DICE 2009: Valve View on DRM and Pirates

DigiQ8

DigiQ8

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Gabe Newell believes that the new way of entertainment is direct customer relationships, service orientation. Valve aims to touch their customers in some way every three weeks, not every three years when a new game is shipped.[br]

Valve have observed the following:
  • 30-year old songs with a little service (Rock Band, Guitar Hero) generate huge profits
  • Pirates are ahead not just on price, but on service
  • DRM appears to increase, not decrease piracy
  • Privacy and transparency
  • Shrinking distance to customer empowers content creators

DRM decreases service value for customers which increases pirated copies of games because they look more appealing, so DRM is bad.[br]

You can read the full keynote live blog on G4tv.com.
 
Gabe Newell via DigiQ8 said:
Pirates are ahead not just on price, but on service
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SOMEONE GETS IT!!11

It is so ****ing refreshing to see someone in the industry actually realise this.
 
honestly its not hard to figure out that DRMs only increase piracy on games.. you'd think more developers would be smart enough to figure that out.. this is why i love valve.. they arnt necessarily smart.. they are just down to earth and understand whats really going on..
 
I thought the numbers he gave were interesting, the L4D sale selling more copies during it's sale than launch day for example.

The rest though is stuff I've heard Gabe talk about before.
 
ZoFreX said:
SOMEONE GETS IT!!11

It is so ****ing refreshing to see someone in the industry actually realise this.
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**** yeah. I feel like Gabe is the only company head who has any sense in this industry.
 
100% Year-over-year growth since 2004
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for Steam.

Woah.

The comments to the linked page are facepalm-worthy. Why are so many gamers so incredibly thick?
 
Because they're retarded 13 years old fan boys?
 
Eejit said:
The comments to the linked page are facepalm-worthy. Why are so many gamers so incredibly thick?
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Almost all of those comments are one PS3 gamer with an incredible inferiority complex posting over and over again. I actually feel kind of sorry for the guy.
 
Yes, great that Valve has joined the anti-DRM block. Now we only need to convince EA...
 
Welcome to operation mind ****! Teeheehee

Gabe said:
Valve has hired an experimental psychologist to come up with new ways to excite users with pricing models and sales. He suggested one in 25 users that buy Left 4 Dead get another Valve game for free. That'd be awesome!
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It's nice to have somebody in the industry who 'gets it' and understands how things REALLY work.
 
Hopefully now they can start persuading others to stop adding additional DRM on Steam.
 
I think Gabe Newell is a pretty cool guy, eh 'gets it' and doesnt afraid of anything.
 
Reading the comments on that page makes me want to palm somebody's face into a brick.

Sure, let's not discuss the DRM, the serious issue currently plaguing and hurting the PC gaming industry. Let's just talk smack about Gabe Newell because of his disinterest in the PS3, or bitch about lack of updates. If all else fails, we can call him fat.
 
So does that mean Valve will remove all DRM from steam? Yeah, didn't think so.
 
He means other people's DRM. Steam's DRM is fine.
 
No Limit said:
So does that mean Valve will remove all DRM from steam? Yeah, didn't think so.
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Valve's DRM adds value, whereas other DRM inhibits. Steam certainly isn't traditional DRM nor does it full under what is normally meant by "DRM".
 
PvtRyan said:
Valve's DRM adds value, whereas other DRM inhibits. Steam certainly isn't traditional DRM nor does it full under what is normally meant by "DRM".
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What value does it add? I don't find having being forced to install a special bloated application to play my games as valuable. Digital right management means protecting the author, that's exactly what steam does. So I don't know why that wouldn't be what's normally meant by DRM.
 
I really wish Gabe would get on a diet and become more healthy, because we REALLY need him to stay alive and keep producing awesomeness.
 
tbh I'm more concerned about George RR Martin's health.
 
No Limit said:
What value does it add? I don't find having being forced to install a special bloated application to play my games as valuable. Digital right management means protecting the author, that's exactly what steam does. So I don't know why that wouldn't be what's normally meant by DRM.
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Right, because Steam has no useful functionality to the user, it's just copy protection.. Everything Steam offers is inherently dependent on games being account locked. Steam is a service, not just a piece of software that's hindering you purely to stop you from pirating it.
 
Yeah, I hope developers get the hint that DRM doesn't work and remove it from future games, because the only other alternatives is them abandoning PC gaming altogether.

Seriously, who thought it was a good idea to add intrusive measures that punish legit buyers and don't really do anything to fight piracy? How does limiting installs or authenticating a single-player game online prevent piracy anyway? I've been putting off buying Mass Effect for the PC for that reason.
 
PvtRyan said:
Right, because Steam has no useful functionality to the user, it's just copy protection.. Everything Steam offers is inherently dependent on games being account locked. Steam is a service, not just a piece of software that's hindering you purely to stop you from pirating it.
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So if EA decided to bundle their DRM with a bloated application that you had to install which let you play a few demos once in a while that would be okay with you? I don't know know about you, but I don't feel like being forced to install additional software I do not need every time I buy a game because of DRM. What Valve does is blatant DRM, for Gabe to be sitting on a high horse preaching how bad DRM is is just a little (actually extremely) hypocritical.
 
No Limit said:
So if EA decided to bundle their DRM with a bloated application that you had to install which let you play a few demos once in a while that would be okay with you? I don't know know about you, but I don't feel like being forced to install additional software I do not need every time I buy a game because of DRM. What Valve does is blatant DRM, for Gabe to be sitting on a high horse preaching how bad DRM is is just a little (actually extremely) hypocritical.
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Nice straw man argument. No, if EA releases their games on a bloated piece of shit for minimal benefit to the consumer, then that wouldn't be OK. However, this isn't the case for Steam, it offers very large benefits and could only be described as bloated if you're living in the Pentium 4 era.
 
It is your opinion that it is not bloated, you have a right to that opinon. For me bloated means anything additional I have to load on my system to make the game I orignally wanted to play work, as in steam's case. You and I should have this choice, but we don't in steam's case. What steam is doing has nothing to do with adding value. If this was about value having steam on your system would be voluntary, instead you are forced to load it. I don't know why you would say that my argument is a strawman, there is nothing stopping EA, Ubisoft, or any other studio from forcing you to load additional bloated software that forces you to give up personal information online as part of their DRM. They don't do that, instead they use regular DRM practices. I actually prefer that. So again, for Gabe to be sitting here claiming that their DRM is bad while his DRM is good is not only hypocritical but I sure as hell hope nobody follows his example.
 
I find the server browser for several different games pretty useful too.
 
My hunch is this has less to do with DRM itself and more to do with how it's implemented. It's not hypocrisy if your DRM is a fully integrated suite with benefits and features whereas others' are just restrictive pieces of shit that lock you out of your game or limit your installs.

You can take issue with Half-Life 2 and other titles that require Steam to play, if you really want to. I just don't see the point since it's not like it's a hassle these days.
 
I am not disagreeing that I don't like the features of steam. The point is that they are forcing you to use it, you don't get a choice. By definition that's not a value added feature since you can not disable it. There are people that can't register for a steam account, they are SOL. There are other people that only want to play single player, why in the world would they need all those additional things? And if other publishers started forcing you to register and download additional software before you could play their games I'm sure there would be a revolt. Finally the economy sucks right now, do you guys have any clue as to what would happen to your games if valve happened to go out of business? They would all be worthless because of the terms you agreed to when you purchased the game. THis is by far the most intrusive form of DRM out there, nothing EA or anyone else does compares to this.

Don't get me wrong, I like Gabe and I like Valve, they built a great community around their video games. But to pretend that what Gabe is saying isn't hypocritical and self-serving is lying to yourself.
 
The main difference between Steam and other, worse forms of DRM is that it doesn't limit the amount of times you can install a product that should be permanently yours. Nor does it install any software on your computer other than Steam itself that isn't easily removable. The fact that it comes with a bunch of useful features is just a bonus.

And that issue of Valve going out of business has been brought up before. Apparently they'll release a patch that makes Steam work completely offline should that happen.
 
No Limit said:
There are people that can't register for a steam account, they are SOL.
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How many people out there play games on a semi-modern to modern computer and don't have even the most rudimentary access to the internet?

There are other people that only want to play single player, why in the world would they need all those additional things? And if other publishers started forcing you to register and download additional software before you could play their games I'm sure there would be a revolt.
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It is not like it is unheard of for games to require an internet connection as part of publishers DRM strategies. Spore, Bioshock and Mass Effect all required an internet connection to complete installation for example and some required a consistent internet connection for "re-authentication". And yeah there was a mass backlash against it. When was the last mass backlash against Steam? Must have been 5 years ago I reckon when, by all accounts I've heard, Steam was buggy and slow.

do you guys have any clue as to what would happen to your games if valve happened to go out of business?
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Valve have already addressed this concern. There is an update sitting on their hard drives that permanently disables Steam's need to contact their servers. Thus if the worst comes to worst Valve's last act would be to allow Steam to run independently from Valve.
 
No Limit said:
The point is that they are forcing you to use it, you don't get a choice. By definition that's not a value added feature since you can not disable it.
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Your definitions are incorrect.
That just means that it isn't an optional value added feature.
 
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