Civ 5/Steam:Offline Mode Question

While I doubt I'll ever be excited by this partnership with Steam, at least I won't have to be concerned about unsubstantiated rumours. Like the 1 gig update. As it stands now, I'll be one of those that won't be buying the game as long as I'm being forced to use Steam. Make that optional and I'll be more than happy to pick it up on release date.

agreed. a shame really, was looking forward to it but with the current decision to mandate the requirement to run via steam I will have to take a pass on the entire thing. :(~
 
Don't assume something is true because I don't post a rebuttal. Sometimes I miss things.

None of this stuff has been finalized, so it would be impossible to know the details yet. However, I think it is unlikely to demand a 1 gig update. When I have complete details, you'll hear about them from me directly.
You promise answers, and that is great.....but when? You say none of this is finalized.....yet this near to release date this sort of thing has to be at least firmly entrenched. It may not be finalized, but what is the current plan?
So I ask again, Will there be a large download on install? Will updates and patches, including the at install update, be downloadable elsewhere and transfered via thumbdrive?
Saying it is not final yet is PR spinspeak, imho, for having unacceptable answers you don't want to give out. Tell us the truth as best you know, but don't blame it on "not finalized".:(
 
You promise answers, and that is great.....but when? You say none of this is finalized.....yet this near to release date this sort of thing has to be at least firmly entrenched. It may not be finalized, but what is the current plan?
So I ask again, Will there be a large download on install? Will updates and patches, including the at install update, be downloadable elsewhere and transfered via thumbdrive?
Saying it is not final yet is PR spinspeak, imho, for having unacceptable answers you don't want to give out. Tell us the truth as best you know, but don't blame it on "not finalized".:(

in my experience, what she is saying is pretty much par for course for 'most' games out there where a rep visits a board on a regular basis. we need to just sit back and relax and enjoy the lil tidbits they are able to share. after all...we could have absolutely no rep here and have zero information forth coming. ;)

I understand your questions and understand, but again...they are being nice in being here in the first place. they will get the info to us when they can.

regarding your thumbdrive transfer...I believe they answered that actually. it is in one of these threads. I believe she mentioned that the pc has to be connected directly. could be wrong...will have to try and track that quote down for ya. sorry :(

PR Spinspeak...heh...imo....ANYtime you speak with a rep from a company ALWAYS take it with a grain of salt. this just meaning that they are a company and you are the customer, so the sale is ultimately out there somewhere. this isnt to say everything they say is spin...indeed majority (on sites like this) are to our benefit and the general interest in answering our questions..and this is a good thing. :)

as such...I am VERY GLAD to see a rep here floating around with a willingness to say something regarding the game and the consideration to find out informatiojn for us....even if it takes longer than we may want it to... heh~
 
Well, a Gig is a big download, regardless of whether it takes a long time or not; who the hell wants to download another Gig, after you just downloaded the whole game, or bought it in store.

This means: done on purpose by the company for some arcane reason. They want to force your internet connection to the max apparently, but for what purpose?

Perhaps they have that much to finish and can't wait to start production and packaging. But Wait, if that is the case, that means there will probably be hordes of bugs as they rush to meet their deadline! Woo Hoo!

If it is not a Gig, even 250 MB is an insult to a customer who just paid $50 at the store and got ripped out of the tiny bit of content (that costs $10 more) that is only available for the exact same game online.

Bigger insult to the customer that has dial-up (and yes, alot of people have dial-up still).

Huge insult and (practically a rip-off) to the customer that has no internet, and cannot return the game because they cannot play it.

I feel bad for the PR people that have to actually answer to the public the horrible anti-consumer decisions made by the upper echelon of grubby management. Perhaps Liz 2K, you should just pull a Bethesda, and not answer at all (as they did to the poor PS3/XBox360 Fallout 3 consumers who cannot play the game without game breaking bugs causing their systems to collapse,fail,power off ever 30-60 mins). Because there never is a good reason, usually just a bunch of political mumbo-jumbo that answer nothing.
 
You promise answers, and that is great.....but when? You say none of this is finalized.....yet this near to release date this sort of thing has to be at least firmly entrenched. It may not be finalized, but what is the current plan?
So I ask again, Will there be a large download on install? Will updates and patches, including the at install update, be downloadable elsewhere and transfered via thumbdrive?
Saying it is not final yet is PR spinspeak, imho, for having unacceptable answers you don't want to give out. Tell us the truth as best you know, but don't blame it on "not finalized".:(

Since we don't *have* a release date yet, I wouldn't say we're close to it!

We're going to have patches and updates. I don't know if there is going to be one on day one and we would have to be a lot closer TO day one to know that. The game isn't finished yet and I'm receiving new builds just about every day, so things are in flux for certain. As for alternative ways of receiving updates beyond Steam, I'm already researching that question, but I don't have an answer yet.

I wish I could give you a better answer at the moment, but when a game's not done, it's just not done. The dev team knows small downloads are important, if that's what you are worried about. I'd be surprised if they didn't.
 
Since we don't *have* a release date yet, I wouldn't say we're close to it!

We're going to have patches and updates. I don't know if there is going to be one on day one and we would have to be a lot closer TO day one to know that. The game isn't finished yet and I'm receiving new builds just about every day, so things are in flux for certain. As for alternative ways of receiving updates beyond Steam, I'm already researching that question, but I don't have an answer yet.

I wish I could give you a better answer at the moment, but when a game's not done, it's just not done. The dev team knows small downloads are important, if that's what you are worried about. I'd be surprised if they didn't.

It is quite ridiculous to press 2k Elizabeth about day 0 patches.

What you are basically asking her is "Will the game have bugs in it when it's released and how big will the patch for them be?"

How on earth can you expect her to answer that?
 
If 250MB patches scare you, you might just not be going along with the times. Love it how you just know how the first patch that'll come out will be 1 gigabyte though. Or even 250MB. Patches are not planned before the game comes out, you know.
 
If 250MB patches scare you, you might just not be going along with the times.

I'd have to agree there. A 250 meg patch is not really out of line, alot of them can reach that size. The largest patch I have on my hard drive right now is for The Witcher at 330 meg. Even the 3.19 patch for BtS is about 169 meg, which isn't that far off.
 
What you are basically asking her is "Will the game have bugs in it when it's released and how big will the patch for them be?"

How on earth can you expect her to answer that?

With a 'Yes'. Of course the game will have bugs at release. No games nowadays are complete without major glitches.

I'd have to agree there. A 250 meg patch is not really out of line, alot of them can reach that size. The largest patch I have on my hard drive right now is for The Witcher at 330 meg. Even the 3.19 patch for BtS is about 169 meg, which isn't that far off.

Well, if it turns out to be true, that a 250MB - 1GB patch is needed on Day 0 of release, that is a bit out of line. If not true, then no problem!

It is different if there is a massive patch down the road. For a patch to be that large though, it is not all 'fixing bugs', but would have to be an update to the game itself (updated textures, content, etc).

In this case, if Firaxis gives everyone a huge 1GB of content on Day 0, everyone will be happy. But this would mean that it was content that just wasn't fnished to include on the initial DVD, in which case a required internet connection makes sense for the game (to force you to download the rest of the game they didn't include with the game DVD itself).
 
Why are your still talking about your imaginary friend the 1GB patch? Cut it out already, there are enough completely false rumours floating around already, maybe focus on them.

It's not my 1GB imaginary patch.. it's someone elses. I stated that it may or may not be the case. Furthermore, it's assumption to say it's not true or to say it is... 2K Liz did not deny it, so it's certainly possible.

Are you Anti-1GB patch if it is required to play the game. It's not a bad thing you know. I am not, I would be 100% for even a 5GB patch, if it is needed.

Because 1GB of extra possible stuff is always good. Don't ya think?
 
Are you Anti-1GB patch if it is required to play the game. It's not a bad thing you know. I am not, I would be 100% for even a 5GB patch, if it is needed.

Because 1GB of extra possible stuff is always good. Don't ya think?

Personally I'd welcome a 20GB patch if it meant more features and content. It just sounded like you, or whoever started this 1GB crap, were spreading false rumours around or at least sustaining them since there's no reason at all to discuss a patch in the future which doesn't exist and likely will never exist. All this baseless discussion is, I imagine, pretty much confusing the people looking for actual information on this site.
 
So if Steam fails, then Civ 5 fails? It must if it is a core component... and Steam may not last forever, rendering the game Civ 5 unplayable if that happens in the year 2087.

Even if Valve doesn't release an official fix, there will be 'unofficial fixes' for this problem. There already are some for other games that require Steam.
 
Furthermore, it's assumption to say it's not true or to say it is... 2K Liz did not deny it, so it's certainly possible.

She pretty much did actually, in another thread:

I can't imagine a 1 gig update, as I've never seen anything that large before, but until I have a final answer from the devs, all I can say is that is certainly not something that's happening right now.

No one can say for certain right now how large, if any, a patch will be at release time. Not even the devs. But that 1 gig rumour is just that, a rumour with no basis in fact.
 
So now I actually tried Steam for the first time. Got Portal since they are giving it away until tomorrow and I wanted to see how it works.
One thing I noticed because I left its firewall permissions temporary: after setting it to offline mode, restarting the computer (multiple times because it at first wouldn't stick to the setting disallowing startup on pc startup) and starting the game: it would request permissions to access the internet and call home. Refusal didn't keep the game from starting, but If I had set the permissions permanently I wouldn't even have noticed that "offline mode" was calling home with an internet connection active :gripe:.

Portal is a great game by the way :mischief:
 
One thing I noticed because I left its firewall permissions temporary: after setting it to offline mode, restarting the computer (multiple times because it at first wouldn't stick to the setting disallowing startup on pc startup) and starting the game: it would request permissions to access the internet and call home. Refusal didn't keep the game from starting, but If I had set the permissions permanently I wouldn't even have noticed that "offline mode" was calling home with an internet connection active :gripe:.

Thanks for the info. All the more reason why I won't be buying the game. I'm not permanently logged into the internet and I really don't want to be dealing with annoying messages everytime I start the game. :wallbash:
 
So now I actually tried Steam for the first time. Got Portal since they are giving it away until tomorrow and I wanted to see how it works.
One thing I noticed because I left its firewall permissions temporary: after setting it to offline mode, restarting the computer (multiple times because it at first wouldn't stick to the setting disallowing startup on pc startup) and starting the game: it would request permissions to access the internet and call home. Refusal didn't keep the game from starting, but If I had set the permissions permanently I wouldn't even have noticed that "offline mode" was calling home with an internet connection active :gripe:.

Portal is a great game by the way :mischief:

For good reasons my router asks me about permission to allow any program to go to the internet.
Thanks for the info, Ori.

I completely agree with Willem here.
 
I just triple confirmed this with the devs and Valve. Yes, that will work. If you want multiplayer, to earn achievements, or to get the game updates and content you'll need to go back out there and hook up again, but you will definitely be able to play offline without a connection. Steam will start, but the internet connection won't.

I checked a few times: its not the particular game (Portal) that tries to call home in offline mode - but the steam client. What happens is that the client starts up, checks for an internet connection, attempts to use it and only then opens a window asking the user whether he wants to stay in offline mode or connect to the Steam Server. Disallowing the internet connection does not make the game unusable, so you *can* play in offline mode, but unless you jump through a lot of hoops and know what you are doing with your firewall/router permissions the steam client will at the very least ping the home server, and there is no way of knowing whether it transmits any further information (I strongly suspect that it does). The claim that the internet connection doesn't get used is false. Unless you use third party software to prevent it the client will use an active internet connection even in offline mode.

The current pitch that you only *have* to connect once to activate and then can go offline, while literally true is misleading in the light of this, since it is only true for those controlling their internet connection tightly and for those who disconnect for ever once the game is installed and activated. For the vast majority of customers it will mean that regardless of mode the game will call home and transmit data. IMHO the best way to make people distrust a company is to advertise with misleading information, so I hope Take2 will reconsider this pitch.
 
"Huge" updates are not problem IMO. My internet traffic per month is well over 1TB so I dont care if some1 release 1GB update - its just few minutes of download.

My notebook is in offline mode 90+% of the time and I never had problem with it. Before UI update it was in offine mode for about 6 months (I like new UI so I decided to update my NTB).
 
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