So basically, if you only ever run steam in offline mode, you're never forced to go into online mode and so never forced to update your game. Of course at any point you can choose the online option and then all bets are off as to whether your game will get updated or not.
Don't get me wrong, it *IS* actually useful in a sense that it allows smooth distribution on a large scale. It's even ingenious enough to monitor what, when & why we're accessing an executable on our PCs. Tracking DRM methods are necessary in this day & age of "Illegally" obtained products. We're all better served by such a layer of content management.
But it remains Spyware. Even if for good reasons.
The distinction is essential. I *MUST* use it as a sub-component that initially refused to install a game on my G: Drive and flooded my Internet folder in C:. It decided to handle an installation process in a tricky manner.
Sure, it's User Friendly.
Yes, it is on the PC.
Nowhere near the usual programming context and resources i *MUST* use to mod... i've been wasting Ms-Explorer style acrobatics for weeks just to synchronize DDS and their counterparts, LUA originals and currently editing indented reference codes.
While it could have been; G:\CiV, --- find the file, it's there.
Steam is an Internet device, it belongs in the utility category.
Not development context or areas with folders worth of tools.
OFF-Line or not.