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[Sentenza]

who cares about RAM usage, really? especially in this day and age.

Me, for a start.
I was on a 2 GB DDR2 system until few weeks ago. Every freaking megabyte wasted counted.
Of course, now I'm on a new system and with 8 GB of DDR3, so it barely makes any difference. Ironically that also translates in barely perceiving any difference in how quick those two clients run. So...

i'd rather worry about random CPU usage spikes from the Steam client (not really using Origin much to compare)..

Yeah, let's talk about that, too: launching Steam never used to freeze my old system like Origin *systematically* did for 30 secs to a minute.

 

[Cipherr]

I will never understand why someone hears me or anyone else say something like "I fucking hate Origin" and immediately somehow think that Steam is the issue, instead of these programs being shitty bloated slow and awful in most cases....

Like... how does your mind even make that jump? I tried out both Origin and Uplay when they first hit, and I found them both awful.

So yeah. I don't bother with them.

 

[The Cowboy]

i'd rather worry about random CPU usage spikes from the Steam client (not really using Origin much to compare)..

Steam doesn't really have random spikes, its CPU usage goes up and down as and when the internal browser is loading info - be it online or stored in cache (you can test this by scrolling up and down the game section while its in grid view while watching the CPU usage for example - it spikes up and down while it loads in all the info).

Its just how the client is designed to work like a web browser.

 

[Costia]

I think Steam includes 2 completely different services:
1) Game store
2) Game library

On the game store side there should be and there is competition, you can buy games and serial keys from various sites such as amazon and GMG.
There is no problem if origin/uplay compete here and sell their own games on thier site or in their client

On the game library side, steam currently has no competition. If i want to play my games using the Origin or Uplay library/UI, i can't , they are tied to valve's library. So a third party currently has no chance to compete.

I think game licenses and library/downloads should be separated. So you can buy a license, activate it in a specific library and download it from that specific provider. And if later on there is a better library UI than steam i would be able to transfer those licenses to another downloads/library provider.

 

[SneakyStephan]

Using memory is a bad thing now? if it only uses it when you open the store/browser it's a good thing, that's what ram is meant to be used for

memory useage is bad when it's about some background process that does nothing for you or has memory leaks

chrome uses a lot of memory but it also keeps everything cached and has a seperate process for each tab so one crashing tab doesn't close all your tabs
= good

shitty fucking uplay drm using up 50MB just because = bad

 

[Stallion Free]

I like that only 2 of the 30 posts you quoted even mention Steam.

Origin is a piece of shit software made by a piece of shit company that I don't want anywhere near my PC. I've installed blizzard games with b.net, I have GFWL games on my PC, but I won't buy a game that requires Origin.

Be more careful whom you're quoting next time.

Sometimes you have to stretch a bit when constructing your Steam fanboy narrative lol.

 

[water_wendi]

Sometimes you have to stretch a bit when constructing your Steam fanboy narrative lol.

Are you suggesting that there arent people that refuse to buy a game if it isnt on Steam? That i am making up it up? lol

 

[Stallion Free]

Are you suggesting that there arent people that refuse to buy a game if it isnt on Steam? That i am making up it up? lol

I'm suggesting you cast a rather wide net.

 

[water_wendi]

I'm suggesting you cast a rather wide net.

No i think i cast it just right. If Titanfall were on Steam there wouldnt be a debate or loads of people going "gg no buy" or talks about unfair exclusivity or Valve being greedy. Its obvious.

 

[kudoboi]

Like... how does your mind even make that jump? I tried out both Origin and Uplay when they first hit, and I found them both awful.

Steam was also awful for its first few years and to some degree the client is still pretty bad even now

 

[NIN90]

I like to play great games and if they are not on Steam so be it.
If Uplay or Origin keep you from getting a game, then maybe you weren't that excited about the game in the first place,

 

[Nymerio]

No i think i cast it just right. If Titanfall were on Steam there wouldnt be a debate or loads of people going "gg no buy" or talks about unfair exclusivity or Valve being greedy. Its obvious.

You make it sound like there's no reason at all that people prefer steam to origin when people have explained multiple times in this thread why some may prefer one over the other. I'm not going out of my way to purchase games outside of steam just because steam has the market pretty much cornered. I'm going to buy games outside steam when/if someone provides me with a client that matches what steam provides for me.

 

[water_wendi]

You make it sound like there's no reason at all that people prefer steam to origin when people have explained multiple times in this thread why some may prefer one over the other. I'm not going out of my way to purchase games outside of steam just because steam has the market pretty much cornered. I'm going to buy games outside steam when/if someone provides me with a client that matches what steam provides for me.

What features would another launcher need to have for you to consider purchasing outside of Steam?

 

[Nymerio]

What features would another launcher need to have for you to consider purchasing outside of Steam?

The whole community hub thing and a workshop for starters.

 

[water_wendi]

The whole community hub thing and a workshop for starters.

Ok thats for starters. What else?

 

[kudoboi]

The whole community hub thing and a workshop for starters.

EA/ ubi has a community forum and workshop isn't supported for most AAA games anyway so i don't understand why Uplay or Origin ( both AAA publishers) would need it.

 

[Sentenza]

What features would another launcher need to have for you to consider purchasing outside of Steam?

What about things like being owned and managed by a company that people trust, being mod friendly, being there first, being an established standard with wide support instead of relying almost exclusively on a single publisher's library and so on?

Not that I expect you to actually consider any of these arguments.
Just pointing that they are a factor.

"Oh, people are SO BIASED; they are fine with Valve but not with EA! That's CRAZY!".
Yeah, like if there weren't legitimate reasons for this...

 

[Dolor]

No i think i cast it just right. If Titanfall were on Steam there wouldnt be a debate or loads of people going "gg no buy" or talks about unfair exclusivity or Valve being greedy. Its obvious.

Quoting myself as it seems to still need to be said.

It's pretty simple really. You don't complain if you're forced to fly first class. You do complain if you're forced to fly in the cargo hold.

 

[Nymerio]

EA/ ubi has a community forum and workshop isn't supported for most AAA games anyway so i don't understand why Uplay or Origin ( both AAA publishers) would need it.

They don't need it, but I like these features when they are supported. So why should I go out of my way to buy games for a service that doesn't have the features I like? I also like browsing through a game's hub, viewing screenshots/videos, browsing reviews for games I'm interested in. I'm not saying I won't buy games for others services (I have stuff on origin), what I'm trying to say is that there are legitimate reasons that people prefer one service over another.

 

[water_wendi]

Quoting myself as it seems to still need to be said.

Its a launcher. Titanfall would be the same if it were to launch through Steam. i dont really see how launching the game with Origin (which you could even launch through Steam itself, with the Steam overlay enabled) will make Titanfall a cargo class experience.

edit: and before someone says something about supporting shitty EA, thats a bogus argument because if you were to buy a Steam Titanfall you would be supporting shitty EA.

 

[Dolor]

Its a launcher. Titanfall would be the same if it were to launch through Steam. i dont really see how launching the game with Origin (which you could even launch through Steam itself, with the Steam overlay enabled) will make Titanfall a cargo class experience.

edit: and before someone says something about supporting shitty EA, thats a bogus argument because if you were to buy a Steam Titanfall you would be supporting shitty EA.

And round and round we go. You disagree, fine, but lots of people have already given lots of reasons (some on this very page) of reasons to prefer Steam.

You don't have to agree, but there are enough posts ITT about the preferences for Steam that maybe you should be questioning why you actually think so many other people are extreme, but you're not.

 

[Dawg]

For the most part it's because other clients have little to nothing advantageous to offer when compared to Steam, and since Steam is the oldest of the bunch it's where many have most of their games so naturally there's a desire for consolidation, plus Valve is largely consumer-orientated. Furthermore, there's no practical reason as to why a game backed by a publisher should not be on Steam -- it's just petulant politics.

Doesn't Steam take a cut off the money made? Now there's a good reason for some publishers to have their own stuff.

 

[Sentenza]

Its a launcher. Titanfall would be the same if it were to launch through Steam. i dont really see how launching the game with Origin (which you could even launch through Steam itself, with the Steam overlay enabled) will make Titanfall a cargo class experience.

Steamworks integration probably wouldn't require *both* a client and a browser plug-in running at the same time, for a start.

edit: and before someone says something about supporting shitty EA, thats a bogus argument because if you were to buy a Steam Titanfall you would be supporting shitty EA.

No, it's not, because giving money to EA for a one time transition and empowering them with the control of your digital purchases is NOT the same thing.

Doesn't Steam take a cut off the money made? Now there's a good reason for some publishers to have their own stuff.

Not for any copy sold outside of the Steam store front itself. They could just sell Steam keys from their own store front to achieve the same result.
In short, that excuse is crap.
EA doesn't want to push Origin to keep "100% of all revenues". In fact they are probably giving up in missed sales at least as much as they are making with that additional 30%.
They want to push Origin because they love the idea of being in control of the whole chain, which is a position where I really don't want to see them.

 

[Substandard]

Doesn't Steam take a cut off the money made? Now there's a good reason for some publishers to have their own stuff.

Yes they do (at least if it's sold on steam, I suppose you could theoretically do a steamworks game sold only on a publisher site and then I have no idea). But every publisher having their own client doesn't help me out at all. I don't want to keep track of games in 20 different clients.

Anyway, my main reason for wanting everything to be on Steam is that they were the first and hooked me before anything else existed, and I'm heavily invested in it already.

I'll occasionally be forced to buy something from somewhere else but then I often forget about it because it's not in my steam library (which is generally what I look at to figure out what to play next). I know you can make shortcuts, but they then don't track time correctly or have achievements (which seems stupid but bother me).

I tend to buy anything I can from Steam or gog.com. I'm not 100% no steam = no sale, but it is a pretty good reason to avoid buying something I don't really, really want. SimCity not being on steam saved me from that whole debacle, so there have been some positive results.

 

[water_wendi]

And round and round we go. You disagree, fine, but lots of people have already given lots of reasons (some on this very page) of reasons to prefer Steam.

You don't have to agree, but there are enough posts ITT about the preferences for Steam that maybe you should be questioning why you actually think so many other people are extreme, but you're not.

Can you explain how launching Titanfall through Origin (even via Steam so you will still get all the things that come with Steam overlay) is a lower class experience compared to launching it through Steam?

edit: anyway.. i have work now so i wont be able to respond for a bit.

 

[JakeD]

has there ever been a case of a game using steamworks/keys while not being on the steam store though? obviously not including old retail games who have been removed from the store

valve doesn't take a cut of steam games sold from other stores, but i always thought the catch of that was that the game automatically went on their store as well so they get their money from that.

i'm sure the 30% EA would lose would be made up in volume, so it's still not an excuse

 

[Malio]

Origin and UPlay actually make playing games worse. They're slow and bloated programs.

I feel the same way about Steam. The only good thing about Steam is having so much software in one location and the low prices.

Come at me.

 

[jim-jam bongs]

I feel the same way about Steam. The only good thing about Steam is having so much software in one location and the low prices.

Come at me.

I agree, so I launch games without it running whenever possible. It's a good thing there are so many DRM free games on Steam, otherwise I might be forced to come on you or something equally vulgar.

 

[Ketch]

I havent read the whole thread yet, so im not sure if this has been said. also im not a steam only guy, i use whatever system/program has the game i want on it.

However, there is this weird thing thing. Steam feels lke your best friend. it was there from the begnning, when shit was rough. When it felt like PC gaming actually was dying it put it self out on a limb to try and help. These other programs,however, feel like the friends who show up afer youve won the lottery. they dont care about you or pc gaming, theyre just here for the money.

 

[Haunted]

edit: and before someone says something about supporting shitty EA, thats a bogus argument because if you were to buy a Steam Titanfall you would be supporting shitty EA.

there's a big difference between supporting respawn by buying titanfall and supporting EA by installing origin.

I'll put it as succinctly as I can: requiring me to install origin on my PC means you don't get my money.

you dont have a problem with origin, that's ok. there's plenty of us who do, for well documented reasons that have been repeated again and again.

 

[the_prime_mover]

I can't say that I am for any one store front, but I am against some. I have confidence in Steam and Blizzard, and don't need confidence in GOG. I have no confidence in EA and hate what I have seen of UPlay (though these games have at least been available on Steam).

I would likely have picked up Titanfall regardless of how I feel about EA as a company if the game had either been on Steam or not linked to any client, but being forced to tie that game to EA's ecosystem just destroys my willingness to get the game. I am sure that many people are fine with the client, but my issue is with the company behind the client and how they will treat me or my account in the near and long term. Nothing in Steams Terms really differentiates them from Origin. However, history, example and rhetoric all put Valve in a completely different sphere than EA.

 

[Dolor]

Can you explain how launching Titanfall through Origin (even via Steam so you will still get all the things that come with Steam overlay) is a lower class experience compared to launching it through Steam?

edit: anyway.. i have work now so i wont be able to respond for a bit.

If I have to login to Origin, it is already worse for having an additional login. And yes, it matters because I will never play Need for Speed Shift 2 because of an EA/Origin launcher login issue I could not resolve before giving up on the game.

Will it track my time played so I can compare to how much I played all of my other games? Do I get Steam achievements? Certainly I won't get Steam trading cards to sell if the game is bad or collect if I like the game. Workshop support is a guaranteed no. Will it work with my controller without issues? Doubtful. I can't just join someone else playing the game via my Steam friends view. Will there be reviews of the game by my friends so that I can see if I should buy it? No.

None of these things by themselves is the most important thing in the world, but neither is playing one more multiplayer shooter.

 

[szaromir]

For me Origin has been the snappiest, least head-ache inducing DRM(/distribution) client so far. Granted I've only used it to play like 4 games so far but the experience has been super smooth. It seems to me this "Origin only = no buy" some people have taken is really out of spite more than anything.

Obviously only EA puts its games on Origin though and given how lackluster its line-up is I won't have any need to use it in foreseeable future. Valve outputs similarly crappy games, sadly given how many publishers/devs put their games on Steam it's much more difficult to ignore that client.

 

[Sentenza]

For me Origin has been the snappiest, least head-ache inducing DRM(/distribution) client so far.

For someone with your usual zealotry against DRMs, you sound surprisingly fond of SecuROM, which comes with most Origin games.

 

[not psycho]

Ok thats for starters. What else?

How about not being the ones that did these:

- Used SecuROM (EA)
- Said they could spy on your entire system in the EULA (EA)
- Had a security vulnerability that left their users open to attacks (EA)
- More high profile account theft (EA)
- Secret rootkit installation (Sony)


You realize buying games with DRM is all about trust, right? The game could be taken away at any moment. You have to trust that it will continue to be available to you, and that the DRM will be secure and not malicious.

Why would I trust EA with that? Even with Steam I would pay extra to get a DRM-free copy too, because even though Steam has built up a lot of trust I'd still rather not be at their mercy. And yet I'm supposed to put myself at EA's mercy, when not only have they not built up trust, they have done the opposite by using shady and malicious practices?

 

[szaromir]

For someone with your usual zealotry against DRMs, you sound surprisingly fond of SecuROM, which comes with most Origin games.

Which ones? Mass Effect 2 didn't have it, Burnout Paradise didn't have it, The Saboteur didn't have it, Bulletstorm didn't have it. Those are the games I played on Origin, but if other games use SecuROM than that's pretty vile on EA's side.

 

[Armaros]

Which ones? Mass Effect 2 didn't have it, Burnout Paradise didn't have it, The Saboteur didn't have it, Bulletstorm didn't have it. Those are the games I played on Origin, but if other games use SecuROM than that's pretty vile on EA's side.

http://activate.ea.com/deauthorize/

 

[kharma45]

For someone with your usual zealotry against DRMs, you sound surprisingly fond of SecuROM, which comes with most Origin games.

http://activate.ea.com/deauthorize/

So far from most Origin games, and not any recent ones.

 

[cm osi]

people like to complain

 

[RionaaM]

Can you explain how launching Titanfall through Origin (even via Steam so you will still get all the things that come with Steam overlay) is a lower class experience compared to launching it through Steam?

edit: anyway.. i have work now so i wont be able to respond for a bit.

You have a nice way of ignoring all the people saying they don't want to own it on Origin. They don't want EA to manage their digital games library. And they think Steam has better features than Origin, which is why they prefer to use the former.

But yeah, keep trying to make the argument be "I don't want to launch a game through Origin". Something that don't think anyone here has said.

 

[meanspartan]

I don't have a problem with Origin existing, more competition is good. I have a problem with them forcing me to "choose" them by EA taking their games off of Steam because they are jealous Valve had an excellent idea before they did.

 

[Sentenza]

So far from most Origin games, and not any recent ones.

Out of... I don't know, twelve games I have on Origin (I'm at work now, I can't launch the client to check) ten are on that list.
That makes "most of them" for me.
And I would label anyone claiming that's an ideal, harmless DRM setup, better than Steamworks too, as completely delusional.

 

[SwiftDeath]

And I would label anyone claiming that's an ideal, harmless DRM setup, better than Steamworks too, as completely delusional.

What I find even funnier is those that try to equate Origin to just a launcher, nothing more. As if digital rights are non-existent or something.

 

[TimFL]

Steam is owned by Valve, Valve is the place you can find Gabe Newell at.

Praise Gaben.

 

[kharma45]

Out of... I don't know, twelve games I have on Origin (I'm at work now, I can't launch the client to check) ten are on that list.
That makes "most of them" for me.
And I would label anyone claiming that's an ideal, harmless DRM setup, better than Steamworks too, as completely delusional.

Great the titles you own have it. That doesn't make it the case for most titles on offer like you said.

 

[Dolor]

What I find even funnier is those that try to equate Origin to just a launcher, nothing more. As if digital rights are non-existent or something.

Or ignore the myriad ways in which Steam is a superior client. I can't wait for Origin to support in-home streaming...

 

[Arkage]

This mainly comes down to a focus on how much you give a shit about a digital platform versus a game. If you find games in general more valuable than the digital platform they're on, as I do, then you'll have no problem buying TitanFall or DeadSpace or Crysis or FarCry 3 or SplinterCell. If you find the digital platform experience more valuable than the game, then you won't use anything other than Steam, and probably will just stick with console versions of those games. I personally don't really give a shit about the platform experience beyond it installing an awesome game and me playing it. I value the game itself above almost anything else.

It's funny though. You don't see Nintendo's digital platform receiving the same levels of hostility that Uplay or Origin get, despite it being arguably much worse. Imagine if Uplay or Origin tied all your games to a single computer ID instead of a universal user account.

 

[jim-jam bongs]

It's funny though. You don't see Nintendo's digital platform receiving the same levels of hostility that Uplay or Origin get, despite it being arguably much worse. Imagine if Uplay or Origin tied all your games to a single computer ID instead of a universal user account.

lol wtf are you srs

 

[Almighty]

For me it boils down to I don't trust EA or Ubisoft to get locked onto their ecosystem. Valve built up that trust over a decade with Steam. As far as i can tell they also don't do anything that Steam already doesn't. For me it is Steam or DRM free or no buy.

 

[JaseC]

Doesn't Steam take a cut off the money made? Now there's a good reason for some publishers to have their own stuff.

30%, as is standard. Disregarding the matter of whether or not it's wise to forgo a service with 65m+ users in an attempt to prop up your own platform (which has been addressed already), there's nothing preventing a publisher from selling Steam keys themselves -- which are provided free-of-charge -- and leaving the game off the store proper. So again, it's petulant politics.