Productivity and Creativity Software Coming To Steam

lga writes "Valve announced today in a press release that they are expanding Steam beyond games and will start to deliver other software. This means that Steam will compete directly with Microsoft's Windows Store and perhaps explains some of Gabe Newell's disdain for Windows 8. The ability to save documents to Steam Cloud space also brings Valve into competition with the likes of Dropbox and Skydrive. According to the press release, 'The Software titles coming to Steam range from creativity to productivity. Many of the launch titles will take advantage of popular Steamworks features, such as easy installation, automatic updating, and the ability to save your work to your personal Steam Cloud space so your files may travel with you.'"

Comments

MS In-OS Store

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is that Microsoft is basically screwing over everyone who has a popular application or game digital store, the same way Apple screwed over the growl team by implementing that in-OS and the Instapaper guy by including that functionality in the OS. They basically are undermining an entire eco-system that already exists (and, in fact, one which in turn actually supports the entire OS's existence, such as the 30 million gamers who may largely only use Windows because that's what is required to play their Steam games on).

Re:MS In-OS Store

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, except the service and the cloud space and the applications etc. are being provided by Valve through the Steam platform. Microsoft didn't do anything but say "yes we think Windows is better with this". Any gripe you have about the way it works or what effects it will have should be directed at Valve.

I know you love to hate MS. I don't like 'em either so I don't use Windows (nothing to bitch and moan about is a good thing!). But this just can't be so hard to understand.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[Sir_Sri]

I think he means with the windows 8 store. Valve is desperately (not necessarily correctly) trying to find something to keep them alive when the windows 8 app store rolls around. They are thinking (possibly completely wrongly) that people won't want to use steam when there's an official MS store.

I suspect they're wrong though, I suspect that the windows store will end up full of crap, including apps for webpages and that nonsense, and valve can own a chunk of the premium store market for windows (and linux).

Re:MS In-OS Store

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, the windows app store will only support new WinRT style programs. The entire installed base of Win32 programs will not be available. If those software vendors want "app store" connivence, they can deal with Steam. It's a very smart move on Valve's part.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[lister king of smeg]

windows store will only support WInRT style programs til cold hard reality comes up and bitch-slaps them in the face. then they will support them and screw over valve. that slap may come in the form of seeing valve rake in money, or people calling them up and screaming them out because their win32/win64 apps won't restore, or any of number of other causes or combinations of all of them. valve stands to gain a whole lot from this in until ms pulls the rug out from under them. they will probably have a metro app for their own store as well as a traditional version. the metro version would on a system restore reinstall all of your programs probably the win 32/64 apps as well.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[exomondo]

The problem is that Microsoft is basically screwing over everyone who has a popular application or game digital store, the same way Apple screwed over the growl team by implementing that in-OS and the Instapaper guy by including that functionality in the OS.

You're comparing the wrong things here, Apple did that with iOS and Microsoft is doing that with Windows RT but neither have done that on their desktop operating systems (Windows 8 and OSX).
There's been enough negativity surrounding Windows 8 that i can't imagine Windows RT is going to overtake Android or iOS so i doubt there's any worry about that becoming ubiquitous.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[PopeRatzo]

Valve is desperately (not necessarily correctly) trying to find something to keep them alive when the windows 8 app store rolls around.

This is the part I can't understand. Why would a Microsoft App Store make it less likely people will use Steam? Is Microsoft going to have distribution deals with every game developer?

Right now, the number of games that I'd be interested in that are NOT on Steam is extremely small. In the past year, there's been only one game I wanted to check out that I couldn't buy on Steam. Fortunately I was able to play it before I bought it because it didn't turn out to be any good after all.

Steam covers my PC gaming needs. I really don't see myself suddenly deciding I'm only going to buy games from Microsoft, especially since the only time I think of "games" and "Microsoft" in the same context is whenever I get angry at how horrible Windows Live for Games is. Every time I go to play a game and see "Games for Windows Live" my stomach sinks because I know it's going to be an extra layer of hassle, such as Arkham City.

If somebody gives me a choice between MS and Steam, I'll pick Steam 10 times out of 10. If Microsoft decides I can't have that choice, I'll go to whichever platform supports Steam. Hell, the only reason I use Windows at all is to play PC games. If those games move to a different platform, so will I.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[Sir_Sri]

Microsoft going to have distribution deals with every developer

having had the unfortunate 'pleasure' of working with a team of people doing business with valve, valve very much builds deals with individual developers. It's basically the same deal for everyone, 30% steam cut, but they do talk to you individually, sometimes not very nicely (and sometimes deservedly so). I suspect MS will have to automate everything and not really build individual relationships. This gives them an advantage in volume, and ease from a developer perspective, but it's worse from an end user perspective.

And ya, steam has everything except blizzard and EA's top tier games, and a few MMO's (because if you're an MMO maker steam is really not something you want to be on if you can avoid it). I see them as continuing to be the premium game and online service provider. I wouldn't be surprised if they lose out on their indie business largely - but even there they can pick up the premium versions.

It will be interesting to see if Microsoft bans bundling steam into games on the windows store. Gamersgate did that for a while, but had to give up on that plan.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[geekoid]

") trying to find something to keep them alive "
yeah, the millions from selling in game items and making very popular games will just go away.

The windows store will end up with thousand og apps for their phone and tablet almost no one uses.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[Sir_Sri]

That's my point. They seem to be spending a huge pile of money, and exerting a huge effort in trying to hedge against windows 8, though I'm not convinced they're in any real risk.

Then again, the reason you invest in a hedge like that is because if you guessed wrong and didn't have a plan B you'd be out of business.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[somersault]

I think it's a rational direction for expansion to be honest. I don't think you even have to look at it as trying to compete against anything. Steam is great because it lets you install your games on any machine you want, without worrying about finding discs and typing in license keys (well, most of the time..). To be able to do that with other software would be a nice addition. It would be like having a package manager, but for paid-for software.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[VGPowerlord]

And ya, steam has everything except blizzard and EA's top tier games, and a few MMO's (because if you're an MMO maker steam is really not something you want to be on if you can avoid it).

That and for the larger MMOs, most of the ones not on Steam are by Blizzard and EA... Square-Enix, Sony Online Entertainment, Turbine, and CCP (makers of EVE Online) all have their MMOs on Steam.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[aaron552]

It will be interesting to see if Microsoft bans bundling steam into games on the windows store.

I may be wrong, but I thought that Microsoft only wanted "Metro-style" apps distributed via the Windows Store. If that's the case, then yes, they'd effectively be banning bundling Steam (or at least, Steam wouldn't be able to distribute the app)

Re:MS In-OS Store

[Stan92057]

Stream may have lost thousands of customers because of the forced agreement. They lost me for sure since i didn't agree i am unable to play the games i paid for which i don't think will stand legally. I may choose Gamestop over MS because of the volume of games they already have.

Re:MS In-OS Store

[hobarrera]

Maybe the growl team did get screwed by the fact that the OS suddenly included the feature, but would you prefer to have an OS lacking features just so some third party can continue to implement it their own way? AFAIK, OS X was the only user-friendly OS that didn't have any notification system out-of-the-box. The only other one that didn't were the sort of OS that don't have an email client or browser out-of-the-box (ie: gentoo, debian, bsds).

Re:MS In-OS Store

[Sir_Sri]

It doesn't seem to have changed their peak concurrent users any. They might have lost marginal customers, but they seem to have retained their core base.

At least not when you're measuring user numbers in the ~4-5 million range. Whether it cost 100k users here or there is hard to tell.

Great!

[Githaron]

Just do it after you create and release Half-Life 3.

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

Half-Life 3 has been re-imagined as a suite of image editing software rather than a first-person single player action game, and will ship with this release.

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

I see that they're following the example of Master of Orion III, which instead of creating a sequel, they released some tax software with an alien interface.

Re:Great!

[toejam13]

So then, the new method to kill your foes in HL3 will be:

Select the wand highlight tool
Click on your opponent
Select the Gaussian Obliterate tool, with pixel radius set to 50px
If foe is not obliterated enough, select the Obliterate More tool

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course, it'll be a first-person image editing application.

Single pixels gets done by your 9mm, spray effects gets done by the mp5 or shotgun while the gravity gun with various implements takes care of cutting, filling etc. Wanna fill? Take a barrel of the stuff. Of course you'll get your obligatory Portal Device to for managing layers/navigation, etc etc.

Sounds a lot more exciting than Photoshop to me.

Re:Great!

[seepho]

You misspelled Hat-Life 3.

Re:Great!

[CadentOrange]

So true. I remember trying to get to grips with MOO 3, failing hard and thinking there must be something wrong with me because games are supposed to be fun.

Re:Great!

[VGPowerlord]

Hat-Life 2 is still going strong. Releasing Hat-Life 3 would likely piss people off who have put time and/or money into 2.

Interesting ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Their focus on Linux suddenly starts looking differently ...

Re:Interesting ...

[maxdread]

And if they start to move into streaming apps/games through steam, the OS you're using will be irrelevant.

I CAN WAIT !! #2

[Anonymous Coward]

Hardly !!

Single Point of Failure

[The Raven]

Valve has, numerous times, banned users from Steam for violating policies (such as cheating). When only games are affected this is draconian, but understandable. However, what about when your kid cheats, and that gets your copy of Office taken away? All the documents you created?

This is something that will have to be addressed in the TOS before I would be comfortable putting too much in their care.

I should note the same issue affects Google... this is not unique to Steam.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Anonymous Coward]

You are not allowed to share your account or credentials with another person. Why are your children using your Steam account?

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Anonymous Coward]

Valve has, numerous times, banned users from Steam for violating policies (such as cheating). When only games are affected this is draconian, but understandable. However, what about when your kid cheats, and that gets your copy of Office taken away? All the documents you created?

This is something that will have to be addressed in the TOS before I would be comfortable putting too much in their care.

I should note the same issue affects Google... this is not unique to Steam.

Wow so let's see now. If I pay for software and do it legitimately then I am beholden to some single vendor who could take everything away from me that I paid for, tell me how it's all allowed in the ToS, and I'd go bankrupt trying to sue them in court before I ever got close to a verdict that would probably not be in my favor anyway. ... or ... I can go to the Pirate Bay and make a couple of quick downloads and have the assurance that I can do anything I want with it and use it any way I want and never have any such problems. Hmm... Gee that's a toughie.

Just another example of the pirates having a better, more functional, more flexible, less restricted, more secure experience than the paying customers.

You want to put a serious dent in piracy, first change that. Treat paying customers like you actually value their business. Until then...

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm fairly sure that when VAC (Valve Anti-Cheat) bans you, the ban is only for that specific game engine. If you get banned for hacking in Halflife 2, the ban is also for Team Fortress 2, but not Orcs Must Die.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Baloroth]

I am not aware of a single instance of someone being banned from Steam for cheating. Banned from VAC servers, yes, multiplayer in certain games, yes, but not from Steam in general. Now, users have gotten banned for things like trying to activate a hacked game or phishing, but I've never heard of an account ban for cheating or other minor offenses.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[maxdread]

They also get banned for credit card charge backs.

However you are correct that they don't ban your account for cheating.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[billcopc]

Agreed 100%. In fact, I find the notion of banning an entire account absolutely vile. Banning users at all is vile. Protect the non-cheating population, sure, but cheaters paid for the damned game/app, let them use it. Cheating has been a part of gaming since the dawn of home computing. They should deal with it far more gracefully, like segregating cheaters to play against each other in a separate lobby (can't remember the company that did that). Even with MMOs, they could shift cheaters to a different server - that would nearly kill gold farming since they could only trade with other farmers.

To now mix in productivity applications, they're going to have to tread very lightly. The day someone gets locked out of their business records due to some draconian lockout, will be the day Valve gets sued into the ground, EULAs be damned. After all, where is the distinction between a game and an application ? At their core, they both move information in response to user input. The difference is, gamers don't tend to sue for lost wages or name publishers in tort cases.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[kwerle]

I should note the same issue affects Google... this is not unique to Steam.

I have local copies of all my google docs, thanks to google drive. And they're backed up (using time machine), so even if google nuked 'em before removing access, I'd still have copies.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Anonymous Coward]

Bans in steam are handled via engine. I seriously doubt they will have a policy for bans on these suites. Plenty of their titles allow for outside user modification and steam has no problem with single player cheating, they only have a harsh stance on multiplayer cheating. Gabe is former Microsoft I have faith he can pull this off.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Tubal-Cain]

Surely they can fine-tune their banning.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[The Raven]

This may be in the ToS, but it is not a practical requirement. Most parents would not want to buy 3 copies of a game for ONE COMPUTER just so their kids could play too.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[maxdread]

Users don't get banned for cheating, you don't lose access to your account or games, you are simply banned from servers that use valves cheat protection.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

They also get banned for credit card charge backs.

Really? Unless something dramatic has changed in the landscape recently, making any attempt to stop a credit card user doing a chargeback if they have legitimate grounds to do so is usually a good way to get your organisation banned by the ubergods of the credit card world for violating their own terms, which are about as fair and balanced for merchants as Valve's own heavily one-sided terms would be to users if they ever actually did what the lawyers have claimed they can in those terms. I don't for a moment believe that Valve are big enough to be an exception, so I suspect whatever prompted your comment was some sort of one-off oddity.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Anonymous Coward]

Do they actually do this though?

My understanding was if you got VAC banned (its the anticheat, so you got banned for cheating) then you get locked out of VAC servers, but can still play games without the anticheat enabled or in single player.

Now there may be other reasons they lock accounts (such as you stealing them, or selling them), but I've never come across this example.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Altanar]

Why would you trust their TOS, when they can change it at a later date and disable your account if you refuse to the new terms? http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/xor0j/i_asked_steam_support_if_i_could_keep_playing_my/

Re:Single Point of Failure

[maxdread]

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=5406-WFZC-5519

However reading up on this, a while back Steam changed their policies, banned accounts can still access their games, they are only stopped for purchasing new games/trading/gifting/redeeming gifted games so this entire thread is rather pointless. You don't lose access to anything you bought when banned.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[rgbrenner]

What?! You have something really confused.

1. Yes, you can't say, "you agree to never file a chargeback".. that is true. That's against the rules.

2. But if you file a chargeback, there's nothing in the rules that says the company must continue doing business with that person. In fact, they encourage you to maintain a ban list so that you do not process charges from high-risk customers.

Besides, if you file a chargeback and win, then the service was never paid for. So why are you using it?

Re:Single Point of Failure

[maxdread]

The OP is wrong.

Bans for cheating only result in you being banned from servers protected by Valves anti cheat system.

Bans for any other odd reason result in your account being locked down, you can still access all of your games (soon to be apps as well) however you can no longer purchase new games/apps, you can't redeem gifts, you can't trade.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[EvanED]

Besides, if you file a chargeback and win, then the service was never paid for. So why are you using it?

Really? It doesn't occur to you that there could theoretically be one fraudulent transaction on an account that is actually used?

Re:Single Point of Failure

[flimflammer]

When Valve bans you for cheating, your account isn't taken away. Your ability to play on VAC secured multiplayer servers is disabled. Sometimes it's only for the one specific game, too. So you wouldn't have your copy of Office taken for your child being banned for cheating.

In order to get your account shut down, they would need to do something particularly bad, like defrauding another user.

Not to say I agree with what Valve is doing. I really think this is a stupid idea. The idea of Steam being a general purpose app store seems inappropriate. I would not want to tie my productivity software to Valve's servers, being unable to open Word for example, when their servers are too strained. It doesn't matter as much when we're talking about entertainment software.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[jmerlin]

Even more at issue: Steam's "subscriber policy" implies that all software purchased in Steam is merely a subscription to Steam's license, meaning you have no license, no ownership, no copy ownership, and effectively no rights at all afforded to you by any Federal, State, or Local laws regarding licensed software, copyrights, or consumer purchases that do not apply to subscriptions. It is unacceptable in a general purpose software store to be required to bind all rights granted under law regarding the purchase of software. It's about time someone take Steam to court regarding the most probable illegality of its policies. WIth them ripping off people individually to the tune of $5-$50, selling software that they do not support that can potentially fail to run on your system, getting a "refund" is impossible, and at best you may eventually get them to refund you the purchase price in your Steam Wallet, but not the actual money spent. In the event of defective products being sold, in most states in the US, a full refund or a functional replacement is required. Steam blatantly violated this law and quite a few others in my own personal dealings with them, so I've asked the EFF for a legal opinion on whether or not their Subscriber agreement is even remotely legal and if it gives them the ability to completely ignore laws and nickel-and-dime US taxpayers.

In the end, we should completely refuse to purchase anything on Steam until Valve corrects this issue (yes, compliance with laws is expensive, boohoo), and until such time, simply purchase the games from the producers directly and merely use Steam as a game organizer.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[seepho]

You're also only banned from playing in VAC-secured servers. But let's not let all of this get in the way of FUD.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[icebraining]

I hate to break it to you, but Google Drive doesn't actually copy the docs down to your machine; the files you see are just metadata that references the file in Google Docs.

When it comes to syncing Google Docs office files, the Google Drive software only downloads a link to your documents and spreadsheets. Click on one to open it and you're taken to the browser to edit the online version. If you're offline, you're out of luck. The actual file isn't downloaded to your computer, so it's useless as an offline backup option.

http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/computers/blogs/gadgets-on-the-go/hands-on-google-drive-20120429-1xsun.html

Files created in Google Docs get their own file type â" .gdoc and .gsheet, though these aren't true local copies of the files. Instead they're links that open files in Google Docs, making them useless when you're offline.

http://www.zdnet.com/google-drive-4010026028/

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously. This can't be modded up enough. I'm not going to buy a game three fucking times so three users of the same computer can play it.

Steam can take this requirement of theirs and shove it. I DO have two steam accounts, and I buy games twice, but only when I plan on playing them on two computers. The same users on 1 computer = 1 copy, and if Steam doesn't like it, they can be on the receiving end of my lawsuit.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Kalriath]

In which case it also prevents you redeeming codes for products bought at retail. They'd be on the receiving end of a lawsuit so fast if they told me I can't redeem my purchased Photoshop key because I charged back a broken product which they refused to refund (as is my legal right).

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Cederic]

My view is similar but opposite: I get distressed that I can't play game 1 on PC 1 and at the same time play game 2 on PC 2.

I've bought both games, and I've been multi-gaming since the early 90s. Steam sadly doesn't allow this.

It's a shit system, and an unnecessary artificial constraint on games that I've purchased. Fortunately much of what Steam does is good and I'm less likely these days to be at two game-capable PCs at the same time.

However, introduce non-gaming software and it's going to become bloody stupid. Can't work on PC 1 because you have a document open on PC 2? Maybe this'll finally end that ludicrous Steam constraint.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[exomondo]

I hate to break it to you, but Google Drive doesn't actually copy the docs down to your machine; the files you see are just metadata that references the file in Google Docs.

Only if you don't set up offline access.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[kwerle]

I hate to break it to you, but Google Drive doesn't actually copy the docs down to your machine; the files you see are just metadata that references the file in Google Docs.

Ugh. Silly me - since files I drop in there are mirrored on gdrive, I assumed that the documents they dropped there work the same way.

There are plenty of ways to get data out of google, of course, but it's good to know that the way I thought it was happening is not. I'll have to look into something a little less automagical...

Thanks for pointing out my error.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[icebraining]

Offline access stores the files in Chrome (probably in Local Storage), not in the Drive directory.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[exomondo]

Offline access stores the files in Chrome (probably in Local Storage), not in the Drive directory.

Yes, but my post was in response to this:
I hate to break it to you, but Google Drive doesn't actually copy the docs down to your machine
If you enable offline access the files are copied to your machine.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[icebraining]

Not all of them, and only if he uses Chrome, which we don't know if he does, and only if he enables Offline, which he probably hadn't.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, this! They do not lock you out of your account unless you scam other people or use stolen cards. And you deserve it for those two.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[billcopc]

Depends on the network. On Steam, yes they're fairly respectful about it. VAC only bans you from other VAC servers and that's mostly fine. Every other delivery platform I know of simply locks your account, so you can't even play solo games anymore. I would love to be educated otherwise on this, but it has been the major reason why I have a Steam account and nothing else.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[oji-sama]

My view is similar but opposite: I get distressed that I can't play game 1 on PC 1 and at the same time play game 2 on PC 2.

I've bought both games, and I've been multi-gaming since the early 90s. Steam sadly doesn't allow this.

Hmm. Do they track the game launch times if in offline mode? As in, would you get in trouble with Steam by using the second computer in offline mode...

However, introduce non-gaming software and it's going to become bloody stupid. Can't work on PC 1 because you have a document open on PC 2? Maybe this'll finally end that ludicrous Steam constraint.

Even if the non-gaming software could be ran on several (or even two) computers at the same time, I doubt that this will change the terms for the games. A rather reasonable solution (in my mind) would be the possibility to mark certain computers to belong to 'homegroup' which would allow you to log into those with a single Steam account. Perhaps a single instance of a apecific game could be run at the same time (unless there are several licenses), but perhaps this limitation should not exist for the other software...?

Re:Single Point of Failure

[fa2k]

Also "interesting" that you can't edit documents while your kid is playing, because the account is in use. Can't even leave a document open on your laptop, then go to your gaming rig and play some dota. An often overlooked downside to steam. It's best to create a separate account for each game (and now software) you buy.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[exomondo]

Well he said: I have local copies of all my google docs, so yes, he probably uses Chrome and has enabled offline access, otherwise he wouldn't have local copies of all of his google docs now would he?

Re:Single Point of Failure

[icebraining]

Except he doesn't, he just assumed he did (his second post), since he didn't know the files created by Drive aren't actually the docs. Which was, in my opinion, the most probable situation, and which was why I posted my first message.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[exomondo]

Well worst case is that you can indeed do what he wants.

Re:Single Point of Failure

[icebraining]

No; as I said, Google Docs offline doesn't save all documents: http://support.google.com/docs/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1628467

Install locations

[Xian97]

I hope that you can install the applications anywhere instead of only under the Steam directory without having to resort to symlinks like you do now if you want to split up your SteamApps directory to different locations.

Re:Install locations

[jo_ham]

And along with that, fix whatever causes the steam apps folder to be marked as "all changed" from Time Machine's perspective every time you open Steam on OS X, causing unnecessary multi-gig backups. I had to exclude the steam apps folder for this reason. It can't be subtly changing every file?

Re:Install locations

[ilsaloving]

I configured time machine to ignore that directory entirely. If you even run into a situation where you have to restore, you don't need Time Machine to do that for you. You can just pull everything back via Steam anyway.

Re:Install locations

[EvanED]

You can just pull everything back via Steam anyway.

I'm not 100% positive about this, but I'm pretty sure that some games store saved games in the Steam folder.

(That said, I'm nitpicking here; it's not like most people consider saved games to be high-value documents.)

Re:Install locations

[ilsaloving]

And that's still Ok, because Steam syncs the save games with their servers. I just rebuilt my machine from scratch last week, and once I got everything back on, it's as if nothing had happened.

Re:Install locations

[Anonymous Coward]

You can just pull everything back via Steam anyway.

I'm not 100% positive about this, but I'm pretty sure that some games store saved games in the Steam folder.

(That said, I'm nitpicking here; it's not like most people consider saved games to be high-value documents.)

Okay except that save files are not "multi-gig" files. No modern backup program should be making "multi-gig backups" because a few small save files are changed.

I was considering Time Machine and now I severely question the competency of its developers. I mean, rsync is more advanced than this (using proper deltas) and has been around a lot longer.

Re:Install locations

[Anonymous Coward]

True, Time Machine is a complete hack under the hood. It's more like something a deranged unix admin wrote with a shellscript than a proper filesystem backup. However, it's integrated extremely well into the Mac interface & actually works quite well in recovery scenarios.

Re:Install locations

[Kalriath]

And along with that, fix whatever causes the steam apps folder to be marked as "all changed" from Time Machine's perspective every time you open Steam on OS X, causing unnecessary multi-gig backups. I had to exclude the steam apps folder for this reason. It can't be subtly changing every file?

What makes you so sure it can't be? Part of Steam's copy protection is encrypted executables, so what makes you certain that it isn't encrypting them with a different key each time the app starts, or decrypting them again or something?

Re:Install locations

[Kalriath]

Do you have any idea what that would cost? Restoring my SteamApps folder from Steam itself would cost me no less than $500 in bandwidth alone.

Re:Install locations

[ilsaloving]

How in the world could it cost you that much money? Is your primary internet connection via tethered cell phone using a Canadian cell provider?

Re:Install locations

[EvanED]

Isn't that only for Steamworks-enabled games? And you're out of luck for older things (say, KOTOR)?

Re:Install locations

[EvanED]

I'm not speaking to why the backup software keeps backing up the actual game files; I'm more talking about why cutting the Steam folder out of being backed up will leave some things that won't be replaced.

Re:Install locations

[jo_ham]

You can just pull everything back via Steam anyway.

I'm not 100% positive about this, but I'm pretty sure that some games store saved games in the Steam folder.

(That said, I'm nitpicking here; it's not like most people consider saved games to be high-value documents.)

Okay except that save files are not "multi-gig" files. No modern backup program should be making "multi-gig backups" because a few small save files are changed.

I was considering Time Machine and now I severely question the competency of its developers. I mean, rsync is more advanced than this (using proper deltas) and has been around a lot longer.

It's something to do with the way Steam "touches" the files when it launches that marks them as changed.

Steam is the only thing that causes this issue with Time Machine.

Re:Install locations

[jo_ham]

And along with that, fix whatever causes the steam apps folder to be marked as "all changed" from Time Machine's perspective every time you open Steam on OS X, causing unnecessary multi-gig backups. I had to exclude the steam apps folder for this reason. It can't be subtly changing every file?

What makes you so sure it can't be? Part of Steam's copy protection is encrypted executables, so what makes you certain that it isn't encrypting them with a different key each time the app starts, or decrypting them again or something?

I suppose it might be, which would explain the behaviour. It's the only app where this happens so it's clearly something unique to Steam. As someone else already mentioned, if I lose that folder in a hard drive failure I can just pull the data back off the Steam cloud, so it's not the end of the world. It would be a pain for someone with limited internet bandwidth though.

Re:Install locations

[ilsaloving]

To be honest I don't know. I haven't performed an extensive test. I'm running on a Mac so the majority of the old stuff isn't available for my platform anyway so maybe I just never noticed.

Re:Install locations

[Kalriath]

No, worse, a New Zealand landline provider. $2/GB. Downloading 4 games off Steam recently costed me $100.

Re:Install locations

[ilsaloving]

Whoa.... and I thought we in Canada had it bad.... I'm sorry to hear.

And lose access to your files

[Anonymous Coward]

Please agree to the new Terms of Service of you will not be able to access your Steam Cloud locker, play your single player games, use any of your productivity software or turn your computer on again (Steam Linux version only).

captcha: deliver

SteamOS ?

[ClassicASP]

If they come out with an operating system to compete with Windows and other windowed environments, it had better be 3d and run on the steam engine. The whole desktop ought to be a virtual 3D desktop, and all office productivity can now be done via gaming joystick. That might be awesome.

Re:SteamOS ?

[kiddygrinder]

Must... resist... -1... disagree...

Re:SteamOS ?

[BronsCon]

"That's not porn and I'm not jerking off; it's the SteamOffice tutorial and I'm working on my document navigation technique!" Would *your* boss buy it?

Re:SteamOS ?

[Anonymous Coward]

They dont need to create an operating system. There are already plenty of operating systems. They allow applications to interface with the hardware and provide api's for common needs. Thats the role of the OS. This idea that the OS has games, the OS has internet browsers, the OS has paintbrush or gimp or open office or microsoft office is all kinda silly.

Having steam be a sandboxed client where you have a portable cloud based environment has some merit, let's see what comes of it.

Re:SteamOS ?

[vlm]

Thats the role of the OS. This idea that the OS has games, the OS has internet browsers, the OS has paintbrush or gimp or open office or microsoft office is all kinda silly

Once their mind is cleansed of that falsehood, you get to do it all over again with "desktop environments" like kde, gnome, xfce.

why can't we just have xterm, or maybe xterm-version1356+++ and 30 other xterms, instead of afterstep's aterm, elightenments eterm, gnome's gnome-terminal, KDE's konsole, gnustep's terminal.app, xfce's xfce4-terminal

Re:SteamOS ?

[ilsaloving]

Oooooooh no. Last time someone did that, some twerp came around, shouted "I know this! It's UNIX!", and undid months of important secret work!

Re:SteamOS ?

[damnbunni]

For what it's worth, that actually WAS Unix.

Re:SteamOS ?

[Hatta]

Once their mind is cleansed of that falsehood, you get to do it all over again with "desktop environments" like kde, gnome, xfce.

And after that, they shove everything into web browsers.

why can't we just have xterm

No one is forcing you to use or install any other terminal. Personally I prefer urxvt, small and fast and highly configurable.

Re:SteamOS ?

[Anonymous Coward]

It was IRIX, but thanks for playing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fsn

Re:SteamOS ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, you're so good at linking Wikipedia! Let me try...

"IRIX is a flavour of the UNIX System V computer operating system"

Steam Linux

[Tubal-Cain]

So Steam is going from being a games repository to being a general repo. Halfway to a Linux distribution of their own.

Disaster == Bad for my business

[Anonymous Coward]

So now we know that when Gabe described Windows 8 as a "disaster", he meant a disaster only for Valve. How can Valve become the app store for Windows when Windows has its own? I have no pity for them at all. We stare like passersby at a car wreck when we see old industry companies get destroyed by new tech. Valve deserves no special pity.

Re:Disaster == Bad for my business

[MrEricSir]

To call Microsoft's app store "new tech" is extremely generous.

non dfsg linux stuff?

[vlm]

expanding Steam beyond games and will start to deliver other software

On linux?

This means that Steam will compete directly with

apt-get install whatever

I'm having trouble thinking of a proprietary piece of software I need... depends on your hobbies I suppose.

One service they could provide is distributing stuff thats "free" in quotes but not really free. I have not checked lately but I though ye olde heekscad was not quite DFSG (would be glad to hear I'm wrong) and I'm almost certain that xylinx fpga software is "free" but not DFSG-free so thats why there's no simple apt-get solution to install those monsters. Its at the point where I assume if there is no Debian package of a cool piece of software its because its not DFSG free, for example the dropbox client might actually be DFSG-free but since I can't apt-get install it I assume its not DFSG-free. If it were, it would already be in Debian, or at least in non-free.

You know what I'd like to pay someone (a very small amount) to do for me? package emc2 for Debian. There's a binary ubuntu install but emc2 is a dependency nightmare (very specific versions of real time linux kernel extensions? seriously?). My milling machine would thank you. I've got a dozen or so linux boxes at home (more if you count images) and one lonely ubuntu box running my mill. A monoculture mught be a security headache but its a sysadmins dream...

Some other non dfsg linux software includes the microsoft fonts, acrobat pdf reader or whatever its called, maybe some other things.

Re:non dfsg linux stuff?

[cupantae]

I doubt you're in their target market.

Re:non dfsg linux stuff?

[Hatta]

You know what I'd like to pay someone (a very small amount) to do for me? package emc2 for Debian.

Sounds like it would take a real Einstein to do that.

Re:non dfsg linux stuff?

[geekoid]

"On linux?"
Yes. Games, for one thing. Valve is building their games for a linux distribution.

"apt-get install whatever"
Does that pull down your data? history? save games? do it automatically?

Re:non dfsg linux stuff?

[Cederic]

I'm having trouble thinking of a proprietary piece of software I need

Excluding games, I only have a couple myself - the software that came with my satellite HD tv decoder, and Adobe Lightroom.

There is however a massive market out there for desktop applications, and several for which there just aren't capable Free alternatives (such as, indeed, Adobe Lightroom).

Re:non dfsg linux stuff?

[VGPowerlord]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that Steam is going to have non-free software on it... it is a software store, after all.

I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[MarcoAtWork]

... software just based on how long it takes to launch things. If I want to play something it's not a big deal to wait the 10-20 seconds it takes to launch steam and waiting for it to connect to my account to allow the game to launch, but if I have some software I need to use for work and/or open/close several times that would get pretty annoying.

This said the steam advantages (and the inevitable steam sales) might make it more likely that people would overlook the speed issues, I am not sure.

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[jo_ham]

Don't forget the achievements!

It will be awesome when Photoshop gets achievements.

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[Stele]

Ding! You just opened a file! 40 Achievement Points!

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[Kalriath]

I'm more interested in Photoshop getting co-op multiplayer.

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[geekoid]

You laugh, but achievements are great motivators.

I predict everything will have an achievement system eventually.
I also predict when smart phones are more aware of their surroundings, personal achievement will become popular.

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[Narishma]

Microsoft beat them to it.

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[pjtp]

Obligatory penny-arcade: http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2007/08/22/

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[Anonymous Coward]

If you leave steam running in the background then you don't have to wait for it to log in to your account.

On another note, this does open the possibility of a business buying licenses for their software and temporarily assigning the software to employees to use (they just revoke the license to that user, and the user can't open the software anymore). Then they could use the steam cloud for document storage.

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[epyT-R]

unless of course you don't have a gambler personality type.. then they're just annoying, pointless filler.

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[not flu]

Multiplayer drawing is awesome! openCanvas 1.1 and paintchat are as close as it gets for now, both being over a decade old by now and not particularly reliable.

Re:I am not sure steam is ready for non-games...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget that Valve permits itself (through the TOS) the right to spy on your use of steam apps and to provide that data to 3rd parties (as of the new TOS).
Steam is becoming a lean mean spying machine. ...Actually, not too sure about 'lean' but a lot more confident about 'mean'...

Steam Cloud

[Lynchenstein]

You gotta love that name.

Re:Steam Cloud

[GoodNewsJimDotCom]

Someone should write a video game named: Pun-K and release on Steam.

we want games

[lt.cyx]

Why ruin such a good thing with boring applications that are not games?

Come on! Next thing you know I'll be forced to see Corel Draw! next to Skyrim in the store screen - I don't think anyone wants that.

A fond farewell...

[Anonymous Coward]

One more step towards users having zero control over their computers.

Not everyone is a Slashdot geek.

Ironic CAPTCHA: kernel

Starting 05/09/2012

[lga]

I should have said in the summary that this all starts on the 5th of September.

Re:Starting 05/09/2012

[Anonymous Coward]

I should have said in the summary that this all starts on the 5th of September.

Yes but you failed. You could not be bothered to proofread. No, not even before releasing it publically to a very large audience. Not one proofreading. Jackass.

You are well on your way to being a Slashdot editor.

Re:Starting 05/09/2012

[Anonymous Coward]

Oops...that should read 9/5/12.

May was three months ago!

Re:Starting 05/09/2012

[lga]

Oops...that should read 9/5/12.

May was three months ago!

I'm in the UK.

Re:Starting 05/09/2012

[Anonymous Coward]

Oops...that should read 9/5/12.

May was three months ago!

I'm in the UK.

Fail.

Try proofreading ya looney bastard!

Re:Starting 05/09/2012

[kevkingofthesea]

I prefer 2012-09-05. Computer sortable, and easy to read, as it goes from most general to most specific, left to right. And it's ISO compliant!

Re:Starting 05/09/2012

[oreiasecaman]

Oops...that should read 9/5/12.

May was three months ago!

I'm in the UK.

Might as well have said "I'm on anywhere else in the world" and be mostly correct

Losing focus

[AMDinator]

I'm not sure what to think of this- by becoming a direct competitor to the Windows 8 app store, isn't Steam losing its differentiation as a specialty store for games? This might end up hurting them in the long run.

Re:Losing focus

[maxdread]

Not sure how much it would hurt them. Gamers won't suddenly jump ship because they offered something non game related, at most you'll pick some new users up, ones who have no interest in gaming. To a point they also need to diversify a bit seeing as how you'll probably see more publishers pushing their own distribution platform (such as EA with Origin). Steam can't compete with them if the publishers refuse to allow their games to be listed on competing services.

Re:Losing focus

[Nurgled]

"Losing focus" means trying to do too many things and doing a poor job of each of them as a result. Users probably won't jump ship immediately, but if resources are diverted away from the parts of Steam that users love in favor of parts of Steam that users don't care about it could hurt in the long run. Perhaps Valve has become a big enough company to pull this off now, but it's always a difficult compromise between "do one thing and do it well" and "don't put all of your eggs in one basket".

An Multi-Platform App Store

[Sean0michael]

I like the sound of this initially. One drawback to current App stores is they are locked to a single platform (ie. OS). Apple's App store only works on Apple devices. Android's various marketplaces only work on Android devices. the Windows App store apps will work only on Windows devices.

Here Steam has the chance to let the same apps work on any OS you want as long as the app developers will support it. Login to your Steam account anywhere and install that must-have-software on any machine no matter where you are or what you have. And if your application can be easily distributed through one channel to all your users, so much the better for you! I hope Steam finds success here.

Danger will!

[Splab]

So, out of curiosity I decided to disagree to the last update to Steam EULA - you will lose *all* access, not just future updates, but everything you have or had with steam will be blocked unless you agree to their terms. Note, their terms and conditions specifically calls for a 30 days heads up for you to save your stuff, this is nice and all, except you don't get 30 days warning and you sure as hell don't get to access your offline items.

And they want us to trust them with our files?

Oh, and their support response to inquiries with regards to the illegal blockage of my applications. "We believe this update to terms and conditions are in your best interest".

Re:Danger will!

[brit74]

Yep, same here. I'll just pirate all the games now.

You do realize that there are other ways to get software on your computer than "Steam", right? Just wondering because you sound like you believe that "Steam" and "piracy" are your only two options.

Re:Danger will!

[maxdread]

Because it is! At least it is when you're looking for reasons to justify pirating everything.

Re:Danger will!

[vux984]

You do realize that there are other ways to get software on your computer than "Steam", right?

I'm sure he does.

Just wondering because you sound like you believe that "Steam" and "piracy" are your only two options.

Why would anyone explore any option other than piracy after they already paid for the game on steam?

Oh... you mean "new games that he doesn't already have..." sure, for that looking at alternatives is reasonable. But if I've got 100 titles on steam, and they up and change the EULA on me and hold everything I bought for ransom against me agreeing to whatever new terms they've imagined for themselves then piracy is really the only option I consider reasonable.

Well, piracy or a lawsuit.

Re:Danger will!

[Kalriath]

Not always true. If you purchase a Steamworks product (such as Skyrim) in stores, it cannot be played without the use of the Steam application and agreeing to their draconian terms.

Re:Danger will!

[blind biker]

Note, their terms and conditions specifically calls for a 30 days heads up for you to save your stuff, this is nice and all, except you don't get 30 days warning

Sorry, I could not understand this statement. I am not a Steam user (never have been), so maybe there's some context that makes this seemingly nonsensical sentence... sensible.

Re:Danger will!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, but you didn't buy it. You are merely paying access fees (or some such nonsense).

Re:Danger will!

[Splab]

What don't you understand?

Their terms and conditions states they will give you a 30 day warning before they implement changes to their terms and conditions. They do however in reality, not give you any form of warning.

Too greedy to implement screen sharing

[tepples]

Most parents would not want to buy 3 copies of a game for ONE COMPUTER just so their kids could play too.

On the other hand, my aunt already bought two copies of a Mojang title so that two of her kids could play together. It's too bad most PC game developers are too greedy to implement spawn installation or screen sharing.

Never will I use this for productivity apps

[pointyhat]

I would never use a system like this for business or produtivity (that includes all cloud crap like Office 365, Google Docs etc as well). The motivation is purely to stone-wall other app stores off (such as the Windows App Store) and take as much market share and control as possible rather than to provide a fair and reasonable service.

The moment you're a customer, they don't care about you as you're locked in. Also the motivations - sorry but:

easy installation - it's not hard to install anything.

automatic updating - most software does this.

ability to save your work to your personal Steam Cloud space so your files may travel with you - I've got a fucking laptop with a hard disk dammit.

I hate saying this but you've got to be very lazy or stupid to trust one of these services.

Re:Never will I use this for productivity apps

[Kimomaru]

Totally agree.

Re:Never will I use this for productivity apps

[lister king of smeg]

automatic updating - most software does this.

Java on windows. i have to go clean computers regularly and remove old java installs and then install the new java. not all software updates as nicely as linux it dose on linux

Re:Never will I use this for productivity apps

[icebraining]

For many people, it is hard to find and install stuff; more importantly, it's very hard to know what software you can trust not to copy your banking password and spam your friends. Steam is setting itself up as another "garden" just like the App Stores of mobile.

As for automatic updating, that's a bonus for the developer, not so much the user, 'though I do get annoyed that every single Windows application has its own updater. A centralized system like Apt (or in this case, Steam) is so much nicer.

As for the traveling files: good for you. Hope your disk doesn't die, ever. Oh, you got backups? Guess what, most people - even plenty of IT people who should know better - don't.

Re:Never will I use this for productivity apps

[pointyhat]

Java on Windows is absolutely fine. We've got Java auto updater installed on about 2000 Windows 7 workstations and use WebStart for some of our apps. It rarely goes wrong.

Re:Never will I use this for productivity apps

[pointyhat]

No it's not hard at all. Most PCs come with everything pre-installed including a seeded copy of Office ready to go. Anything past Windows+Office is likely to be specialist and to be honest, at least in the UK, most people just go to PC World and buy boxed software as there is a human there who can help them choose.

For the majority of users, they already have that through Windows Update/Microsoft Update which takes care of their PC, antivirus and Office quite happily. Apt is great when you're offline isn't it - I assume you have 73 CDs or 11 DVDs on you all the time.

I don't care if my disk dies. I have backups and a spare laptop (Lenovo T61's are cheap as chips). Windows 7 whinges at you persistently if you don't set up a regular backup routine so there is no excuse! You plug a USB stick in and it deals with it for you. Laziness or ignorance is not an excuse.

Re:Never will I use this for productivity apps

[icebraining]

Windows+Office (possibly +browser) are the only "big" software people need, but then they install dozens or hundreds of small applications from the web; it's how they get viruses and fill IE with toolbars. It's true that now "webapps" are making those less relevant, but there's still plenty of them.

For the majority of users, they already have that through Windows Update/Microsoft Update which takes care of their PC, antivirus and Office quite happily.

See above; there's plenty those don't update.

Apt is great when you're offline isn't it - I assume you have 73 CDs or 11 DVDs on you all the time.

I have no idea what's your point. Why would I expect Apt to update my software when I'm offline?

I don't care if my disk dies. I have backups and a spare laptop (Lenovo T61's are cheap as chips). Windows 7 whinges at you persistently if you don't set up a regular backup routine so there is no excuse! You plug a USB stick in and it deals with it for you. Laziness or ignorance is not an excuse.

Sigh. What is and isn't an "excuse" is completely irrelevant to whether people will do it and, more importantly, to whether Steam can be successful by allowing people not to worry themselves with it.

Also, USB sticks are not really that great for backups.

Re:Never will I use this for productivity apps

[lister king of smeg]

*grr didn't delete last three words on accident

Re: Steam startup time

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not have Steam start on system boot and leave it running? If the various friend/group invite notifications bother you, disable them.

Video on demand and 1040 other things

[tepples]

I'm having trouble thinking of a proprietary piece of software I need... depends on your hobbies I suppose.

Apart from games, a lot of people need proprietary video player software to stream rented non-free films and non-free TV shows. The software is non-free due to compliance and robustness rules imposed by the movie studios. And a lot of people need proprietary tax preparation wizard software to prepare income tax returns. This software is non-free because tax software publishers treat their machine-readable interpretations of annual tax law amendments as a valuable trade secret.

Its at the point where I assume if there is no Debian package of a cool piece of software its because its not DFSG free

There is a DFSG-free (zlib license) 6502 assembly language development toolchain called ca65, but it's not in Debian (and thus not in Ubuntu) because it's bundled with a non-free C compiler called cc65. I filed a needs-packaging request for ca65 years ago.

Re:Video on demand and 1040 other things

[Cederic]

a lot of people need proprietary video player software to stream rented non-free films and non-free TV shows. The software is non-free due to compliance and robustness rules imposed by the movie studios.

Which is interesting. I can stream live football from my preferred club's site (which requires paid subscription), I can stream live sport, movies and other TV programmes from my satellite TV provider's website and I can stream a whole ton of shit from the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 all without having to install any applications I didn't already have on my PC.

Unless you count Firefox as proprietary and non-free. I guess you could. Some people would include Flash and Silverlight too, but they're technologies I have installed rather than media streaming applications.

PaintShop Pro is a game

[tepples]

If you think photomanipulation is not a game, then you don't hang out on Cracked's Pointless Waste of Time, Something Awful, or Worth1000.

Re:PaintShop Pro is a game

[Hatta]

That's not what's meant by "I'm going to go play with my PSP".

Re:PaintShop Pro is a game

[tepples]

[Corel PaintShop Pro is] not what's meant by "I'm going to go play with my PSP".

Let me guess: You saw the loading screen on Luminesweeper.

Don't underestimate Microsoft

[DrYak]

Don't underestimate the energy that Microsoft will put behind squashing the competition once they roll out their own product.
They will put every single effort they can trying to kick Steam out of the business.

Yup, probably that the official MS store will be crap. But Microsoft has an history of successfully managing to destroy competition by bundling inferior products (As an example: real-time compression almost died during the Stacker vs. Doublespace saga).

Valve is completely right in attempting to get prepared for the worst.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

No, realtime compression died because it totally sucked ass on the hardware of the day. (It's still in Windows, and I've never heard of anyone turning it on.)

Also the current group of drooltards running Microsoft are completely inferior to the ruthless business geniuses of 20 years ago, so please stop bringing up ancient history as if it was relevant.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

No, realtime compression died because it totally sucked ass on the hardware of the day. (It's still in Windows, and I've never heard of anyone turning it on.)

Also the current group of drooltards running Microsoft are completely inferior to the ruthless business geniuses of 20 years ago, so please stop bringing up ancient history as if it was relevant.

It's relevant because other than Gates you still have the same personalities running the show as you did 20 years ago. Especially Ballmer.

Now maybe he's seen the Light or found Jesus or whatever but I wouldn't count on it.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[interkin3tic]

MS already has "games for windows live" which sold games you could download. I wasn't aware of that fact, which should tell you something about MS's ability to intrude on steam's turf. Origin is a bigger threat. I don't know of any hard statistics, but they're building up a lot of ill will among gamers as far as I've heard.

Anyway, this is valve moving into MS's area, not vice versa. I'd guess that Newell realizes that windows 8 app store is going to be a disaster and that he can position himself to replace it, like firefox replaced internet explorer. I don't think he's worried windows 8 is going to replace steam.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[Sir_Sri]

I've had windows live bundled with various games for a while, but yes, MS has managed to seriously screw up pretty much every attempt at an online store for consumers so far.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple seems to have the bigger business brains these days, but their Mac App Store isn't doing so well. Experienced computer users will find Steam and Origin. Newbies find the OS's default app store. So basically, that store is for mom & dad, while Steam is for you.

With that said, I doubt that Steam will succeed with this counterattack. It's probably mom & dad getting productivity software, as experienced users are already set in their ways as far as their work habits go...

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[Sir_Sri]

The difference is that the average user can't see what previously bundled products did badly, and developers kept supporting it.

Windows 8 is different. From the moment you boot it up on a desktop you can see what's wrong with it. You try and use anything, and you can see what is wrong with it. With the app store it will probably suck at actually being an app store, you won't be able to find good apps easily (unless you know the name of what you want), and the apps themselves won't connect you to other users, which is critical to a multiplayer environment.

I'm sure microsoft will *try* to put other people out of business, but if the windows app stuck is as bad as windows 8 or GFW live steam isn't in any real danger. XBL competes directly with valve in style, but it's also too expensive for most indie devs, which is the point of app stores.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[nielsm]

On the other hand way too many Steam users have hundreds of dollars worth of games on their account, those users aren't just leaving the train mid-journey.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[JDG1980]

It's relevant because other than Gates you still have the same personalities running the show as you did 20 years ago. Especially Ballmer. Now maybe he's seen the Light or found Jesus or whatever but I wouldn't count on it.

It's not Ballmer and associates who have changed, it's the rest of the marketplace. Microsoft's competitors are far more numerous, powerful, and skilled than they were 10-15 years ago. Google and Apple (and apparently now Valve as well) are not going to let Microsoft steamroll over everything like they did in the 1990s. Furthermore, businesses have learned the hard way that open standards are a good thing. "Embrace, extend, extinguish" only works when people don't realize what you are doing. Businesses got burned bad with IE6's proprietary features; there are still a ton of legacy Intranet applications out there that will have to run in an XP virtual machine from now until the end of time. This is why, with IE9 and IE10, Microsoft isn't pushing proprietary features but is instead bragging about their "native" HTML5 (standard) support. This (plus litigation from the EU, let's not forget that) is why Microsoft has made at least some nods towards openness with the new Office XML file format.

I'm sure that Steve Ballmer would like to party like it's 1999, but he can't. His competitors won't let him, and his customers won't put up with it any more.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[shione]

Or they just keep throwing money at their turd products no matter how much money it loses until it becomes successful eg xbox

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[RaceProUK]

Don't underestimate the energy that Microsoft will put behind squashing the competition once they roll out their own product. They will put every single effort they can trying to kick Steam out of the business.

The more likely outcome is Steam ends up in the Win8 App Store. I seriously doubt MS will want to piss Valve off so much that Valve abandons the Windows platform - it would significantly impact on the success of Win8 itself, which frankly needs all the help it can get. And I like Win8. A bit. But only for touch-enabled devices. My workstation will retain Win7.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[aaron552]

I'm not sure where you get this idea. While I'm not a fan of Windows 8 in the slightest, I'd like to point out where you are clearly talking out of your ass:

With the app store it will probably suck at actually being an app store, you won't be able to find good apps easily (unless you know the name of what you want)

There's a rating system and apps are sorted into categories. No different to the iOS (or Android) stores. That's not necessarily a point in its favour, but it's perhaps better than the way things are in Windows 7 and earlier (you have to manually find, download and install applications all by yourself)

and the apps themselves won't connect you to other users

Windows 8 has a system similar to Android's intents where an app can (with users' permission) read from your user account's "People" list, which aggregates contacts from various sources (again, like Android). It would be trivial for a game to use this list to find contacts who are currently playing the same game as you, assuming both are running Windows 8, or it could be done outside of Windows 8's system pretty easily too.

Granted, GFWL was and is pretty horrible, but that doesn't automatically mean that MS won't win. The app store on Windows 8 just has to be "good enough" to beat the competition: if it does the job adequately, then the fact that it's bundled means that it wins. GFWL was never bundled and even now struggles to even be adequate, but perhaps MS has learned from its mistakes with that.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[Voyager529]

But Microsoft has an history of successfully managing to destroy competition by bundling inferior products (As an example: real-time compression almost died during the Stacker vs. Doublespace saga).

Valve is completely right in attempting to get prepared for the worst.

Counterexamples: Winzip (albeit now an arm of Corel) and RAR Labs still exist and sell compression utilities, despite Windows having bundled ZIP file handling for the last 11 years. Corel, Cyberlink, and Adobe's Fisher Price division are still making plenty of money despite the existence of Windows Movie Maker. Stardock makes a majority of their money by making programs that change the look of Windows despite Windows having a perfectly functional UI out of the box.

Just because Microsoft bundles something doesn't equate with destroying established inertia. Gamers who use Steam and have a decent quantity of games in their account will likely keep them. If for no other reason, games like CoD: Black Ops and Portal 2 ship with what amounts to a Steam backup on a plastic disc. You're using Steam one way or the other with those titles, so it will push its way on. Plus, it remains to be seen if the Microsoft App Store will be running the kind of sales Steam does that have twisted my arm into buying games I otherwise had no intention of buying except that they were $5.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[zlives]

"Experienced computer users will find p2p. Newbies find the Steam and Origin store.So basically, that OS app store is for mom & dad " FTFY

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[Sir_Sri]

There's a rating system and apps are sorted into categories.

yep, and that's problematic, because like the iOS and Google play store, if you aren't on the front page you may as well not exist. Which is the whole problem with the app store model.

Which doesn't even work well for those of us in the games business. Gaming is actually a series of specialized niches, telling everyone they can go buy angry birds is fine, but if you want to sell prototype 2, or legends of pegasus you're never going to match angry birds on the chart, even if you could have a very successful game. Which is where steam comes in. If you want games for a 9 year old, steam isn't your place. If you want shitty mobile games, steam isn't the place to be. So right off the bat steam is a selection pressure on the market, you have to be good enough to warrant listing on steam in the first place, and you're not burying 60 million dollar games with 600 dollar games (production costs).

Adding in two dozen categories isn't going to help either. Steam and its ilk are useful because they roll through releases reasonably quickly and reasonably well, but you can still sensibly organize stuff. Although even that is becoming a problem with 2000 games on steam as we get into having games that are from 2002-2003 still prominently listed even though they don't really belong there.

That's why I say it's going to suck at being an app store: because they all suck at it. Even, as I say, something like steam, where you start adding in DLC and more than a couple of years of history and it becomes very cluttered and very hard to find something decent that was released 2 years ago unless you know exactly what you're looking for.

and the apps themselves won't connect you to other users

This one I definitely wasn't clear on. Steam connects you to your gamer friends, regardless of what game you're playing. XBL and PSN do the same thing. GFW actually is XBL, but the question becomes on of whether or not apps in any sort of sensible way will bundle in functionality, or if they'll all try and talk to each other reasonably well. With the windows app store you *might* be able to get into a contact list, you might not, you might use XBL/GFW, they might let you install steam, it might store lists on its own and now all the matchmaking services (for gaming) are going to try and bundle. It's going to go from 'use steam like everyone else' to an ungodly mess of dozens of companies all trying to be the matchmaking service. Which in and of itself isn't the end of the world, it's just going to be confusing compared to steam.

I'd like to point out where you are clearly talking out of your ass:

I'd like to point out that I'm in the process of trying to re-package a (non steamworks) game for windows 8, and confronting all of these problems, and more. And we're working on a release coming up that will have to support windows 8 somehow. Unfortunately we're a niche title (because gaming is a collection of niches), where 50-60K copies would be very successful, and it's not that we see windows 8 as a problem, we'll just use steam and gamersgate and impulse and .... and skip over the windows 8 store, because it's not adding value to us, and if anything it's just making things harder for our users. Not that I'm in charge of business decisions so the boss guy could decide he wants to go all in on windows 8 or steam or whatever.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[TemporalBeing]

But Microsoft has an history of successfully managing to destroy competition by bundling inferior products (As an example: real-time compression almost died during the Stacker vs. Doublespace saga).

Valve is completely right in attempting to get prepared for the worst.

Counterexamples: Winzip (albeit now an arm of Corel) and RAR Labs still exist and sell compression utilities, despite Windows having bundled ZIP file handling for the last 11 years.

In all honesty, Windows Compressed Folders suck compared to WinZIP and WinRAR. You have zero options, and it tends to fall over when you get to between 700MB and 1GB of data (don't know if they fixed that since say WinXP SP1, but it's probably still a problem).

Corel, Cyberlink, and Adobe's Fisher Price division are still making plenty of money despite the existence of Windows Movie Maker.

And Windows Movie Maker sucks compared to nearly anything else. Also note, that all those companies provide versions for Mac as well.

Stardock makes a majority of their money by making programs that change the look of Windows despite Windows having a perfectly functional UI out of the box.

Some people like to customize their desktop look 'n feel. Microsoft does provide some ability to do that, but it can be rather difficult to setup. For example, try changing the colors for the various dialogs in a consistent way - it's a PITA on Windows. Third Party tools make it easier to get all those settings correct, and build themes that are consistent.

Just because Microsoft bundles something doesn't equate with destroying established inertia.

That depends on their goal. In most cases its the Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish (EEE of Microsoft), and then they do. Sometimes they add something and kind of forget about it - it still affects the competitor - yes WinRAR and WinZIP likely lost some business because of Compressed Folders; but then, most of what they lost was probably just customers using their demo products so it's not much of a loss. (7zip has a deeper impact on them both.)

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[Voyager529]

But Microsoft has an history of successfully managing to destroy competition by bundling inferior products (As an example: real-time compression almost died during the Stacker vs. Doublespace saga).

Valve is completely right in attempting to get prepared for the worst.

Counterexamples: Winzip (albeit now an arm of Corel) and RAR Labs still exist and sell compression utilities, despite Windows having bundled ZIP file handling for the last 11 years.

In all honesty, Windows Compressed Folders suck compared to WinZIP and WinRAR. You have zero options, and it tends to fall over when you get to between 700MB and 1GB of data (don't know if they fixed that since say WinXP SP1, but it's probably still a problem).

True, you have zero options...but "extract stuff" and "add stuff" are going to be the most common things people do with ZIP files, and I'm pretty sure that Winzip had no shortage of people who bought Winzip almost exclusively for those things. The entire point of the GP's post was the fact that MS was eating the lunch of companies who made "very good" tools simply by bundling "good enough" tools with the OS.

Corel, Cyberlink, and Adobe's Fisher Price division are still making plenty of money despite the existence of Windows Movie Maker.

And Windows Movie Maker sucks compared to nearly anything else. Also note, that all those companies provide versions for Mac as well.

Neither Cyberlink PowerDirector nor Corel VideoStudio are available on OSX. Premiere Elements is, but it faces the same problem on the Mac platform as it directly competes with the bundled iMovie. Again, the GP's point was that Microsoft's "Good enough" replaces superior tools.

Stardock makes a majority of their money by making programs that change the look of Windows despite Windows having a perfectly functional UI out of the box.

Some people like to customize their desktop look 'n feel. Microsoft does provide some ability to do that, but it can be rather difficult to setup. For example, try changing the colors for the various dialogs in a consistent way - it's a PITA on Windows. Third Party tools make it easier to get all those settings correct, and build themes that are consistent.

Stardock's tools are epic. Fences and ObjectDock are lifesavers. However, while I can concede that Stardock's titles fit less with the others, my point was that there is a workable UI that ships with Windows.

Just because Microsoft bundles something doesn't equate with destroying established inertia.

That depends on their goal. In most cases its the Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish (EEE of Microsoft), and then they do. Sometimes they add something and kind of forget about it - it still affects the competitor - yes WinRAR and WinZIP likely lost some business because of Compressed Folders; but then, most of what they lost was probably just customers using their demo products so it's not much of a loss. (7zip has a deeper impact on them both.)

How much who lost is a question that would require balance sheets. If the Steam Hardware Survey is any indication, WinRAR has fared much better than Winzip; the former having over 44% install base against Steam and the latter is a paltry 4.3%. I concur that 7zip is an excellent alternative to both, with IZArc being much better for those who like the traditional WinZip UI. Presumably, your point is that since Microsoft wasn't gunning for that market, they've been able to survive better than Netscape was.

Again, the question posed by the summary was where Steam fits into this. If Microsoft has their crosshairs on Valve, then by your logic (not an entirely unsound one), they're preparing to avoid being the next Netscape. MS could be gunning for Valve's market the way they went after Netscape, but they will have a coop full of eggs on their face if Valve pulls off a WinRAR instead.

Re:Don't underestimate Microsoft

[aaron552]

Thanks for the lengthy reply. I understand better where you're coming from now.

It's going to go from 'use steam like everyone else' to an ungodly mess of dozens of companies all trying to be the matchmaking service.

That's the way it is now. Steam may be the dominant digital distribution platform, but GFWL, Origin and UPlay also exist and a lot of high-profile games use these. It's a mess as it is now, but I agree that adding another service to an already cluttered market is a bad idea.

and skip over the windows 8 store

I thought that the Windows Store was going to be the only way to distribute Windows 8 (Metro)-style apps? This is, possibly, the major reason why Valve is hedging against Windows 8. Sure, you can publish your games as "classic" Windows apps, but that cuts out all the WinRT users (which you may want to target) unless you want to maintain two separate builds for different SKUs of Windows.

Steam's Ecosystem . . .

[Kimomaru]

From a geek's standpoint, Steam is probably the best "ecosystem" out there but I find that every company these days wants to get into the cloud-based ecosystem business and I'm tired of it. The last thing on earth I want to do is store my documents in the cloud, in fact last week I completed migrating off of google's infrustructure - the headaches weren't worth the loss of convenience and lack of peace of mind. I love Steam and I just won't buy a PC game anywhere else if I can find it on Steam, but I'm fed up with cloud based storage offerings and productivity apps - there are better options out there for the techically inclined.

No thanks

[thetoadwarrior]

Stema may be one of the better game services but you still don't *really* own all your games and can lose everything by them taking it away, going out of business or someone hacking your account.

Why can't people just sell software that's not locked into their own product?

Re:No thanks

[geekoid]

I get your concern, but:
1) I get title pretty damn cheap.
2) not likely to go out of business
3) I can turn off the connection.
4) Steam taking away things will shoot them in the foot, so that isn't likely except for abuse.
5) Steam handles 'hacked' accounts pretty well.
6) Going out of business? it's not like a judge would let them turn off everyone's games.

Of course, all that data is just used to create risk analysis. So in regards to games, my risk is very low, and the cost of games is cheap enough to out way that risk.

Non games software, the risk might be greater then any monies I save. No games is an inconvienance. Other software and data is far more important.

Re:No thanks

[thetoadwarrior]

I think as long as Gabe is in charge things will go well. My only concern is he's a techie who is, let's be honest, pretty fat and around 50 now. History says he potentially doesn't have much time left which is very unfortunate for much more important reasons but also from a purely selfish point of view one could argue we can't honestly say where Valve will be even in a year.

I for one welcome our Valve overlords.

[biochozo]

The idea of Valve expanding creates more competition which is great. However, I don't trust the cloud or any 'account' to store my files on. Maybe if it were marketed as a backup and sync instead of storage I'd be more comfortable with it. Owning a few trivial digital pieces of software is my limit of trust no matter what company. I can see Valve prepping to expand, taking the competition by surprise and by next year will have their own tablet, linux based OS, music store... So where 'should' Valve be headed? Have they lost focus or is it just what's good for business?

Re:I for one welcome our Valve overlords.

[geekoid]

Steams cloud is a sync.

You sound like my Luddite uncle who doesn't trust a computer to store his tax information.

Re: Steam startup time

[EvanED]

The complaint isn't Steam startup time, it's the startup time of the individual programs that are launched from Steam. (When it sits there for a few seconds going "Preparing to launch Portal" or whatever, and you want to tell it what's with all the preparing and to stop preparing and just go. :-))

New homework excuse!

[damnbunni]

Nah, I couldn't print my paper because stupid Steam failed to connect to my account, so my office program locked me out.

I'll have it tomorrow when the internet's fixed, I swear!

Re:New homework excuse!

[geekoid]

Well then, since it's a sync, and you can run the programs off line, you get an F.

Nice try, ignoramus.

Re:New homework excuse!

[damnbunni]

You can run the programs offline if Steam feels like letting you.

Steam's 'offline mode' is not reliable. I often have it just say 'Unable to connect to server' and quit without offering offline mode.

So no, you can't necessarily 'run the programs off line'.

Which was sort of my point.

Run locations

[phorm]

Also, when you're able to run them anywhere.
Steam needs to separate accounts from app instances. For example, I should be able to run Photoshop or Maya from computer "A" while my game is running on computer "B", despite them being on the same account. What should be blocked is running a copy of the same application simultaneously on computer "A" and "B".

At the moment, instance permission is account-level, rather than application-level. If they want to bring in non-games, that would be a deal-breaker for me as I often may have multiple things going on at once (say playing a game while something is rendering, etc)

Re:Run locations

[Cederic]

Thanks for articulating a point I made elsewhere in this thread rather more eloquently than I managed.

Assuming people use a single PC is a naive and archaic assumption. I can't even support it as an anti-piracy facility as I should be able to loan games to friends - I have a dozen game CDs out of my house right now..

Re:Run locations

[aXis100]

Offline mode should cover this to a fair extent. It will just make cloud access difficult, but you could work around it.

sweet

[geekoid]

I can't wait for the summer windowscon where I can pick up every MS title for 29.99.

Maybe not.

gabe gabe..

[Anonymous Coward]

Valve get desperate much? good luck losers

Valve could make Linux on the desktop a reality

[JDG1980]

I've thought for years that Linux on the desktop was a dead end, but it's actually conceivable that Valve could get it to work.

Admittedly, there are still problems to be solved: the utterly horrible font rendering, the reliance on having the obsolete and slow X11 subsystem sitting behind all other graphics, the lack of a UI that matches up with Windows. But three of the major problems – fragmentation, bad hardware support, and lack of commercial software – could be addressed by Valve.

If Valve rolls out a Steam client for Linux, then any distribution which doesn't support it will be relegated to an even smaller niche than it is now. This means that Valve pretty much gets to say what Linux on the desktop is. Less fragmentation. And while some people think Valve will make a "Steambox" console (and who knows, they might), I think it's more likely they will make a "blessed" list of supported and tested hardware. This list will become a reference for anyone who wants to use Linux on the desktop. Valve also has the muscle to push for additional hardware support, while the existing open-source community might simply be ignored.

Regarding commercial software, you're obviously not going to see MS Office there (and this is a major stumbling block) but you might see some other big players. If Adobe brings Photoshop and the rest of Creative Suite to Steam, Microsoft is going to shit a brick.

It's a trap

[Anonymous Coward]

They recently changed license terms, so I emailed support asking for way out. They said that either I loose access to my Steam account, or accept new terms.

When I asked whether refunds were available in that case for all the software I bought on Steam, they said "no". Just like that.

Productivity software, eh? I do not care in the slightest - they won't get my money anymore, it is a trap, and kudos to Mr Stallman for seeing it earlier than anybody.

Re: Steam startup time

[VGPowerlord]

The complaint isn't Steam startup time, it's the startup time of the individual programs that are launched from Steam.

What Steam is doing is checking the central server to see whether you actually own the game as well as checking if there are any updates to it. The latter is necessary for certain multiplayer games that update a lot as Steam doesn't always immediately pick up that there are updates to them if they were updated after Steam was started. This is most noticeable with Team Fortress 2 but also Half-Life 2: Deathmatch, Day of Defeat: Source, and Counter-Strike: Source as they all use the same game engine (CS:S's updates are delayed, though). Likely CS:GO and DOTA2 also have this problem as both are still in beta testing with CS:GO launching in 12 days.

Running the game in offline mode should make that screen a lot shorter, but also disables achievements.

(When it sits there for a few seconds going "Preparing to launch Portal" or whatever, and you want to tell it what's with all the preparing and to stop preparing and just go. :-))

Unfortunately, the Internet doesn't run at Ludicrous Speed.

Silverlight with Microsoft DRM is non-free

[tepples]

Unless you count Firefox as proprietary and non-free. I guess you could.

Mozilla Firefox is source-identical to a free application. For the purpose of this discussion, I'm ignoring the "iceweasel" bickering and calling it free until the moment you install a non-free content-type handler such as Flash Player with Adobe DRM or Silverlight with Microsoft DRM, after which point the combination is non-free.

Flash and Silverlight [are] technologies I have installed rather than media streaming applications.

When you combine a free browser, a non-free content-type handler within the free browser, and a web application, the result is a non-free media streaming application in the sense to which I was referring.

I wish they would finish Steam first.

[Control-Z]

Steam is good, but it's not great. How about allowing me to put my games in more than one category? How about allowing me to list my games that support co-op or multiplayer? The data is already in the Steam store database.

The old users vs. new users.

[DrYak]

The old users aren't going to run away.

New users: that's another question.

If Win8 app store suck badly compared to steam (in a "microsoft compressed folders" vs. WinRAR / 7Zip way, cf the other replies in this thread). Consumer are just going to install steam for anything else than fetching microsoft software. (Probably fetching Steam from Win8 app store, and then getting their games from Steam).

If Win8 app store is compelling enough: good choice of games, good integration with other community service, with Microsoft Live Messenging services, with Microsoft's recently acquired Skype, with their older infrastructures like XBox Live and Windows Games, etc.
Well new comers won't have much incentive to try to find other distribution channels, they will be attracted by the ads and nags displayed in Windows 8 and just click in the app store to get what they need.
If microsoft lands a deal with the next über-successful AAA-title and it lands in their app store, lots of gamers will flock to get it from there, and then will use the infrastructure around Win8 to play.

Just as a recent example on both side: take Internet Explorer:
- Some time it has been "the internet icon that is good enough, why bother with anything else ?" that almost crushed non-microsoft browsers for ever.
- Some other times it has become "the blue thing on which I click to go get and install Firefox or Google Chrome on any new machine".
Depending on how Microsoft manage it, Steam vs. Win8 app store could go both ways too.

The networking effect is less strong in gaming infrastructure than on social network.
in social network, what matters most is the interaction with absolutely everyone else, no matter what the short term events. Thus the huge inertia before moving to something else. A whole generation is bound to some social platform. FB is poised to stay where it is, despite it blunders, until the current generation on it grows older and thus current kids grow up with what they are use to. (Twitter and Tumblr seem to be the next trend).

in games, what matters the most is the microcosm around the currently popular games. the rest of the social network is ancillary to that. all it takes is a new crop of successful AAA-title to get released on a new platform. You don't log into steam to communicate with your long lost cousin. You log into steam to play games. If your current games and other games with whom you can multi-player are on a different network, you log into that and promptly forget about steam... until Half-Life episode 3 or something similarily popular ends up there. In which case the cycle can start over.

The best for the long term of the platform would be to have a few concurrent channels each specializing in their own offering (exactly the current situation with Linux distribution, where you have the distro's official repository, and then 3rd party repositories to get extra or newer software: Ubuntu and PPA, openSuse and Packman + SuseBuilder, etc.) (one could imagine win 8 app store, steam and a google repository (with firefox, chrome, libreoffice, etc. in it) living together and all interfacing nicely with the upgrade system. Such a perfect situation would completely remove the bad habit of end users install any crap they find on the internet. And thus bring into the Windows world part of the reasons which make every single other system - including Linux - much more secure).

Sadly, history has shown that Microsoft rarely plays nicely with concurrence (unless ordered by an EU court), and it's very likely that they would try to go the Apple iGizmo route and could try to do anything they can legally (or without being caught) to make sure Win8 App store is the absolute inevitable stop to fetch anything you would want to run on Windows.

Just to be on the safe side

[DrYak]

I agree with you that *probably* the Win8 App Store will utterly suck as a game distribution channel.

But that probably won't stop Microsoft in trying anyway.
That won't prevent them in doing some (limited harm) anyway.

And Valve wouldn't be right to base their strategy just on hunch.

They are preparing a "Plan B" just to be safe and Linux (and a potential Steam Box down the line) seem to be their current bet.

In any case Microsoft has already several cards to play:
- They will need a half baked Win8 App Store for their own software anyway. (Just like Apple distributes OS-X software on their app store)
- They already have some eco system with XBox Live, although expensive, as you mention.
- They did have some attempts with Games for Windows as you mention, although as other point out, not much people have actually heard about it even if it has been available.
- They have some user gathering/meeting potential with their messaging software:
-- Windows Live Messenger (formely MSN)
-- Skype that they acquired recently.
-- Their half baked social network that they built around Windows Live.

If they had some genius on they payroll (Hey, are we sure that Steve Jobs is indeed dead? And not simply abducted to get his brain stolen and locked into a Jar somewhere deep in Microsoft's R&D department) they could manage to leverage all this and bring something which isn't as puke-ugly-bad as usually.

On the other hand Valve hasn't much to lose:
- They have a deep warchest and working on Linux ports isn't taxing them much.
- There are benefits from developing cross-platform (like discovering crazy/rare bugs or performance problems). Thanks to the work on Linux, according to some benchmarks, the Linux version of L4D2 is bat-shit crazy fast, the Windows version running on the OpenGL backend saw some performance improvement and is currently better than the DirectX backend, although not as fast as on Linux, and the DirectX version saw some minimal improvement thanks to some of the indirect optimisations.
- By releasing a Linux version, they not only gain a (rather) small market, but also attract a lot of publicity, which is also nice (and this is basically what Id has been doing for a while. They didn't earn a lot of money directly with the Linux version, but they were popular).
- By collaborating with upstream and hardware vendors, Valve can benefit *to* the Linux community, which is both a nice publicity stunt but also is positive in some more long term utopia. (Gabe is currently completely sold on Linux ideologies according to recent interviews)
- A Linux port paves the way for some Steam-Box a few years down the line.

So even if Win8 App Store utterly bombs as a game distribution channel they still can have lots of advantage by staying prepared with a Linux release. It won't be a total waste of resource.