HAPPY 10TH BIRTHDAY STEAM! (12/9/13)

I remember reading an article in a magazine about Valve and HL and the plans that they had for Steam, I thought it could fail why could I want to validate my games online or buy games digitally. And here I am mostly happy with the service they provide.
 
One of the headers reads "The Imapct of Steam," and is a typo. That or it's a joke I don't get. Otherwise, this is a fine post.
 
December 21st, 2004, here.

I'm not even sure what I signed up for. Maybe it was Codename: Gordon (remember that?). Maybe it was Half-Life 2's demo (where I learned I could run it at 1/3 FPS, stutter all over the place, not have a functional flashlight, and have glass shatter and turn into wireframes - before upgrading to a Radeon 9250 PCI card and finally having the game vaguely playable). Either way, Steam swears by that date, so here we are.
 
I remember updating HL2 over a dial-up connection.

That was a fun 14 hours. Because, y'know, unlike everything else I couldn't just play the game as it shipped. It NEEDED that update.

Still, how far we've come.
 
Happy Birthday Steam, let the sales begin soon. :D

With a registration date of August 5 2006 (7 years of service woo) I feel such a youngster compared to some of you.
The first thing I actually bought was The Ship Single Player on December 29 2006, for $12.14. And to this date I still haven't played it.
 
strafer said:
I remember this Steam. :D

otsZZ.jpg
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Such painful memory's
I hated you then.

I love you now
 
I wonder if Steam will have an "event" on its birthday just because people are expecting it now...

Thanks for making this thread, OP!
 
Bring back Cyl, Sir Roderick and friends

Trackmania (sorta-RIP now) and Audiosurf were my entries into happy Steam land (only 5 or so years ago! Time flies and all that - and it was a 50% Steam sale on Audiosurf!).

OK, and TF2 too, which has served me so well, hats, warts and MvM too.
 
I remember HATE to be obligated to install STEAM to play Day of Defeat, or was Half-life 2?! I don't really remember, just remember all my hate...LOL
 
I still remember having to help a mate install Half-Life 2 back in '04. He couldn't play his game anymore, because he forgot his steam password.

How much things have changed.

Though he still doesn't remember the password of his account. :lol
 
nbthedude said:
They've only been absent one sale (the summer sale). They were even in the Linux debut earlier this year. But if they aren't back for the winter sale, I'm going to be bummed.
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The Halloween Sale is next month. Assume the worst if they don't make an appearance. :(
 
Things I can't get over in this thread:

  • Original Recipe(tm) Steam Puke Green
  • the kerning in the OP images OH GOD
  • that it's been TEN FRIGGIN' YEARS
Happy birthday Steam! (and cheers to OP, just joshin' re: the kerning)

Oh, also, my guess for 10th Anniversary celebration: everyone on Steam gets a free copy of the original Half-Life 2 Gold package (digital only tho)! gabetrollface.gif
 
Woah, ten years already? Happy Birthday Steam!
I remember quite well the controversy surrounding Half-Life 2 that it needed to be online activated via Steam. Steam was the ultimate evil back then.

Today everything is different and I also consider myself as a Steam fan.
But there a still a few things I hate about Steam:

  • buggy and unreliable offline mode (I will never forget that one train ride where I had no internet and wanted to play Oddworld in offline mode but Steam didn't let me -.-)
  • the inability to conveniently download updates while playing games (when I play singleplayer I want my downloads to go on, but Steam automatically pauses them and I have to ALT+Tab out of the game in order to continue the download manually)

Btw, great OP, was a very interesting read!
 
I still remember my first jump into steam.
They were selling TF2 on steam for 2.49 and /v/ was going nuts about it. I had to jump in at that price as well. Regardless played a good bit but then didnt mess much more with the service. Having a family computer and the like will do that. Though at the end of 2012 with the winter sale and a new PC purchase is what brought me back. Have been loving it since. So much so that its killed all my hype for next gen, since I basically already have it.
 
strafer said:
I remember this Steam. :D

otsZZ.jpg
Click to expand...

Man I hated Steam when it first hit. The only reason I got it to begin with was because TFC was switching from WON to Steam and we had to have Steam to continue playing. This was during the height of TFC days, so I had no choice but to accept it. Then they kinda ruined (arguably) TFC and I didn't really play much after that. So I always blamed Steam for killing one of my favorite games and didn't really use it much after that. I always kept the client running anyway so I could chat with my old TFC buddies but never used it for games up until more recently. If I had known then what it would become, I would have gladly embraced it. I still miss TFC though. :(
 
I first got on Steam when they put out their Mac service and were giving away Portal for free. Now of course I have a PC as my main computer and 262 games (I know some people have thousands of game, but this is impressive to me nonetheless!)
 
FiveElementNinja said:
Man I hated Steam when it first hit. The only reason I got it to begin with was because TFC was switching from WON to Steam and we had to have Steam to continue playing. This was during the height of TFC days, so I had no choice but to accept it. Then they kinda ruined (arguably) TFC and I didn't really play much after that. So I always blamed Steam for killing one of my favorite games and didn't really use it much after that. I always kept the client running anyway so I could chat with my old TFC buddies but never used it for games up until more recently. If I had known then what it would become, I would have gladly embraced it. I still miss TFC though. :(
Click to expand...

I only played tfc from time to time and incredibly casually.

What did they do to ruin it? Just controversial balance changes?
 
SteveWinwood said:
I only played tfc from time to time and incredibly casually.

What did they do to ruin it? Just controversial balance changes?
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Yeah the balance changes and the teleporters. Teleporters really caused a stir in the TFC leagues and made everyone rethink strategies (not necessarily a bad thing). The changes really weren't that bad, but for people like me who had been playing since the beginning, the changes were hard to swallow. To be fair, the community was already starting to die out around that time. The changes just kinda helped speed up the process. So many of us kinda blamed the updates and Steam at the time.
 
Ah Steam... Joined in December 2004 to try out a mod, but then never really did anything.

Then I bought Half-Life 2 in 2005 for a different mod that didn't come out. Didn't play HL2 until 2006 (and when I did, it became my favourite PC game. I freaking fell in love, but that's for another thread).

Steam, when I first met you, I couldn't stand you. Thought you were ugly, and really, a little slow. But time has passed, and you've grown into an incredible platform, and I cannot imagine my PC life without you.

Happy birthday.
 
JaseC said:
The Halloween Sale is next month. Assume the worst if they don't make an appearance. :(
Click to expand...

Maybe they died and will be back as zombies this Halloween with a story arc that goes over to the Christmas sale where Santa Gaben gives them new life and cheap games?
 
strafer said:
I remember this Steam. :D

otsZZ.jpg
Click to expand...

JaseC said:
I appreciate the sentiment but I don't think that's how it works. :p

Edit: The best feature of Old Steam was Friends having in-built games:
zlBJq8V.png
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I remember playing chess quite a few times. Man, that gray look is so OLD! I remembered it had no background downloading at all.

Wish I registered day 1, but the site was so hammered. It'll still be 10 years old in about a week.
 
Member since day one, can't wait to see my member badge tick over to 10.

Gabe <3 Steam <3

Edit: Also I met my current friend group through Steam, thanks Steam!
 
Gabe has lost a lot of weight since that picture.

Happy Birthday to Steam... I still wonder whatever happened to my old account from '06 though. I only had 2 games anyway.
 
September 15, 2003 it tells me. Funny I remember signing up the first day I could. Now there will forever be a bunch of Steamers a few days older. :-(

For reference my account login is my email from an ISP that has been dead for a decade. Wish I could change it.
 
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