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[Deleted member 17706]

Is Steam acting up for anyone else?

I was just about to join in on the Killing Floor free weekend, but when I click the "My Games" tab I get stuck at a "Scanning for Steam games updates..." screen. I googled the problem and apparently the most common fix is to close out of Steam completely, delete the ClientRegistry.blob file and then boot up Steam again. Unfortunately that didn't work for me.

This is the first time I have encountered the problem and I am about to try and reinstall Steam to see if that does it, but is anyone else having any problems?

 

[wolfmat]

Is Steam acting up for anyone else?

I was just about to join in on the Killing Floor free weekend, but when I click the "My Games" tab I get stuck at a "Scanning for Steam games updates..." screen. I googled the problem and apparently the most common fix is to close out of Steam completely, delete the ClientRegistry.blob file and then boot up Steam again. Unfortunately that didn't work for me.

This is the first time I have encountered the problem and I am about to try and reinstall Steam to see if that does it, but is anyone else having any problems?

Nope, currently leeching ArmA II without any problems whatsoever here.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Reinstalling Steam did that trick. How weird. I have never experienced that problem before and I've been using Steam for over 4 years now.

 

[wolfmat]

For half a month, Steam didn't remember my user credentials and I was required to enter them upon every startup.

It's not exactly the best program ever.

 

[Almak]

So, anyone picking up Torchlight? Just preordered myself. The art direction seems good besides I could use a Diablo'esque game right about now.

 

[Doytch]

So, anyone picking up Torchlight? Just preordered myself. The art direction seems good besides I could use a Diablo'esque game right about now.

Yup, preordered a few days ago. There's a thread for it kicking around somewhere.

 

[graywolf323]

You can buy it at Walmart and then register it via Steam.

I never saw anything about it being Steam activated or able to register it with Steam :-/

are you sure on that?

 

[Frawdder]

So, anyone picking up Torchlight? Just preordered myself. The art direction seems good besides I could use a Diablo'esque game right about now.

Just bought it myself. I really enjoyed the limited time I had with Mythos, so Torchlight was a no-brainer.

 

[D4Danger]

So is ArmA II worth buying? It's only £12 this weekend

also lol @ MW2. £35 :lol

 

[DarthWoo]

So is ArmA II worth buying? It's only £12 this weekend

also lol @ MW2. £35 :lol

Curious about this myself. All I remember is hearing about how bad or nonexistent the AI was upon release. I have always been fond of the war games in the vein of the Battlefield series, Red Orchestra, etc. though.

 

[Peronthious]

Curious about this myself. All I remember is hearing about how bad or nonexistent the AI was upon release. I have always been fond of the war games in the vein of the Battlefield series, Red Orchestra, etc. though.

Definitely check out the demo, AI issues aside. It's one of those games that you'll either love or loathe.

 

[wolfmat]

So is ArmA II worth buying? It's only £12 this weekend

If you like realism-heavy multiplayer shooters with awesome graphics, of course! The SP campaign is so-so.
You need a capable machine though, pay attention to the recommended specs and exceed that if you can.

 

[DarthWoo]

Also, does any mod community exist for the game? I'd love to see some WWII content for it.

 

[wolfmat]

Also, does any mod community exist for the game? I'd love to see some WWII content for it.

Check http://www.armaholic.com/index.php?c=arma2_mods

The modding community is still in the growth phase for this title, but pretty active already.

 

[D4Danger]

If you like realism-heavy multiplayer shooters with awesome graphics, of course! The SP campaign is so-so.
You need a capable machine though, pay attention to the recommended specs and exceed that if you can.

downloading the demo now. My computer far exceeds the recommended specs but that doesn't always mean it's going to run smoothly.

See how it goes.

 

[ClovingWestbrook]

I never saw anything about it being Steam activated or able to register it with Steam :-/

are you sure on that?

Yes. On the box it says you must agree to Steam's SSA in order to install and play MW2. There fore you will need to register the game via Steam.

 

[x3sphere]

I tried the demo of Arma II and while I thought it looked great, the way the game responds to mouse movements ruined it for me. It feels very unresponsive coming from shooters like Counter Strike.

 

[Tim-E]

so is everyone getting this on console instead? I don't wanna screw up again, I bought L4d on xbox :/

Not sure, because I'm not buying it either way.

 

[b.e.r.g]

Modern Warfare 2 (lol) is now up for pre-purchasing for the 2 PC people here that still plan on buying it for a low, low price of $59.99!

It's €60 here, that's a delightful $90 (USD). And yes, other titles are priced lower in € than $. Thank you, but fuck you.

 

[Raydeen]

Anyone tried Left4Dead in Windows 7 under the XP mode? Performance hit? FPS?

 

[Almak]

It's €60 here, that's a delightful $90 (USD). And yes, other titles are priced lower in € than $. Thank you, but fuck you.

Its ridiculous, especially when retail price here is at around 400sek which is roughly 40eur (PC). :/

 

[eznark]

Anyone tried Left4Dead in Windows 7 under the XP mode? Performance hit? FPS?

Why are you playing in compatibility mode?

 

[b.e.r.g]

AI War is just up. awesome game

HOLY! This I must check out...

 

[clip]

Anyone tried Left4Dead in Windows 7 under the XP mode? Performance hit? FPS?

You can't use XP mode to play games because it doesn't utilize DirectX.

 

[Kosma]

Steam Store aint loading for me at all.

What are the weekend deals in the EU?

Anyone tried Left4Dead in Windows 7 under the XP mode? Performance hit? FPS?

I just play it in Windows 7.

???

 

[b.e.r.g]

Steam Store aint loading for me at all.

What are the weekend deals in the EU?

The same as US, Arma II at €15

 

[Blizzard]

Is Steam acting up for anyone else?

I was just about to join in on the Killing Floor free weekend, but when I click the "My Games" tab I get stuck at a "Scanning for Steam games updates..." screen. I googled the problem and apparently the most common fix is to close out of Steam completely, delete the ClientRegistry.blob file and then boot up Steam again. Unfortunately that didn't work for me.

This is the first time I have encountered the problem and I am about to try and reinstall Steam to see if that does it, but is anyone else having any problems?

Weird, but this brings up a question...is it possible to uninstall/reinstall Steam without losing all your games, or do you have to manually back them all up to another drive first?

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Weird, but this brings up a question...is it possible to uninstall/reinstall Steam without losing all your games, or do you have to manually back them all up to another drive first?

It is pretty simple actually. Uninstalling Steam does not delete your Steamapps folder which is where all your content is stored. After uninstalling Steam, just rename the Steam folder to something temporary and then reinstall the program. You have to rename the folder because Steam will not install into an already existing folder for some reason. Alternatively you could name the default Steam folder something else during the installation process.

After you finish installing, just move the steamapps folder into whatever folder you installed Steam into, boot it up and log in as you normally would.

 

[firehawk12]

I thought it did kill your Steam games? I had to uninstall and reinstall because the launcher wouldn't work and all my games were gone.

 

[epmode]

Anyone tried Left4Dead in Windows 7 under the XP mode? Performance hit? FPS?

FYI, XP mode is almost entirely useless for games.

I thought it did kill your Steam games? I had to uninstall and reinstall because the launcher wouldn't work and all my games were gone.

Copy/pasting your Steamapps folder should work if you're uninstalling and reinstalling Steam to the same exact operating system. The important thing is that the registry data required for many of the Steam games will NOT be re-entered when you just copy the folder back, so if you're copying the folder into a new Windows installation, you're going to have a lot of broken stuff.

 

[iam220]

So is ArmA II worth buying? It's only £12 this weekend

Those sons of bitches! I just bought this at full price 2 days ago.

They should really have some sort of 30 day price drop guarantee. Without it, unless the game is a new release I don't think I'll be buying another full price title from steam again.

 

[Blizzard]

I thought it did kill your Steam games? I had to uninstall and reinstall because the launcher wouldn't work and all my games were gone.

Yeah, I'm almost certain I uninstalled the Steam client and it deleted all my games (including some save files) without warning...I should have known to back it up myself. Also I'm not sure if using the Steam backup option to create files manually will back up save files that are stored in the Steam directory structure, and I'm ALSO not sure if it handles any sort of registry values that are needed by games. Of course, if you're just reinstalling Steam it in theory shouldn't delete registry values?

 

[Hawkian]

Not sure if this is quite relevant, but in changing computers, I moved my entire steam directory (steamapps included) to the new pc, then directed the Steam installer to that folder. Since there were no registry keys I guess, it just installed fine. Opened it up, and all my games were there, even my favorites had been remembered. Only thing I had to do is readjust the non-steam game links, because those were absolute shortcuts now pointing to nowhere. Truly a thing of beauty.

 

[b.e.r.g]

The important thing is that the registry data required for many of the Steam games will NOT be re-entered when you just copy the folder back, so if you're copying the folder into a new Windows installation, you're going to have a lot of broken stuff.

... but Steam will fix that for you. I've had Steam on a separate disk for pretty long, and I've reinstalled Vista a couple of times without much hassle.

 

[Loxley]

They should really have some sort of 30 day price drop guarantee. Without it, unless the game is a new release I don't think I'll be buying another full price title from steam again.

You probably already realize this, but the reason they don't give warnings or sort of heads-up about an impending sale (with the exception of free-weekends like they're doing right now with Killing Floor) is because of situations like yours. No one would ever buy the game at full-price of they knew for a fact that the price would drop on X date. So all of the digital services stay hush-hush about it until the day of the actual discount/price drop itself.

It sucks when something like that happens, but it's understandable from a business perspective why they don't do it.

 

[Volcynika]

Those sons of bitches! I just bought this at full price 2 days ago.

They should really have some sort of 30 day price drop guarantee. Without it, unless the game is a new release I don't think I'll be buying another full price title from steam again.

That'd be a very unintelligent decision. "Hey you bought this game a couple weeks ago, but we have a deal for half off. Here's half your money back"

 

[iam220]

You probably already realize this, but the reason they don't give warnings or sort of heads-up about an impending sale (with the exception of free-weekends like they're doing right now with Killing Floor) is because of situations like yours. No one would ever buy the game at full-price of they knew for a fact that the price would drop on X date. So all of the digital services stay hush-hush about it until the day of the actual discount/price drop itself.

It sucks when something like that happens, but it's understandable from a business perspective why they don't do it.

I'm not advocating that they announce when the price will be dropped. I would like a price protection guarantee for a certain period of time. You know, kind of like the one best buy has? If I buy a something and within 30 days the price drops I can get the difference back.

You guys are saying its a bad business decision but I think that matching some of the great policies that your competitors offer is actually a GOOD business decision. This way I have more incentive to buy the game from you rather then your competitors.

 

[Campster]

I'm not advocating that they announce when the price will be dropped. I would like a price protection guarantee for a certain period of time. You know, kind of like the one best buy has? If I buy a something and within 30 days the price drops I can get the difference back.

You guys are saying its a bad business decision but I think that matching some of the great policies that your competitors offer is actually a GOOD business decision. This way I have more incentive to buy the game from you rather then your competitors.

Steam has virtually no competitors. At best you're talking GOG (a slightly different set of games) or Impulse (a distant second) and Direct2Drive (whose client is an abhorrent mess). Which sucks, but it is what it is.

And their competitors don't do price protection plans, so even if they were threatened by some of these other sites there's no reason to start giving free money to the customers, especially when A) Game sales tend to drop off dramatically after the first few months, and B) The bigggest sales are usually weekend deals that people know to wait for. Even if you piss off the 200 guys who may have bought Arma II Sunday-Wedenesday you're making the 2000 people who buy it half-off Thursday-Sunday very happy. There's just very little incentive to do price protection in general.

 

[iam220]

Steam has virtually no competitors. At best you're talking GOG (a slightly different set of games) or Impulse (a distant second) and Direct2Drive (whose client is an abhorrent mess). Which sucks, but it is what it is.

And their competitors don't do price protection plans, so even if they were threatened by some of these other sites there's no reason to start giving free money to the customers.

I'm going to have to disagree with you there.

I'm no economic whizz, but I think their competitors include any retail store that sell video games. After all, If I buy a game through steam I'm not going to rebuy it retail, and vise versa.

 

[Kosma]

COD is 60 for a pre order, what a great fucking deal, not even 5 euro off

 

[Blizzard]

I'm going to have to disagree with you there.

I'm no economic whizz, but I think their competitors include any retail store that sell video games. After all, If I buy a game through steam I'm not going to rebuy it retail, and vise versa.

If you think you're going to save money buying all your games through Best Buy, and you don't mind swapping disks, go for it. :lol

 

[iam220]

If you think you're going to save money buying all your games through Best Buy, and you don't mind swapping disks, go for it. :lol

Steam has its advantages and its disadvantages. The no disk swapping and auto updates is very nice, the fact that I have a bandwidth limit is not.
In any case, I think it will benefit both them and the consumers if they put the above policy into effect. As it is I'm going to be paranoid about buying a full priced game from them thats not a new release. I bet there are others like me out there.

UPDATE: Luckily, the guys at steam have great customer service and after I send an email to support describing my issue with them, they refunded my purchase and said that I can buy the game again at the discounted price. Although they did stress that this is a one time thing.

 

[Visualante]

COD is 60 for a pre order, what a great fucking deal, not even 5 euro off

Buy it or don't. But don't whine about Activision being Activision.

 

[Javaman]

Whoops. I switched my download location to another country and now steam is downloading an update for it's software. I hope I didn't flub anything up. Did anyone else get a client update tonight?

 

[Baha]

Whoops. I switched my download location to another country and now steam is downloading an update for it's software. I hope I didn't flub anything up. Did anyone else get a client update tonight?

Yeah a client update has been released.

 

[Javaman]

Yeah a client update has been released.

Good to hear. I'm either getting crappy speeds or it's a biggie.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

Why do companies make such awful business decision? Railworks looks so cool but the grossly overpriced DLC kills any interest at all. Do people think that making an already niche game so grossly expensive you have to spend around $200 for it is a viable strategy?

 

[Dead Prince]

You can pre-load the L4D 2 demo now.

 

[epmode]

Why do companies make such awful business decision? Railworks looks so cool but the grossly overpriced DLC kills any interest at all. Do people think that making an already niche game so grossly expensive you have to spend around $200 for it is a viable strategy?

It's user-generated content, I think. I don't understand why they're charging so much for it but maybe fans of railroad sims (yawn) might feel differently.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

It's user-generated content, I think. I don't understand why they're charging so much for it but maybe fans of railroad sims (yawn) might feel differently.

I'd buy it if not for the outrageous price and this is all on sale, I'm not talking about the $20 normal price for one extra engine. SMH.