We do not allow discussion of avoiding anyone's EULAs on this forum. So, please refrain from such discussion.

Complaining about it will not change it. Actions speak louder than words my friend. If you want to change it then don't buy NV. If your going to complain and still buy the game then your supporting Steam anyway and everything else is just subterfuge.

Apparently, given that they went through with it.



Or perhaps they simply don't consider the EU market big enough to warrant working out conversion fees? Or they are dirty American supremacists who get their jollies by abusing the poor hapless EU customers.



Sure. But knocking out one of steam's larger selling points is poor business sense, like I said. :\



Again, I'm not exactly seeing the problem here. If your country bans games and games are important to you, why not emigrate? Why are you complaining that Valve isn't making it easy for you to circumvent your country's laws?



But is that a valid anology? How many people accept Windows because it comes with the computer, and how many accept it because it's the only convenient way to run games and most other software these days?

I don't know about that... About the only thing that you can do better in Windows than any other computer is play games. Any other application or use, can be done as easily if not easier in *nix, more efficiently, and costs nothing. Back in the late 90s early 00s, ok, but nowadays..

Going back to the Steam-Windows anology, think about this: the very first computer you got or used, what OS did it have? Did you go out and looked into other OSs to see which one was better? I don't know how old you are, so I don't know if you are aware of what happened to the personal computer market in the late 80s and early 90s (and yes, I am an old gizzard still playing video games ) . Long story short, Microsoft made deals with mass marketers like Dell and others to include Windows installed in the systems they sold. In those days, the main players in the personal computer market were Mac, IBM's OS/2, and Windows. As late as 1995-97, you could still go to any Egghead store ( again, yes, I am THAT old ) and buy IBM's OS/2 for your PC, or get OS/2 when you bought an IBM computer from IBM. Mac, same. But you got Windows when you bought a computer from Dell, or HP, Compac, etc. Unix OSs were exclusively used for high-end computing. As time passed, Mac developed its cult following, OS/2 faded away -not because it wasn't as good, more because bad marketing practices by IBM), and Windows was left as the one widely known OS available to the mass marketers to include in the computers they sold. So, in a nutshell, you ordered a computer from Dell, you got Windows.

So now, we are getting Steam in our game, like it, or not. The one difference of course, unlike an OS in a computer is that, for the game, we do not have a choice of either use something else, so our only other choice is to not buy the game.

I'm not that familiar with *nix, I just know that most of the businesses I'm familiar with use some sort of windows-based system, often with the reasoning being that windows has the software they want.



First computer I used? It was an old 386 with DOS as its main OS and we later installed Windows 3.1. I thought it was a game for awhile before I figured it out. 'Course, as it was my parents' computer, I didn't have much opportunity to shop around for different OSs.



Isn't that sort of like taking issue with the fact that the game isn't being released for Mac or *nix though? I mean, if you want to play NV with mods, you have to get it for Windows, you can't play it in Mac, and you can't play it on a *nix system reliably unless WINE's gotten a lot better than I heard it was - and even that's basically working around the problem by emulating Windows.

I hope its sinking in to Beth that using steam as the only option is a bad choice...

Bad choice meaning that they should have launched a standalone model with a simple disk check and serial and also distributed THROUGH steam and had that as an option... only cook off a set number of retail copies, then focus on steam. Give the players that don't want to use a 3rd party program the option.... I see this as forced choice, there is no reason they couldn't have done a Dragons Age: Origins style release Simple SecuROM on disk if you didn't like that there was a STEAM option. Unless all the disks are already pressed then there is no turning back...

I would even pay upwards of $20 more for a non-steam version of the game... that only used a disk check and a serial.. any online requirement and deals off

Because of people complaining on a forum? Sorry bub, but publishers seem to recognise online verification and account limitation as very profitable in the long run.
Not necessarily. If Steam would offer age verification (which they probably will have to in the future) they could offer much better service that stays within the law for that region.

So far the simplist solution i see to secure you games from being stolen from you by valve/steam is to use the backup data function steam has to burn a disc this way if anything does happen im sure you can find a way to play it if it does get stolen from you.

I personally love/hate steam it's great most of the time but no where near perfect, i purchased Fo3 Nv knowing the risks and well i'll back it up if it i ever become concerned and they wont ban your account for modding a game who's main life source for many within a year or so was modding which is promiesd by it's developer.

If it saves so much money on shipping, overhead, etc., why do they charge the same price for a digital distribution as they do for retail box, disk and manual?

I don't care what you think, unless your way of thinking is harmful to me or others, and I'm not trying to change your "opinion." You're not even arguing an opinion, you seem to have convinced yourself that they will release a version later without Steam. I'm just pointing out the fact that the odds of that happening are slim. I don't care if you buy the game or not, since it doesn't effect me. I haven't even decided if I'm going to buy the initial release or not. If it's going to be tied to Steam, I'll probably wait until the price comes down.

First of all, Valve still takes some share for general maintenance cost. Whether or not that is the same value as spent for packing, pressing and delivering, nobody outside seems to know. Combined with the fact that on Steam the publishers have direct control of their prices, and that local competition like that between offline stores or internet shops does not figure in nearly as much, this leads to pretty much stagnant prices.
Competition would really make things more comfortable for the customer.

Do Bethesda get a bigger cut from valve by forcing people to use steam in the hopes of gaining new recruits?

That's not what it works like. Steamworks is a free kit, the Steam distribution contract is the same as always.

Ah ok, thanks. I'm just trying to determine if there are any other reasons for this. Steam doesn't work against piracy, so I can only determine that they think they can get in on the second hand sales. Which is also questionable given that people who sell games are likely to buy more games with the money and people who buy second hand games have limited funding and will not suddenly buy more new games. Also, it could only about cutting out ebay-type personal sellers since new PC games are hard enough to come by in brick&mortar shops, never mind used PC games.
The only other reason I could think of is managerial stupidity.

This is the worst idea ever from Bethesda. This will make 2 gaming companies I won't be buying from any more. My experience with Steam from Empire: Total War was not good and I stopped playing it completely. If you like buying vaporware (hence the name STEAM) then more power to ya!

Well, in light of new info I've decided to once again (somewhat) reverse my position on Steam. I'm still not supporting Steam as a whole but I am supporting Bethesda. As long as they keep making open world games that also include a construction set and are sold on a retail disk, then I will be (albeit reluctantly) buying those games. They are the only one though as I'll not be buying any other games from Steam, downloaded or hard copy.

Bethesda, I hope you can appreciate how much I love your games and the sacrifice I'm making to my principles in order to continue supporting (IMO) the best developer in the industry. If you can somehow find a better way eventually then I shall praise thee and if not you can have some of what I gave Obsidian, "Damn you Bethesda...and thank you".

It's different from taking issue with not releasing the game for other OSs - that's a whole other conversation I personally don't have an issue with developers not coding games for those OSs, although I feel they are passing on a great opportunity to make money - well, that is if Microsoft doesn't make it not worth their while, if you know what I mean . My issue is that I like the game, and I was ready to purchase the game, up until the time I was told I must use this utility, namely Steam, and use like it or not, if I want to play the game

The Bethesda published game Rogue Warrior had this option already, when you install it it asks you to activate online for all the features, or allows you to just install offline for the singleplayer game with no achievements. I wish New Vegas was using this same system.

That makes two of us.

Steam is a good choice, its definitely one of the less intrusive DRM solutions, and best of all, requirement to keep the disc in the PC to play.

Yeah, I hate games that require the disk in the drive to play. That bothers me more than online activation or even connecting to Steam to play a single-player game (in terms of day-to-day hassle factor). In fact, needing the disk in usually keeps me from replaying a game as much, because I can't be bothered to go dig out the DVD. Steam works very reliably for me (it has become much better over the past few years), so I find it pretty convenient, despite any concerns over the erosion of user rights.

Didn't have time to read all the posts, so sorry if this was mentioned. I wanted to say something before this thread gets locked. It looks like this is a 2K agreement with Steam, since Civ V is doing the same thing, I am guessing when TES V comes out it will be the same again.

This is the new way of doing business with 2K, so unless you buy your games on console, any PC game you buy from 2K will also have to have a steam account as well.

the need for CD is irrelevant, you always will forever have the CD.. the need for the internet to get your software/game to work is whats at stake... ever title prior to F:NV has been able to be fully self sufficient, no need for outside verification... with F:NV you are forced to always have it validated outside of what your provided to work correctly...

the point is this game removes the freedom of the gamer, the end user, and replaces a false sense of security... I know until the end of time, and as long as i keep a machine with windows 7 or lower up and running i can play every gamesas game ever made.... with Fallout: New Vegas i have no guarantee... im basically long term renting the game... yes there is a slight chance there might be ways around it i the future but that's not the point.. the point is i will always and forever need to "ask permission" to play the game in the future when i install... be it by login into steam or installing it and activating though steam...

I do really like the CD Projekt guys thoughts on the matter. I respect CD Projekt immensely as a company because of their stance on DRM and DLC and yes I know The Witcher had bugs (though personally, I loved it to pieces, even so), no doubt in part because it was their first game, but they went to ridiculous lengths to resolve them as best they could. If every company thought the same way as them, I would be thrilled to death. But I know they are the minority, and I will settle for 'the lesser evil' when it comes to DRM, and think Steam is among the better options. Especially if they are planning on releasing DLC in the future, because dealing with GFWL was a royal pain in that regard if you didn't wait for the CD's.

I do understand the point of view of people who don't want Steam to be mandatory. But I also think some people are resorting to outlandish hyperbole regarding it to make it out to be worse than it actually is. (and in regards to Civilization 5, which is having a similar debate) Steam has come a long way from it's troubled past during the HL2 launch, I've only ever had it wig out on me once, and it was an easy fix. I've only been online once when the Steam servers were down, and I was still able to play my games even though the servers were down. I find it to be unobtrusive, it uses very little memory when minimized, and Steamworks games can even come with some great benefits, particularly very recent releases. My motherboard wigged out on me a while ago, so i had to use another computer while waiting for the warranty to come through on a replacement, and I was able to pick up right where I left off in Half-Life 2 because they recently added Steam Cloud support to it for saved games, same deal with Trine. I will never have to worry about losing my saved games for HL2 or Trine or any other game that opts to use Steam Cloud EVER AGAIN. If Bethesda/Obsidian use Steam Cloud for save games, will that appease people somewhat? Yes, the store coming pre-packaged is admittedly a somewhat sketchy business practice, I admit. However, no one is forcing you to use it, and it's Impulse, D2D, etc's own fault if they wont carry the game because of it. The vast majority of gamers already have Steam installed, due to HL2, if nothing else. So they really are shooting themselves in the foot by not carrying Steamworks games, since they are not likely to be stopping very many new Steam accounts from being created, in addition to losing a sale to Steam. Steam is not preventing them from carrying it. Set your default window to the games list and forget about the store if it bothers you. I've gotten my mom a Steam account so I can gift her games over it when they have sales, and while she refuses to touch the program itself for the most part, (I have to go and get her computer downloading it), she has no problem playing the games on her laptop as long as I create shortcuts for her, and I put her in Offline Mode after getting any new games since she takes her laptop to places with no internet connection, and have never had an issue with it. Now, my computer is a desktop with a constant connection, so I don't really bother, but still.

ps. to the people whining about the ads Steam pops up, you know you can turn those off. go to Steam->Settings->Account->Interface, uncheck the 'notify me of additions/changes etc.' thing near the bottom. I realize it's not terribly intuitive to find the checkbox, but you *can* disable the popups.

Yeah Great Stuff

I hate Steam,.... becauseof the fact that it's nothing more than a customer anoiance and a cheap excuse to reduce production costs for the Corps AND the fact that it makes it impossible to resell my license (which is perfectly legal in Germany,... well at least it was before the recent high court verdict from the Software Nazis came out which terminated resell rights for "Downloadable content" once and for all ! ),

There is actually another thing that freaks me out about this whole Steam garbage.

I used to import my Games from the Yanks (which increased the shipping costs by quite a margin) because quite frankly our domestic Game Versions are nerfed down to Mickey Mouse Level in terms of Screen Violence (we have to thank the other bunch of Nazis from the Game Censorship Board for this by the way !!)

That means: No Gore, no Blood (well at least we get Boobs but considering that this game is made in the US of A i fear there will be a serious lack of naked Chicas ).

I could play AVP3 (which wasnt even released in Germany because some [censored] figured it could irritate the youngster !).

But what if Steam suddenly decides that a US Fallout Version cant be activated from a German IP Adress ? Id say i am fooked then,... cause i certainly wont spend a penny on the German crap Version they will come up with !!

This is really dissapointing to say the least. My Favourite Game series of all times comes to an end because of some [censored] controll Software..... Hell i am 30 and i feel like i am living in [censored] North Korea when it comes down to PC Games.

I might even apply for Citizenship there,... cause my German one aint worth [censored] anymore these days .

Damn,.......