The future of PC gaming - 2009 edition

[El_Cid]

I still don't get why the british government won't help out it's games industry in the same way france, canada and the usa does, or even in the way it helps out the film industry? what has british gaming done wrong i wonder?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7919777.stm

Every six months or so you see a plea for some kind of help and it is always seemingly ignored, maybe it's time to move to canada?

And the gama related article:

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=22520

maybe Michigan if not canada(you can also hang out with Mr.Wardell). the uk sucks sometimes

[El_Cid]

How annoying is this?

http://www.totalwar.com/empire/gameinfo/news.php?n=3029

A demo, only available on steam.....sigh who says PC games aren't d00med?

[DrSpike]

You.

[El_Cid]

Doh! ah yes..........

ok i'm sitting here with the Empire total war in my hands. You will need:

Windows XP service pack 2/Vista
2.4Ghz
1GB ram(XP)/2GB ram(Vista)
15GB free HD space
256MB DirectX 9.0c shader model 2.0 graphics card

And now the kicker, on an orange stiker on the back cover:

"Requires Internet connection and free steam account to activate: Notice Product offered subject to your acceptence of the Steam Subscriber Agreement("SSA"). You must activate this product via the internet by registering for a Steam account and accepting the SSA. please see http://www.steampowered.com/agreement to view the SSA prior to purchase. If you do not agree with the provisions of the SSA, you should return this game unopened to your retailer in accordence with their return policy"

and indeed i shall(return it), I just like wanted to play a game easily and legally. It's only a game, i won't jump through hoops. Tell you what Sega/CA why not just release it on consoles and have done with it ok? maybe for the next game? blah! One less PC game series to worry about!(but i was already luke warm over SecuRom on Med2 expansions(didnt get them either) and was falling out of love with the series anyway).

Luckily Med1 has some great mods and is imho the best in the series

[DrSpike]

You should just download a means around the Steam stuff.

[lord of the mark]

How annoying is this?

http://www.totalwar.com/empire/gameinfo/news.php?n=3029

A demo, only available on steam.....sigh who says PC games aren't d00med?

I have heard lots of folks who find Steam very helpful - certainly Valve is pushing hard to support the platform. What exactly is your problem with Steam?

[El_Cid]

You should just download a means around the Steam stuff.

No. I refuse to let publishers bad(imo) decisions force me to become a pirate in an industry i've supported and loved for over 20 years. I have on occasion used abandon ware sites for getting an old difficult to find game(rip HOTUD!), or to replace a title i've already bought on a few occasions and lost disks etc. But i've never used a torrent(dont know how, dont want to know how) to play a new/recent available to buy in shops game.

The thing is these are just games, and very few, these days, have the impact or really improve on what has gone before imho, so i would rather just not buy(or in the case of ETW get a refund). So i often don't these days, especialy in the AAA market.

I have heard lots of folks who find Steam very helpful - certainly Valve is pushing hard to support the platform. What exactly is your problem with Steam?

Implimentation mostly. It doesnt have to be as intrusive a system as it is, stardock/impulse and a few others prove that. But also i suppose there is an 'ethical' element to my choice to not go with steam. They are kind of too big, in terms of the D2D market, and their business model can be very hard nosed to smaller devs in terms of pricing and exclusivity deals etc. I kind of have a feeling they are becoming like MS is to the OS monopoly.....that kind of thing, and i dont think that is especialy good for gaming or the promise and potential of the D2D movement. I just think they could do better in terms of being for the developer and the gamer, less than monopolised business for themselves.

Also in current world climates(financialy) who is to say exactly if anyone around now(in D2D) will be here in 5 years time? I still play games from 20 years ago, i just dont like the idea/principle that these systems might stop me being able to do that. Yes i do know Steam have said if they ever get in trouble they will 'unlock' peoples games from their system BUT you have a steam game, mostly that wont work with non-steam patches etc so that could be a problem also.

Yeah, i just wish they were less draconian(in implimentation), offered manuals, were more considerate of smaller devs(they are sometimes, so why not always?), and had games that could use 'normal' patches/updates etc. I want to feel like they really want to help push PC gaming and devs getting the games to the punters, but well it seems a heavy handed approach, especialy in terms of how other less influencial D2D systems can deliver.

[lord of the mark]

so its intrusiveness on your system, monopolization, and having the game should they go out of business.

I cant speak to the intrusiveness, other than that many say its not so big an issue.

as for monopoly - it seems I keep hearing about new services - gamersgate, impulse, direct2drive, and GOG and I think even Gamestop has a service. If only I had so many choices of operating systems - and its not like a game download service is quite the commanding heights of the world economy like PC OS's are (or were). Anyway, I would see that as a reason to buy from a different service where possible, not to avoid a particular game altogether.

As for not having the game if and when they go out of business? Well we are talking a game, that costs $50 US now, and will cost much less in 2 years time (thats been the patter with TW games) So IF Steam goes out of business in 2013, and IF whatever they unlock doesnt work, you go and buy a used copy of Emp TW off Amazon for $10 or whatever that is in your money. Not a big deal as a contingency, really is it? And if you are so deeply offended at paying again, well in that case even I could justify alternate means of acquisition, I guess. So I just don't see that as a big issue.

[El_Cid]

so its intrusiveness on your system, monopolization, and having the game should they go out of business.
.......edit.........

good points and all reasonably weighed up, I would say if you loved Medieval 2 Total War the best out of the series then Empire only being on steam shouldn't be that much of an issue for you.
For me the series has been doing a "1 step forward 2 steps back" thing since around Rome: Total War(my old favourite 'graphics over gameplay/depth'), add that to my upto this point reticence over steam in general and well i'm not too upset - i can live without this new breed of TW games i think

@Asher yeah i agree Impulse isn't quite as 'finished' as Steam currently although they are in the process of developing what will be one of the better DD systems.
Stardock itself was eventualy a fairly painless system to use but did give me odd results when patching a retail copy of GalCiv(it created new game icons that didn't quite have all the content i think it should have....complicated story, quite dull but yeah I can expect Impulse to improve on all that).

For me the biggest draw of Impulse is the not needing to keep an active internet connection open(i.e you can physicaly disconnect from the net with no lack of function of the games). I dont game on my internet PC and neither do i directly connect with the internet on my dev/gaming rig, so i need to be able to work around that.

"I'm the customer, therefore i'm always right" - i really hate being dictated too when it comes to how i use my leisure time, if a games company wants to nanny-state me into some restrictive system because of "their" issues i'll just take my money somewhere else, it's as simple as that. At the end of the day these are only games we are talking about.

[DrSpike]

Impulse isn't nearly as nice as Steam.

3 times now I've had to completely uninstall and completely redownload and reinstall games (wiping out my settings each time) to do Sins of a Solar Empire patch.

That sucks.

Call me mr evil if you want but I think that justifies downloading it illegally.

[El_Cid]

Another fun selection of Indie games to check out in this gamasutra article:

http://gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=22595

I like the look of Blush, ever since getting into eco the dolphin I think 'peaceful' underwater theme games need more attention

Oh and i liked "Linear RPG", very inventive and dont forget to read the story in the background!

[lord of the mark]

That sucks.

Call me mr evil if you want but I think that justifies downloading it illegally.

If I understand the folllowing correctly, they are working on the problem. Doc, this is one developer I think you might really want to support.


Yea we're working on something called "Impulse Anywhere". There's really two parts to it.
First, a web-based mechanism for downloading a .impulse file that can then by copied to other machines and such (so you could use Firefox to download a .impulse file from the web from wherever and take it home to install via Impulse).

The second will come in the form of updates to Impulse Reactor (this is similar to Steamwork except Impulse Reactor is more server based, doesn't require the Impulse client) which will allow games to update within themselves without having to load up the client.

The first part will be available before Demigod because, let's face it, a lot of people, particularly in Europe, are not in a position to download a multi-gigabyte program to their home computer.

The second will come later since it requires developer implementation work too.

At least, doc, come to Qto3 and ask Brad directly before you dl illegally.

[DrSpike]

Well I wasn't planning to play it so no immediate urgency.

[Nikolai]

The first part will be available before Demigod because, let's face it, a lot of people, particularly in Europe, are not in a position to download a multi-gigabyte program to their home computer.

Eh, what? Broadband is pretty usual in Europe now... In Norway it's almost no people who doesn't have broadband now, if any. 2-4 Mb/s is pretty much standard, and not few of us have more. Broadband came on the market a little less than a decade ago, for crying out loud.

[Standup]

Eh, what? Broadband is pretty usual in Europe now... In Norway it's almost no people who doesn't have broadband now, if any. 2-4 Mb/s is pretty much standard, and not few of us have more. Broadband came on the market a little less than a decade ago, for crying out loud.

Not sure about the rest of the EU but most people I know in the UK with broadband also have useage caps which are around 10-15GB a month. I guess a download of Empire would use up much of that allowance. I know quite few less technical people who have been caught out with additional charges after using Iplayer (BBC TV streaming) so I think it's potential problem. Or do most gamers have better useage deals?