I'm pretty sure your point about updates to the Steam client is irrelevant to my point about updates to Skyrim. Are you sure you really read it?

Now that is relevant.

But... too little, too late.

I understand that this thread is more about the Bethesda games on Steam, but I thought I should ask here instead of creating a new thread.
With any PC game I buy physically (that you can get on Steam, of course), can I somehow redeem those games in steam? For example, I am getting Morrowind an Deus Ex for Christmas, and I was wondering if I could do this. So I can get the achievements, etc and whatnot that Steam offers with those games.

while some games do allow you the choice to hook your game to Steam, but I don't think those two do, for the steam achievements I think you need to get the steam version to begin with

Those are old games, they wouldn't come with a code you can enter into Steam. Plus, Morrowind and Deus Ex don't have any achivements.

Indeed, although it should be noted they can bypass this at will (it's in the ToS) anyway so it's still kind of superficial.

No way around it afaik.
Are you using the pre-steam patched tesv.exe? If you are, create a restore point before going online, then go online and install your games then go back into offline mode, then go to the skyrim install directory and right-click the skyrim folder and go to properties > previous versions and restore the folder from the point you created, then you can launch the game from the 1.1 exe. You'll have to do this anytime you need to go online with steam though. If you don't have the pre-steam tesv.exe, you're sol though.

I see, thanks (I meant the new one though, which I have found out needs Steam anyhoo)

Paradox Interactive came very close to announcing their newest release, Crusader Kings II, as a Steam exclusive. They hemmed and hawed and hinted heavily (alliteration ftw ) around the subject but never quite confirmed it. Since then they have backtracked a bit and are releasing non-Steam versions of the game. This is notable for a few reasons besides the change-of-heart, the PI developers are as active on their official forums as any devs I have seen, also they have never used ANY DRM on their games before. No disk check, not even any copy protection, you could copy a game to a disk and give it to a friend, just like the old days. They said they were not going to activate any Steam DRM other than the initial activation and only use Steam as a distribution source. Once the game was activated you could uninstall Steam and everything would still work perfectly.

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?566740-quot-Requires-a-3rd-party-download-and-account-quot&p=13009805&viewfull=1#post13009805

"If no DRM is turned on it's no problem to sell through other routes though? So why go Steam only?"


Emphasis on the last paragraph is mine.


http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?566740-quot-Requires-a-3rd-party-download-and-account-quot&p=13009805&viewfull=1#post13009805; it is pretty similar to the discussions here (people set in their ways talking past people who vehemently disagree with how they want to buy games) but with some input from developers, which you don't see much.

Ok, posted a topic in the PC forum, topic was closed and I was directed to this topic ... so here again:

Ok, nothing to do with Skyrim ... but it has: did a total un-install of both Skyrim and Steam, wanna do total clean start again after that haze thing I had in Skyrim.
But first Steam was installed and it tried to download the whole game? Even though I did start the install from DVD? After some search I did find how to install from DVD.

Then that piece of crap will not continue the install because the Steam servers are busy ... what the hell?? I have the game on DVD!!!??

Really, that whole Steam nonsense has nothing to do with software protection anymore: you MUST use it to update the game, so you HAVE to go online with steam. And then together with the update some spam is added about some totally uninteresting free game in the My Games part of Steam. Right: so how is some free spam game suddenly a game of mine??

... really can not understand why we are FORCED to use this piece of crap ....

Ok, rant over, lets see if their servers are not busy anymore.
Ah they are not. Install was finally done (first time for me a DVD install of a game took over 15 minutes!!). Oh and now it's updating over the super fast Steam servers with a stunning 200 kB/s ....

Ok, rant is over really now

Actually it is about protection.... from those who buy (remember that disc & it's contents does not belong to you, the money invested just allows you the right to play as long as you stay in Valve's good graces), those who sell their games to recoop some money & let's not forget the heathen horde on dial-up.

those are the insidious ones that steam is used to fight

While Steam is cool for devs to have an easy patcher, I don't like it as a user.

I disagree with the anti secondary market policies, as I think secondary market allows the first buyer to continue purchasing games. The money isn't lost, devs get it.
I don't like having my bought games tied to an account that could be hacked like PSN accounts, Frogster's, etc. I prefer to have the responsability to keep a working copy by myself.
I don't like having to bend before a company to double-check my honesty if I bought the game when the piracy way makes it easier, sadly.
I don't like getting ads pop-ups in the face each time I'm using the online mode. Using the offline mode makes pointless any attempt to draw stats for your games, so devs can't rely on that. And it brings a kind of consumerism that makes piracy ridiculous : people buy games and they don't even play it. But which game company will speak about that?
I don't know what to blame in my config*, but I do have technical problems with Steam. I don't know if it's inherent to its behavior or if it's badly coded, but when you buy a game and it doesn't launch from Steam only, it's difficult not to see Steam as the problem itself, particularily for solo games.
Given what I had to do to make Steam launcher work, I suspect a dodgy behavior, touching what isn't its business.


* : I'm really amazed that nowadays so many people adopted the awful support hotline answer : "Oh no, we don't have that problem here on our computers. Goodbye."

I see this brought up all the time, just turn them off..

I, like most other people, am no fan of intrusive and draconian DRM systems. I hate having to run third party software on my system in order to play a game, particularly, as in the case of the recently released Skyrim - a singleplayer game that has no online features. I personally discount Steam’s online achievements as completely irrelevant as it is just a method for publicising your private game play online and bragging to complete strangers who mean nothing to you.

As for the usefulness of Steam, it serves its purposes, but these are self purposes only, mostly aimed at convincing the public to make further purchases and its obvious advantage to developers is that their games will reach a larger sales market.

In order to make the Steam client seem attractive to the player, Valve set about a campaign to highlight things such as its ease of updating game titles and the aforementioned achievements, etc. And as we now know, this campaign was largely successful as many people (but not all) bought into the notion. It is quite astonishing to see how many people actually think that Steam is not DRM. It just shows how a good marketing campaign and a pretty interface can fool the public.

With regards to piracy prevention, it does appear to solve the issue of pre-release leaked games. As far as I’m aware, no PC game tied to Steam has ever been leaked prior to official release, and that helps greatly during the initial lucrative sales period. Of course once the game does release, the pirates crack the game executables and release non-steam versions immediately and from this point onwards, the DRM aspect serves no purpose because non-legitimate versions of games do not use Steam at all. The days of Steam being uncrackable have long since passed.

As far as other DRM systems are concerned, for example SecuRom, I have to say that they serve no purpose whatsoever, basically because the whole concept of this kind of DRM is fundamentally and deeply flawed. It can only and will only ever affect a legitimate customer, because a pirate (by definition) will use a cracked version and never have to endure any DRM whatsoever. This means that a developer that opts to have their game tied to this kind of DRM will get little or no advantage for the price they paid for the use of it.


Stannie

You know for all the griping about Steam there is a point here everyone is missing, compared to most other DRM system this one is great! I mean look at the messes we had to deal with before. We had media with specially created bad sectors that would not run on some hardware correctly. We had large intrusive programs that would slowdown the system or even cause crashes outside the game. I understand the complaint of a solo game needing online access but how big a deal is that really? I mean think about it, 99% of gamers I am willing to bet have the internet. I mean this is almost like complaining you need electricity to have a computer.

Now the Steam solution is not perfect for sure but it is far better than other options. Now while in a perfect world we would not need any DRM lets face it we have enough thieves in the world that this is a matter of concern. What is worse though is that we, the gaming community often enable these people by accepting their excuses for being a thief and treating it like it is social acceptable to steal from others. Until the PC community and the gaming community at large stand up and clean house the gamers makers will do what they can.

Bethesda I want to say thank you for using Steam. This method of DRM allows me to install the game on my machine at home as well as my machine at my In-Laws so I can play at either location without having to lug disks and risk breaking them. Plus it gives me a back up to my game media if I should ever need it.

I disagree that it is so great as a DRM granted DRMs of the past had their own issues but Steam is not excluded from having some of those same problems as well, to give an example some people started having issues with Skyrim when the infamous stealth patch was released so know that steam can cause issues as well. and another thing Steam really needs a broadband connection & that is not everywhere,at least not yet
the thing is.. Steam does nothing to curb piracy but instead targets the customer. And I am a against a company making my life miserable if I support it

funny thing. I can do pretty much the same thing with the disc version of Fo3. though I only installed on the computers I personally own

All this talk of DRM etc.....Skyrim was being played by pirates and whoever downloaded the pirated version before the game was even released to be sold....FACT.
Anti Piracy doesn't work.....FACT
Heard the argument made if you pirate games you won't get any support.........LOL?!?! You won't get any either way.....Quite Possible...
You won't be able to play the latest version of the game......WRONG.

Now I don't pirate games but I do know people that do....the one who say pirated Skyrim says his version works independent of Steam(and he has it online and running) It is version 1.3.1.00 now and it has never crashed to desktop he is level 52. Personally I have no issue with Steam nor do I think it is causing the issues that people are having with the game. However being forced into having it to play a single player game is pointless. Piracy will always happen most likely due to the fact that companies like Bethesda cannot even make a functional game....third parties fix that... So why do they assume third parties won't crack and distribute their game no matter what attempt of security they try and add. Steam, SecuROM, etc. have all been cracked through and I honestly doubt there is any game that hasn't been made to work in a pirated fashion either before or on release day of that game. So you are treating the people who are buying your product as suspects. You are actually pushing people to prefer to pirate games which is part of the reason I would assume Skyrim is on steam since it has absolutely no multiplayer not even some type of online leaderboard for idk locks picked or whatnot so what is the point. Before anyone talks about patches and steam....please don't embarrass yourself. You don't need Steam to distribute a patch and matter of fact it does a very bad job at patching most games.

TOO BE CLEAR I DO NOT CONDONE NOR SUGGEST YOU PIRATE SOFTWARE
however
I DO INSIST YOU DEMAND BETTER QUALITY SERVICE FROM DEVELOPERS

That's the thing about Steam, it targets the pirates more than it targets the customers. People who pirate Steam games have no access to the features like achievements or online play, they have to pirate all their patches too since the only way to legitimately get them is through Steam, they can't use the Steam cloud to store their saved games. The only advantage they have is that they don't have to run Steam in the background, and for most people who buy the game that is not even a disadvantage to begin with.


No it wasn't.

You know the majority of PC's and high end hardware like motherboards, processors, sound cards, video cards and memory are bought by gamers! I am wondering when the makers of those items start seeing the light and get involved in this. If devs are going to push we the PC gamer out in the cold, sales of all that hardware are going to dry up and go away too... then what happens?

The majority of console users are under the age of 30 I would bet. I cannot even imagine trying to play a game like Skyrim or Oblivion on a console. I had a friend that was so pro-console constantly. Finally one day I got to show him my setup. He left totally pissed. I showed the big differences. The three main things I showed him were Falcon 4 Allied Force and DCS A-10, then Oblivion and the MODS that expand the game way beyond its original release as well as the websites showing what I had installed was a pittance of what is out there, I showed him some FPS games like Call of Duty Modern Warfare and he could not get over how simple, easy and FAST using a mouse was in a shooter..

Anyhow, What will these hardware companies do if the software companies get their way?

Just because most anti-piracy methods are less effective than producers would like, that doesn't mean they should just give up trying to prevent pirates from stealing their software.

That being said, I do think that DRM often treats the legitimate user who bought the game poorly. Ubisoft has some of the worst DRM software of any company and treats the legitimate consumer like dirt, while not preventing pirates from doing what they do.

However, Steam is a fine balance between "DRM" (in quotes because I don't think of it as DRM) and fair distribution. Obviously you need to be online to download and update the game (how would you do it otherwise?), but aside from a few small instances where you need to be online to activate the game (never more than once, and always directly after the installation which you had to be online for to download the game anyway), you never need to be online again (unless for updating). There's a feature called "offline mode" which most anti-DRM crybabies advocates seem to selectively ignore.

No, Thoth. It was not. The only leaked version prior to official release was the XBox 360 version, which of course has nothing to do with Steam. Simply making bold statements, followed by the word 'FACT' in capital letters will not change reality.

And that IS a fact.

I disagree. Take Skyrim, for example: none of the (mostly worthless) achievements registered for me and the complaints about the patches are already well established. And I can't sell it second-hand should I choose to do so because it's now tied to my Steam account; and contrary to what greedy publishers might think, preventing second-hand sales won't necessarily make them more money because there's only a finite amount that people can spend on games anyway.

Steam causes me various other problems: I can't play if I encounter the interminable "preparing to launch" bug and I can't play if my internet connection goes down. It's of no benefit to me as a player of single-user games and I'd much rather publishers made it optional if they use it at all. Pirates are unencumbered by the problems, don't care about the useless features and will get hold of the patches just fine; usual caveat which is not that I'm endorsing piracy, obviously, but sometimes I think I'm a mug to actually pay to be treated like this.

I agree. And yes, it's very important that piracy is never endorsed, but unfortunately, you are not the only mug that pays for the treatment DRM inflicts. As you say, all legitimate players do. Only the dirty pirates are rewarded for their theft by being free of it.

And this, as I previously said, is the fundamental flaw in DRM.

Running Steam in the background is hardly a con. While it's true that Steam used to be very buggy and a resource hog, these days it really has no impact on game performance and uses so few system resources that it might as well not be there (provided you have even the most basic kind of moderately decent computer).

Besides, if you really feel that strongly about it, most games can just be launched through the .EXE file in the game directory. While some games like Skyrim were patched so that this is no longer an option, for a huge number of games, it is.

you guys need to go to some [censored] country and see some real problems

That's really mature. Just because we're talking about this doesn't mean we don't care about actual life-altering issues that happen elsewhere.

Unlike a lot of people who criticize others about not caring for the less fortunate and but never do anything to help, I actually do things to help the afflicted people. I donate money to Nothing But Nets, I hold fundraisers with my fraternity to benefit briast cancer awareness (among other things), and I donate old clothes to the Salvation Army.

I think New Vegas was pirated a day early on Steam but that's because there was a feature that allowed it to happen. Although I do agree with everything you said, DRM is a severely flawed concept and it's main mission doesn't stop Pirates but further produces more and alienates honest consumers who just want to play the game without interference or a 3rd party system.