Did Valve put the carriage before the horse?

[homercles337]

Was the year long delay due to Valve being paranoid about pirating--hence "Steam?"

Why am i forced to wait HOURS after install to actually play the game while Steam (tm) chugs away using 2-15 CPU cycles "decrypting" files?

Why do i have to have an internet connection to play a game that has a single player campaign?

Is this the direction that all PC games are going? If yes, why would this motivate me to purchase similar games?

Why do i have to have the disc in the player and potentially risk scratches and/or damage to the disc?

Why do developers feel the need to make games so anti-user friendly that they would prefer to put the carriage before the horse rather than think about their users?

Why?

 

[WhiteZero]

Was the year long delay due to Valve being paranoid about pirating--hence "Steam?"

http://www.gamespot.com/features/6112889/index.html

Why do i have to have an internet connection to play a game that has a single player campaign?

You dont... you can play in Offline Mode

Is this the direction that all PC games are going? If yes, why would this motivate me to purchase similar games?

With all the whining people do about Steam, I doubt it.

Why do i have to have the disc in the player and potentially risk scratches and/or damage to the disc?

Your disk wont get scratched if it's just sitting in your drive...
Though I do disagree with having to always have it in there.

Why do developers feel the need to make games so anti-user friendly that they would prefer to put the carriage before the horse rather than think about their users?

I personaly dont see how any of it is not user-friendly. It's just a little time consuming. This is why I have Steam in my Start-Up list in Windows. And if you refering to the authorizing and whatnot, blame piraters.

 

[madcat75]

I just hate the leaving the disc in there all the time thing. That's my only pet peeve.

 

[WhiteZero]

I just hate the leaving the disc in there all the time thing. That's my only pet peeve.

Yeah, I really don't see why they do this, since Steam is there. It's pretty redundant and unnessisary protection.

Atleased us people who bought it on Steam don't have to worry about that.

 

[homercles337]

http://www.gamespot.com/features/6112889/index.html

Yea, i know. I have been following this carp since HL2 was announced. Shoot i still have my disc and case from the original.

You dont... you can play in Offline Mode

Not for some time. And even then it has to be "authenticated" on start up, no?

Your disk wont get scratched if it's just sitting in your drive...
Though I do disagree with having to always have it in there.

Thats my point. There is a no-cd for the game AFTER steam has "decrypted/authenticated/sucked an evening out of my life" but thats not the point.

I personaly dont see how any of it is not user-friendly. It's just a little time consuming. This is why I have Steam in my Start-Up list in Windows. And if you refering to the authorizing and whatnot, blame piraters.

How about a manual? How about a "walk through" for install? How about informing users that install will take an entire evening? How many of the 20,000 banned were actual "pirates?" Its pretty easy to DL a game that you have no intention of buying, or better yet want to see how it will run. Demo? Hello. Also, how many copies did they sell before banning 20k? Was this 0.1%, 1% or 10% of sales? What about sales from crap-box, expansions, etc? Pirating is not going away. Either they should do a reasonable job at thwarting or think of the "real user" that will be spending money on their product. IMHO, valve did a piss poor job with both. :flame:

[edit]well, im off to see if i can cure this sound stutter. :flame: :flame: [/edit]

 

[doomed - uk]

Valve have come up a lot of ideas but many of these them simply weren't thought through well-enough so we've ended up with a lot of people suffering from that.

It reminds me of what happened with John Carmack and John Romero of Id Software after Romero left. Carmack kept Id Software small and focused on Quake 3 but Romero didn't with Ion Storm and their game Daikatana and the inevitable happened there...

With Valve, we have a late/buggy Half-Life 2, people angry about buggy/unavailable/unavoidable Steam, Counterstrike: Source lacking maps/innovation, Half Life: Source lacking proper public information of what it really was plus a late Half-Life 2 multiplayer which also lacks maps/game modes.

I'm sure it'll all get sorted out but maybe just doing what Carmack would have done and focusing everyone totally on Half-Life 2 for a conventional retail release would have been the wisest move.

 

[WhiteZero]

How about informing users that install will take an entire evening?

Because it dosent for everyone... took all of 20min for me.

How many of the 20,000 banned were actual "pirates?"

99.99%?

Demo? Hello.

Demos always take a while to come out. Wah...

Also, how many copies did they sell before banning 20k? Was this 0.1%, 1% or 10% of sales?

Why does this matter exactly? They stole the game, they got baned. Simple.

What about sales from crap-box, expansions, etc?

If you bought the Collectors Box, then you knew what was going to come with it. Also, Vivendi decided what comes with the boxes and what were on them, not VALVe.

Pirating is not going away.

No sh*t, Sherlock

Either they should do a reasonable job at thwarting or think of the "real user" that will be spending money on their product.

Their the first to attempt something this (other than Microsoft with WindowsXP). Trial and Error.

Counterstrike: Source lacking innovation

Never was supposed to be all that different, just a face lift. CS2 will have the innovations.

 

[iphitus]

It's stupid to whinge about software requiring the internet to allow itself to work.
All you need the internet for is to create an account, register cd-key with account, and then you can use offline mode. It's an attempt to stop piracy.

Valve isnt unique in doing this, go and buy yourself a copy of Windows from the store, it locks you out after 30 days if you dont authenticate it to microsoft.

Office, Photoshop, plenty of products want to phone home to be able to install. So dont bitch because Valve is the first game company to do this.

As for the 20,000 pirates: they had used a method to install the game with a fake cd key, that was easy for valve to detect. It's kinda obvious when 100 people have the same CD key they just got from a tutorial on pirating hl2. They probably had other methods of detection, such as logs from registration servers and others.

iphitus

 

[destrukt]

$.

4char.

 

[diluted]

Because Valve is Satan

 

[Link]

ARGHHH - I am going slowly mad with all these posts clogging up the forum.

I'm going to say this slowly for th hard of thinking... If...you...do...not...like...the...way...valve...do...things...do...not...buy...their...products. what os so hard about that? Don't come here to winge, or rather, do it in the dedicated threads. You may think you are more important than anyone else, but you are not, so follow the herd.

Besides, if you have a problem with steam protection etc, blame the ****ing pirates. Its them that are forcing valves hand. Are you telling me if someone kept breaking into your house and stealing from you you wouldn't get better locks, even though it takes every member of your household 5 seconds to unlock it?

 

[destrukt]

I'm going to say this slowly for th hard of thinking... If...you...do...not...like...the...way...valve...do...things...do...not...buy...their...products. what os so hard about that? Don't come here to winge, or rather, do it in the dedicated threads. You may think you are more important than anyone else, but you are not, so follow the herd.

Maybe we didn't know that we'd have all these problems ? Such as people not being able to play the game since the release, over 2 weeks ago. I'm sure when they bought this game they thought "I love Valve, I'll ignore the problems and buy the game anyway!."

Everyone who makes thread is making themself more important ? No.

 

[CR0M]

It's stupid to whinge about software requiring the internet to allow itself to work.

Valve isnt unique in doing this, go and buy yourself a copy of Windows from the store, it locks you out after 30 days if you dont authenticate it to microsoft.

Windows doesn't require an internet connection to unlock.

Remember kiddies, the intarweb isn't omni-present on every PC on the planet. Not even most. Authenticating is a good idea, but an alternative method to auth should be available.

Besides, if you have a problem with steam protection etc, blame the ****ing pirates. Its them that are forcing valves hand. Are you telling me if someone kept breaking into your house and stealing from you you wouldn't get better locks, even though it takes every member of your household 5 seconds to unlock it?

How about some of them 20 minutes and others 2 days? I don't want to stand outside in the pissing rain fumbling with keys when I could be inside by the fire with a loaded shotgun on the wall and brandy in my glass.

 

[Link]

The intarweb may not be omni-present, but Microsoft are. They have offices in just about every country in the world, so setting up over the phone registration is much easier than for valve. Are you telling me that people would complain less if they had to pay international rates to call America to get authenticated. Or perhaps you think valve should set up call centers everywhere? The point of it was to save them money. No use if they spend more than they save running it.

Regardless, I have said my piece, if people want to bitch and moan about what valve did here, rather than to valve themselves, I guess we can't stop them, but it is fruitless, and they are certainly not endearing anyone to themselves.

 

[CR0M]

What the hell makes you think I'm interested in saving Valve money???
If you can't afford to instigate a process like this PROPERLY (ie, with all options covered) then you shouldn't even entertain the idea of doing it at all, it's just common sense.

 

[Link]

Well, you may not be interested in Valves money, but Valve are and its up to them if they do this or not. As I have said in many many threads in the past, Valve are a business and business's are there to make money. Obviously, they felt this method would yeild the most profiable results at the expence of a minority (And yes, its a very small minority) of users. You don't care about Valves money, so why should they care your dislike of their methods. Why should we come to that?

Regards that edit: You have to spend 20 minutes - 2 hours every time you load HL2? You've got something set up wrong. Either that or your deliberatly twisting my anology in ways its not designed to go to fit your argument. Fair enough, if we take what you say, it would be fitting the lock (As its a 1 off thing) And if you can get a lock smith to fit a new heavy duty lock in less than 20 minutes, I will be impressed.

In reality, using my example, I was demonstrating the time/security trade off. If I was continually robbed, I would fit stronger locks at the expense of an extra 5 seconds to open the door and so would valve. You may prefer the brandy and shotgun approach, but when you are found unconscious and drunk, with your shotgun fired and your foot missing with all your furniture gone, don't say I didn't warn you...

 

[CR0M]

 

[homercles337]

To the "this is done all the time" group. Youre WRONG! Plain and simple valve tried putting their SW in a safe, when most just try to lock it up with a chain. Hours to install encrypted software?! WTF is that?! Hours to decrypt SW that was installed encrypted?! Come on...this is simply a POORLY executed attempt at protecting SW that was cracked before it was even released. I paid for this software and have to deal with the time vacuum that is necessary to install/run this shit because valve cant pull their head outta, well...whatever.

Also, what valve did is NOTHING like windows authentication. Windows installs and runs, end of story. Authenticate and it runs for ever. Valve decided to build a system on top of their SW (steam) that has to be installed to install HL2, that has to be authenticated, then has to be decrypted. Thats a FAR cry from what windows does.

BTW, there are no other "internet authentication" apps (Adobe? Nope. MS office? Nope. Whatever else? Nope.). Even if there were would they be so arrogant as to make them "intenet authentic" EVERY time they launch? Nope.

 

[iphitus]

Windows doesn't require an internet connection to unlock.

Yes you can do it via telephone or other methods, but my point is you need to authenticate it. Valve wouldnt have the resources to support a telephone or other alternate methods, so they did what works for them

And to the post above me:

You dont need to authenticate every time you launch, there's something called OFFLINE MODE. You only need to authenticate once. Argue if you wish, but there are other pieces of software which use authentication. My point simply is, that this method is not unique to software, there are similar attempts.

Saying that this is pointless because it will be cracked is stupid. It did work for Valve. CS 1.6 was not cracked for months. No system is perfect and every system is breakable, and the inevitable happened. Someone cracked it, but they lasted a while before that happened. Besides, the cracked version of HL2 isnt as good as the real, the AI cuts out all the time.