Quote:
Originally Posted by NarcissistZero
That made me chuckle.
Look guys, I don't want this to define my freaking existence on this board. I don't want to endlessly debate it either. The fact is I prefer DRM-free games like Mass Effect 2 to games that tie themselves to an account and need the internet to install. That's me, that's what I want and what I care about. I see a day when there is no used market, possibly no retail boxed market, and that upsets me, because I believe in buying a game and never having to say please in order to play it.
As I said on the Bethesda forums, imagine buying a DVD of The Dark Knight and getting home and having to activate your movie online, then having to assign it to your Warner Bros. account, making it never work for anyone else again. The mass market would not accept such a thing, but with PC games I am supposed to accept it AND be happy about it I guess. Well I'm not.
There are also other factors at play... you might not notice since you guys mostly just shop on Steam, but Amazon is cheaper. A lot cheaper, often. I got Splinter Cell Conviction for $40, Alpha Protocol for $34, Prince of Persia 2010 for $25 and those are all shipped prices. Amazon is extremely rewarding for loyal customers, as well as just having lower prices to begin with. Even old games, things people flip-out over on weekend deals, are often just as low on amazon... I just got Death to Spies 2 for $5, which would have been a cool weekend deal if I was still in love with Steam.
Also, as Magus can attest, I love boxes. I sold all my boxes in 2002 or so when I "got out of gaming" and now I am building my collection back up. I have two nice DVD racks from Target and I line my games up and I think it's cool to collect them like that.
So there are a lot of reasons I have "turned against Steam." I'm glad many of you are fans of it and welcome the digital delivery age... I do not. Let's stop focusing so much on this decision of mine though, seriously... people are allowed to have a difference of opinion, and last I checked digital delivery was reported to be 30% of the PC gaming market, not 90%, so it's not like I am way out on the niche limb for all to gawk at.
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If you weren't so busy chuckling over my first sentence, you may have actually bothered to read the rest of my post. I can play all of my Steam games in offline mode, except perhaps one or two and I don't even remember which (and it may have been fixed by now). I don't know how ME2 works, but I can play ME1 fine in offline mode. Again, you seem to have the impression that you only rent games through steam; no you own them and you can play them as much as you want for as long as you want as often as you want to.
My friends can try a game at my place and see if they like it and then buy it themselves if they do. I really don't see why I should have the right to borrow out my game left and right and have my friends play a bunch of games, but not pay for it.
I don't buy the DVD argument; Movies also have a huge income at movie cinema's, developers only really have one source of income for games: the private persons who buys them for private use. Besides when I buy Blurays, I often pay 2-4x as much as it would cost to rent them. I consider that extra money spend towards the possibility of me lending it to friends or family. If you absolutely want this, the prices for digital copies should stay the same, while the price for retail copies should be 2-4x the price of account-unique digital copies - however that's not going to happen for historical and practical reasons.