Darwinia To Be Distributed via Steam

Nuskrad writes "Independent developers Introversion Software, creators of cult hacking sim Uplink have announced a deal with Valve that will see their highly acclaimed title, Darwinia distributed on the Steam platform from December 15th. It is hoped that the deal will help boost sales of Darwinia, and the profile of Introversion Software, which has been struggling against the 'big boys' of the industry."

Comments

Steam blows.

[Godeke]

I tried Darwinia out and it had some appeal. However, they can forget about me ever becoming a customer via Steam. I'm not sure why DRM on music CD's gets everyone in a tizzy around here and yet Steam is the cat's pajamas, despite the fact it gives Valve remote termination capabilities over the software.

When I purchased Half Life, I was able to play it on my machine and then when I was done my son was able to play it on his. The CD meant I could run only one copy, which I was fine with (in fact, I removed everything but the save files from my machine: I had finished the freaking Zen jumping puzzles and *wasn't* going back.

With Half Life 2, if I put the CD into my machine, it is "bound" to that machine. If my son then tries to put it into his machine and activate it, it will terminate my original account's access to the game and *not* grant the other machine access either. Valve has been bragging up how they have disabled 30,000 steam accounts. That's 30,000 *valid* purchases that were disabled because of potentially the situation described. Wow, sign me up for a reaming up the ... well you get the point.

So, while Darwinia may be cool and all, Steam is *not* the way to distribute in a user friendly manner.

Re:Steam blows.

[Godeke]

Actually, *I* haven't had this problem. I refused to purchase anything based on Steam from other reports of such problems. I *have* been burned by reinstalls back in the day with RealGames (now RealArcade or whatever) and Steam is just the same DRM in a different dress.