Halflife2 on dvd only?

Razor

Razor

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With the announcement of Far Cry coming on dvd only and not including a cdrom version of the game, what is the possibility that Valve will do the same, release only a dvd version?

It is great to see that game developers are starting to harness the storage capacity of a dvd drive and to try to get the few remaining people left behind to upgrade from their old cdrom drives.
 
Even though I agree with you Badger that excuse would have kept the gaming world stuck with MX's for all eternity. That said, powerful graphics cards aren't really essential yet (DX2 aside, although that's pixel shaders not raw processing power)while a drive clearly is.

I'm sure Valve said that both formats would be likely- I have a DVD drive, and I wouldn't care if they went the way of FC (which I hadn't known they'd taken, for the record)but many others would.
 
mrBadger said:
Doubt it. They better not tbh, since not everyone can afford DVD drives
Click to expand...


I would have to disagree with that statement since a dvd drive could be purchased for a less then Halflife2 will be when it comes out. A dvdrom drive costs about £15 - £30. Yes, there are people without dvd drives and yes there are people that wouldn't be able to afford £15 - £30, would these people be anticipating Half life 2 though, a game that is being aimed at taking advantage of £100 graphics cards and more.
 
Yes, but how do you explain the fact I have a card thats worth about 160 quid, but I don't own a DVD drive? The thing is, I am thinking of purchasing a DVD drive.. but only becuase I'm sick of 4CD changingness :/
 
mrBadger said:
Yes, but how do you explain the fact I have a card thats worth about 160 quid, but I don't own a DVD drive? The thing is, I am thinking of purchasing a DVD drive.. but only becuase I'm sick of 4CD changingness :/
Click to expand...

You haven't got one most probably because you don't need one, like a lot of other people :).

If Halflife2 is only going to take up 2 or 3 disks, it might be an inconvenience to use 3 disks to install the game but it would just be that one time. But a dvd would offer the advantage though.
 
Yes, I didn't need one when I was building my computer, and also, I didn't know how to put in more than 2 IDE devices :eek:
 
Pretty easy, the first just has to be set as the master, and the others as slaves. At least, that's the way we did it for my new computer. XP took care of the rest.
 
Atari/Epic have the right idea - both CD and DVD versions for UT2k4.
 
I think I remember reading that it would come out on both versions. Plus valve is trying to make sure the game will be available to everyone, thus the backward compadability with slow systems, so I doubt they'd make it so only people with a DVD drive would buy it, since the older computers they're trying to design for probably don't have a DVD-ROM.
 
Didn't VALVe say the DVD version would be the collector's edition? IIRC, that's how it was announced.. correct me if I'm wrong
 
I would hesitiate to guess that any computer that can run HL2 will also have come with a DVD ROM Drive.

The only reason you would have a decent PC that didn't come with one would be if u was badger, and built your comp yourself and didn't buy one, in which case I doubt people into computing that much can't find £35 to buy a DVDROM Drive :)

It would be a very small minority that didnt have DVDROM drives and were going to play HL2, but that said, if u want to cater for EVERYONE (and their grandfather) you would make CDROM version.

Possibly their "Cheap Walmart" version, if they are still doing it, will be a CDROM version.
 
The collectors edition will be on DVD, but there's no way I'm getting that. It would be nice if the normal game is on DVD only then I'm garanteed to get the DVD version and not the CD version when my pre-order comes through the post.
 
ALL games should only come on DVD these days. All computers have come with a DVD drive for years, and even if you don't have one you can pick one up for ~£20.
 
Wilco said:
I would hesitiate to guess that any computer that can run HL2 will also have come with a DVD ROM Drive.

The only reason you would have a decent PC that didn't come with one would be if u was badger, and built your comp yourself and didn't buy one, in which case I doubt people into computing that much can't find £35 to buy a DVDROM Drive :)

It would be a very small minority that didnt have DVDROM drives and were going to play HL2, but that said, if u want to cater for EVERYONE (and their grandfather) you would make CDROM version.

Possibly their "Cheap Walmart" version, if they are still doing it, will be a CDROM version.
Click to expand...
Wilco, I didn't want to have useless hardware, so I didn't buy a DVD drive :p I don't own any DVD movies or anything, so I failed to see the point. Anyway, I'll be buying one soon, USB 2.0 external :)
 
Valve says - we don't care. Buy from steam. You could have NO optical drives and still play HL2.

That being the case, they better let us burn that massive piece of meat to some discs for backup.
 
I hope they make a DVD version. Quicker Installs, fewer CDs.

Oh yeah, my computer can have up to four optical drives. SATA :) (right now I have three - easier than swapping out CDs).
 
WHAT? is FarCry DVD only!?! the hell!?? now I gotta get a god damn DVD player...
 
I agree with what Razor says near the top.. Most don't have DVD players / burners in their PC's cause there's no real need for them. I author DVD's quite a lot, but I don't have one in any PC here, don't need one. Until I need one I wont be buying one either. It's certainly nothing to do with the price, they are dirt cheap now compared to only a couple of years ago. Though granted, if my CD-RW dies, I'll probably just replace it with a DVD-RW instead, but right now, I can live without.. I don't need one for films, I'd much rather watch those on a big TV than a monitor anyways :)
 
Yeah same here, and I won't be buying a DVD-RW before my now 40 cd spindle is empty :p

Also I have no need what so ever for a DVD player for my comp, since we have at home 1 home theaters system with a big tv, one DVD-RW for the tv, one DVD in my mums and dads bedroom, one PS2 dvd player in my sisters room. :p
 
Fenric said:
I agree with what Razor says near the top.. Most don't have DVD players / burners in their PC's cause there's no real need for them.
Click to expand...

I think you'll find it's a crushingly huge majority who do have DVD players in their PC.
 
MaxiKana said:
WHAT? is FarCry DVD only!?! the hell!?? now I gotta get a god damn DVD player...
Click to expand...

That's what's been floating about, Ubisoft said it themselves according to farcryhq.



Iconoclast said:
I think you'll find it's a crushingly huge majority who do have DVD players in their PC.
Click to expand...

Agreed. I think 90% of my friends with PCs have DVD drives
 
I think it will come in both flavours, but I wouldn't be surprised if DVDs become the norm for game releases over the next 6 months, simply because games are getting bigger and bigger. It is easier to create and package 1 DVD for a manufacturer than 4-5 CDs.
 
Iconoclast said:
ALL games should only come on DVD these days. All computers have come with a DVD drive for years, and even if you don't have one you can pick one up for ~£20.
Click to expand...

When you reason this way; 'All computers should now be void of 3.5" floppy drives' then your reasoning makes sense.

Why are they still in computers?

On a side note though I have heard that Intels next chipset won't have a Floppy Controller supported on it.
 
Kincaid said:
When you reason this way; 'All computers should now be void of 3.5" floppy drives' then your reasoning makes sense.

Why are they still in computers?
Click to expand...

No.

Floppy drives still have uses, that's why they're still in computers. The benefits of a CD drive over a DVD drive when a DVD drive is incredibly cheap are non existent. Unless you're a 12 year old the price of a DVD drive should you require one are almost completely moot, even more so when you consider all the other kit you'll require such as the necessary memory, processor and graphics cards to get a modern game to even run.

I picked up Knights of the Old Republic over Christmas - 4 CDs. I'd gladly pay £20 to upgrade to a DVD drive if I didn't have one just so I could avoid this crap in future, not to mention the other benefits such as the reduction of overly compressed movies designed to fit on the last scrap of space on a CD.

There is no reason that games should still be produced on CDs. None.

The console market moved over to DVD a long time ago. I am continually amazed that the PC market has not done so.
 
1 DVD version. 1 CD Version. Simple.
 
Kincaid said:
When you reason this way; 'All computers should now be void of 3.5" floppy drives' then your reasoning makes sense.

Why are they still in computers?

On a side note though I have heard that Intels next chipset won't have a Floppy Controller supported on it.
Click to expand...

There really isn't a need to have a floppy drive with windows XP and a modern motherboard, as you can boot from the CD directly. I'm not surprised that floppy drives are becoming redundant. I can't even remember the last time I used mine.
 
Kadayi Polokov said:
There really isn't a need to have a floppy drive with windows XP and a modern motherboard, as you can boot from the CD directly. I'm not surprised that floppy drives are becoming redundant. I can't even remember the last time I used mine.
Click to expand...

Floppies are only good for boot disks, that's about it. I use floppies when flashing my BIOS/booting into DOS.. past that, I have no use for them
 
Personally my computer is getting on a bit .. 2 and a half years old nearly now .. but a with the few strategic upgrades I've given it it will be able to run hl2 reasonably .. not spectacular but it will do the trick .. but I don;t have a dvd drive .. and don't plan on getting one in the near future and I think there will be a lot of users like that.

Apart from anything else do you see valve or possibly more pertinently the publisher alienating a not insubstantial market share by going dvd only.
 
The question is, if Valve did make it dvd only, would there be anyone that would be dead against it?

Over the next year, i really do think we will start to see the phasing out of cdrom software completely, in favour of the larger capacity of the dvd.

With this special edition dvd, will it just be the standard edition with a t-shirt, poster, etc, or will the extra storage space of the dvd actually been made use of and something extra i.e. a making of...movie, interviews, behind the scenes pictures, concept art, etc? Like the bonus disks in dvd movies.
 
Shuzer said:
Floppies are only good for boot disks, that's about it. I use floppies when flashing my BIOS/booting into DOS.. past that, I have no use for them
Click to expand...

Not true, floppies will still be around for a while. Floppies have many advantages over a cds, they are much faster, are more durable, and are very useful for transporting docs. I use my disc everyday for taking docs to and from school.
 
mrBadger said:
Wilco, I didn't want to have useless hardware, so I didn't buy a DVD drive :p I don't own any DVD movies or anything, so I failed to see the point. Anyway, I'll be buying one soon, USB 2.0 external :)
Click to expand...


when you find one that you think is good, could you tell me about it? I've been trying to look for external DVD drives with not much luck.
 
Six Three said:
Not true, floppies will still be around for a while. Floppies have many advantages over a cds, they are much faster, are more durable, and are very useful for transporting docs. I use my disc everyday for taking docs to and from school.
Click to expand...

..floppies are faster? What are you talking about? It takes over a minute to transfer 1.44MB to a floppy, it'd take less than a second if you did that to a CD

Besides, USB pen drive devices are pretty much over throwing floppies in terms of portable storage, they're much faster, hold more data, and are alot smaller.
 
hmm.. i'd guess Valve would have both DVD versions and CDR versions for HL2.. but i guess a benefit of owning a DVD version would be less worrying about losing CD's..

i have visited enough forums to see "omg i lost my hl, op4 and bs cds" line.. with have a DVD version u eliminate the number of cds u can lose.. assuming of course that HL2 will need 3-4 discs.

anyway DVD drives are cheap.. so if pple can afford $300 dollar video cards, than they can afford DVD drives as well :p
 
Shuzer said:
Besides, USB pen drive devices are pretty much over throwing floppies in terms of portable storage, they're much faster, hold more data, and are alot smaller.
Click to expand...

HL2's comin out on a pen drive? That'd be great!

/me reeks of sarcasm
 
Hmmm to sum it all up. The only people who CAN'T afford a dvd drive are people that are kids that don't have any money. Thus, 14 year olds (give or take) and under. For the rest of us who have jobs, I don't think this comes off as being a big deal. I'm looking forward to the collectors edition.
 
i think they will
simply because that is the future
 
lol well then i'am not buying Far Cry cause a dvd disk is no good to me , i'd rather have 4 discs, rather then going out and buying a dvd drive only to install games
 
To everyone who has said they dont plan on upgrading to DVD, I have this to say....

Good luck installing games in a year or two ;)
 
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