Burn the Witch
10-04-2003, 02:15 AM
(this has been written by Burn the Witch as a proper article, not just a forum post, please take time to read it)
Much of this information has been taken from the official Valve site, and PC Gamer UK, a link to which can be reached from here : Daily Radar (http://www.dailyradar.co.uk)
I stress that the majority of the news here is not my own work, but I wrote the article myself.
This contraversial new information just released by Valve, and also circulating throughout the internet suggests that to play Half Life 2 Online, players may have to activate a monthly subscription.
Firstly, what is STEAM? Steam is, according to Valve:
"At its core, Steam is a distributed file system and shared set of technology components that can be implemented into any software application".
Half Life, CS, Day of Defeat and all other Half Life mods have recently had STEAM integrated into them, Valve like using the term that these games are part of the "Steam Community". Basically, Steam is Valves way of making patches and additional content far more accessible and easier to download.
The last quote on Steam Powered.com (http://www.steampowered.com/) tells of a far darker intention to the network:
With Steam, developers are given integrated tools for direct-content publishing, flexible billing, ensured-version control, anti-cheating, anti-piracy, and more.
This doesn't look good, and essentially, doing this Valve might have shot themselves in the foot. Not many people are willing to pay a monthly fee of around $10+ to play a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game, which automatically means you have a dedicated server capable of holding thousands of players, being maintained by a large team who's salaries are paid out of peoples monthly "contributions", leaving a small percentage of the funds as profit for the company, so the chances of them paying $10 a month or there abouts are fairly slim. Also, Half Life 2 would presumably only have a few official servers, the rest being maintained by other people. Also, there would be no guarantee of new content or patches on a monthly basis.
Gabe Newell of Valves reply to the rumours were vague at best. While admitting such plans were still under consideration (but this is admitting they are existing plans) Gabe admits that Valve are considering releasing not one but THREE different versions of Half Life 2 to the public. One that does not contain any multiplayer, a more standard version, and finally one with lots of bonus content, for the more "hardcore" among us.
Playing Multi player Half Life 2 with STEAM is where contraversy arises. Valve are planning for 2 methods in this area, with Valve planning to let players download two versions, a normal version where players can download patches, and another, which lets players obtain patches, mods and add ons as soon as they are released. This could cost players up to $9.95 a month.
Valve Production Manager Erik Johnson stated recently "the next release of STEAM will be the first step towards converting the entire Half Life user base to STEAM". Does this mean those who don't wish to use STEAM will be unable to play Half Life 2 online at all? In essence this means if you don't pay -- you don't play.
STEAM itself has not started incredibly well, with an unstable few weeks, and more problems continuing to arise.
Much of this information has been taken from the official Valve site, and PC Gamer UK, a link to which can be reached from here : Daily Radar (http://www.dailyradar.co.uk)
I stress that the majority of the news here is not my own work, but I wrote the article myself.
This contraversial new information just released by Valve, and also circulating throughout the internet suggests that to play Half Life 2 Online, players may have to activate a monthly subscription.
Firstly, what is STEAM? Steam is, according to Valve:
"At its core, Steam is a distributed file system and shared set of technology components that can be implemented into any software application".
Half Life, CS, Day of Defeat and all other Half Life mods have recently had STEAM integrated into them, Valve like using the term that these games are part of the "Steam Community". Basically, Steam is Valves way of making patches and additional content far more accessible and easier to download.
The last quote on Steam Powered.com (http://www.steampowered.com/) tells of a far darker intention to the network:
With Steam, developers are given integrated tools for direct-content publishing, flexible billing, ensured-version control, anti-cheating, anti-piracy, and more.
This doesn't look good, and essentially, doing this Valve might have shot themselves in the foot. Not many people are willing to pay a monthly fee of around $10+ to play a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game, which automatically means you have a dedicated server capable of holding thousands of players, being maintained by a large team who's salaries are paid out of peoples monthly "contributions", leaving a small percentage of the funds as profit for the company, so the chances of them paying $10 a month or there abouts are fairly slim. Also, Half Life 2 would presumably only have a few official servers, the rest being maintained by other people. Also, there would be no guarantee of new content or patches on a monthly basis.
Gabe Newell of Valves reply to the rumours were vague at best. While admitting such plans were still under consideration (but this is admitting they are existing plans) Gabe admits that Valve are considering releasing not one but THREE different versions of Half Life 2 to the public. One that does not contain any multiplayer, a more standard version, and finally one with lots of bonus content, for the more "hardcore" among us.
Playing Multi player Half Life 2 with STEAM is where contraversy arises. Valve are planning for 2 methods in this area, with Valve planning to let players download two versions, a normal version where players can download patches, and another, which lets players obtain patches, mods and add ons as soon as they are released. This could cost players up to $9.95 a month.
Valve Production Manager Erik Johnson stated recently "the next release of STEAM will be the first step towards converting the entire Half Life user base to STEAM". Does this mean those who don't wish to use STEAM will be unable to play Half Life 2 online at all? In essence this means if you don't pay -- you don't play.
STEAM itself has not started incredibly well, with an unstable few weeks, and more problems continuing to arise.