DRM Damages a Game's Value, Says Valve Boss

[Regulas]

[citation][nom]thegreathuntingdolphin[/nom]I do like steam a lot, and I think it is the best form of DRM except for one problem: You can't resell steam games.[/citation]
Correct so I don't buy steam either after The Orange Box. Plus when you buy a boxed version of a Steam game (The Orange Box) it takes forever to install the game even though you have the game DVD right in the drive. To much control over what I paid for.
I have to give the consoles credit. After I finish FF XIII I can sell it and recoup most of my money.

 

[theubersmurf]

You can watch the GDC awards (where he made the comments) here

http://gdc.gamespot.com/video/6253472/?tag=topslot;thumb;5

it starts about sixty minutes in.

 

[Revord]

[citation][nom]zerapio[/nom]Like others have mentioned, what happens when you want to play your game in 15 years? Will Steam be around then? Who knows. I rather not have to be tied to a service. And worse, I can't sell my Steam games. This is a pretty bad one.[/citation]
Have you tried to play any of your 15 year old games lately? Also, if your so concerned about being able to sell a game, then probably, you shouldnt even buy it to begin with. I my self dont have a lot of disposable income, so if I want a game bad enough, Ill wait till the price drops on it, or steam has a sale. Christmas time is the gamers happy place at Steam. The deals they have are incredible, not to mention the regular sales they have on a regular basis

 

[truehighroller]

I think that when steam goes down and you can't even play single player on your games,, that's causing more headaches for your customers then is needed as well... I haven't seen any one mention this, yet this has happened every week for the last four weeks now once a week with Steam.... I don't like DRM at all because of this.....

 

[razor512]

steam is crap also.

they show that you never own the content you buy by showing off their power to mess your games up.

when ever they release a game demo, they will often deactivate the demo after a short while (it just disappears from their site and the game refuses to launch and they tell you nothing about it or give any warning, which sucks especially if you are unlucky to download a demo of a game then the company disabling it the next day.

they can do this with paid games also.

you need a internet connection for the most part, if not you get very limited functionality, much less than many securom DRMed single player games (before securom started using the online checks crap)

what happens when steam goes out of business, what happens to your games?
(if you install a single player game on stean and never allow it to connect to the internet again, it kills the game (the reason behind this is they don't want users buying games then having 10000 other friends loging into the account to install the game on their system, then preventing the game from connecting online that way everyone can enjoy a single player game off line with just 1 user paying for it)

while that prevents this trick, it also causes another problem, when steam dies, so will your games that you paid for

Steam has a lot of DRM, it just seems less annoying than services like securom and the other really bad ones because it is more transparent to the user when things are going correctly but if theres ever a problem with the connection or the company, the DRM will quickly become more annoying than than almost every other DRM that ever came out.

has DRM ever stopped a game from being pirated?
at most it causes a 1-7 day delay in getting a pirated copy. and most people are patient enough for that. and once the game is cracked, the pirates never have to worry or notice the DRM

but the legit users have to struggle with the game for as long as they own it. this means that the pirates are getting a better product. No DRM at all

with very basic DRM, just a simple short cd key like in old PC games, it can stop novice users from pirating and doesn't really annoying any of the gamers. This type of DRM will still get cracked but so with all others, so making a stronger DRM will not effect piracy but it will annoy the legit customers more.

 

[isamuelson]

Bravo to you, Mr. Newell. However, could you PLEASE remove the Tages DRM that is in the Chronicles of Riddick on Steam then? You get 3 activations. If you use all 3, then a 30-day wait kicks in and then you can activate it again 3 more times. That's just plain bull!

 

[isamuelson]

@razor512

Steam has been around for close to 10 years now. If they were going to go out of business, don't you think they would have by now?

Demos, pah. Who cares? I have NO issues with Steam (other than the DRM crap that is still in Riddick). Otherwise, it's not tied to your machine. It's tied to your account.

Oh, I have over 30 games in Steam and NONE of them have EVER been taken away from me, period. Nice try, but your arguments don't hold much weight.

If anything, Steam is probably the best implementation of DRM without hosing the user. Oh, and you CAN play offline. Just set Steam to go into offline mode and ensure all the games are up-to-date. After that, as long as the game doesn't require online play, you're good to go.

 

[Silicon Jesus]

I remember when people were offended by Steam's protection system. Now things are getting so bad that Valve + Steam are the good guys.

 

[razor512]

@isamuelson

your games were not taken away because you paid for them, but what I said about the demo is that steam has the power to take your games away if they wanted (they are not doing it but they can if they want)

they have been running for close to 10 years

Fate Bankruptcy
Successor CircuitCity.com
Founded 1949
Defunct 2009

just because a company is running now, doesn't mean it will be running in the future (when a company has been around for 60 years, you don't expect them to go out of business but it happens)


your games are working find now but what about is 1 year, what about in 5 years, is there any guarantee that they will still be around?

when you have a internet connection and nothing like trainers or other esoteric apps running, steam's DRM is rather transparent but the moment that changes, Steam can throw a temper tantrum like the world has never seen

steam needs internet for both multiplayer games and single player games, with out internet the offline mode will only be useful for a short period of time before steam assumes that you stole something and kills the game until you connect to the internet again

Steam games also benchmark lower compared to cracked games (mainly because steam constantly checks to make sure you are not running anything that can effect it's DRM (a few of my friends had their steam accounts banned and they had to go through a large hassle to get the accounts working again because they used a trainer for a single player game. While not all trainers will cause this, it shows that the DRM is more of a hassle for legit customers.

just because a company has been around for a while doesn't mean they will be around for ever. Look at how many large banks went out of business in the past 2 years (even though they have been going for up to 50 years in some cases )

theres no way to predict the future, so you must always take into consideration the possibility of the company dying tomorrow or the day after that. think about what will happen to you if it happens, if you are a steam user, all of your games will stop functioning shortly after the company dies.

As I said before, Steam as really bad DRM, it is just more transparent to the user when things are going properly (eg a stable internet connection, no software that can cause the DRM to freak out, running in the background)

but when things don't go as planned, Steam can be a real bitch.

 

[theubersmurf]

It's been years since I had my connection affect my ability to play a game on steam.

 

[thegreathuntingdolphin]

I agree with many on here about Steam's unreliability. I have had several instances where Steam would not let me go into Offline mode. My brother also has this problem a lot (where he lives he has bad and weak internet, it comes and goes). A cousin of mine attends a college that has strict port controls over the internet. He cannot use Steam online at all and is in offline mode all the time. As such, he has problems in offline mode all the time.

It really pisses me off when steam wants me to log into the online mode to change it to offline mode...Geez I would be playing in online mode if I had internet!

As I mentioned before, you still have the issue that you cannot resell your game. The only thing I give Valve in defense of that is the fact they actually put their games on sale all the time. The weekend, midweek, and holiday sales are absolutely killer. I don't think I have paid full price for a game on Steam yet. Just wait and be vigilante and you can get even new games for 25 - 50% off.

 

[razor512]

thats due to their DRM, every once in a short while, steam likes to phone home to make sure that you are not stealing from them. for some, they can use offline mode just find because they are usually on line enough where it wont freak out. Steams DRM phone home DRM is similar to the kind of DRM that mass effect 1 took a lot of heat for before the company eventually got rid of it (remember when mass effect was having the game phone home every few days to make sure your copy is legit? thats what steam does,

you can use offline more but if you use it "too much" then it will disable to game (this time varies from game to game but all of the games have it)

 

[frozendarkness]

Of course a game company would not want you to resell a game, they get no piece of that. I, personally, have no problem with this as I see Steam as a great service soo the price I would have to pay is not to be able to resell the games. I help game companies, they help me.

 

[Regulas]

[citation][nom]Revord[/nom]Have you tried to play any of your 15 year old games lately? Also, if your so concerned about being able to sell a game, then probably, you shouldnt even buy it to begin with. I my self dont have a lot of disposable income, so if I want a game bad enough, Ill wait till the price drops on it, or steam has a sale. Christmas time is the gamers happy place at Steam. The deals they have are incredible, not to mention the regular sales they have on a regular basis[/citation]
You are wrong and old games sometimes sell for a bundle, look at some old original Baldur's Gate or PC versions of Final Fantasy. So I agree with the other poster you disagreed with when he said:
zerapio :
"Like others have mentioned, what happens when you want to play your game in 15 years? Will Steam be around then? Who knows. I rather not have to be tied to a service. And worse, I can't sell my Steam games. This is a pretty bad one."
Absolutly correct zerapio.

 

[shurcooL]

Guys, don't worry!

What happens to all your Steam games in 10 years if Steam goes out of business?

Valve have said it themselves. If it ever happens, they will release a patch that will make all your games playable without Steam.

Sheesh. :/

 

[truehighroller]

I like how people are coming on here saying, I've never had issues with Steam, yeah? Well tell that to the steam forums when steam is in mid outage and no one can play single player or multiplayer and see what it gets you. Probably your account hacked and disabled..

This has happened in the last four weeks four times and at various different times to not at night when no one is playing. Hell it happened last week mid day.....

For every one not just some people, everyone. In all seriousness I'm so~~ about to just start getting games cracked at this point. They are driving me away more and more every day. Here soon I'll just give up on these big companies ever seeing the light and stopping this ludicracy.

 

[EXT64]

I still play 15 year old games. Tie Fighter is one, and it still runs great on Vista.*




*with DOSBox, of course.

 

[mayne92]

[citation][nom]Revord[/nom]Have you tried to play any of your 15 year old games lately? Also, if your so concerned about being able to sell a game, then probably, you shouldnt even buy it to begin with. I my self dont have a lot of disposable income, so if I want a game bad enough, Ill wait till the price drops on it, or steam has a sale. Christmas time is the gamers happy place at Steam. The deals they have are incredible, not to mention the regular sales they have on a regular basis[/citation]
Zerapio had a good argument by the way...

 

[razor512]

[citation][nom]shurcooL[/nom]Guys, don't worry!What happens to all your Steam games in 10 years if Steam goes out of business?Valve have said it themselves. If it ever happens, they will release a patch that will make all your games playable without Steam.Sheesh.[/citation]
do you really expect something like this to happen, when a company is going out of business, the last thing you want to do is pay programmers to make patches for every single game in the market place in order to remove the DRM.

For something like that to be believed, it must be in their terms of service, thus legally binding them to remove all DRM when going out of business.

 

[Guest]

Yeah I agree - having to validate online is OK but that should be a one-off and like some Aussie flight sim scenery I got recently there should be a work around for validating via another computer if you have a machine that you use for gaming and do not expose to the internet (and hence don't run security software on). My 3g and even ADSL can be flaky at times and it is unacceptable for a constant connection to be required - that is not a reasonable requirement and consumer affairs departments in various countries will be recieving valid complains about this.

Maybe validating an uninstall is also acceptable because you may need to reinstall the product on your current machine after OS reinstall, a new machine or if you sell the game to someone else. I regularly played Far Cry 2 on a machine that had no internet connection aside from when I validated and I had to install a firewall etc before doing that - a pain in the rectum! I won't support vendors who put unreasonable restrictions on their products. There are too many good titles coming out in any given year.

 

[OvrClkr]

@isamuelson

your games were not taken away because you paid for them, but what I said about the demo is that steam has the power to take your games away if they wanted (they are not doing it but they can if they want)

they have been running for close to 10 years

Fate Bankruptcy
Successor CircuitCity.com
Founded 1949
Defunct 2009

just because a company is running now, doesn't mean it will be running in the future (when a company has been around for 60 years, you don't expect them to go out of business but it happens)


your games are working find now but what about is 1 year, what about in 5 years, is there any guarantee that they will still be around?

when you have a internet connection and nothing like trainers or other esoteric apps running, steam's DRM is rather transparent but the moment that changes, Steam can throw a temper tantrum like the world has never seen

steam needs internet for both multiplayer games and single player games, with out internet the offline mode will only be useful for a short period of time before steam assumes that you stole something and kills the game until you connect to the internet again

Steam games also benchmark lower compared to cracked games (mainly because steam constantly checks to make sure you are not running anything that can effect it's DRM (a few of my friends had their steam accounts banned and they had to go through a large hassle to get the accounts working again because they used a trainer for a single player game. While not all trainers will cause this, it shows that the DRM is more of a hassle for legit customers.

just because a company has been around for a while doesn't mean they will be around for ever. Look at how many large banks went out of business in the past 2 years (even though they have been going for up to 50 years in some cases )

theres no way to predict the future, so you must always take into consideration the possibility of the company dying tomorrow or the day after that. think about what will happen to you if it happens, if you are a steam user, all of your games will stop functioning shortly after the company dies.

As I said before, Steam as really bad DRM, it is just more transparent to the user when things are going properly (eg a stable internet connection, no software that can cause the DRM to freak out, running in the background)

but when things don't go as planned, Steam can be a real bitch.

Why are you so concerned? I can play all my SP games in "offline mode", been doing this for almost 8 years buddy . I have never experienced "steam assuming that I stole something and kills the game until you connect to the internet again"? , seems like you are altering something that is making steam think you are trying to play a cracked game. Like i said i am an everyday PC gamer, if its an FPS then its most likely I have at least played the demo, I have not seen anyone complain about steam the way you have, its like you are paranoid or something. Is there a specific issue that you have with steam that has not been addressed? You need help with anything or do you just bash companies for the heck of it?

Steam games also benchmark lower compared to cracked games (mainly because steam constantly checks to make sure you are not running anything that can effect it's DRM (a few of my friends had their steam accounts banned and they had to go through a large hassle to get the accounts working again because they used a trainer for a single player game. While not all trainers will cause this, it shows that the DRM is more of a hassle for legit customers.

you gotta be kidding me :lol: , even if it does bog down the PC a bit you would really need a low end PC just to notice any real world lag. Your friends got banned because they tried to alter the game , steam works as intended, nothing will ever be perfect.

As I said before, Steam as really bad DRM, it is just more transparent to the user when things are going properly (eg a stable internet connection, no software that can cause the DRM to freak out, running in the background)

How is it that your games do not work properly? What software causes the DRM to freak out?? Again, never have seen this issue.. sounds fishy to me

I also run a few programs in the "background" and to this date "knock on wood" I have not had one issue.

 

[razor512]

I have left 4 dead 1 on steam (was really cheap so I used some of the money that I had on my second life account to get it)
(if you have not tried it, it is a great game if you like mods and doing weird stuff)

if you do the mod that allows you to run the game with out steam running (great it you want to experiment with mods)

for example on the dead air level, with steam I will get around 164-166FPS but with out steam, I get around 168-170FPS much of the time
(so yes it does bog down my system)

Steam has a performance overhead

I buy steam games once in a while when they are really cheap as if they go out of business at least I wouldn't have lost a lot of money ( I just keep an eye out for sales and stick with the games that have lots of mods out for them)


and for steam freaking out over background apps, if you are playing a single player steam game and use program like artmoney to edit a couple memory values in order to do weird stuff in a single player game, you can easily cause steam to freak out while a non steam title will have no problem with this

if you don't believe me, try launching a steam game, then run a memory editor like artmoney then edit some memory values (if your lucky, you may be able to do stuff like make npc's extra stupid and just run in circles

 

[OvrClkr]

Well I can see why you are upset, yes I used to fiddle with games also when i was bored. But i don't run artmoney nor any other programs that do not offer any benefit to the performance of the game.

Also, the FPS issue is irrelevant. After 60FPS the human eye cannot tell the difference, however for benching purposes (v_sync disabled) yes you might lose a few points but 4 frames is hardly considered a loss. If you are a true gamer you should be more concerned about your lowest FPS(with v-sync enabled for superior visuals) not highest FPS (unless you play Crysis/Warhead/Stalker etc..

Back in the day we were very lucky to not have DRM incorporated into the games. Hackers/pirates are the ones that screwed it up for all of us

I also have L4D and L4D2, both purchased via steam. The game is lovely, specially when building a fortress (cage) and being able to fly around the map . Have not tried to play them offline because I am always connected.

Why would you want to play offline anyways? You should be connected 24/7 so I don't see why that would be an issue...

 

[WarraWarra]

The working abroad thing is a pain or if you travel a lot.
Direct2drive Crysis and trying to download my payed for copy was a pain as I had to travel overseas so half way thru the started in USA download your ip is overseas = you are hacking our system was the last time I used Direct2drive.

Have a steam account but dew to their prices not being with reality sometimes I can get cheaper games at Walmart or on the internet and so steam is cute but not a real world solution or prices reflective of what is the current market trend.
Some games paying 4 times what a game at newegg has cost me is not my idea of a solution.

Both sided of the coin of DRM has strong points but seeing Ubisoft and their unconstitutional hacking and torture of their customers with their DRM and then their lack of fixing their product or patching known errors does not balance out.

If you want to impose rules then provide a reason to use a product ie: support that works patches fixes updates content for at least 5 years one stop shop for content related info and resources on a working models that is compatible with most users and then sure do what you please as you will have loyal customers unlike the current Ubisoft DRM situation.

Major problems with Ubisoft is that with 5 payed for walmart cd keys games I had to eventually download a torrent to get a working cd as cd4 of my game was busted with all the replacements by walmart it was busted or bad batch and Ubisoft tells me I am a pirate so no support say what ?

We let MW2 get away with murder and now the rules is set so any clown with a gaming name can impose their DRM or games / jokes on users.

MW2 paying $60 for 4 hours of gameplay and then no dedicated server to have a multiplayer game as their wall hacked constantly unstable forced on players servers is someone's idea of a game or DRM, this is not acceptable.

Cd check or verified payed for user something to disable by users choice the cd check is okay as you will have to be on the internet at least once is acceptable. Problems with unstable windows you might have to reinstall 3 times a month dew to viruses eating up avast avg ect. and destroying your windows / data as has happened with 5 paying for games players I talked to in the last 2 weeks. 1 lost all data on his hard drive. 3 of them installing windows again as I type and not limited to win7 or vista with xp being the least affected.

Torturing their customers with Ubisoft DRM is not cool.

Anyway this online DRM and cloud gameplay Redmond idea of there is internet to do this with, what are they smoking most of the time you can not even get a decent internet connection in Scottsdale AZ / Phoenix AZ USA that is stable enough to make a vonage or skype or yahoo voice chat with so how will they be able to do their constant online checks with that internet connection, packet errors and other Arizona ISP issues.
Using opendns to compensate was a solution but they are falling out of the bus opn avg 50% of the time.

Just try to get a working stable above 7MB/s internet in Phoenix AZ nearly impossible the rest of Arizona you can not even get decent dial-up and Phoenix was the 5th largest city in the USA in 2005 growing at 12% per anum.
The rest of the USA you are lucky to have internet in your state that produces 200KB/s download speeds or 20KB/s uploads so how the ???? do they want to constant internet and internet streaming torture anyone with their DRM ?

Remarks based on 5 linux livecd/livedvd distro's and 4 actual pc's with OSX 10.6 win7 xp running on them on 8 locations / hotels / house / office in AZ with the same results.

 

[JohnnyLucky]

it seems to me this has turned into one great big mess with no easy solution.