Civilization 5 Steamworks questions/concerns for inclusion in the FAQ

[nerd]

I just want to say people need to lighten up on Greg. He is not personally the beast some of you for whatever reason want to slay. In particular I want to call out:



Nerd: You really must know it all

Greg is here to help us, stop wasting his time keeping him PC in pointless arguing and stop treating him like the bad guy. This community is better than that.

Actually, thats just the issue, I don't know, and 2K is not forthcoming with answers. I am not particularly interested in all the posts by self-appointed experts who are trying to answer questions for 2K. I want 2K to answer.
I really don't see where you get the idea I know everythibg, or even very much at all, since my posts are almost entirely questions and concerns that I want answered.
Is it too much to ask that I be assured that after I pay my money, that I will actually be able to play the game I paid for, on my computer and my limited internet?

 

[Drakarska]

@ Boozie: lol, nice rejoinder old chap, your sense of humor meter broke? no matter.

@ Dixie. Unfortunately, you have to have Steam installed in order to play Civ V. Sorry bro, potential paper weight might be happening.

 

[DixieBull]

@ Boozie: lol, nice rejoinder old chap, your sense of humor meter broke? no matter.

@ Dixie. Unfortunately, you have to have Steam installed in order to play Civ V. Sorry bro, potential paper weight might be happening.

My issue is now this... how does Steam make money if there services and software is supposedly free

To me it sounds like a back alley deal where Steam suckers a mess of game makers into using their services... then one day in the near future BAM they start charging fees to access your saved games.

 

[Joel E]

My issue is now this... how does Steam make money if there services and software is supposedly free

You must be joking. They make money the same way everyone on the internet makes money....advertizing. They also probably get the same or better spread on the sale of a downlaod as bestbuy would for the sale of a box.

On another note. IMO. If the truly unthinkable happened and steam somhow just disappeard, there would be some sort of update with new DRM developed and made available at the official CIV5 site. There is a lot of unwarrented fear monggering on this thread.

 

[jabberwalkee_]

You must be joking. They make money the same way everyone on the internet makes money....advertizing. They also probably get the same or better spread on the sale of a downlaod as bestbuy would for the sale of a box.

Actually, the only stuff steam advertises is games they sell through their own service. I believe steam takes a cut of the profits of the sale (same as a game store) and perhaps charges an up-front fee to publishers.

 

[timtofly]

So let me get this straight... without Steam / Valve one can not play C5... for example if Steam goes belly up and shuts down because they arn't making any money then my $50 C5 game would be a very expensive paper weight?

A very very very expensive one, since it does not even hold paper while in the "clouds".

 

[The_Coyote]

offtopic answer to Joel E

Spoiler :

On another note. IMO. If the truly unthinkable happened and steam somhow just disappeard,

Really, you know the business figures from Valve or at least sales figures to estimate the revenue? Perhaps with the always made assumption such an events is atm (very) unlikeley, but surely not unthinkable. Also steam has a lot of fixed costs (eg server infrastructure), how long do you think steam would survive when - let´s say in 4 years - the market favour has switched away from steam? Every posted view about the actual economic health of Valve is only a guess - but this applies to both sides. Every future scenario is much less.

there would be some sort of update with new DRM developed and made available at the official CIV5 site.

As sure as fate? Perhaps it will happen, but a guarantee from 2k couldn´t harm (btw this question is already asked), so that in 5 - 6 years, the moment civ5 doesn´t make real profit any longer, the patch still will come. And of course, all the features done via steamworks are lost, or? So the game will be a bit crippled - at least considering the multiplayer part, or?

There is a lot of unwarrented fear monggering on this thread.

There is a difference between a question what will happen in even an unlikely case and fear mongering. Nobody* said it will happen (= fear mongering). But this was not the claim, it was only the question, what will happen if this situation will arise. The second is only a question to safeguard this case - however likely this case itself is.

* honestly, i´m no longer sure if this is the truth, but than at least say: Most didn´t

@ 2K Greg

Do you have an ETA for the FAQ? Or could you please provide at least the list of questions that will be covered, so that we have a chance to repost/post questions before the FAQ is final?

 

[Sam_Yeager]

@ 2K Greg

Do you have an ETA for the FAQ? Or could you please provide at least the list of questions that will be covered, so that we have a chance to repost/post questions before the FAQ is final?

In an earlier post in this thread he said it should be out by the end of June at the latest IIRC.

 

[jaythewise]

I am surprised at the amount of hate steam gets...

I rather enjoy not having to go into a store and buy a game and have all the waste that comes along with buying a game. Box, manual etc which I do not need.

I share my steam account with my brother who also buys games and this allows us to share the games without having to meet up give each other CDs.

And really how do you not have internet in 2010?

 

[PieceOfMind]

Just a friendly reminder this thread is meant to be for asking 2K Greg questions. I'm not sure where the tipping point was but it seems to have become yet another discussion thread. To make things easier on 2K Greg, how about we limit the posts here to questions? If a question is ridiculous for some reason or other, it probably won't be answered.

 

[ori]

I mostly agree, though its unavoidable that discussion errupts every now and then I guess

Moderator Action: split the bankruptcy discussion to its own thread

 

[The_Coyote]

I share my steam account with my brother who also buys games and this allows us to share the games without having to meet up give each other CDs.

Perhaps you should edit your post, it could be read as promoting something non legal. The SSA clearly says: "You may not reveal, share or otherwise allow others to use your password or Account" and "You may not sell or charge others for the right to use your Account, or otherwise transfer your Account."

@ Sam Yeager

Thanks I can remember this post, i only hoped that now after one or two weeks passed since he posted this and also Greg should slowly get the answers to our questions / concerns he would be able to give a more final ETA.

 

[binhthuy71]

I have a simple question: will I have to create a Steam account in order to register Civ V or to play it in single player mode?

Tried to find the answer with Search but, there's a lot of clutter attending to any search involving the word "Steam."

As an aside; if the answer is "yes" then an unbroken run of Civs that goes back to 1991 for me ends with Civ IV.

 

[2K Greg]

Yes, you will need to create a Steam account if you do not have one already.

 

[binhthuy71]

Yes, you will need to create a Steam account if you do not have one already.

Greg, thanks for your quick response and for a clear answer. I can understand the business case for going with Steam. I also neither trust nor mistrust Steam any more than any other online service. That said, this is a deal breaker for me. I would have cheerfully paid another ten bucks for the game for the privilege of not having to submit personal information - no matter how meager the amount required - to another third party.

But heck, I'm old (62) and an anachronism in these parts anyway.

No snark; best of luck with Civ V. I hope that it exceeds everyone's expectations and that it introduces even more players to the game.

 

[gmbfly98]

Greg, thanks for your quick response and for a clear answer. I can understand the business case for going with Steam. I also neither trust nor mistrust Steam any more than any other online service. That said, this is a deal breaker for me. I would have cheerfully paid another ten bucks for the game for the privilege of not having to submit personal information - no matter how meager the amount required - to another third party.

Well, a Steam account is free. And who says you have to fill in accurate personal information (or fill in anything more than just the bare-minimum required fields)?

*edit* Speaking of which, haven't you already filled in more "personal information" than required with your civfanatics user account? Don't misunderstand; I'm a believer in not providing any more personal information to the outside world than is necessary or prudent. I'm just saying that the actual required amount of information you need to give to Steam for the sole purpose of authenticating your copy of Civ 5 is fairly minimal.

 

[binhthuy71]

Well, a Steam account is free. And who says you have to fill in accurate personal information (or fill in anything more than just the bare-minimum required fields)?

*edit* Speaking of which, haven't you already filled in more "personal information" than required with your civfanatics user account? Don't misunderstand; I'm a believer in not providing any more personal information to the outside world than is necessary or prudent. I'm just saying that the actual required amount of information you need to give to Steam for the sole purpose of authenticating your copy of Civ 5 is fairly minimal.

You're correct. I even have a spam-only email account for such purposes. When I signed on here I understood that submitting some personal information was part of the "price" I pay for the service. If it was only necessary to do a one-time log in to Steam in order to register the game I might be okay with that. However, my understanding (And Greg can correct me if I'm wrong) is that you must have Steam's app installed and therefor running in the background in order to even play the game in single player mode. That is unacceptable. Although Steam's EULA and it's intentions may be exemplary at present they're one buyout away from being something else.

 

[gmbfly98]

You're correct. I even have a spam-only email account for such purposes. When I signed on here I understood that submitting some personal information was part of the "price" I pay for the service. If it was only necessary to do a one-time log in to Steam in order to register the game I might be okay with that. However, my understanding (And Greg can correct me if I'm wrong) is that you must have Steam's app installed and therefor running in the background in order to even play the game in single player mode. That is unacceptable. Although Steam's EULA and it's intentions may be exemplary at present they're one buyout away from being something else.

To see what information was required (particularly since I've determined that the way Civ 5 is using Steam is acceptable to me), I created a Steam account. All it asked for was a valid email address (for validation purposes, such as password changes), and a username and password--nothing more.

Also, it was confirmed earlier on in some thread that after the initial activation of Civ 5, you could leave Steam in "offline" mode while playing the game. However, it does appear that you do need to have Steam running to play, and from the sounds of it, starting Civ 5 will start Steam. As long as this remains true for single-player and LAN-based multi-player games, I'm okay with this. (I'd prefer a simple disk check/CD key, but I'll accept their use of Steam).

 

[Drakarska]

You're correct. I even have a spam-only email account for such purposes. When I signed on here I understood that submitting some personal information was part of the "price" I pay for the service. If it was only necessary to do a one-time log in to Steam in order to register the game I might be okay with that. However, my understanding (And Greg can correct me if I'm wrong) is that you must have Steam's app installed and therefor running in the background in order to even play the game in single player mode. That is unacceptable. Although Steam's EULA and it's intentions may be exemplary at present they're one buyout away from being something else.

You are correct in that you must have Steam installed on your system in order to play Civ V. That ( and a few other minor gripes) is what the majority of Steam threads is about. It's a real pity too, I was really looking forward to playing ( along with the rest of the fam) the next installment in a great series. I even managed to convince the significant other that we actually deserve a new comp for us ( a bit selfish, I know, but we're entitled to splurge for us occasionally) just so we could enjoy all the neat graphics. Ah well, guess we'll do something else.

 

[binhthuy71]

You are correct in that you must have Steam installed on your system in order to play Civ V. That ( and a few other minor gripes) is what the majority of Steam threads is about. It's a real pity too, I was really looking forward to playing ( along with the rest of the fam) the next installment in a great series. I even managed to convince the significant other that we actually deserve a new comp for us ( a bit selfish, I know, but we're entitled to splurge for us occasionally) just so we could enjoy all the neat graphics. Ah well, guess we'll do something else.

Heh. I'm in the process of building a new, full-on Intel Core i7 machine to celebrate my retirement. I, too, was looking forward to playing Civ V with every last option lit up on any size map. I'll just have to console myself with playing Civ IV with every last option, etc. It could be worse.

Kind of disappointing though; I've been playing Civ since it came out in 1991.