CoH on steam

Strangely enough, it *was* on Steam... but that was before it went F2P.

Not sure what NCsoft would have to do to get it back up there, but i do agree that it would be an excellent move for them now that it has transitioned from Subscription only to the Hybrid model.

As I recall, it was removed because a F2P game on Steam is required to integrate any in-game market with the Steam software, and give Valve a cut of the money from any market purchases.

I think this is correct. As time has gone on there have been quite a few games I've noticed taking issues with Steam's policies of taking a cut from the developers. I'm no Steam hater, and have quite a few games on it myself, but I do think that it's a good thing some companies are standing up to them and forming their own services (i.e. Origin) or opting out altogether. Competition is good for the consumer.

For obvious reasons, Steam are not happy about just handing out free bandwith to F2P games. If they don't get a profit from game client sales, they need to make a profit in some other way... this makes F2P games problematic for Steam's business strategy.

And this is an example of competition really sucking for the consumer. I want convenience, not a different game manager client for every software publisher in existence. That would be beyond useless.

Yes, god forbid Steam actually want to get some returns on the bandwidth cost from distributing these games... How greedy of them. ( By the way, Origin is a steaming pile. )

I don't think Valve is/was being quite realistic with thinking they could be the universal distributor for online publishing, especially since they can't or won't pony up the hardware required for something like that.

Just the other week, downloading the the demo for ME3 was done lickity-fast on Origin compared to what it would have taken on Steam, simply because it wasn't bogged down with people stealing bandwidth for other games.

Valve has made some...questionable decisions in the past few years. They're no longer the 'cool up and comer' anymore and as far as I'm concerned, they burned up a good amount of the gaming community's good will and support. I wonder if they even make games anymore or simply buy up small productions like L4D and Portal and regurgitate with a decent coat of paint at minimal cost, because they've certainly not been releasing Episode 3.

Still, when EA walked away from Steam, well it was easy to side with Valve, but now that others are doing it, it's clear there's been a shift. So far, Valve's response has been to stick its fingers it it's ears, chant 'la la la!' and pretend nothing's happening. Or, they've been chasing rainbows like their "Steam Boxes". Yeah, I'm sure it'll be a smash just like the Phantom.

Valve championed online distribution, the big guys scoffed at it, but it took off big time. Then Valve made them bend over and took a cut of their profits. Now they're going to get some serious competition from those same big guys and Valve wont be able to coast anymore with their hand in the cookie jar. So what happens next will be very interesting.


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+1, good overview

I think this is pretty accurate. I'm just worried that the end result will be any number of mutually exclusive distribution systems, because everyone wants a slice of the cake.

Best case, there would be multiple distribution systems like Origin, Steam and Impulse, that all have more or less the same content so that the consumer can pick whichever system offers the best, to him, service. That's the kind of competition that would be good for the end consumer. What EA is doing right now, however, isn't competition. They are just saying: "If you want to play EA games, you will use Origin. If you want to play something else, use whatever." If all the big publishers go that route, that would pretty much defeat the purpose of online distribution systems.

Of course, EA probably needs to be that heavy handed about it, if they want anyone to use Origin. Considering how long they take to fix known issues like the default language thing (three years and counting )

Well the thing is there is no 'in the end'. Things will just go on evolving. One day soon, there may very well be no need for these download services as they exist at all, because no one person will have to host them. It'll be distributed by players who have the games installed on their system and you may very well be downloading the game from the HD of the guy down the block who also bought it, like a torrent. Further, one day there may be no downloading games at all, only dynamic cloud streaming.

So I wouldn't worry too much. The Steam service, as it currently exists, WILL come to an end. It had its day in the sun and knocked down a number of barriers showing that moving away from physical media was viable. But time, and technology, marches on.


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No thanks. The less Valve is involved, the better. I don't want all future Costume Packs to contain nothing but hats.