes a huge difference both for players and for the development team. It not only helps make multiplayer slick and sizzling, it also frees up a huge chunk of the team's time which helps make the whole game better.”

“Total War has become one of the most successful franchises in PC strategy gaming, one of the industry's mainstay genres,” said Gabe Newell, president of Valve. “We're honored Sega selected Steamworks as they expand the franchise with leading-edge online services.”

Empire: Total War is set in the 18th century, a turbulent era that is the most requested by Total War's loyal fan base and a period alive with global conflict, revolutionary fervour and technological advances. With themes such as the Industrial Revolution, America's struggle for independence, the race to control Eastern trade routes and the globalisation of war on land and sea, Empire: Total War promises to be the richest and most dynamic PC RTS game of all time. Empire: Total War will be released on February 3 in North America and on February 6 in Europe and other territories worldwide.

Pre-purchasers on Steam will receive a free copy of Rome: Total War Gold for immediate play.

http://store.steampowered.com/news/?appids=10500,10600

Go Steam

[Husar]

Check the arcade for the Mount and Blade thread. Steam won't accept my CD key for it.

It only accepts CD keys from a few selected games, whose developers worked with Steam in some way or another I guess.
On the issue of physical media vs. download, by the time your last CD drive has broken and you cannot buy any CD-compatible drives anymore, the download might still be available, but then by that time your hardware and operating system might be rather incompatible to your 30 year-old games anyway, so future proof is very relative. And when you go to the cinema, you don't own the movie either.

I too have a lot of old games sitting on my shelf but in some of my more honest moments I thought I should throw most of them away because realistically I'm not going to play them again anyway, because it would be too much effort and then I'd realize how my flowery memories made the graphics soo much better than they really are(happened with RTW once, man were those textures blurry...).

[Merak]

as a person that never have used steam is there any ports that need opening in the router?

[Belgolas]

as a person that never have used steam is there any ports that need opening in the router?

You shouldn't need to. I never had too.

[pevergreen]

On a concern I had earlier, you can tell steam to not automatically update games.

[gardibolt]

I've never used Steam before, but it seems to be an acceptable compromise that doesn't drag us into DRM-land. So I am feeling pretty secure (ha!) about getting Empire whereas I didn't about Kingdoms. I appreciate Jack adding the comment that you can tell Steam not to load automatically and it remembers that setting. I've got too much junk loading automatically that I can't figure out how to stop.