Jason Moyer on 26/12/2008 at 22:08
What's the advantage of getting these games on Steam over the retail versions?
EvaUnit02 on 26/12/2008 at 22:43
Quote Posted by Jason Moyer
What's the advantage of getting these games on Steam over the retail versions?
It should be obvious, the Steam DRM doesn't have activation limits.
june gloom on 27/12/2008 at 01:23
Quote Posted by Morgoth
I never had any problem with SecuROM, but thanks. I prefer to save money.
Sure, but there's also spending your money wisely, and trust me- there's a reason those games are cheap.
Zygoptera on 27/12/2008 at 01:59
Heh, Mass Effect retail is down to $40 here now (~22usd), barely above budget price, and has been nearly as low as far back as September- the normal retail price is $100. Its sales figures must have been utterly appalling for that sort of price implosion to happen within six months of release.
Jason Moyer on 27/12/2008 at 02:36
Quote Posted by EvaUnit02
It should be obvious, the Steam DRM doesn't have activation limits.
Ok, so it's a plus if you plan on installing a game on more than 5 machines (or whatever EA's limit is now, I know it's at least 5). Anything else to justify waiting 5 minutes for the game to launch and having a hefty TSR running in the background all the time?
june gloom on 27/12/2008 at 03:12
If it takes you 5 minutes to launch the game then you're doing it wrong.
EvaUnit02 on 27/12/2008 at 04:19
Quote Posted by Jason Moyer
Ok, so it's a plus if you plan on installing a game on more than 5 machines (or whatever EA's limit is now, I know it's at least 5). Anything else to justify waiting 5 minutes for the game to launch and having a hefty TSR running in the background all the time?
It takes you 5 minutes to launch and login to Steam. Your PC must either be A. a total shitbox or B. is poorly maintained.
Limited online activations + not providing a revocation tool is total bullshit.
-I had Crysis Warhead installed on my PC, but I had to upgrade because of a faulty motherboard. New motherboard means that Windows needs to be reinstalled. Boom, one activation gone.
-Sometime later my 8800GT was faulty (broken fan control and temperature monitoring), I couldn't get it replaced with an identical card because they weren't being made anymore and brand new stock had completely dried up in my country. Another activation gone. Sure, I could've BIOS flashed my new 9800GT into a 8800GT, but then my new GPU's warranty would be void.
Ringing EA NZ Tech Support costs $1.99 NZD per minute. Lord knows how costly it would be to get more activations, especially since a lot of call centres these days are out-sourced to countries where English isn't the primary language. Foreigners have been known to find the Kiwi dialect quite fast too.
Jason Moyer on 27/12/2008 at 12:14
Main Entry:
hy·per·bo·le
Pronunciation:
\hī-ˈpər-bə-(ˌ)lē\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
Latin, from Greek hyperbolē excess, hyperbole, hyperbola, from hyperballein to exceed, from hyper- + ballein to throw — more at devil
Date:
15th century
: extravagant exaggeration (as “mile-high ice-cream cones”)
Anyway, it sucks that if you have a "worst case scenario" situation that you have to make a toll call to re-activate your game (pretty much everytime I install my current copy of XP I have to reactivate it via phone for some reason). Otherwise SecureROM in the way that EA currently implements it is the most hassle-free copy protection I've ever seen, Steam included (and despite my above hyperbole, I love Steam). It's so transparent for me that I recently picked up Mercenaries 2 and I'm not even sure if it uses it. The box says it does, but I patched it before I ran it and it never asked for a serial that I recall. It also never asks for the DVD to play so I dunno.
