steam hate, why?

[Icehearted]

Funny how people who are fans of Steam often think anyone that doesn't is simply wrong. Yes, negative labels, name calling, and all other manner of basic dickery do wonders for making your side of the argument seem all the better.

I really like what Sarge034 had to say, find most of it pretty much on par with my own feelings.

I dislike the concept of Digital Distribution, with exception to GOG, since it's DRM free and encourages backing up your purchases locally if you like. Their approach trounces Steam roundly in nearly ever possible way. This isn't about GOG though, so I'll leave it there...

I remember a big brouhaha over BioShock. If I recall it straight, people that purchased the game via Steam were forced to wait as Steam needed to sort out activation issues, activation being a concept I hate immensely, and were thus for about a week or so deprived of enjoying what hard copy purchasers enjoyed from day 1. Like Sarge pointed out the mangled concept of what ownership really means has shifted considerably in the gaming landscape, more so since Digital Distribution became more and more popular. It is a slippery slope we've seen rear it's head before; that fellow that EA blocked from playing his own new copy of Dragon Age because he said something they didn't like on their forum. That was later rectified, but it demonstrated clearly the power companies wield to literally take a purchased item from a consumer at will. Another example I know all too personally is with Amazon's App Store, and how games released by a considerable number of companies, including PopCap, simply vanished, no warning, no refunds, screw the customer. Doesn't happen with physical copies, I've got games going back to 8bit era I an still play because I paid for them and I OWN THEM.

One final point, a digital copy is often priced the same as a physical copy and are often slower to decrease in price. I realize distribution has it's costs, but if a physical copy, preferably one that cannot be blocked by it's publishers for any reason ever, means I get a physical manual, disc, other things for the same price as an all digital copy, physical will win every time. Call me old school, but digital ownership feels far less substantive and much too abstract by comparison.

Incidentally, I have a sizable Steam collection, many of which I'd gotten via Humble, which is a superb organization. I've touched maybe two of my two dozen or more games. My DRM free games on the other hand tend to get a lot of attention and a lot more of my time, right along with my console games, which also don't require activation.

 

[Bat Vader]

At the moment I find Steam to be pretty darn near perfect. There was one thing that I disliked that they fixed months ago though. It was when you were downloading something on Steam and decided to play a game that it would stop the download. I was happy to see them implement an option allows me to not have to Alt+Tab out of my games now to start the download back up.

If they allowed people to trade in/swap games with other Steam users or put new games on the Steam Marketplace that would be awesome.

 

[Guitarmasterx7]

There's a lot of backlash right now because they apparently did away with the greenlight system dictating what games can go on steam and now any game with a publisher can be sold on steam, and these games are being featured as new releases, even games released years ago that are only now making it to steam since they opened the flood gates. Also their policies have allowed several notably large cases of early access games being sold at full price promising features that aren't in the game (and in some cases not even being listed as early access games at all)

It's mostly brought to public attention by total biscuit, who if your not familiar is an extremely influential videogame critic/personality. While I don't think it's enough to actually turn anyone against steam, I think a lot of people with that "valve loves us personally, valve can do no wrong" mentality are starting to question their faith in what has always been a business with above average public relations, and they're starting to see it as that so they're angry.

I dunno, that's my theory. Not that people don't dislike steam for other reasons, but that's probably why you've noticed a recent surge in it.

 

[zefichan]

A big reason for "steam hate" is the fanatical steam fanboys who cannot handle that some people are not fond of steam and claim that it is the "best thing that happened to PC gaming".

It's not. It's not the messias, NuclearKangaroo. You can stop trying to be a martyr for it.

oh and heres the real kicker, microsoft wanted to CHARGE YOU 60 BUCKS FOR THE FUCKING PRIVILEDGE

Look at this. You're defending one awful practice with another.
Spoiler: Microsoft may be worse, but steam is still awful for many of us.

Steam is close to a monopoly, and this is generally bad.
Steam is DRM, spyware, may go out of work one day (spoiler: I can still install my copy of Ultima Underworld when I want to. Can't do so with steam games once it dies, which it eventually will - that's not paranoia, that's technology), is extremely slow where I live, is overpriced, and forces me to get it with boxed copies of games(!)

Not to mention that Steam has zero respect for customers. That's not a lie, that's a fact.
-Awful Refund policy
-Broken games sold in general without any curation, including games shipping WITHOUT THE EXE
-Makes it easy for awful developers to censor criticism in their forums
-Hides real release dates of old games that get thrown on steam
-Hides when games are mobile ports, including censoring the tags that could indicate this

I'd believe that Steam had respect for customers if all games on Steam were guaranteed to actually work and if customers could tell other customers that, say, games are mobile ports matter-of-factly.

Look, all flaming aside:
Steam is not the messias and I do not need a reason to not use it. It's the other way round: Steam needs to give ME a reason to use it. So far, it only gives me reason to avoid it.

Why would I want it? I honestly don't see a reason. If I want to buy digital, I can just use GoG, and get a superior, DRM-free product that WILL work (and if it doesn't work on some systems, Gog doesn't censor this in the reviews). if I want massive sales, I use the humble bundle with the DRM-Free downloads.

What has steam to offer for me? Nothing other than fanatical fanboys. I prefer a lack of fanboys.


I honestly do not understand this tribalism gamers have. Gamers like to latch to a company and defend it to the death, as if it was their friend. These are companies, not your friends. We have no obligation to use them and their services, if we do not want to.#
Doesn't matter if its Gog, Steam, Humble, microsoft, amazon - none of these are beyond criticism, and a customer is not bad or evil if she avoids shopping at any of them.

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

There's a lot of backlash right now because they apparently did away with the greenlight system dictating what games can go on steam and now any game with a publisher can be sold on steam, and these games are being featured as new releases, even games released years ago that are only now making it to steam since they opened the flood gates. Also their policies have allowed several notably large cases of early access games being sold at full price promising features that aren't in the game (and in some cases not even being listed as early access games at all)

It's mostly brought to public attention by total biscuit, who if your not familiar is an extremely influential videogame critic/personality. While I don't think it's enough to actually turn anyone against steam, I think a lot of people with that "valve loves us personally, valve can do no wrong" mentality are starting to question their faith in what has always been a business with above average public relations, and they're starting to see it as that so they're angry.

I dunno, that's my theory. Not that people don't dislike steam for other reasons, but that's probably why you've noticed a recent surge in it.

not exactly, steam has always had a policy of, once you get one game released on steam, you can release as many as you want, the first one is the only tough one, so what many scummy devs are doing is dumping their entire back catalog into steam as soon as they get 1 game in, the funny thing is that, not long ago steam was actually CRITIZED for making it hard for indie devs to get their games into the service, with relatively well known games such as unepic and unity of command being rejected, apparently numerous times

if id have to choose between old closed steam and new open one, id definitively choose the new steam, but i realize shovelware is bound to be tradeoff for this level of freedom, that being said there are many initiatives steam could take to allow the garbage to sink into the bottom while the good stuff and the hidden gems get discovered and in the end they would benefit as well, not only steam would improve its reputation, but good games sell more than bad ones and valve gets a cut off every sale

i just hope the user reviews and tags are part bigger plan to make this happen, Valve has showed interest in opening the floodgames sometime in the future, but right now, is nowhere near close an acceptable state to do so, then last thing we need is another app store

A big reason for "steam hate" is the fanatical steam fanboys who cannot handle that some people are not fond of steam and claim that it is the "best thing that happened to PC gaming".

It's not. It's not the messias, NuclearKangaroo. You can stop trying to be a martyr for it.

oh and heres the real kicker, microsoft wanted to CHARGE YOU 60 BUCKS FOR THE FUCKING PRIVILEDGE

Look at this. You're defending one awful practice with another.
Spoiler: Microsoft may be worse, but steam is still awful for many of us.

Steam is close to a monopoly, and this is generally bad.
Steam is DRM, spyware, may go out of work one day (spoiler: I can still install my copy of Ultima Underworld when I want to. Can't do so with steam games once it dies, which it eventually will - that's not paranoia, that's technology), is extremely slow where I live, is overpriced, and forces me to get it with boxed copies of games(!)

Not to mention that Steam has zero respect for customers. That's not a lie, that's a fact.
-Awful Refund policy
-Broken games sold in general without any curation, including games shipping WITHOUT THE EXE
-Makes it easy for awful developers to censor criticism in their forums
-Hides real release dates of old games that get thrown on steam
-Hides when games are mobile ports, including censoring the tags that could indicate this

I'd believe that Steam had respect for customers if all games on Steam were guaranteed to actually work and if customers could tell other customers that, say, games are mobile ports matter-of-factly.

Look, all flaming aside:
Steam is not the messias and I do not need a reason to not use it. It's the other way round: Steam needs to give ME a reason to use it. So far, it only gives me reason to avoid it.

Why would I want it? I honestly don't see a reason. If I want to buy digital, I can just use GoG, and get a superior, DRM-free product that WILL work (and if it doesn't work on some systems, Gog doesn't censor this in the reviews). if I want massive sales, I use the humble bundle with the DRM-Free downloads.

What has steam to offer for me? Nothing other than fanatical fanboys. I prefer a lack of fanboys.

ill be the first one to admit im heavily biased towards steam and valve, but lets get our facts straight, steam IS one of the best things to happen to PC gaming and easily one of the biggest reasons behind the resurgence of the platform

you think steam is a "bad practice" well thats your opinion i dont think so, but the bottom line is that what microsoft was trying to do was several times worse, and is not hypocrite to critize it

maybe im not so bothered over the idea of my games one day becoming unplayable because:

1) steam has already existed for 10 years
2) Gabe himself has said hed disable steam's DRM if valve ever went down
3) steam probably is the only reason why i can own video games legally in the first place, thanks to its reasonable prices and short delivery times compared to importing

if valve has built a monopoly with steam is because of its quality, there are plenty of other DD platforms out there, Valve shouldnt do worse just so they can catch up, its not like the are pulling stuff like mandatory steamworks integration or "release parity" like microsoft, valve actually encorages devs to release their games in as many platforms as they can

i could argue steam is pro customer with this
-allowing customers to post their own reviews on the store page which get much more visibility than the forums
-allowing cancellations of pre-orders
-constant improvement and additions of features such as big picture, steam workshop, community features (you know, the same forums you complain are being censored), etc
-giving out free games (Portal, Left 4 Dead 2), which crashed their own site and made em lose sales
-supporting content creators and working closely with them

there are 2 sides to this coin pal


also stop lying, you are the second person saying devs can censor reviews on steam, thats a flat out lie, you can check the FAQ of steam reviews and see for yourself, or check the store page of bad games

steam had censored tags, or rather, has allowed the community to report abusive and unaccurate tags, because tags are not reviews, if you dont like a game, just write a review and post it, dont just tag the game as "bad" or "donte" or "fish AI", stuff that doesnt really give the customer an idea of the quality of the game or allows them to find similar games to those, on top of all, unlike reviews you dont need to play a game to tag it, so the system can be abused, such as when FEZ got a "diva dev" tag (not saying fish isnt a jerk mind you)

you dont have reasons to use steam, i do, if i can accept some people hate DRM on principles and that a refund policy would be welcomed, you could at the very least acknowledge steam's features

 

[sweetylnumb]

I love steam sales. But seriously, every single game i buy i have to fix or patch or run in compatibility mode becuase steam doesnt give a shit about what it sells. Also no refunds, also the amount of crap on thier right now is gross.

But i love it, still. Im a sucker. I deserve better.

 

[ShinyCharizard]

3. Download speeds are slow and inconsistent (this is likely a regional problem)

No, Yanks and Europeans have complained a lot about the same. I usually don't care when I'm DLing a game because I've never bought a game that I absolutely had to play NOW!!!!!!!!!! so I have limited frame of reference, but my Xbox downloads games faster (when talking about similar-sized games).

Hmmm well that is certainly interesting, but yeah I concur on the Xbox being faster, it downloads equivalent sized games at least twice as fast as I get on Steam or on my PS3.

 

[zefichan]

if id have to choose between old closed steam and new open one, id definitively choose the new steam

Why are there only two options?

Why not do the reasonable third option:
A game can only be sold on steam if it works, regardless of the publisher.

Even Apple manages that - yes, Apple actually checks this. Why can't steam?


The problem with the "old" closed steam (Spoiler: Greenlight still exists, so it's still an issue) is that it randomly let some companies through without a check. This is the exact same problem the new steam has.

Neither is a solution, neither is a good option.

you could at the very least acknowledge steam's features

Why? I am not paid to do marketing for steam. Why should I talk about 'features' that don't interest or benefit me?

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

if id have to choose between old closed steam and new open one, id definitively choose the new steam

Why are there only two options?

Why not do the reasonable third option:
A game can only be sold on steam if it works, regardless of the publisher.

Even Apple manages that - yes, Apple actually checks this. Why can't steam?

because PC is a much more complicated platform than iPad or iPhone, and while apple always knows what to expect from its own hardware, neither steam not the dev have the slightest idea of what kind of machine their customers built to play the games, in fact some old games become problematic because they ar being run on machines that couldve possibly be conceived back when the game was made

an more indepth QA system i assume, would be needed to check every game and see if it runs properly, this system could potentially make the process of publishing a game on steam clumsier

The problem with the "old" closed steam (Spoiler: Greenlight still exists, so it's still an issue) is that it randomly let some companies through without a check. This is the exact same problem the new steam has.

Neither is a solution, neither is a good option.

the old system only required a publisher, thats why it was so problematic for indies, and while greenlight was problematic in the begining its actually extremely lenient nowadays

you could at the very least acknowledge steam's features

Why? I am not paid to do marketing for steam. Why should I talk about 'features' that don't interest or benefit me?

because otherwise you are only listening to your own voice instead of having a real discussion

i for instance care very little about DRM as long as its not intrussive, something in my opinion steam is not, but i can understand and respect why someone wouldnt tolerate any form of DRM on principle

is not a matter of marketing, and regardless youve already done plenty of it for GoG.com



some people like achivements, some people like sales, some people like trading, some people get some extra cash via the steam market, some people like easy modding, some people like community features and big picture mode, are you willing to accept those facts?

 

[endtherapture]

I really used to love Steam but the UI has hardly updated in ages, years in fact. This gives it a very late 00s feel whilst Origin has moved onwards and is much much faster and cleaner in it's UI.

Also I've just got too many games. When a game used to be on Steam I know it would be a quality game and always worth a buy, especially if it was on sale. Now they've just flooded it with too much shovelware, old games being passed off as new ones, so if you don't do your research it's like playing Russian roulette with your moeny to get a cgame that works.

 

[Roxor]

Steam's own DRM might not be a problem (for some users), but the third-party DRM they allow publishers to include is a pain. Requests for Valve to ban it have been a perennial topic on the suggestions forum for years, but they won't listen.

More recently, their lack of quality control is another very good reason for Steam to get some hatred directed at it.

 

[XSTALKERX]

There's lots of reasons to hate steam but let's just say this. Try and look favorably on steam when when you got a 2mb per sec internet connection speed for only 10GB a month. Then come and tell me steam is actually good.

 

[Sarge034]

Wait, so if I go to my local retailer, buy a PC game off the shelf, go home and plop it in my disc drive, it won't let me play the game I payed for without installing steam and getting the OK?

Is there a little Steam emblem on the box at least to warn me? How many and what kinds of games have this restriction?

That is correct. The "warning" is on the back of the box under "minimum system requirements" and "recommended system requirements" in a section all to itself labeled, "other requirements and supports". It says, and I quote, "Initial instillation requires one-time broadband internet connection for Steam authentication; software installations required (included with the game) include Steam Client, Visual C++ 2008 Runtime Libraries and Microsoft DirectX." At least that is what is says on the back of my case in tiny print.

Could you please elaborate on this? Or post a link so I can read up on this?

I'll break it into pieces.

I can't find anything legit to post about the resource sucking part but know that it is always running in the background, even if you haven't opened the program, and consumes approximately 17,960K (+/- 3K) memory while running in the background on my rig. It is always communicating online so it will eat your bandwidth allowance if you have a cap.

As for the claims of data mining. There is an "optional" setting that allows steam to basically record everything that happens while you are using the client to understand how things affect the experience. This is from rig specs, to your brand of mouse/keyboard, anything else you have connected like a phone, and any other programs running while you are using steam. I say optional in quotes because there have been claims that data mining still occurs, intentionally or not, when the option is disabled. You can Google it and find a site you trust but out of fear of accidentally linking to a site that would break the Escapist CoC I will not.

Jim Sterling made a video about why PC gaming gets away with DRM charmingly called "why PC gaming gets away with it"

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/7586-Why-PC-Gaming-Gets-Away-With-It

First and foremost, why are you asking us why we hate steam if all you are going to do is try to convert us to Valveboyism?

Anyway, I am well aware of the video as I watched it the day after it went live and I disagree with him too.

1) i can understand how this can be problematic, theres no real reason for devs to do this, other than to make it easy to update one single version of the game and have feature parity as well as saving time thanks to the services steam provides, things like cloud saving and achivements

So take a step back and ask yourself, "Who else do I sound like right now?" It's better because of the cloud! Trust us! Look at all these services we provide; TV, Football, achievements for TV, achievements for watching ads, DA CLOUDZZZZZZZ!

It might surprise you but I don't give a flying fuck about "the cloud". Much like I prefer hard copies of games I also prefer to own the thing my data is being stored on. As for your point about updating, I didn't realize steam could magically make all of the OS code identical. Damn guyz, did ju hear? Just code for steam and ittle work on mac, pc, Linux, and all the rest! Wait a sec... If that's the case why is there a push to get more steam games Linux compatible? Doesn't just being on steam make that all work?

2) i think this is overly paranoid, steam has existed for 10 years, we've heard the same "if valve goes out of business your games are gone" argument for 10 years now, thats probably more than a physical copy of my 140 games on steam wouldve lasted, also steam does not restrict access to your library if you ever get banned. plus Gabe Newell has given his word he would disable Steam's DRM if Valve ever went backrupt, and i trust the man

I don't own the things I bought with my money. That's enough to oppose it on principle. However, this might cause you to back peddle a little.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2013/12/30/steam-removes-game-order-of-war-challenge-from-user-libraries/

3) its not hypocrisy, you cant possibly compare a ridiculous DRM box that required you to call microsoft every single day so it wouldnt fucking unplug your console, i can set steam to offline mode from now until the heat death of the universe and i will still be able to play my games, oh and heres the real kicker, microsoft wanted to CHARGE YOU 60 BUCKS FOR THE FUCKING PRIVILEDGE.

Did steam not require you to call home the entire time you played at one point? Last I heard the offline mode was chinchy at best, didn't include all games with single player, and only worked for 30 days at a time.

plus steam offers tons of features that services like xbox live/GFWL/Origin/Uplay dont, things like cloud saving, achivements, sales, steam workshop, community features, steam market, trading, family sharing, in-home streaming, big picture mode, etc, all for free

So Xbox live doesn't offer cloud saving, achievements, sales, family sharing, or in-home streaming? Damn, that's news to me. OH, WAIT! No it's not, because I can turn on my Xbox right now and see these things. /credibility

4) you can OPT OUT of hardware survey thing, i never do but ive seen the option

You might be able to opt out but there are still reports of data mining, intentional or not, afterwards.

5) why do you make stuff up?

I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of how wrong you are.
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2914901
http://www.reddit.com/r/Steam/comments/1wyu01/castleminer_z_developer_yes_actual_developer_is/

Valve is in my opinion one of the most pro-customer developers around, providing DRM that instead of making the customer jump through hoops adds value to their games, it has allowed people with extremly limited budget like me, acquire games legally, theyve given out free games in the past and keep updating steam with new features regularly, they also allow content creators profit off their effort

Pro consumer...? *insert gif again* Have you tried to get a refund from Valve, ever? The horror stories are endless, the lack of QC in their store is sickening, and the DRM is lazy.

hell they've given part of their split of the sales to the developers of the software modelers use and they let the modelers decide how to split this amount

they had literally no reason to do that other than indirectly support their fans and content creators

Except for the fact that they are required by law to provide compensation for a product they are buying into with the intent to sell.

i can understand if you are agaisnt DRM just cause of principles, but man, dont fabricate stuff

I can't understand being a valveite so why don't you try becoming informed at least.

 

[Doom-Slayer]

3. Download speeds are slow and inconsistent (this is likely a regional problem)

Wat? I live in NZ, after upgrading my modem to actually make use of my Broadband, I can get 1.3mb/s off Steam. I cant even get half of that from any other website, including torrents, including using download managers with 20 parts. Steam is ludicrously fast for me.

Id have to say its a regional thing for you.

I don't own the things I bought with my money. That's enough to oppose it on principle. However, this might cause you to back peddle a little.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2013/12/30/steam-removes-game-order-of-war-challenge-from-user-libraries/

Just read the article and it stated due to the games always on DRM(not Steam) the game was nonfunctional, even the single player component didn't work. Its pretty understandable for them to remove the game then. Not perfect, but understandable.

Personally I see where you are coming from with your arguments. I don't agree, but I see where you are coming from. In sort of order of the things you dont like.

-Steam uses practically none of my processing power, to the point I leave it open 24/7. It uses 1/6 of what Firefox uses for comparison.
-I actually like the cloud and look forward to the day I dont have to own physical copies of games or movies etc.
-Ive never had to get a refund because I have never bought a game I dislike(I have over 200 games).
-Offline mode works perfectly for me for every game I have used it for, and ha never "run out" like some people say.
-I will believe Valve is preforming unauthorized data mining when I see a credible source that says so. (I haven't so far)

I can't understand being a valveite so why don't you try becoming informed at least.

Im no Valvite but overall...thats my thoughts, mayeb it will clarify some things. I wouldnt call myself a fanboy personally, I use Steam and enjoy it because it works. My experience has basically been

-Huge variety of game choices
-Cheap games
-Fast download/updating speeds.

At the end of the day, I want to play games without jumping through hoops, with Steam I don't have to. I buy games, I play games, they work, Steam works..I have fun. I have nothing to complain about.

 

[MrBaskerville]

I think it's too slow and annoying to navigate, i don't have a good user experience when using their clunkky launcher. Stopped using it years ago, but i recently needed to test some things in Braid, so i tried to boot it up, instead it gave me error messages and therefore i can't acces my games, so i've basically uninstalled it and i'm probably never going to use it again. I used it back in the day becaus it was neccesary and because it was the only service with a decent selection of games and fine prices. But lately i've found a lot of cool alternatives like Gog, so i haven't had any reason to deal with steam and i haven't missed it.

It is probably worth mentioning that i'm not that much of a pc gamer these days, which is why i don't see any reason why i should take any time solving the issues i'm experiencing, just isn't worth it. And i don't hate Steam, i'm just very indifferent towards it, and slightly annoyed.

 

[Zac Jovanovic]

Prices!

Counting 1 dollar as 1 euro is a standard practice for my region on Steam and prices are not region adjusted, so Steam prices are ~30% higher than physical boxes even. I don't think I've ever bought a game on Steam that wasn't on a big sale, I usually get keys from re-sellers.

Wat? I live in NZ, after upgrading my modem to actually make use of my Broadband, I can get 1.3mb/s off Steam. I cant even get half of that from any other website, including torrents, including using download managers with 20 parts. Steam is ludicrously fast for me.

Id have to say its a regional thing for you.

Well 1.3Mb/s is hardly ludicrous, or was that a typo?I mean, any torrent with 2-3 stars will easily beat 1.3Mb/s.
The minimum cable here is 15mb/s (~1.85Mb/s).

But your point stands, I've had Steam download whole games within seconds on a gigabit connection, usually speeds stick between 50 and 55 Mb/s. Still, there are like 50 regions on Steam, some of them are bound to suck I guess.

 

[KungFuJazzHands]

I could give as many reasons for hating Steam as I do for liking it, but I'll only list my most egregious one here: the fact that Valve can permanently lock your account at any time and for any reason, and they're not required to give any kind of explanation. Even worse, they will lock your account if you choose not to agree to their ToS updates -- once they do that, you lose access to any previous purchases made on that account, and I can't begin to tell you how fucking offensive and anti-consumer I find that to be.

i could argue steam is pro customer with this
-allowing customers to post their own reviews on the store page which get much more visibility than the forums
-allowing cancellations of pre-orders
-constant improvement and additions of features such as big picture, steam workshop, community features (you know, the same forums you complain are being censored), etc
-giving out free games (Portal, Left 4 Dead 2), which crashed their own site and made em lose sales
-supporting content creators and working closely with them

there are 2 sides to this coin pal

You're absolutely right about 2 sides:

-Steam may allow customers to post reviews, but it also allows devs and publishers to flag reviews for "offensive" material. While that can be beneficial in theory for everyone involved, in practice it can lead to episodes like this [http://www.steamgifts.com/forum/9uZDg/what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-the-developer-of-this-game].
-Cancel pre-orders? That's great and all, but have you ever tried to get a refund from Steam for a broken-at-release game? It's a long, arduous process that forces customers to fight tooth and nail with Steam reps to even get an acknowledgement of any existing issues, even when armed with mountains of evidence.
-For every improvement Valve adds to Steam, they break something else. They also have a habit of ignoring serious issues for years (remember how terrible offline mode used to be?) until the public outcry becomes too loud to ignore.
-Valve's free giveaways crashed Steam because Valve couldn't be bothered to prepare for the overloaded bandwidth they knew would result if they started giving away free copies of some of the most renowned PC games in the world. They also pull the same crap with each and every seasonal sale they hold, the results being massive downtime, client crashes and server bottlenecks.

also stop lying, you are the second person saying devs can censor reviews on steam, thats a flat out lie, you can check the FAQ of steam reviews and see for yourself, or check the store page of bad games

Not only does Valve allow devs to flag reviews and tags (with the end result potentially being deletion, collapse or alteration, i.e. censorship) , but they also give devs free reign to edit, hide, delete, lock, and outright disappear Community forums associated with whatever particular title those publishers may be selling on Steam.

If I were you, I'd do a little homework before accusing others of being liars.

 

[Doom-Slayer]

Well 1.3Mb/s is hardly ludicrous, or was that a typo?I mean, any torrent with 2-3 stars will easily beat 1.3Mb/s.
The minimum cable here is 15mb/s (~1.85Mb/s).

But your point stands, I've had Steam download whole games within seconds on a gigabit connection, usually speeds stick between 50 and 55 Mb/s. Still, there are like 50 regions on Steam, some of them are bound to suck I guess.

Not a typo. That is the fastest internet speed I have ever seen while living here(maybe up to around 1.5-1.7 max). Like I said, my average speed on torrents is in around 700-800kb/s each, maybe combined on multiple torrents youd push it up. 20 part downloads on FDM don't reach above 1mb/s. Ever.

And this is AFTER I upgraded my modem. I used to never even break 800kb/s before upgrading my modem.

EDIT: Just tested Steam, peaked at 1.4mb/s. Thats the highest it goes for me around here. One of the only things I dislike about being here(that and no legit Netflix)

 

[putowtin]

price,
outside of sales it's too dang much!

(also I don't hate, it's bad for you!)