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Have you tried tech support? They are way too helpful when I need it. You might see if there's a problem that has to do with your location, especially if you connect through certain universities. I haven't been having any problems with downloading games or content.

If you connect through a router, try here

If its after buying a game, try here

Other applications can sometimes prevent connection aswell; the test here can help identify if your running some that may cause conflicts

Server status can be found here, I have it book marked. If there's no bar; there's no service.

Have you tried tech support? They are way too helpful when I need it. You might see if there's a problem that has to do with your location, especially if you connect through certain universities. I haven't been having any problems with downloading games or content.

If you connect through a router, try here

If its after buying a game, try here

Other applications can sometimes prevent connection aswell; the test here can help identify if your running some that may cause conflicts

Server status can be found here, I have it book marked. If there's no bar; there's no service.

Have you tried tech support? They are way too helpful when I need it. You might see if there's a problem that has to do with your location, especially if you connect through certain universities. I haven't been having any problems with downloading games or content.

If you connect through a router, try here

If its after buying a game, try here

Other applications can sometimes prevent connection aswell; the test here can help identify if your running some that may cause conflicts

Server status can be found here, I have it book marked. If there's no bar; there's no service.

Lots of people have had crash/lock-up problems, see this 47 page thread on the problem http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.p hp?s=ba8aabc64afc836e73033b7bd2d1781b&threadid=444 078

I love HL2&ep1 but I have had a lot of problems with it (but not HL2 oddly) and I live in the hope of an update that will sort it. I would love to buy ep2 but I will wait a month or so and see if others have the same problem before I cough up.

When I was a lad, all our games ran on Steam!

Is it just me, or does Valve's Steam already do what PHANTOM is planning to do? Heck XBox Live 360 seems about the same too.

Props to the Phantom guys if they can get others to join them.

IMarv

As a matter of fact, there are legitimate licensing solutions--they just don't cover all the most popular games, at least not yet.

The best license management system out there, bar none, is Valve's "Steam" (http://steampowered.com/) system. Most people are familiar with this is the basis for their internet-based software distribution model, but there is actually a special version of Steam that is available for use ("required" actually, if you're licensed) by game centers. This "cafe" version of Steam solves three problems:

(1) it does license management: you pay Valve for a certain maximum number of concurrent licenses, regardless of how many actual PCs you have, and Steam manages the licenses for you.

(2) Normal game software updates can kill your internet connection's bandwidth--World of Warcraft is the worst (but others are almost as bad): it runs a custom BitTorrent client with no bandwidth limits on every machine running the game; every time people started playing WoW in my 27-PC cafe after an update had been released, no one else in the cafe could do anything on the internet, including simple web surfing. The cafe version of Steam uses a local Steam server (which you have to provide) to fetch updates once, then disburses them to local PCs over your LAN, as needed.

(3) The cafe version of Steam lets customers save their games, automatically copying the relevent game state files onto your local Steam server. If you don't have something like this, no one can really play single-player games, since they have to start from the beginning every time they come in.

And no, Steam isn't just for games from Valve--there are lots of other publishers that are using Steam now. . . but if the game publisher doesn't have a distribution deal with Valve, Steam won't help you.

There are several other companies that are trying to do their own version of Steam specifically for game centers, but, as is often the case, these problems are actually a lot harder to solve reliably and consistently than they appear at first sight, and Valve has at least, from what I can see, a 2-year head start on everyone else trying to do this.

Could you do it yourself? A friend and I wrote all the software (http://fun-o-matic.org/) we used my game center, and we tried to tackle license management, too, but never got beyond the early development stage with that particular module--I'm convinced there is no technical reason why it can't be done. However, as a previous poster pointed out, just because YOU think you're being fair and legal doesn't mean the game publishers will see it that way, so unless you have a special licensing agreement with every publisher, you'd be running some legal risk, anyway.

Personally I find the amount of information contained in this article lacking and misleading. From the sounds of the short article the questions were loaded, probably something like this, "How do you feel about piracy in the game market?" Everyone knows that piracy can be a problem on the large scale. However, I think it has absolutely nothing to do with companies moving their efforts to console. Also, I think charging users a fee every month isn't the answer either. As much as I disliked the concept to begin with, I have come to embrace the way Valve Software has moved in relation to content management systems with Steam(http://www.steampowered.com/). I think it provides a very effective and reliable system for distribution. While it can be inconvenient at times, I love the fact that I can download steam from any computer log on and have access to any games I have bought through the system. While the software maybe installed on three machines only the one with the account I'm currently using can access the content. Obviously, people could hack the system, yada, yada, but I think all in all it's a very good way managing and controlling data without being too inconvenient.

most people are not running 1024 or 1280 desktops...most are still running 800 or at most 1024.

To answer your question specifically, you can refer to this post http://www.steampowered.com/index.php?area=news&ar chive=yes&id=691. This is part of Valve's Content Delivery system aka Steam. It would appear that you only need to purchase Half Life 2: Episode 2 which comes bundled with Portal and TF2 (Team Fortress 2).
 
Having said all that, you are not obligated to buy anything by setting up a Steam account. I've had a Steam account for over 4 years (early beta tester was not fun :/ ), I've had my fair share of frustrations with Steam but lately, it's rock solid. Valve has been done some good work with the system. In addition, if you haven't already played Half Life 2, or the original, I'd highly recommend it. I'm a firm believer in the episodic content (if implemented correctly) that Valve is testing out. I finished Episode One in about 5 hours and thoroughly enjoyed it. HTH.

I am really looking forward to the game Portal by Valve. It doesn't appear to have very much shooting, but it looks like a total blast to play. And SO different from any other puzzle/FPS game I have ever played. Portal Trailer on Steam

You're missing the point. Take a look at Half Life 2: Episode 1 stats. Click on the question mark next to the "Games Completed" as well.
When only half of the people playing the game reach the last map, something seems to be wrong. While all games are for entertainment purposes, games like Half-life 1 & 2 are telling a story. If you don't finish the game, you're missing out on the story. It would make more sense than to make it a little easier to finish the game so the story gets told, than to make it harder so less people get to finish the game.
You also need to realize the indented audience. Some games are very heavy on the story, and some are run and gun based. Just like some comedies are slapsticks and some are based off of dark humor. Different audiences. It sounds like this game wasn't designed with you in mind, which is perfectly okay. You will never find a game that is designed for everyone. I can't stand counter-strike, yet most people I know love the game. Prey is perfect to me at this age. I work 12 hour days and when I play a game, I want to be able to do a little at a time, have some story (but nothing I have to be too focused on), and be easy to learn and fun to play. I'm only 25. I'm sure your desires for games are much different.
Just something to keep in mind before reminding the Slashdot community how your views are the best...

http://www.gametrailers.com/gamepage.php?id=13

The trailer shows the use of a portal gun that seems to be an evolution on Valve's Gravity Gun from HL2, so you can pick up objects and such while traveling through portals. Watching the trailer made me really want to play with that technology, and after reading the review, I might have to try Prey when it's a little cheap.

Does Prey have multiplayer? I'm thinking that almost any of the multiplayer games based on Steam would be insane with the portal gun thrown in.

PC ain't dead. There's a small valve keeping it alive. :D

That given, the consoles have a long life in them yet. Wii60 is the way forward; power and innovation, hand in hand.

3000?! Valve is currently reporting 122,843 players with 4.723 billion player minutes per month.
http://steampowered.com/status/game_stats.html

I loved HL2, loved ep 1 apart from the fact that it crashes avery dman half hour. I would get much more excited about episode 2 if they could get episode 1 to work, so many people have had crashes with ep 1 (http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread. php?s=af9613eb805c3b3e392eba8461620be3&threadid=44 3922) it needs sorting before ep 2.

I just bought the game about a month ago from a retail store (mistake -- the price was nearly double of what it should have been, but I was impatient).

When I finally got to installing the game, Steam told me the key was registered. I was pissed at first, but then took digicam pics of the serial and the receipt and sent them to Valve via their support site, along with a message where I described the situation. They took nearly a week to respond, but when they did, their response was to grant me my key back.

Valve need to do something about this, but they do have a process in place that serves as a workaround.

While I'm sure you mean HL2, HL1 was out in 1998 and it still has a huge number of people playing it. Checkout http://steampowered.com/status/game_stats.html Steam's Network status: 1. the original Counter-Strike and Half-Life's Deathmatch is just below HL2:Deathmatch at #7.

Was there an option for this anywhere that I missed?

Yup - every so often, when Steam starts it comes up with a brief message asking if you'd like to take part in the hardware survey. If you click yes, it detects what you've got, presents you with what it's found and then asks if it can send it off to Valve. If you do, it then links you to the results.

Evil. Pure evil.

My poor MacBook Pro got abused in this way. :-(

Episode one, on launch day, was incorporated into two packs of games sold on Steam (including the complete pack for $80) contain Episode 1, in addition to the $20 pack sold in stores that includes HL2:DM and HLS:DM.

You can see the details of the three packages here: http://storefront.steampowered.com/v2/index.php?ar ea=game&AppId=380

Does the boxed version come with all the extras the Steam version does?

http://storefront.steampowered.com/v2/index.php?ar ea=package&SubId=79&

Have you even read the Steam Subscriber Agreement? Accessible via Help -> Steam Subscriber Agreement or here: http://www.steampowered.com/index.php?area=subscri ber_agreement

C. Acceptance/Rejection/Returns The terms of this Section 3.C do not apply to European Union consumers. You will have a period of thirty (30) days after the date of receipt of any Merchandise to examine the Merchandise to confirm that it conforms to this Agreement and the offer for such Merchandise presented to you at Steam. If the Merchandise does not conform to this Agreement and the offer for such Merchandise presented to you via Steam, you may reject the Merchandise by returning it to Valve (at your expense) along with a copy of the receipt or other proof of purchase. Additional policies and instructions for returning defective merchandise to Valve can be found at http://storehelp.valvesoftware.com./ After Valve has received your valid return, Valve will, within a reasonable time and in Valve's sole discretion: repair the Merchandise, replace the Merchandise with an equivalent item, credit to the credit card used to pay for the product an amount equal to the value of the Merchandise (as determined by Valve in its reasonable discretion), or provide another remedy that Valve determines in good faith is appropriate in the circumstances. All claims whether based on contract, negligence, strict liability or otherwise are waived unless made in writing and received by Valve within thirty (30) days after your receipt of Merchandise.

If you thought a game you bought via Steam sucks did you try to return it to Valve? Valve's not an evil company, if you really feel legitimately ripped off by a Valve product that was completely misrepresented and you bought it because of misleading information from Valve then you should completely return it. Unlike CDs purchased in stores, Steam does allow a license code to be deactivated and therefore makes software returns possible. Did that ever cross your mind? Of course, if you buy it, play it and then just think, meh, it wasn't as much fun as I thought it would be and try to obtain a refund then well...

Looking at the temperature graphs, I think the bigger message from the testing is that it isn't necessary to spend the extra cash on buying non-stock cooling. You can even get away with non-stock cooling if you're overclocking.

Rather than spending cash on changing the stock cooling, consumers would be better off spending that $50 on getting better ventilation for their case since recently, the biggest producer of heat /noise in the computer is the video card, not the processor. Currently my AMD 3500+ (overclocked from 2.2->2.6ghz on stock cooling) is running at 37C while my gpu at non 3d is running at 57C and will approach 87C when using graphically intensive applications. Typically gpu coolers are built thinly...so in order to make up for the smaller room to work with cooling wise, the fans are run at very high rpm. This also makes the video card the noisiest thing in the machine.

By the way, if you're looking for a good place for help on building a computer, I find that the steam hardware forums are the best place to get help.
Steam Hardware Forums

As someone who owns several original versions of each of Half life, Opposing Force, Counterstrike, Blue Shift, Team Fortress, Gunman Chronicles and Condition Zero (as well as Half-life 2, CS:Source as Steam purchases) my reasons would include:

A P233 with a Voodoo card could run all of the HL1-based games at a very decent speed when they first came out. Even now my 1GHz laptop can still perform more than good enough TODAY on all the above HL1 games without needing a brute of an AGP/PCI-Express card. CS:Source kills it stone dead, as does HL2.

Each HL1 game provided many hours of play and something completely different each time (even CZ was quite different to CS). Most were designed for offline play for the most part and therefore the single player game was the primary focus. In a time when the Internet WAS 56K modems or less this was a big plus.

Mods were very prevelant and didn't require extreme 3D graphic skills to get a basic mod running. For HL2 serious physics, enormous maps, complicated AI, professional-level 3D graphics and level design all mean that a casual mod will be next-to-impossible for the average small team to produce on their own.

http://steampowered.com/status/game_stats.html

That page shows you that I'm not on my own with this. The sum total of all source-based games doesn't come NEAR the sum total of all HL based games. CS alone has 4 times the number of player-minutes compared to CS:S. Then include the fact that even the serious competitions are skipping CS:Source completely because it's been dumbed down.

Are you an HL2 mod developer? If so, link to your HL2 mod.

I am one (our project burned out for a while), and I'm far more satisfied with the HL1 modding environment. I don't feel like repeating all of the reasons why, but amongst the developers I know, it's a well shared sentiment. Valve is nowhere near as friendly to developers anymore, especially to us open source ones.

The HL2SDK is astoundingly disorganized, barely compiles properly on GCC, is poorly supported, not ported to AMD64, and known serious bugs have gone unfixed for over a year.

Look at the game stats. The most popular third party Source mod is a tinker toy called "Garry's Mod". The next highest used Source mod has users that can be counted in one server screen. Not only is independent modding for HL2 a failure, but Valve is directly impeding it.

For the third year in a row, Urgo's list of April Fool's Jokes on Websites contains the most complete list of April Fool's Day pranks websites have created. Featured by news.com.com.com.. and Microsoft, the site strives to list EVERY joke site, and is updated every few minutes with new verified jokes.

Here is a sample, the twenty most popular ones:
blog.outer-court.com - Google Rooms
thinkgeek.com - USB Tanning Center, RFID Blocking T-shirt, Grow Your mymsnsearch.com - fake (but hilariously accurate) search results gtachicago.com - gta chicago does not exist, (*hint check the whois info*)
tveps.net - Isaac 'Chef' Hayes not leaving southpark after all. Comes clean that it was a publicity stunt.
iwantoneofthose.com - tiny device that downloads your brain's memory to a 2GB USB Flash Drive
blizzard.com - BLIZZARD ENTERTAINMENT® PRESENTS BURGERCRAFT(TM)
bolloxcomics.co.uk - Myspace parody
figuiere.net - int is_computer_on(void)
wiebetech.com - 5 TB iPod
googlesystem.blogspot.com - Google Browser is finally launched. Installer 1.68MB
steampowered.com - VALVe purchased by Apple
slashdot.org - OMG!!! PONIES!!! (and pink layout)
ogrish.com - (NSFW) Bizarre Baby Born In Nepal
worldofwarcraft.com - Blizzard to put Wisps as a playable race for World of Warcraft.
gearlog.com - Laptop Lingerie: Bringing Tech & Pleasure Together
2600.com - 200600 google spoof
bungie.net - Bungie's next game, Pimps At Sea, progessing nicely for the Xbox360
forums.worldofwarcraft.com - World of Warcraft 1.11 patch notes leaked
theregister.co.uk - customise The Register to suit your needs - from blocking ads, to selecting the kind of stories you really want to read.

For the third year in a row, Urgo's list of April Fool's Jokes on Websites contains the most complete list of April Fool's Day pranks websites have created. Featured by news.com.com.com.. and Microsoft, the site strives to list EVERY joke site, and is updated every few minutes with new verified jokes.

Here is a sample, the twenty most popular ones:
mymsnsearch.com - fake (but hilariously accurate) search results
thinkgeek.com - USB Tanning Center, RFID Blocking T-shirt, Grow Your Own 1up Mushroom Kit, Caffeine Inhaler, and more
blog.outer-court.com - Google Rooms
gtachicago.com - gta chicago does not exist, (*hint check the whois info*)
tveps.net - Isaac 'Chef' Hayes not leaving southpark after all. Comes clean that it was a publicity stunt.
blizzard.com - BLIZZARD ENTERTAINMENT® PRESENTS BURGERCRAFT(TM)
iwantoneofthose.com - tiny device that downloads your brain's memory to a 2GB USB Flash Drive
bolloxcomics.co.uk - Myspace parody
wiebetech.com - 5 TB iPod
googlesystem.blogspot.com - Google Browser is finally launched. Installer 1.68MB
figuiere.net - int is_computer_on(void)
steampowered.com - VALVe purchased by Apple
slashdot.org - OMG!!! PONIES!!! (and pink layout)
ogrish.com - (NSFW) Bizarre Baby Born In Nepal
worldofwarcraft.com - Blizzard to put Wisps as a playable race for World of Warcraft.
gearlog.com - Laptop Lingerie: Bringing Tech & Pleasure Together
2600.com - 200600 google spoof
bungie.net - Bungie's next game, Pimps At Sea, progessing nicely for the Xbox360
forums.worldofwarcraft.com - World of Warcraft 1.11 patch notes leaked
theregister.co.uk - customise The Register to suit your needs - from blocking ads, to selecting the kind of stories you really want to read.

Seriously, these new HD DRMed formats are setting themselves up for failure. I feel that Sony, Toshiba et al must must think that their prospective buyers are really stupid. It's almost offensive just how low these companies are willing to go to protect their profit margins, especially when there are so many better ways to do it.

While I'm busy boycotting these new formats, I'll be waiting for stuff like this to hit the mainstream and become as simple and widely-used as this or this.

P.S.: For what it's worth, Apple is a member of the Blu-Ray Disc Association. Are they thinking of an application of the technology that could be tied to iTunes (download movie, burn, watch on your TV,) or just going with the flow of capitalist greed and not counting on the success of the format?

I'm 42, and I love FPS and RTS. WoW and the rest of the MMORPG's are a black hole - I played SWG for a while and realized I was spending more time gaming and thinking about gaming than on RL. And for what? So I could earn some fictional skills and make more fictional money?

FPS has been good for me - my son and I play together (CS:S) and I join in competitions through CAL and TWL. I even cut back on caffine, alcohol and started exercising so my game would improve (well, in part, it was also for general health reasons). My kids play team sports and game, and I also play sports from time to time.

Back to the original question - would I watch MLG tourny's? I guess, since I watch CS demos now of pro players so I can learn strats and skills. It would probably be more interesting with interviews, and some kind of interaction from the viewers (vote for the best play of the match, etc). Does it have wide appeal? No, but then again look at the stats on Steam (http://steampowered.com/status/status.html) and you'll see that there were 2.6 million unique players on last month, for over 5.6 billion minutes of play - that's like 35 hours a month per player? What kind of untapped add revenue is that?

That is certainly not the impression one gets after reading dozens of complaints on steampowered's forums. Nor, even it it were true, does it solve the problem of initial activation. At least Windows XP allows activation by phone.

Even Steam allows you to play Half-Life 2 in a completely offline mode - whether Valve are still extant or not.

If anyone can possibly make a good and fair DRM system, it's Google.

I don't know if they'll end up screwing this one up and end up just playing along the content providers game but there's a chance that a new breed of fair DRM will emerge from Google.

I think that the DRM concept isn't necessarily the problem. The problem lies in its current implementations.

Well, at least, most of them.

It comes to me that a very nicely implemented sorta DRM system is Valve's Steam. It actually adds value, IMHO. I don't know its innards but it seems to provide some kind of developer platform which abstracts content loading, so that it can be downloaded on demand. A direct consequence of this is that I don't ever need to worry about losing the game disks of a Steam powered game. I can always download them again. I find this pretty neat.

... because thanks to a german consumer association, if you have bought a retail box of HL2, you no more have to pay Valve the infamous "$10 resell tax". Strangely, this move from Valve has made little publicity.

But if you only have a Steam version of HL2, well you are out of luck. You need to realise you haven't bought any game, but merely pay some subscription fees to access an overhyped content on some buggy and restrictive online service. So technically, you have pretty much nothing to resell. Did you say the advertisement was unclear?

I suppose that is one way to look at it, but really isn't that what propells some of the greatest game today? What would Half-Life or it sequel be without its mod community and company provided SDKs and Editors? Who would still be playing HL today if not for Counter-Strike? (why not see for yourself http://www.steampowered.com/status/game_stats.html ) Really, this is the kind of reason I love HL2, WoW, and others. The sense of creating something your own that would be very difficult otherwise, whether it is your own unqiue (to a point) Warlock a Texture to call your own, or a great Deathmatch level to share with your friends. Spore has a long way to go before we'll know if it truely worthy of admiration, as it is now described it seems an evolution of the mod scene. A game created to allow nearly unlimited creative design for all users in an easy interface, and the ability to automatically share these creations with all the Spore community. If nothing else, the prospect of how it's written to dynamically create content and reducing the need for massive content development teams.

Here you go. Next time, find it yourself.

I have no problems with a transferable key. I to have a problem with "binding" to a machine, having been burned in the past by reinstalls on the same hardware causing loss of access to games.

Purchases of games on (and for) Steam aren't bound to any particular machine, just to a particular Steam user account. As a wild example, my PC could be destroyed in a nuclear explosion, taking every last molecule and data bit with it, and so long as I can remember my email address and Steam password (and possibly not even that) I can download the Steam client on another machine and get access to all the games I've bought.

It's absolutely not a perfect system (Valve seem to have some kind of a vendetta against dial-up users for a start) but the roaming-account system is one of the more impressive aspects of it.

A brilliant bonus for Introversion will be the huge amount of publicity. My very own MINERVA mod is in Steam's games listings, and so far it's chewed its way through over 100,000 downloads and about 1.5TB of bandwidth. I won't be purchasing Darwinia through Steam, sadly - I've got my very own, lurid-green boxed copy as purchased just days after release. It's a great game, and well worth it. I hope they get the success they deserve...

Steam games aren't bound to the machine, they're bound to the Steam account. You can use an account on any machine, assumming that only one machine is connected at a time - if you try to log into the same Steam account on two machines, the first gets kicked off. Steam games can only be used on one account though. (I also found info about moving retail games between Steam accounts, but it isn't that freindly from the looks of things)

Do you have any evidence that all the Steam account that Valve banned were for valid purchases, or for people trying to (innocently) register used CD Keys? I seem to remember that they did have a problem with people getting stuff for free from Steam, and they got kicked off, but I haven't heard of people getting kicked off otherwise. (Why do people making such fairly inflamatory statements on Slashdot never provide a source? It would really help their case if they provided some sort of source...)

Anyway, I am rather unwilling to pay for big purchases through these DRM systems I suppose. I do have Half Life 2 (bought the retail version for £13 in an offer on Amazon.co.uk), but otherwise I've only bought a few single songs from iTunes, if I buy an album or something, I'd prefer to have the real CD.

(I already have Darwinia anyway, I don't need to worry about buying it through Steam anyway).

Steam games aren't bound to the machine, they're bound to the Steam account. You can use an account on any machine, assumming that only one machine is connected at a time - if you try to log into the same Steam account on two machines, the first gets kicked off. Steam games can only be used on one account though. (I also found info about moving retail games between Steam accounts, but it isn't that freindly from the looks of things)

Do you have any evidence that all the Steam account that Valve banned were for valid purchases, or for people trying to (innocently) register used CD Keys? I seem to remember that they did have a problem with people getting stuff for free from Steam, and they got kicked off, but I haven't heard of people getting kicked off otherwise. (Why do people making such fairly inflamatory statements on Slashdot never provide a source? It would really help their case if they provided some sort of source...)

Anyway, I am rather unwilling to pay for big purchases through these DRM systems I suppose. I do have Half Life 2 (bought the retail version for £13 in an offer on Amazon.co.uk), but otherwise I've only bought a few single songs from iTunes, if I buy an album or something, I'd prefer to have the real CD.

(I already have Darwinia anyway, I don't need to worry about buying it through Steam anyway).

I have no problems running both HL2 and CS:S on multiple computers on my local network using the same steam login. In fact, I've never heard of anyone having a problem with this. Everyone complains about all these problems with Steam when in fact they dont even exist. Oh well, at least people find those ignorant posts "interesting".

When worse comes to worse you can always play HL2 on multiple computers in "offline mode":

http://support.steampowered.com/cgi-bin/steampower ed.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=213&p_creat ed=1094245645&p_sid=MA2oEYQh&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoP SZwX3NvcnRfYnk9JnBfZ3JpZHNvcnQ9JnBfcm93X2NudD0yNzM mcF9wcm9kcz0mcF9jYXRzPSZwX3B2PSZwX2N2PSZwX3BhZ2U9M Q

I've been using steam for 3 years or so, and yes, it did suck back in the day. It's working fine now so everyone can stop that annoying, ignorant whining.

I don't think being the "best FPS available for a console" would mean 5 million copies sold if all FPS suck on consoles. The shiniest piece of shit is still a piece of shit, and generally, pieces of shit don't sell.

Also, just because you don't enjoy and/or aren't good at console FPS doesn't mean they suck. I know there are around 2 million Counter-Strike players who would disagree, but I don't think too highly of their opinions. Nothing against you if you play CS, but as the Steam forums prove, there are a lot of stupid CS players. Not that there aren't a lot of stupid Halo 2 players.

That said, I don't see what the big deal is. I like FPS on both consoles and PC. I tend to prefer consoles simply because they're cheaper, but in terms of controls, using two thumbsticks instead of a mouse honestly doesn't bother me. It's less accurate, sure, but when everyone is using the same configuration it's not like you're at a disadvantage.

Well, I find it interesting that gamers that play Half Life 2 are split nearly evenly. Intel is still in the lead, but AMD has a substantial share.

According to Valve's survey, which results are located at: http://steampowered.com/status/survey.html
AMD has 47.77% and Intel has 52.22%.

You can also see some interesting stats on Video cards.

Didn't Linux get people used to great software with no packaging?

I'm actually really excited about this, as it is long overdue. There is really no reason for software to be purchased through traditional retail channels anymore. Not only should this be slightly cheaper, but it will allow for impulse purchases without spending the few hours it would take to go get the stuff. See a positive review of Halo? Go and download the game. Need to edit a PDF file before your meeting tomorrow? Instead of waiting for the store to open tomorrow morning, or running off to Kinkos and run up a dollar-a-minute bill, just buy the software you need right now and use it. All of your software would be available in a centralized location somewhere, helping to make things easy to find with Microsoft's legendary User Interface skills (cough cough).

The only potential (and probably highly likely) problem that I can see is if it were unnecessarily expensive to get into Microsoft's little digital mall that it became dominated by a few big retailers. The UI could also be crappy, the application might crash all of the time, the DRM could make it difficult to carry things between computers... So there are other potential problems. But as a fundamental ideal, buying software in 100% digital form, and in a forum that comes with every system is kind of nice. I'm sad that Apple didn't do this first, but I'm glad somebody other than Valve did.

So that those who prefer SP games don't get their hopes up,

IT'S MULTIPLAYER ONLY

Of course, if you want some single-player HL2, there's always my episodic MINERVA (less cryptic site), which had its first chapter released just over a week ago.

And yes, the first map is a bit of a homage to Halo's Silent Cartographer (it was originally nicknamed 'Flatulent Geographer' for a start), but they should all come with a liberally Marathon-flavoured dollop of mystery and intrigue, through text messages sent by an unnamed third party which guide, goad and cajole the player through the story.

Entirely different approach to Dystopia too: while they've got some immensely talented modellers, texture artists, sound engineers etc., I'm repurposing existing HL2 content for my own needs. There is some new music, but that was an unexpected gift from someone who really liked the look of the mod when first publicised by Valve themselves. Everything else is done by me - it's the closest you'll get to a one-man mod these days... ;-)

Still, there's half-an-hour to an hour of gameplay there, so do have fun!

In related news, the long overdue Day of Defeat: Source mod is set for release on September 26th.

You will be able to purchase it on Steam and pre-load the large art files a week in advance.

If you already bought the silver or gold HL2 edition you can reportedly pre-load now.

http://www.steampowered.com/Steam/Marketing/Septem ber9.2005/

To answer to both you and the child poster, Blue Shift came with a high-definition model pack (which updated Half-Life as well), and that scientist in the screenshot (a main character in Blue Shift) was a good demonstration of the HD pack.

And yes, I would agree that Blue Shift was a bastardization, as you put it. It was only a few hours long, and the story wasn't nearly as interesting or well-done as that of the original Half-Life.

And for nostalgic reasons, I like the original 8-polygon faces better anyway :-)

To those of you who use Steam to play Half-Life, they only just recently released Blue Shift on Steam, and later released the high-definition pack.

To answer to both you and the child poster, Blue Shift came with a high-definition model pack (which updated Half-Life as well), and that scientist in the screenshot (a main character in Blue Shift) was a good demonstration of the HD pack.

And yes, I would agree that Blue Shift was a bastardization, as you put it. It was only a few hours long, and the story wasn't nearly as interesting or well-done as that of the original Half-Life.

And for nostalgic reasons, I like the original 8-polygon faces better anyway :-)

To those of you who use Steam to play Half-Life, they only just recently released Blue Shift on Steam, and later released the high-definition pack.

Regarding distribution, look at Valve's online distribution, Steam.

About the initial $50 investment, I agree to a point, then my reasoning takes a different tack. Most games on initial release tend to suck, especially MMOs. If you are allowing free access for a month and everyone tries a game during its first month, almost nobody will be back to pay-to-play for half a year or so. I fairly agree with the rest of your points/examples. There are good chances that something else will be released taking eyes away from last month's offerings, reducing the number of people returning at that six month mark.

Again, it comes down to percieved value. If you get something for nothing your initial expected percieved value is quite low. If you pay $50 for it, that initial value is expected to be higher. The more value we percieve the more likely we are to continue paying a monthly fee.

In other words, Valve was in no way obligated to give me those things, even though I had given them $50.

That is the kind of mentality that disgusts me about the Valve community. People act like Valve is the second coming of Christ or something.
Over the years, I've paid roughly $280 into the Half-Life franchise. This includes my purchase of the original version of Half-Life, Opposing Force, Blue Shift, Half-Life 2 and Gunman (even though GC is not technically a part of Half-Life). Under normal conditions, I would have multiple, viable, copies of some of these games due to the way they've been packaged. With Steam, I lose all of that.

Valve has a habit of, "joining," existing accounts to new purchases. Therefor, if I already have a copy of HL registered on Steam, I don't get a second viable copy if I buy the Gold/Silver package. http://www.steampowered.com/ clearly states I get the back catalogue, yet what happens if I already have a copy of it? Does Valve give you a second copy? Nope, not at all. People pay $80 for what? HL2 and crap port versions of HL:S and CS:S?
Until gamers figure out that Steam hurts gamers, be sure you have a lot of lube.

i agree completely. i will NEVER buy anything from valve EVER as long as steam is required. what really pissed me off was the fact that the original HL2 retail box didnt mention an internet connection being a game requirement.

It did. If you don't believe me, check out the http://steampowered.com/ forums. People that did complain were told to look again at their retail boxes. Guess what they found?

http://www.steampowered.com/index.php?area=news&id =435 Steam and Halflife run on linux. I'll refrain from insulting you.