Now, your statement is misleading. You have to activate your game once over steam, but you have to use steam every single time you want to play the game. You can run it in offline mode, but it still has to be running to play the game. If you could uninstall steam after you have activated it, then it wouldn't be too big of a deal, but you can't. You have to keep steam installed & running to play the game.

If your PC can run games similar to Fallout New Vegas, having Steam running all the time won't affect your PC in the slightest.

First, no offense, but how is this relevant to the conversation? What's the point you're making? Second, Stardock Central was not like Steam. It was very limited in scope. Valve is absolutely the first company to make a real attempt at a full-service gaming portal on the PC. Steam wasn't a content delivery service that grew...its scope was planned from the beginning.


To be honest, this is pretty arbitrary criteria. What about Valve strikes you as disreputable? What makes you think they're any more likely than, say, Microsoft or Google, to try to steal your information for some nefarious purpose? Sure, Gabe Newell could use a couple of months of charm school, but they don't seem all that evil or threatening to me. As far as incentives, you do know that if they were caught doing such a thing it would kill their baby, right? Do you think it's worth it to them? Seems like a lot of trouble to go through just to set up a front for an information-gathering empire.

Really, though, nobody collects more information about us than Google does. Should I assume you avoid everything Google as well? I'm not saying that people shouldn't protect their privacy online. In fact, I think most people are entirely too careless about how much they expose themselves. It's just that Valve and Steam are really pretty low on my threat list. It's not in their best interests to mess with the gaming community.

If you're really that worried, grab a copy of wireshark and watch steam's network traffic. You don't need the source to see what something's doing.

See, that matter has yet to be confirmed on release, but I'm only stating according to the released information, Doo Doo.

my main issue with having stuff like Steam running isn't from a privacy pov, it's simple that I shut down everything BUT the game when I'm playing - firewalls, virus checkers, set scheme to Windows Basic etc - my PC is in the "just about works" league, so I have to. Does Steam use much resources when running as a background service? Is my game going to lag every time it connects/checks/runs?

Steam takes about ~25-30mb of RAM when not in game, I don't know if it unloads itself somewhat when you are - but 25-30MB of RAM, given any decent amount of RAM and a modern OS' memory management, is not going to be noticable at all.

Nearly all Steam games require Steam to be running to play them. Fallout 3 is an exception, and i hear there are few other too, but since NV has Steamworks integrated, there's really no chance you can play it without having steam running.

I like the way Impulse works better; it's just a shop and download application that doesn't need to be running, or even installed, to play the games. However Steam has a big focus on MP and community functions, so that's propably why it is the way it is.

Ever since i bought Half-Life 2 (some years after release, it had Episode 1 with it too). Steam has been installed on my machine. I haven't seen anyone posing as me or using my credit card yet either

That's how Steam works. You buy/activate a game over Steam, and you have to run Steam in order to play it.

From what I understand, you can change the skins and make this use less resources. Certainly turning off all the online features will reduce it's foot print.

Yeah, I was going to bring that up as well but he already mentioned that the network traffic could be encrypted. Encryption can be broken, though, and people have already been anolyzing Steam's network traffic looking for foul play and have found nothing so far. Really, you're not going to catch them doing anything like violating your privacy or "stealing" information from your computer without your consent. It would be suicide for them.

Differences between installing Fallout 3 and New Vegas for me. Fallout 3, stick the disc in the drive then run the install program. Wait awhile, then play the game. New Vegas, repeat this process making sure my internet connection is active as it's not always on. Once the game has finished installing, set up my Steam account and register the game. Then go into the Steam option menu and select the offline mode option. So yes, things will change quite a bit with Steam being a requirement, and it's going to take me alot longer to set up my game and start playing. Ironic that I as an honest consumer have to go to all that extra hassle to play my game when the pirates will no doubt have the DRM broken within days of release. Civ 5 also uses Steam as it's DRM system and there was a pirate version available within 3 days of it's launch. So using Steam clearly benefits no one yet adds another layer of inconvenience that the general user will have to endure.

Damn... gaming industry is making me saving a lot of money and free time these days

Wasnt one of the devs speaking proudly about FO3 how it does not requires any online DRM methods? I take back all nice words and thoughts I had back then.

Turning on Internet connection - < 1min
Set up Steam account - 10 mins, though it's a one time thing
"Register" game - immediate, plus any necessary patches
Turn on offline mode - < 1min

So yes, there are more steps, but the amount of work and the time it takes remains largely unchanged.

Again, it's really weird to me that people would be so up-in-arms about Steam (requires internet but otherwise harmless) yet seem to have no problem with SecuROM (doesn't require internet but vandalizes your computer and god knows what else). Makes no sense to me. :shrug:

Microsoft's already kinda in-my-[censored] already, I'm using their OS and its a legal copy. I don't think Google does data theft, I've never run a google .exe on this system, so they'd be hard-pressed to pull that off.

At the point where I am (theoretically) signing-up for steam, I would anticipate that I'm giving them permission to do what they say they need to do. That's not a data theft situation. Part of their 'service' is, I am told, DRM, which these days is IMO venturing into grey hat territory. There is an incentive related to DRM enforcement to do information-gathering while they are in my system. From my perspective, this is pointless and unwanted. I'm sitting at home, with my freshly-purchased disk in my hand, and I know I didn't steal it. That's as far as it should go.

Let's think about why I can't just register the software via a web site, and have it pass me the necessary encryption keys for the install? Unless I missed something, that's not allowed. For some reason they insist upon being directly in my [censored]. So, we have an impassee.



I use Windump if I'm on a windows OS, tcpdump if it's linux, and realize, once you see the data go out, it's already gone.

No, not in arms anymore. My "rage" against it was replaced by lethargic dissapointment for some time now. These days I'm just fair enough to say its the main reason for at least one lost sale and forget about it mostly (mostly because some gain some sanety later i.e. Mass Effect). I'm aware that some people had securom problems, but I had the luck to never have any of these.

Wrong. Google logs every search you make and every result you click on (unless you do something to prevent that). And that's just via a search engine.

Steam is required for Steam games because the game is coded to require Steam to run. There's no secret conspiracy behind it. There aren't there to learn everything about you.

I know many may very well disagree with me, but heres my take.

Now days, DRM is simply something we must deal with. That being said, there are far worse ways than STEAM to implement it.

Look at Ubisofts idea for example. You must be permanatly connected to internet to play. No connection, No gaming for you. You simply have no choice.

GFWL ... blah!

Many others have limited activations.
Re-Install Windows, Replace major HW, install on a second PC etc all counts as a re-activation. Once your out, your at their mercy to re-activate.


Steam on the other hand, requires you to log into your account, and be online to activate your new game.. But, Only 1 time EVER.
Once your game is activated, it is permatly tied to your account.

From that point on, you do not have to remain online or even connect at all to play if you do not want to.
They do however offer extra features if you stay online. But you are by no means forced to.

You can also uninstal /re-install as often as you want to or even install the game on multiple machines if you want to.
So long as the Steam client is logged into YOUR account the game is assigned to, there will not be a issue.

For these reasons, I personally prefer STEAM over any other DRM measures.
Used to, I didnt like the idea of it. But after getting used to it, and having issues with other DRM measures (Mainly activations etc being exceeded)
I have completely switched over to STEAM for all Digital purchases.

It doesnt really use any resources to speak of, to run either. It really isn't that intrusive at all. IMHO, things like Secure ROM add far worse to the OS installation thatn Steam does.

That's not data theft, that's web logs. It's common practice to do this and it means absolutely nothing to me. I expect connections which I initiate to a server to potentially be logged.



Think about that!

What's to think about? The game requires Steam. Big deal. No different than checking if the disc is in the drive.

In my extremely primitive knowledge of programming, I would imagine there somewhere in the code, there's an IF statement to check and see if Steam is running. If it is, the game goes on just like is supposed to. No secret download of information or anything. Just a check.

You gotta stop thinking everyone is out to get you. There's too much **** to look out for than to think a game company with millions of satisfied customers is stealing all of your info so as to use it against you when the time comes.

Google even collects information about you when you use their search engine. Granted, it's fairly anonymous, but based on the other criteria you've presented that would seem to be enough to put you off. Again, your criteria seems a little arbitrary to me.


No, see, it's not considered "hacking" when they're being up-front about what their application does and that application doesn't do anything out of the ordinary to your computer. I mean, unless you're considering requiring the client to play a game is some kind of social engineering shenanigan to get their software on your computer. Again, seems like a lot of trouble (building a huge full-service gaming portal) just to get their little client on your machine to steal your info. This seriously isn't sounding paranoid to you?

If anything, other forms of offline DRM are a lot closer to hacking, because they make changes to your OS without asking you. Some versions of SecuROM could even be considered to fall under the 'rootkit' category. Steam is just a very visible client app used to request authentication among other things. To be honest, it's probably the least 'hacking-like' form of DRM I've seen since the days of low-tech manual lookups and code wheels.


Can you explain this incentive? They're sending certs to decrypt the .exe file. What more do you think they are doing? Also, do you think all of the people that have been scrutinizing Steam for years wouldn't have figured it out by now if they were doing something unscrupulous?


Fair enough. We're not allowed to discuss the merits of using DRM or not here, though, and that isn't what the discussion is about anyway.


Because 1.) that would be incredibly non-user-friendly and piss off a lot of non-techie users and 2.) there's no way for them to verify that you're using a legit certificate that's not been passed around.


What's the point in even talking about sniffing network traffic if you're going to preemptively assume something is sending personal info before you even try it?


So, what's the deterrent from using Steam (something that uses the internet to authenticate you but otherwise is pretty harmless) versus something like SecuROM, which actually vandalizes your computer? I never had problems running games with SecuROM (never had problems with Steam either), but the fact that it alters my OS without my permission is reason enough for me to hate it. Steam is much, much more benign than most other forms of DRM.

Edit:
You know, I take that back. I have had problems with SecuROM. It won't allow my games to run if I'm running perfectly legit apps like Process Explorer (distributed by Microsoft) or virtual CD/DVD apps that I use to mount legal images. Steam doesn't tell me how I can/can't use my computer at least.


Lol...again, the point is that Google is collecting and indexing this information about you, which is a heck of a lot more than there's any evidence that Steam does. Really, the idea that Steam is a tool for data theft is pretty implausible.


No different than a game being coded to require SecuROM or a code wheel. :shrug:

I think you're maybe reading too broadly into what my concerns are with this, and, I don't know how to explain any better than what I already have.

oh for goodness sake. for those in the UK, iv run the numbers and FONV get unlocked on steam at 6PM :banghead:

I don't think I'm reading into it too broadly. I think I'm confused about what information you think Valve is collecting, what their incentives would be to do so, what would make it worth destroying their reputation as a company if they were caught doing it, and why you think nobody has been able to catch them so far with no lack of trying. To me it's pretty implausible that Valve is secretly stealing your information through Steam. From their standpoint it just wouldn't make any sense.