Oh god I hope not, that was a nightmare. Say what you will about Steam, at least it works. Plus it doesn't cause nearly as much trouble for modders, nothing that's not easy to deal with if you know how at least.

Aye, besides Steamworks having the benefit of being able to register the CD-key of a physical retail copy and then download the game, they are equally bad. Same junk, different package, and I rather be with neither.

GFWL is nowhere near as bad as some people seem to make it out to be, though. If the game used GFWL I wouldn't be more upset than if the game used Steam.


So what trouble did GFWL cause FO3 modders?

I am glad to hear of someone else who didn't have GFWL [censored] up there game.

also may I add DLC first!

I didn't see all the fuss about GFWL....Until I had to update it. That was not fun or quick.

Steam at least auto-updates on it's own and for me it has always played nice with oblivion and Fallout NV. I would rather have my local retailers start stocking PC games again, but those days are long gone.

You're using the wrong retailers then. Best Buy and Fry's both still properly support large selections of PC games. If you stick to trashy stores like Gamestop (trashy as in physically dirty and poorly kept btw) then you might think PC gaming is already long since dead.

I could deal with that. Mostly because with gfwl and Fallout 3, I had to wait for the retail disc version to come out, since I could never get gfwl to work for the dlc, even with the assistance of people who actually do know what they are doing. And it wasn't the tech support for gfwl. If I have to wait for a physical disc anyway, what difference does waiting for the exclusive period to expire make? [the game really didn't work right until I followed the unofficial advice of how to run it without gfwl at all]

I never did get all the dlc for FO3 until it came as the goty version to Steam. That was a lot longer than just waiting for an exclusive to end.

Oh wow. Just....wow.

Not everyone has the luxury, or desire, of living in the big city where the retailers that still carry a good selection of PC games are close at hand. My local retailers didn't even bother placing the PC version of New Vegas on their selves. They had huge stacks of the XBox and a smaller number of the PS3 versions. The last big title that got stocked for PC was Starcraft II.

To be fair I would much rather have Steam, or GFWL, than a system like UbiSoft's DRM. If Bethesda goes down the UbiSoft path I won't touch Skyrim.

I don't mind steam that much (but I still prefer NOT to use steam, because I don't use this program, I hate having to load it up, wait for the updates etc), but GFWL was awful. It felt so clunky.

I think GWFL feels less clunky than Steam.

If you start a game that require Steam, you will have to wait until Steam launched (which take ~10 seconds) before the game launches. With a game that use GFWL, you launch the game right away and GWFL starts to load at the same time as the game.

That is true (which is why I don't like steam much), however I remember having problems with Fallout 3 on GFWL. I remember one time my saves all disappeared because apparently it logged me out or something (and I didn't know). I had to start all over before someone told what had actually happened.

Where's the good old CD check?

Really? There three gamestops I frequent near me, one 5 minutes away by train or car and the other two in Oslo (Walking distance from uni) and they are all very well maintained, have large selections of various games for all platforms and are staffed by friendly people, most of which are gamers themselves and some who are personal friends of mine. I can literally not count the number of fun conversations I've had with Gamestop employees, Gamestop is a store I like going into and keep coming back to whenever I buy physical copies of games.

Not all gamestops are the same obviously, but I'm rather tired of hearing senseless trashing of an entire chain of stores when most people only frequent one or two at most, which leaves you with absolutely no perspective. I'm sure some Gamestops are crap, but I've yet to find one.

For me Fallout 3 only started working properly after I followed up on an unofficial guide which yanked it out of my game. For me there was no such thing as an 'easy uninstall'. And at one time I purchased those Microsoft points to get me a dlc. Microsoft took my points and then when I wanted to download my purchased dlc, it just slapped on error messages, leaving me unable to download my purchase. :brokencomputer:

well then I guess your computer needs an upgrade

+1.

I can't see why.

GFWL is the black death plague of games and gamers. Stay away from it. Dont look at it, dont think about it, dont use it.
Ok more serious:
They tried to make it into a new XBL (pay) gamers laughed at them. Then they ran away from the PC market and came crying back asking for forgiveness. Not only that its super unstable (even more then the first versions of steam), most of the issues someone will have with a game is from that software. it eats lots of memory and adds nothing. Yeah...

Not at that time. It was new, CCNA helped with the parts list, and built with "new" games like Fallout 3 in mind.

Going by the posts from others who had problems, I wasn't the only one. If gfwl was the *only* way to get the game, I wouldn't bother. When it finally released on Steam, I'd get it then. I won't bother with anything on gfwl again. It was so not worth the hassle.

the list for games supported by GFWL is paultry. and not GFW is not the same as GFWL before someone posts that list again. there is a reason for it. developers know it is an awful service for PC users.

That makes no sense. Software and hardware are different things, you can ahve the best computer in the world and GFWL will still be [censored].

No.

NO!

this makes no sense it works better than Steam for me

How can someone seriously like GFWL???!?!!111

This is the biggest Malware that infected games ever. I am not completly against these kind of platforms. I recently came to peace with steam because it can (not always) add to the game. But GFWL??!?? Seriously? I am a big fan of fallout/tes, but if any game forces you to install GFWL, like new vegas, i will not buy this game. GFWL needs to be destroyed. I am dissapointed of my anti-virus, which did not warn me about this dangerous Malware.

@TE: Have you played games without GFWL? What did you miss?... You realise that the main purpose of this platform is to lock you in? why are so many people like http://funrecycler.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/lemming.png guys??

1) I don't see the point of 'achievements', 'online content' or any of that in an Elder scrolls game. The achievement notifications are just annoying, they should not pop up when playing. I don't enjoy the feeling that a game is just a checklist of 'things to do'.

2) At the time of Fallout 3's release I had a relatively old computer. It ran ok, but not great. Removing GFWL and removing the scripts that checked achievements (with a mod) helped performance quite a bit.

3) I think a lot of people had problems with buying and installing the DLC.

4) Their pay structure with special Microsoft money was pathetic. Maybe this has improved these days?

So basically, I would much prefer to have none of this online stuff (or at least for it to be optional). But GFWL failed in ways that Steam so far has not, so let's just avoid it.

^