Did you not read all the responses to your OP? Iirc only one other person had issues with Steam, and they still use it. You are being short-sighted on this - cutting off your nose to spite your face springs to mind, I don't know if you have that expression? :hmmm:

The posters in that thread did not even correctly understood what the problem was and thus gave answers to questions that I did not really ask. They described a different problem situations - which were not present in their described form on that man'S system. I had given up the thread back then, for this reason.

And if you want to know more precisely than basing on one thread in a forum that has nothign to do with Steam, I recommend you do a search via Google, like I did extensively. When I say the complaints of people locked out of their games or unable to play when they want count by legions, then I mean it. It is not just Shogun, but apparenbtly Steam-based games in general. Empire especially got mentioned as problematic, too.

And I searched just the German-tongued web, !

Google search terms like 'Steam problems' or 'Unable to play Steam game' and you'll get page upon page of people bitching about Steam, obviously. I think by having issues with one game, that you didn't even pay for, and refusing to use Steam in future is just absurd. I think online DRM, as long as it's not too intrusive (or like Sony's rootkit from CDs a few years ago), is perfectly tolerable if you've got a reasonable t'interweb connection.

Yes you're tied to Steam, but so are millions of Steam users every day without complaint.

Steam has it's advantages when it comes to online playing, but I really find it absurd and annoying that I'm forced to use it when playing games that doesn't even have a MP function, such as Mafia II :doh:

Who are "people"?

You've just had had a whole thread of people tell you that their experience with Steam has been pretty good, and so has that of the roughly 50 friends I have on my Steam list. As I said, I think one reason that Steam holds such sway over the market is that it's not just DRM, it is also a whole package of services, and those services are pretty good.

Sorry, I disagree with you, you have a rather biased sample in your "too many people" study, which by the way isn't terribly good quantitative science to begin with.

Steam has its pluses and minuses, like everything, but overall it's a pretty good platform. Until someone invents a better business model for distributing games and maintaining games online, I'll stick with this one.
By the way, Steam also has an offline mode - which works darn well and has no issue letting you use games on as many PCs as you like, as long as you don't try to get online with them. I've had zero issues with that even on creaky old laptops where I just wanted to put an old game or two. Ran without a hitch, and I never saw more of steam than an icon in the system tray.

From game developers' perspective, it also makes a certain amount of sense to adapt their games to a platform that offers them a marketing tool, a matchmaking service, auto-update framework, and DRM all in one go. Again, the fact is that until there's a better economic alternative available to developers and publishers, I don't think you'll see them 'untethering' games. From their perspective, the ability to sell and maintain their games more efficiently is a much bigger gain than pleasing a few luddites.

Doing a steam forums search via google gives me 8 350 results for the search words:
Currently Unavailable.

At the moment of writing this, there are 4,020,716 Steam users online.

Looks to me it's working just fine, all apps have problems, but to hint it's widespread
is just silly.

Did you read the FAQ for the "currently unavailable" issue at Steam's site, Sky?

Yes. Already weeks ago.


CCIP, which part of when I said "offline mode does not solve issues" did you not understand? ;) Or if you use google again. What you tell the many many peoples that also report that offline mode first works and then does not work anymore? ;)

Do a search for for example "Shogun 2 Spiel ist nicht verfügbar", or something like that, as I said I already found a huge number of comments and desperate questions when just searching in German. Not just five or six. But pages over pages, on a wide array of game titles.

Anyhow, neither the Steam boards nor their FAQ help me, and do not help the many people who also are left stranded with a steam game that they bought but cannot play. Hell, even on Amazon they bitch about it. And the clever ones of them come to the same conclusion like me: this business model is not worth to be supported by my wallet's content. So I will not buy Skyrim, and cannot play Shogun 2, like it also did not run on a totally foreign system as well. I hoped that maybe I could get Skyrim a year later, free from Steam, but it seems not. Okay. Bad lesson learned, many many hours uselessly wasted, several afternoons and evenings killed over nothing - an experience that I made weeks ago over several days, have repeated now again over several days, and will not repeat another time. .

And the latter will not change in the future.

And now moving on.

But this is subsim, and we're only on page two! You know this isn't how it works. :O:

Good point. :hmmm:

Herr-Berbunch, you are a smelly apeman! :stare:

Name calling - check

Now, for the pointless "I'm right, you're stupid" debate, so here goes:

Black is really yellow!

Oh, so wrong!
I am, of course, assuming you're domesticated? :hmmm:

Not necessarily house-trained, but domesticated. :O:

Source for the ferret vision (also known as boobopia)


Edit: Can I also put forward a motion to change Dowly's name to Duke Dowly, or Dowly Nukem?

In before Obama :O:

NO Yellow is really blue! get your facts straight!!!! For we all know its a conspiracy by the left, and or right commiefascistsimpeiralsocialistcapitalistsists who are invading the internet, and media leaving their false smokescreens to fool the normal populace!

but in the end its Obama Fault!!!!!!

There we go... it is now GTalized.

And yet still only on page 3, let's keep working for another couple of days and then necro this, say -err, next July? :yeah:

JULY! July is a lie... its a month made up by a conspiracy... the 12 conspiracy... they didn't like that there where only 11 months. so they shoved July in!!!!

Sorry, it's obviously a conspiracy that is Jewish in origin - Jew Lie, how could I have been so foolish. :damn:

What about February? Or is that the conspiracy to put iron in alcoholic beverages? Fe Brewery... :hmmm:

April?

Hmm... cant think of anything wrong with April. other than the spring conspiracy.

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a1...ou88/what2.png

Someone in steam really needs to pay attention, and or get fired.

Shhhhh! We're trying to convince Skybird to use it, and you show up with a case of incompetency which isn't going to make him change his mind!

I have a cunning plan - we'll get Tribesman to say Steam is rubbish and shouldn't be on Sky's PC - that'll do it. :har: