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Half Life 2 Available, Delays Not Valve's Fault
Evil Avatar has the word that even Best Buy is selling Half-Life 2 boxes at this point. If you're planning on picking this one up it should be available pretty much anywhere. Voodoo Extreme has news from Steam that in no uncertain terms are the delays in opening the game to customers their fault. From the article: "This is not Valve's choice. Vivendi is insisting that the game has not yet been released, and has threatened that Valve would be in violation of its contract if we activate the Half-Life 2 Steam authentication servers at this time."
(and Shacknews)
Hey Vivendi...seriously, fuck you.
Wow, that blows my mind that a company could be in such a state of denial. How does a situation like this happen? I could see some corporate mixup causing the game to be released early, but to then insist that it wasn't released is pure lunacy...
This will either result in:
- People downloading a crack
- People returning the game
- People deciding not to play the copy protection game
All three look good to me, and should hopefully promote a more copy-protection free future. As far as blaming Vivendi... Did Vivendi put the authentication in there? No?! Hmmm...
Whose fault is this really, then?
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
I want to play as much as anyone, but we've all known for some time that the release date is the 16th. They aren't doing anything wrong.
I really will laugh when someone cracks the authenticaion for single player play and releases the iso + crack before people who actually *bought* the game can play.
Valve really needs to find an alternative to Vivendi.
It does seem rather unfair that even the single-player portion of the game needs to touch the Steam authentication servers in order to become active; there appears to be no concession made to those who have no Internet connection (or are unwilling to allow the program to touch the public network).
Even Microsoft, with WinXP's activation, has a do-it-yourself option via telephone.
It's disappointing that a content *delivery* system like Steam is instead being used as a content *regulation* and *denial* system.
You forgot the fourth option.
They wait two days and then activate the game and enjoy playing it. What's the big deal honestly?
I'm a firm believer in the philosophy of a ruling class. Especially since I rule. -Randal, Clerks
My first reaction was "wow, what a bunch of jerks Vivendi U are for keeping this game out of play any longer. I said to myself: 'I'll never spend any money on them (after HL2, of course) again.' But if I were in their shoes, i might feel differently.
What I mean is, if I had a deal with Valve that I would produce and distribute hard copies of HL2, then i would not want to be shafted at the last minute. Vivendi invested a lot of money in the raw materials to produce the copies of HL2 that are being sold. I'm sure it was a shock to them (it was to me, but i hated it for other reasons, i'm sure) when Valve came out with steam and started offering their product in a mode that totally bypassed Vivendi. While it is not illegal, it is certainly a dirtbag thing to do. If that was going to be the deal, Valve should have said so up front. perhaps old habits die hard for ex-MS employees.
In any case, VU would have probably been glad to stop all the legal nonsense and allow Valve to unlock much earlier if they had agreed to share a fair portion from steam purchases (since they're not discounted, apparently) with VU. of course that won't happen. in this case, VU would be shooting themselves in the foot to let any more early releases occur, because what gets sold early is going to be their main profit before the massive remainder of hard copies go to the bargin bin.
i'm just as disappointed as the next guy that I can't play until monday, and that i still have to use steam, for that matter (although that's improved a lot), but VU is just looking out for their best interests and that of their employees.
i'll start feeling warm and fuzzy w/ valve again whenever they hire icculus-the-person to do a port. :)
This is amazing.
Valve built some kind of retarded copy-protection scheme into Half-Life 2. Now people who have bought the game cannot play it. They are blaming this on Vivendi.
Amazing. Just amazing.
(Please browse at -1 to read this comment.)
Eh? That makes my brain hurt. What did they say "in no uncertain terms?"
The image of them standing around and yelling "are the delays in opening the game to the customers their fault" is funny, though.
I'm guessing this meant to say "Voodoo Extreme has news from Steam that says, in no uncertain terms, that the delays are not Steam's fault."
Note: my comment has no useful content. I'm just tired and cranky.
The game has to be activated via STEAM before you can play it. Even for single player
...and this is why I wouldn't even consider buying the game.
Besides, just 10 more days until WoW.
So you wont buy a game that needs to be activated online, but you will pay a monthly fee in addition to around 60$ at the register for a game that can ONLY be played online?
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Hey - Vivendi!
I was going to buy the hard copy of Half Life 2 - however I just fired up steam. I don't care if it takes longer (which it probably won't) to get to play it. I am not giving you my money.
Especially after reading This article about Valve and Half Life 2. I now sympathize with Gabe and the delays the game had. I don't really fault him - people make mistakes.
Granted I understand Vivendi's side - but if a publisher only gets $7.00 from a retail game, you start to remind me of the RIAA Vivendi... Download here I come.
To quote George Broussard:
Fuck you.
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!
I have an expectation that I be able to use it then. I do not go buy a hamburger and then wait for permission from Wendy's to be able to eat it, I can devour it while driving away if I like.
If Vivendi doesn't want the game on the market, they need to take the appropriate steps to prevent it from going there. This crap of selling it but not letting you use it till later is just that: crap.
Why is it that people seem to think that creators of digital content should have some kind of unlimited rights to their works. If anything the constution allows a more limited set of rights than on physical property. There has been a long standing concept of Doctrine of First Sale. That means once you sell some IP, be it a book, CD, whatever, you lose control over the copy. Peopel can destrouy it, resell it, whatever, they just can't copy or derive works from the content.
Sorry but Vivendi is just wrong here. If they want to cut the games lose to retailers and allow sales, the damn game better work. Had I bought a copy, I'd be filing a lawsuit on Monday in small claims court (since software companies tell retailers not to take returns on opened merchandise).
So you wont buy a game that needs to be activated online, but you will pay a monthly fee in addition to around 60$ at the register for a game that can ONLY be played online?
I'll pay a monthly fee for a service. It costs to run those servers and it is an online game. I'm not too happy about the initial fee.
I will not ask a company for permission to run a game locally on my own computer after I've already paid for it.
It's going to be fascinating to see if and how long it takes the folks who must be lined up right now to crack it when they can see the traffic to the auth servers.
Regardless of that, the question about what happens if Valve go tits-up is a very good one and actually should apply to any vendor selling protected software. The fact it's $40 instead of $400,000 is irrelevant - there are 400,000 customers potentially losing what they've bought. Unless, that is, the EULA says different.... Has anyone out there with a box actually ready the EULA?
When I worked for a vendor (UK based), we always had to lodge the source code with the NCC (kind of governmental computing standards org) who held it in case we went TU. If we did, the authenticated purchasers had access to the code. Pretty fair solution all round.
Seems like this is something consumer groups and EFF could pick up.
Mike Bakke (not anon but too lazy to reg)
Ok so to start of I've pre-ordered my copy of HL2 from amazon. Hopefully I'll get it on Tues 16th, possibly the 17th. I have nightmares about going to authenticate with Steam and it's be so overloaded I'll have to wait even longer, but seriously take these points into account:
- HL2 is easily the biggest release this year. Here we are 2 days before the release date, and there is no leak. As of yet no cracked versions floating around on suprnova, even though you can pre-load it & the SDK is out. That is unheard of! What was the last game to come out that didn't leak onto torrent sites way before the official release date? Far Cry? nope. Doom 3? nope. Total War? nope. You can even go get a legit copy from shops (in the US I read anyway) and you STILL cannot play before the release date that has been set. That is a success on all fronts. The fact that you've been allowed to purcahse a copy is purely the fault of the shop - the date is the 16th and has been for a while now.
- You don't have to constantly authenticate with steam to play. Once per install is whats needed. Obviously if you don't have a net connection that sucks, or if you're stuck behind a firewall or NAT'ed somehow so steam won't work. Sorry but that's just the way it is. What about people with old machines? They can't play. What about people with very old gFX cards? They can't play. What about linux users? They currently can't play. Non-net users aren't the only ones unable to enjoy it, but the majority of people will be okay. And about the installing in 20 years time question - yeah that may be an issue, but really how many games do you play from 20 years ago?
I guess you never watched demolition man?
Stallone: "Hold it! The Schwarzenegger Library?"
Bullock: "Yes, the Schwarzenegger Presidential Library. Wasn't he an actor?"
Stallone: "Stop! He was President?"
Bullock: "Yes. Even though he was not born in this country, his popularity at the time caused the 61st Amendment..."
truth is stranger than fiction -- this could actually happen?
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
I agree one hundred percent. This isn't a game related comment but does involve how dangerous server-based/controlled applications can be from a user's perspective.
... if I could have even RUN one of their demos I would have picked one and BOUGHT it! I guess these are the kind of business people that lose sleep at night that someone, somewhere, might be using their product without paying for it. Boggles the mind. It's funny, but this kind of thing was used very heavily back in the early eighties (copy protected discs, you know, with the bad sector marks and laser burns and all that crap) but the software industry woke up and realized that they were only hurting their honest customers and themselves. Now it seems like they're taking a step backward and using the Internet for the same thing. I think a lot of it is for the same reason that dogs lick their balls: because they can. You can pull this off if you're a monopoly: when you're in a competitive market it's a risky proposition. In this case, it is driving me to a less sophisticated but safer solution, one that doesn't have any authentication crap.
I've been looking into Windows software packaging applications, in particular Jitit's Thinstall and BitArt's Fusion. Either of these products are impressive and would solve a lot of technical issues that have been plaguing us for some time (among other things I'm responsible for developing installation scripts and generating releases.) But get this: even their downloadable demos require Internet access for activation, and so far as I can tell you can't even use them unless you have permanent Internet access (one of them supposedly has to download program code in order to run, each time you start it!) I was told to evaluate what was out there and recommend one, and I had approval to on-the-spot BUY whatever I came up with. The truth is that I cannot, in good conscience, recommend to my manager that we buy either one of these products. How could I? We're talking about something will become a key part of how we build software distributions, and if the software ever fails to run we (and in particular, I) would be thoroughly screwed. It's amazing how these companies think: they don't trust US to actually BUY their products so they implement ridiculous protection schemes, yet we are supposed to trust that they will always be there to give us permission to use that for which we've already paid! Hell, where I work our Internet connection (powered by SBC, what does that tell you) is a little flaky: I would get upset if I couldn't get my job done because my application couldn't do the ET thing. Just absolutely stupid, and they're losing business
Now look at Valve. $89.00 for their Gold version of Half Life 2. That's a lot of bread for a game. And I don't like the idea that I might someday be unable to play it because Valve isn't in business anymore, or just decides that they don't want me to for whatever reason. Yes, yes, I'm sure there will be a "no authentication" crack out shortly if it isn't already, but it still pisses me off. I bought it, leave me alone. If you want to charge me a fee for the use of your servers, that's fine, that's a value-added service. I personally believe Half Life 1's phenomenal success as an online game was due to the fact anyone could run a server, join a server, and that the master list was available for free.) If Valve wants a repeat of that success they'd best not be too greedy.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.