BTG: The Final Hours of Half-Life 2

[ysbreker]

My halflife 2 with a silver lining is pre-loading as we speak (31.9% done)

[toblix]

You don't get a hard copy no matter what Steam package you buy.

[Kester]

So what do all you guys think of Steam? Are those of you buying from it doing so just because its convenient, or because you think it's the "future of games" or somesuch and needs to be supported?

I see people all over the internet saying how it will revolutionise game delivery and put more power back in the hands of the developers, but I just don't see it. Sure, I think it's going to work fine for Valve, but they have a founder with fat stacks of cash to throw at the company. They're kind of the Chelsea FC of the gaming world, and as such are the exception rather than the rule. I don't see how a typical small developer on a shoestring budget is going to have the infrastructure to set up a delivery system like this. I imagine they could 'rent' the service from Valve (or whoever else sets something like this up - I believe Fileplanet is trying to get a less sophisticated version of this system running), but isn't all you're doing then just creating a new middleman?

I'd honestly like for this to work for small developers, I just don't see how it can.

[ysbreker]

You don't need a big budget to set up a content delivery system like steam, just use (your own version of) the bittorrent network. Everything is already there for fast & cheap content delivery, the industry is just affraid to use it.

[Kester]

You don't need a big budget to set up a content delivery system like steam, just use (your own version of) the bittorrent network. Everything is already there for fast & cheap content delivery, the industry is just affraid to use it.

That's a good point, I hadn't really considered peer-to-peer distribution. You get to use other people's hardware to distribute, just as long as they are happy to let you.

[MrHoatzin]

My internet being pathetic at times, and having only a 20 gig hard disk (mostly full), I am going to get me the hard bronze copy once it comes out, evil or no.

[jokemaster]

SILVER, BRONZE AND GOLD: download via steam

Buy it at store: 5 discs

Buy it at store, Limited Collector's edition: 1 DVD + HL1 Source, A T-SHIRT and a book.

[JimmyTheFish]

All of the steam versions give you the ability to back up the file to DVD, so you are safe if steam goes under.

[Kolzig]

Buy it at store: 5 discs

Buy it from a European store: 1 dvd