Without Steamworks there is no Civ V though, in the exact same way there is no Civ V without DirectX. The game is built on it.
A case for forum members easing up on 2K a bit
- Thread starter thelibra
- Start date
Without Steamworks there is no Civ V though, in the exact same way there is no Civ V without DirectX. The game is built on it.
I'm already prepared to live with that. If Steam could be made to only work for muliplayer I could live with it too. And of course the initial authentication. Only time will tell if I become more open to it as the game gets released. A new CIV is a mighty temptation.
You're still completely misunderstanding my post and I really don't know how to say it more clearly and simply.
In the same way the game is developed using DirectX and other various APIs and computer game engines, the game is developed using Steamworks - it's an API. Without Steamworks there is no Civ V. You can't just "make Steam work only for multiplayer" as Steamworks is a large part of what Civ V is built with. The Steam client is only one aspect of Steamworks.
Akka
Moody old mage.
You completely miss the point. I'm talking about the fact that I need to authentificate the game on an online server, which has nothing to do with the "offline" mode, and is about being dependant on a third party to make the game work.
(not to point that the "offline mode" isn't working as you could expect it at first, but that's another beast entirely)
Yeah, and that's precisely the problem.
That's a completely idiotic statement. Direct X doesn't act as a DRM, doesn't force me to authentificate my games to an online server if I want them to work, etc.
Steam is simply a built-in annoyance you can't get rid of. It just doesn't add anything by itself to the game that is actually really needed, and adds plenty of things that are a pain. DirectX allows the game to actually display something on the screen (among other things), which is a rather useful function...
What I mean is that I have no particular reason to WANT DirectX gone from the game, while I have PLENTY of reasons to WANT Steam gone from the game. As such, Steam being an API, and hence not being possible to get rid of, is, YES, actually something that makes it worse than SecuROM : because SecuROM, not being an API, is a pain that CAN be removed.
Gosh, all this is just obvious and simplistic. Did you purposedly try to not get it on the first try ?
Maybe Steam games are harder to crack. But it isn't relevant for anyone but the hackers who crack them. For the overwhelming majority of people concerned, they are just another Torrent able to be find on release, like every other games with every other DRM. Your point is, hence, totally moot.
No No No. I believe its you that misunderstood my post. Steam, steamworks and Directx are different entities. One (direct X) is a tool to render the game. The other is a totally unecessary one that introduces some unwanted things. Like calling home to force an update on the user. Collecting and then transmitting that users data to valve and who knows who else. That doesn't matter though as they have no right to it. Can unilaterally decide that it doesn't think you shlould be able to play the game you payed for. Steam can also unilaterally change the contents of what a person agrees to in order to play his game. Sure he can opt not to agree to it. Buy buy $50.
There are options to both but steam is the one with the potential to do the most harm. Valve decides what acceptable behavior is. Valve judges if your behavior is acceptable according to what they defined to be acceptable behavior. Valve enforces their behavior standards and you as the consumer have no recourse. At all. Convicts have more rights.
Jugalub wrote:
How much of the game was built using this? Just the multiplayer and other unecessary bs? I really don't know this but I suspect you don't either. Would city placement be broken without steam? 2K wouldn't be the first publisher to back down after a public outcry of this sort.
How much of the game was built using this? Just the multiplayer and other unecessary bs? I really don't know this but I suspect you don't either. Would city placement be broken without steam? 2K wouldn't be the first publisher to back down after a public outcry of this sort.
pleasenoname
Chieftain
I forgot to mention that you are forced to view game advertisements every time you start steam.
Steam runs in a kind of modified web browser.
Steam runs in a kind of modified web browser.
Since you've (poorly) paraphrased my post I'm sure you'd be expecting a reply from me.
I am not at all asking for steamworks to be patched out. I'm stating that an advantage of the civ4 DRM was that it was later patched out when the developer/publisher were no longer as worried about piracy, as the game has already lowered significantly in price and anyone who wanted a pirated copy probably already had one.
Obviously something like DirectX if it's used (which is in civ5 IIRC) is obviously essential to the game. That is unless I wanted a patch for removing the 3d graphics from the game.
Actually, in some cases that could be neat. 
And a lot of games don't need steamworks. Civ4 didn't use steamworks and it was tremendously successful by any measure. It sold very well, it was modded extensively (and still is), it had and still does have a very active community discussing strategies and so forth. It even still has an active mp community. All of this was achieved without steamworks.
I appreciate that using steamworks to free up some development efforts/time and also to take advantage of some of its attractive features (like in-game DLC) is not simply a matter of choosing which DRM to use. I know that steamworks is much more than DRM and so I don't pretend that Firaxis/2K are treating it merely as DRM.
However, one of the disadvantages of using steamworks in the first place is that the DRM that comes along with it will not be able to be patched out. That is unless all those steamworks dependent features were in fact very simple to code without steam. We could go round in circles with an argument like this.
Agreed. It's much more than that. A lot of the other things associated with steamworks are not attractive to civ players either. A functioning MP system is what I'd say is one of the main benefits from the consumer's point of view, particularly because the use of gamespy with civ4 did not go particularly well, and Valve is known for their successful MP games.
It looks like steam fans are going to have to start qualifying this assertion.
Unless we are told otherwise, it appears that Steam can make you need to re authenticate the game when it detects a change in hardware on your computer. This wreaks of Starforce by the way, except Starforce goes so far as to limit the number of activations as well.
My computer is almost an open workbench. I rarely am hesitant to plug in or pull out hardware from my computer when I want to. I already own one game that is artificially demanding I stop doing that (DCS BlackShark - a game which has DRM that detects hardware changes) and because of it I am unable to install the game if I reformat the system partition or something like that when I am living temporarily without internet connection.
The claim that steam checks for changes in hardware configuration has only recently been raised in the forum.
Offline mode in Steam would be better described as "offline and don't touch your computer" mode.
Actually that can be disabled by going into the settings. You can disable popup ads and also set the default page (on loading Steam) to something other than the steam store. For example, many people suggest making the Library page the default - the page where your games attached to steam are listed and you can launch the game from there.pleasenoname said:
Still, what you describe is the default behaviour (hence it's likely a lot of people leave it that way), leading me to call Steam a type of adware.
Actually now that I think of it, I would be very interested in testing the hypothesis that if Steam is in offline mode yet detects an internet connection, it would download new ads despite you not even accessing the steam store page. This will take a bit of work to ensure the test is done right though.
I use Steam and games built with Steamworks all the time, seems to me like it would be easy to make a version of a game like CIV without Steamworks. Can you be more specific about how Steamworks embeds itself in a game like CIV?
Unless you're planning on deliberately cheating in your games, why is this an issue at all? I've played with literally hundreds of different Steam users over the years and the only person I know to be banned from Steam is one who cried for months over Valve banning him unfairly... until he finally conceded one day that he was using an aimbot in CS:S.
Well there's good reason for why there has never been a game that uses Steamworks to have a second non-Steamworks version. The games will have been designed and built with Steamworks in mind, and it's a complete waste of time to create a second version of the game, which will have to handle the same processes that the Steamworks version does but in just a different manner, just to appease a tiny, tiny minority of potential customers. The number of people who make a conscious decision to not buy Civ V because of Steam wouldn't even add 0.01% to their sales figures.
We've been around this block so many times before with Modern Warfare 2 and Football Manager 2009. A Steam boycott of Modern Warfare 2 was probably fourth or fifth down the list of reasons to boycott the game (after changes to how the game was different from the original ect) and look how that turned out. As a lot of the FPS crowd already used Steam, I too give the example of Football Manager 2009. We had the exact same situation on the FM forums with people refusing to buy the game because of Steam. A month into release and most of the steadfast boycotters were enjoying the game and as usual the game dominated the sales charts in the UK yet again, posting numbers that only the likes of Call of Duty and GTA can do.
The developer has chosen to use Steamworks for good reason - like it or lump it. They aren't going to waste time developing a second copy of the game for such a slim minority - and nor should they.
I think some of the pro-Steam people miss out on an important fact: Many of the ones who do not want Steam on their computer do not want it because it is third party software. They do not care how useful Steam can be to some, they just want the box and put in the disc and install the game. Then play the game without Steam popping up at Windows start or being generally a pain of the arse.
I think a good part would be fine if the Steam was not forced - Hell I would, but it is and therein lies the problem.
I think a good part would be fine if the Steam was not forced - Hell I would, but it is and therein lies the problem.
Senethro
Overlord
Its not forced because you're not forced to buy the game. Its no more forced than DirectX/OpenGL or any other APIs. You also put up with Securom.
It is forced if I wish to buy Civ5, which I would if it did not have forced Steam.
Senethro
Overlord
If its acceptable, you buy it. If its unacceptable, you don't. Theres no force involved.
The Civ5 is acceptable, Steam however is not. Yes, it very much is forced. When I buy a game I expect it have the programs I need to run it, not third party malware I am never going to use.
eireksten
Protective/Organized
This is one of the reasons I really don't get. The simple fact that it was developed by someone else than Firaxis is your problem? So you'd require all the software you buy to be developed by one and the same company?
Just companies making cars use third party parts, that's the case for software as well. I see absolutely no reason at all to require them to create their very own framework for online functionality, just as I won't require any producer of a car to develop their own wheels. The important part is that it works in the end. Reinventing something that's been fully developed by others is not very useful (unless of course it is impossible to understand how it works).
If it's the fact that the Steam processes has it's own program/GUI you've got a problem with, I don't get that either. You have a problem with the processes running on your machine being visible? Now, that's silly.
I agree that not everything with Steamworks integration is optimal, but the fact that it's made by a third party really is nothing to complain about. DirectX is made by a third party. Windows is made by a third party.
That's not completly a problem.
You're forced into a contract with this third party (and not everybody trusts this third party), and it will require to last on, because you'll probably somewhen have to re-authentificate your game.
Edit: Yes, windows is somehow the same, but i need Windows for several things, so i'm willed to do that. I do not need Steam for anything (blabla, besides it's an integral part of the game, i know).
It's comparable to the current practice of car companies to force you to use one of their car mechanics for X years after buying the car, else you'll lose the warranty of the car.
I would not want to buy such a car. I do not want to have to rely on that contract for an amount of time, i want the procedure of buying the car to be finished after i've bought it, and i have a car mechanic i trust in.
You're forced into a contract with this third party (and not everybody trusts this third party), and it will require to last on, because you'll probably somewhen have to re-authentificate your game.
Edit: Yes, windows is somehow the same, but i need Windows for several things, so i'm willed to do that. I do not need Steam for anything (blabla, besides it's an integral part of the game, i know).
It's comparable to the current practice of car companies to force you to use one of their car mechanics for X years after buying the car, else you'll lose the warranty of the car.
I would not want to buy such a car. I do not want to have to rely on that contract for an amount of time, i want the procedure of buying the car to be finished after i've bought it, and i have a car mechanic i trust in.
Like it or lump it isn't an answer to my question, which I will repeat. Do you know specifically how Steamworks embeds itself in games like CIV V such that it would be difficult for the developer to create a version without Steamworks? Thanks..
