Valve: Piracy is a Service Issue

[Raa]

I completely agree with Gabe. DRM seriously puts me off (Ubisoft, i'm looking at you).

It's an antiquated way of thinking, imo.

I'm happy to pay the price, but offer me the service!

[Ryoken]

I don't see that as much of an excuse. You can always rent games, watch gameplay videos, read reviews, etc.

Ironically, the only games I've ever pirated are ones I've bought -- ones that have horrible DRM systems that are a pain in the ass. I don't feel bad about it, either -- if I bought it and don't want the headaches, I'm not going to apologize for that.

Renting a game is often half the price of buying the game, or damn close..

I pirate some games, if they are good I buy them, if not then they are deleted within an hr.. So few games have Demos these days it's just a sin. And I'm not paying $20 to rent, or $40-60 to buy a game that half the time I find buggy and not very good. Sorry, not gonna happen.

[Reacon]

I've been saying Valve has got it right for quite a few months now. Having a wonderfully huge and functional community integrated with your DRM, along with a refined way to manage your entire library, is incentive enough for me to buy most games. In fact, Steam has gotten me off of piracy to the point where I only really download a game if it is from a company I have a grudge against, or I really cannot afford it and succumb to temptation. Usually I buy a game when it's financially convenient for me if I pirate it first.

It's no surprise that Gaben is well aware of what he's doing. I am completely dependent on a DRM software and I'll be damned if I'm not happy about it.

[remixedcat]

yeah and securom has trashed a lot of systems including mine. I normally buy the discs and with some of the EA titles I had I got securom on them and it hosed my dvd drive (it will read but not burn anymore) and also can screw stuff up if you run a server os. some of the server role config stuff would screw up...

I know I should have not used discs for EA stuff but the games were cheap as hell at wal-mart so I got em.... baaaad mistake.

this partition has ben formatted since and the OS is ok, but my dvd drive is still messed up ;-(

securom and ubisoft's DRM is hell.

[The_Decryptor Veteran]

And this is relevant to DRM... how?

Oh by the way, you can turn off automatic updating. Not sure why you'd want to though considering today's development culture of "broken-on-release, fix it with a patch".

At least Steam allows you to turn off updates and still play, something like GfWL won't even let you sign in if the game is out of date (or if the password is complex, but meh), and since a lot of GfWL games link your save file to your account, if you aren't logged in you can't play your normal save games (and if you then log in, you can't use your save games from when you were logged out)

[oceanmotion]

I think the only solution is every publisher having their own version of Steam, perhaps in the cloud rather than a client on the desktop though still in the game being somewhat invisible. You log in for each publisher just like you sign into Steam but through the game menu. Forget the DRM that always gets cracked and stick to online authentication, though a fairer approach such as log in once that last 24hrs even if you go offline. If your going offline, request a pass for a couple of days or weeks that has limited uses per year but more allowed if you get in contact for specific reasons.

Gabe has Steam, but nobody else does, can't expect everyone to bow to Steam.

[theyarecomingforyou]

DRM is pointless. It only impacts legitimate users and has no impact upon pirates. The way to combat piracy is to offer incentives, not disincentives. Steam completely changed the industry. Before I had to go to a store, buy a game, go through a tedious install process (often fullscreen and with music), find a download site for the patch and wait in a queue and then try to find a way around the CD-check. It annoyed me that I had to keep messing about with inserting discs when from a technical perspective it simply wasn't necessary. And if I broke or lost a disc - both have happened to me - then that was it, my game was gone. Steam changed that by not requiring CD-checks, auto-patching games, removing the installer process and making purchases dramatically faster (just the download time). Since I started using it features like Steam Cloud have been added for backing up saves and a screenshot function was added, along with a tool to update graphics drivers. Steam also offers incredible sales.

Steam works because it is so much less hassle than pirating. Rather than manually searching for patches and cracks it's all automatic and quick. However, the next challenge is interoperability. The last thing I want is 30 different services like Steam and having to remember all the different logins I need. I find anything that's not on Steam doesn't get played as much, like Starcraft II on my Battle.net account. And Good Old Games is a pain because I just have a pile of installers - I have over 440 games on Steam and I can't be doing with manually installing them all.

[SirEvan]

we are in 2010 not 1980.

? did you forget what year it is?

[LaP]

? did you forget what year it is?

I was referring to the decade. Should have written 2010s and 1980s instead or something like that dunno english is not my primary language.