Yeah, its like a lot of people don’t know you can just… move files out of Steam’s directory, and 95% of the time, game still runs, just, not through Steam.
The problem is that with Steam you only know if that works after you bought the game and only know if that works across machines if you upfront have two machines to test it in.
I mean, if you know upfront that it matters to you (which you might not until, say, your machine breaks and you happen to have no access to the Internet or Steam in your new machine yet, at with point you’ll be thinking “I wish I checked”) you can go through all the hassle of always thoroughly testing it within the refund period of that game, but at that point piracy is less of a hassle.
Meanwhile some of my GOG offline installers are so old that they have been used on 3 different machines (well, one was the same machine under Windows and under Linux) already.
Don’t get me wrong - I use both Steam and GOG, my point is that saying that “Steam has DRM free games” is even worse than a half-truth and about as bollocks as saying that a shop selling TVs is selling “Quake game machines” - sure, people with the right skills can get Quake to run in some Smart TVs, but that’s not how the store is selling them as, that’s definitelly not supported by them and they won’t refund you a Smart TV purchase as “not suitable for purpose” if that device fails to runs Quake.
The PC wiki actually has a dedicated field for if steam games require it or not. It’s rare if not close to never that you don’t know ahead of time if you actually look.
This is something I wasn’t aware of, so thanks for the info.
There are also some other ways to work around Steam DRM, such as the Goldberg Emulator (basically a steam_api DLL which for steam client games emulates the Steam servers).
It’s just all so unreliable and an unecessary hassle when it does work, because of something which only benefits Steam and causes a product to be inferior for the customer.
If Steam made available offline installers with no DRM, clearly stated on the store page even if alongside stuff with DRM and/or no offline installers, I would be buying way more from them than I do.
Even with the whole “so far, so good” soft thouch approach under Gabe’s leadership that does not leverage market power over developers to force use of Steam’s DRM and lets us as customers have all sorts of ways to work around Steam DRM when games do have it, we’re all just having to pray that the guy keeps eating his veggies, avoids saturated fats and walks at least half an hour a day so as to reduce the risk of dying from a heart attack, and always looks both ways when crossing the road so as not to be run over, because when the guy goes the “benevolent regime” might very well be replaced by a malevolent one (as has happened in lots of good companies) and people’s game collections in Steam will be hostages to it because of the way things are set-up (since the first thing a “malevolent regime” would do is push updates closing all the loopholes).
Ok I had to read that twice to understand the angle I think you’re coming from, but uh, basically yeah, agree.
If you want a game, that works if the net goes down… yeah, sometimes just 100% relying on vanilla Steam, that’ll fuck you.
But, Steam does have ways to set up local backup, freeze potentially breaking updates, work in offline mode…
But but, yeah, in many cases, for many people, it makes sense to just either make and keep your own isolated backup of some kind, or yeah, just grab a rip from somewhere and keep it in emergency storage.
My own experience of problems with the “Steam way” is wanting to install and run a new game whilst offline (for example, when I moved houses and was waiting to get landline Internet running, whilst mobile Interned was too slow or expensive to download anything but the tinyiest of games, all the while my external HD with a collection of GOG offline installers gave me plenty of options) and installing games in machines with older versions of Windows because the Steam Application doesn’t support those old OS versions anymore (plus, in all honesty, you definitelly don’t want to to connect such machines to the Internet for security reasons).
Further, as I said in a different post, I can run my GOG games through Lutris by default sandboxed with networking disabled, but I can’t do that in Steam.
More in general, as a Techie since the 90s I’ve long been very aware (and averse) to the dangers of having software or data which is supposedly yours yet is de facto under direct control of an external 3rd party for whom you’re nothing (i.e. not a mate you lent a CD to, but a big company with a massive Legal budget controlling your access to it using phone-home validation), so out of principle I heavilly favor sellers who do not try and retain control of what I bought from them. Same reason I didn’t like “phone home” or “dependent on external servers” hardware or DRM-wrapped books or music, well before the recent wave of enshittification and increase in problems like digital books taken away from people because of some licensing dispute (or even their accounts just being terminated) or hardware bricked because the servers were switched off.
Whilst it might seem like an old-fashioned sense of ownership, that posture has saved me from pretty much all the effects of the enshittification wave.
Yep, I am personally just a bit more comfortable with the convience of Steam, at the moment… but oh yes, when Gabe announces he’s retiring, I’m backing up everything.
I dunno, I mod (as in, make mods, as well as configure combos of other ones, hell I even mod mods lol) a lot, and I’ve just… got my own method, at this point, would be hard to fully describe lol.
It is a very appealing proposal and that’s why I myself have bought games from Steam when I can’t find them in GOG. Further, I’m not strict about always downloading GOG offline installers for all my games, even though if I don’t I run the risk of losing those games if for example the GOG store closes.
And, as you point out, “so far, so good”.
I’ve just been burned by earlier forms of enshittification and service relationships misportrayed as purchases of forever access.
Also, almost 4 decades of using or in Tech have made me very aware of elements which can affect long term usability of software and hardware.
So nowadays I’ll only ever spend money on things which follow that scheme if I’m willing to lose it, even if for now they seem fine, and favour things that I’ll have a chance to still make work 10 or 20 years down the line (funilly enough, this week I’ve been playing Jagged Alliance 2, which is a 26 years old game with gameplay that’s still as fun as back then).
Yeah, way way back, I had a choice between either … playing JA2 with a group…
Or joining the mod team for Project Reality, which is now Squad.
I was just a beta tester / ideas guy, but uh, I’m proud of my choice, led me further into making my own mods, learning programming, etc.
That being said, no irrational hate toward JA2, solid game, doesn’t get the recognition it should, I just… had my own ideas and wanted to be a part of making something, even before I was outta high school.
Yeah, its like a lot of people don’t know you can just… move files out of Steam’s directory, and 95% of the time, game still runs, just, not through Steam.
What even is a Steam rip, anyway?
The problem is that with Steam you only know if that works after you bought the game and only know if that works across machines if you upfront have two machines to test it in.
I mean, if you know upfront that it matters to you (which you might not until, say, your machine breaks and you happen to have no access to the Internet or Steam in your new machine yet, at with point you’ll be thinking “I wish I checked”) you can go through all the hassle of always thoroughly testing it within the refund period of that game, but at that point piracy is less of a hassle.
Meanwhile some of my GOG offline installers are so old that they have been used on 3 different machines (well, one was the same machine under Windows and under Linux) already.
Don’t get me wrong - I use both Steam and GOG, my point is that saying that “Steam has DRM free games” is even worse than a half-truth and about as bollocks as saying that a shop selling TVs is selling “Quake game machines” - sure, people with the right skills can get Quake to run in some Smart TVs, but that’s not how the store is selling them as, that’s definitelly not supported by them and they won’t refund you a Smart TV purchase as “not suitable for purpose” if that device fails to runs Quake.
The PC wiki actually has a dedicated field for if steam games require it or not. It’s rare if not close to never that you don’t know ahead of time if you actually look.
Its annoying it’s not on the store page but eh.
This is something I wasn’t aware of, so thanks for the info.
There are also some other ways to work around Steam DRM, such as the Goldberg Emulator (basically a steam_api DLL which for steam client games emulates the Steam servers).
It’s just all so unreliable and an unecessary hassle when it does work, because of something which only benefits Steam and causes a product to be inferior for the customer.
If Steam made available offline installers with no DRM, clearly stated on the store page even if alongside stuff with DRM and/or no offline installers, I would be buying way more from them than I do.
Even with the whole “so far, so good” soft thouch approach under Gabe’s leadership that does not leverage market power over developers to force use of Steam’s DRM and lets us as customers have all sorts of ways to work around Steam DRM when games do have it, we’re all just having to pray that the guy keeps eating his veggies, avoids saturated fats and walks at least half an hour a day so as to reduce the risk of dying from a heart attack, and always looks both ways when crossing the road so as not to be run over, because when the guy goes the “benevolent regime” might very well be replaced by a malevolent one (as has happened in lots of good companies) and people’s game collections in Steam will be hostages to it because of the way things are set-up (since the first thing a “malevolent regime” would do is push updates closing all the loopholes).
Ok I had to read that twice to understand the angle I think you’re coming from, but uh, basically yeah, agree.
If you want a game, that works if the net goes down… yeah, sometimes just 100% relying on vanilla Steam, that’ll fuck you.
But, Steam does have ways to set up local backup, freeze potentially breaking updates, work in offline mode…
But but, yeah, in many cases, for many people, it makes sense to just either make and keep your own isolated backup of some kind, or yeah, just grab a rip from somewhere and keep it in emergency storage.
My own experience of problems with the “Steam way” is wanting to install and run a new game whilst offline (for example, when I moved houses and was waiting to get landline Internet running, whilst mobile Interned was too slow or expensive to download anything but the tinyiest of games, all the while my external HD with a collection of GOG offline installers gave me plenty of options) and installing games in machines with older versions of Windows because the Steam Application doesn’t support those old OS versions anymore (plus, in all honesty, you definitelly don’t want to to connect such machines to the Internet for security reasons).
Further, as I said in a different post, I can run my GOG games through Lutris by default sandboxed with networking disabled, but I can’t do that in Steam.
More in general, as a Techie since the 90s I’ve long been very aware (and averse) to the dangers of having software or data which is supposedly yours yet is de facto under direct control of an external 3rd party for whom you’re nothing (i.e. not a mate you lent a CD to, but a big company with a massive Legal budget controlling your access to it using phone-home validation), so out of principle I heavilly favor sellers who do not try and retain control of what I bought from them. Same reason I didn’t like “phone home” or “dependent on external servers” hardware or DRM-wrapped books or music, well before the recent wave of enshittification and increase in problems like digital books taken away from people because of some licensing dispute (or even their accounts just being terminated) or hardware bricked because the servers were switched off.
Whilst it might seem like an old-fashioned sense of ownership, that posture has saved me from pretty much all the effects of the enshittification wave.
Got nothing really to add to that or challenge.
Yep, I am personally just a bit more comfortable with the convience of Steam, at the moment… but oh yes, when Gabe announces he’s retiring, I’m backing up everything.
I dunno, I mod (as in, make mods, as well as configure combos of other ones, hell I even mod mods lol) a lot, and I’ve just… got my own method, at this point, would be hard to fully describe lol.
It is a very appealing proposal and that’s why I myself have bought games from Steam when I can’t find them in GOG. Further, I’m not strict about always downloading GOG offline installers for all my games, even though if I don’t I run the risk of losing those games if for example the GOG store closes.
And, as you point out, “so far, so good”.
I’ve just been burned by earlier forms of enshittification and service relationships misportrayed as purchases of forever access.
Also, almost 4 decades of using or in Tech have made me very aware of elements which can affect long term usability of software and hardware.
So nowadays I’ll only ever spend money on things which follow that scheme if I’m willing to lose it, even if for now they seem fine, and favour things that I’ll have a chance to still make work 10 or 20 years down the line (funilly enough, this week I’ve been playing Jagged Alliance 2, which is a 26 years old game with gameplay that’s still as fun as back then).
Hah! JA2 huh?
Fuck its been a while.
Yeah, way way back, I had a choice between either … playing JA2 with a group…
Or joining the mod team for Project Reality, which is now Squad.
I was just a beta tester / ideas guy, but uh, I’m proud of my choice, led me further into making my own mods, learning programming, etc.
That being said, no irrational hate toward JA2, solid game, doesn’t get the recognition it should, I just… had my own ideas and wanted to be a part of making something, even before I was outta high school.