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At equal pricing, would you buy a game on Steam or from Retail?

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Steam, Digital Distribution, or Retail?

  • I would buy from steam

  • I would buy from steam only if it replaces the drm included in the retail copy

  • I would buy from a download service that does not require me to be logged in to play

  • I would buy a retail copy

Results are only viewable after voting.
zerocool84 said:
Only certain games which isn't many of them. You can buy any game and add a shortcut through Steam which is entirely different.

Here are the games that you can register with Steam:

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=7480-WUSF-3601
Click to expand...

Although, when you register a game with steam doesn't that tie it to your account, preventing lending/resale? If so, I'd just buy the game on steam in the first place. In that situation, getting a physical copy is an extra and unnecessary step, bandwith nonwithstanding.
 
Terzo said:
Although, when you register a game with steam doesn't that tie it to your account, preventing lending/resale? If so, I'd just buy the game on steam in the first place. In that situation, getting a physical copy is an extra and unnecessary step, bandwith nonwithstanding.
Click to expand...

Yes it'll be tied to your Steam account.
 
Retail of course (as long as its not one of those retail ones that makes you download the thing anyway because its not actually on the disk).

Don't have to spend ages downloading, don't max out my ISP download limit, don't have to mess about backing it up to DVDR, and can even resell it one day. Steam's only worth it if its very cheap.
 
pmv said:
Retail of course (as long as its not one of those retail ones that makes you download the thing anyway because its not actually on the disk).

Don't have to spend ages downloading, don't max out my ISP download limit, don't have to mess about backing it up to DVDR, and can even resell it one day. Steam's only worth it if its very cheap.
Click to expand...

So if you could download things faster, it'd be cool?

And if you could back them up to DVDR? Good thing you can back up steam games to DVD, but I'm not sure why you'd want to considering you can always re download them.
 
I love STEAM. Makes my life so much easier, and I do not ever resell my games, so it's win-win for me.

As long as STEAM stays in business, haha.
 
I love steam, but I think I may go with a retail copy just for one reason. The fact that I can install the game on another computer(even if it is a limited amount of times), therefore a friend can play it on another computer while Im playing another game on another computer. Point is, this way all my games are not tied to one account and therefore one PC and two people can't play different games at the same time on different PCs
 
ViviTheMage said:
I love STEAM. Makes my life so much easier, and I do not ever resell my games, so it's win-win for me.

As long as STEAM stays in business, haha.
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The general consensus is that if Valve ever did go out of business they would release an unlocker for everyone to download, so realistically you still wouldnt lose access to your games.
 
shortylickens said:
The general consensus is that if Valve ever did go out of business they would release an unlocker for everyone to download, so realistically you still wouldnt lose access to your games.
Click to expand...

There's no way valve could feasibly obtain the licenses from every game company to legally remove the DRM from their games. I suppose they could release an offline mode only steam and you could just copy your files, but I'd say realistically, you'd lose access to your games. The last thing a company has time to do while going under is take on side projects, but maybe valve would unlock all their own games.

I'm not terribly concerned about replaying games at some point in the future, most games lack replay value these days, and I'm sure I won't touch most of my games 10 years (or even a few months) in the future. If being able to play the same games for the rest of your life (something you're not even guaranteed with on the consoles), then steam will be an inconvenient choice for you.
 
shortylickens said:
The general consensus is that if Valve ever did go out of business they would release an unlocker for everyone to download, so realistically you still wouldnt lose access to your games.
Click to expand...

Fox5 said:
There's no way valve could <snip>
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Not that I've used nor do I condone such methods, but there are already ways to play Steam games without Steam.

I'm not worried about it.

Plus by the time Valve runs out of business (which won't be for a long time unless they pull a 3drealms), they will be irrelevant and the end of Steam will be as sad as the end of Halo 2 servers was (ie, all of 10 people still cared).
 
I've always loved Steam, and have only bought games through there for some time.
After my last format, and realizing I can just restore my backed up Steam folder, with little to NO need to change a thing for the games to function.... holy hell. Steam is my new lover.
 
I like to resell my games when I am done with them so I would go retail. However, I also have a pricing rule. If I can resell a game I will pay up to $40, if I can't resell the game I will only pay up to $30.

-KeithP
 
Steam as well here.

I haven't seen the steamcloud mentioned, but I find that a fantastic service especially for those of us who are upgrading their systems and such fairly often. I've lost more save games in my life than I could list in this thread in a timely manner and more and more games are adding in replayability through achievements where even your complete games should be saved.
 
Fox5 said:
There's no way valve could feasibly obtain the licenses from every game company to legally remove the DRM from their games. I suppose they could release an offline mode only steam and you could just copy your files, but I'd say realistically, you'd lose access to your games.
Click to expand...
So you think Valve may go out of business and yet their most valuable asset (steam + steam users) would just disappear instead of being sold? I find that so improbable to not even be worth considering.
 
JoshGuru7 said:
So you think Valve may go out of business and yet their most valuable asset (steam + steam users) would just disappear instead of being sold? I find that so improbable to not even be worth considering.
Click to expand...

You assume steam will remain a successful business forever? What if microsoft builds a game store into windows 8 and that takes over the digital distribution business and steam dries up?
 
Fox5 said:
You assume steam will remain a successful business forever? What if microsoft builds a game store into windows 8 and that takes over the digital distribution business and steam dries up?
Click to expand...
What kind of odds would you give me on that wager?
 
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