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Old 03-12-2019, 03:50 PM   #1
chrisvasey
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PC or Steam?

Long time OOTP player.....new to Steam.
Suggestions on the best way to play/get the game....Steam or PC? Always just downloaded to PC, works well...wondering if Steam is better or worse.
Pros & Cons please and Thank you.

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Old 03-12-2019, 04:07 PM   #2
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It's funny; I was just having this debate with myself this morning over another game.

Steam - Pros:
1) Easy installation.
2) Automatic updates.
3) Quick access to manuals, mods, etc.
4) Interaction with Steam Community if desired.

Steam - Cons:
1) You never really own the game; you just rent it.
2) That's because you depend on the continued viability of Steam.
3) You have no control over version updates; they just come on down.
4) Modding Steam games may not be as easy as the downloaded versions.

Download - Pros and Cons: Reverse all of the above.
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Old 03-12-2019, 05:45 PM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Déjà Bru View Post
Steam - Cons:
1) You never really own the game; you just rent it.
You never really own a game. You buy a license to use it no matter what game you get or where you get it.

As for the OP, be prepared for the old guys around here to tell you how bad Steam is. Nothing beats it. And when it comes to modding OOTP, it's just as easy.

Last edited by low; 03-13-2019 at 08:09 AM. Reason: Made it less snarky sounding.
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Old 03-12-2019, 05:53 PM   #4
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Also you don't have to mess with licenses. You can uninstall and reinstall the game at will.

The only con is that Steam does take a high % cut of the price of the game.
Buying from e-sellrate in theory gives OOTPD more revenue. I don't know how much they take per sale.

I use the steam version for simplicity sake. Having as many games as possible in one place, no messing with licenses or having to go back through my e-mail to find my license or download link that may or may not expire.

As as low said, you never own any software. Read any license agreement ever and you are leasing a license for the software.

And as far as Steam folding, at this point if Steam/Valve goes bankrupt and closes then PC gaming itself has probably experienced some sort of cataclysmic event that has altered the entire industry.
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Old 03-12-2019, 06:03 PM   #5
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Steam is the obvious choice. As people have said, the only cons to Steam are very abstract consumer concerns that will never actually come to pass.

That said, the devs get more money from a direct sale.
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Old 03-12-2019, 06:35 PM   #6
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Steam advantages really start to show once you have dozens and dozens of games. You just log into whatever computer you want with steam and download and install the game.

Plus lot of other steam games use steam cloud for saves. So you aren't confined by your desktop if you are constantly upgrading gaming pcs or switching from laptops to desktops.

Then steam has a community etc. OOTP is lucky they have forums, discord, youtube/twitch company streams. Lot of other independents gaming companies aren't as lucky.

Once you buy into any ecosystem life is easier for anything having to do with that ecosystem.

If you only ever play 1 game and its OOTP then its questionable which way you should go. But I have versions 18/19 and soon 20 all via steam. Which means if I needed one of those old versions I could easily reload it in 2 minutes.

Plus big advantage is Steam has seasonal steam sales where games get heavily discounted even OOTP. Plus there are steam key resellers. You can get OOTP 19 right now from a reseller for anywhere from $5-$10 even though it currently sells on Steam and OOTP for $20.
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Old 03-12-2019, 06:59 PM   #7
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Plus there are steam key resellers. You can get OOTP 19 right now from a reseller for anywhere from $5-$10 even though it currently sells on Steam and OOTP for $20.
Please do not promote or support Grey market game resellers.
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Old 03-12-2019, 07:10 PM   #8
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Quote:
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1) You never really own the game; you just rent it.
You don't need to connect to Steam or to be online after your initial purchase.. obviously you must connect to get the update but you don't have to reach Steam to play.

I agree that Modding the game via Steam is a pain in the ass, but I have stuffs (logo, facegen, jersey, cap,..) for everything on my hard drive that I use since forever...

Personally I prefer Steam because the money conversion rate is better and, of course, because it's easier to go from one computer to another (I have three that I use).
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Old 03-12-2019, 08:36 PM   #9
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???????
It's actually super easy to mod for Steam.

I have over 100 games, so Steam is the easy answer for me. If you want OOTPD to get the full $35 and/or want the beta access, by all means pre-order through their website.
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Old 03-12-2019, 08:46 PM   #10
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Please do not promote or support Grey market game resellers.
Disagree any huge marketplace will have scammers and people up to no good. Same can be said for Amazon, Ebay, and Craiglist.

The amount of counterfeit products sold on Amazon as genuine is astounding. But you don't hear anyone saying "don't support amazon".

Same thing on Ebay 95% of everything is legit. But you have those 5% trying to scam people. Selling empty boxes. Or hacked computer parts with bogus firmware to fool the system. Again no one says avoid Ebay.

The Top steam reselling marketplaces are 100% completely legit. It's a market place however. And if you aren't buying from a market place verified members or someone who has 10k+ solid reviews then the fault lies with the user.

And if resellers were that much of a problem Valve/Steam wouldn't allow keys to be sold anywhere else but Steam. But they don't. Valve/Steam allow reselling of keys outside of their marketplace for a reason. If not we wouldn't have the option to even type in a key. We would never be given keys. We would only be buying games from Steam and having them show up in our list.

Any gigantic market place can be taken advantage of by scammers. The user has to take little initiative to find they are buying from a good source. This includes Amazon, Ebay, Craigslist and Steam resellers.
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Old 03-12-2019, 10:50 PM   #11
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Definitely PC over Steam. With Perfect Team in existence now, updates come fast and furious, and with pc you can do them on your own time.
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Old 03-13-2019, 04:03 AM   #12
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I discount the "Steam takes such a huge cut from the developer" argument completely. Any reasonable business will have made their calculation beforehand whether they can offer their product in a certain marketplace without hurting their bottom line. OOTPD has been around for a few decades, so they should be considered reasonably reasonable. If Steam would take such a huge chunk out of OOTPD's sales as to hurt them, they would not offer the game on Steam. Period.

And as I said in another thread a few days ago: Steam, for convenience, all the way …!
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Old 03-13-2019, 09:04 AM   #13
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All good comments about Steam. I happen to be one of those older guys who used to avoid Steam for the reasons I indicated (which still linger in the back of my mind). However, I now "lease" 32 games from Steam.

Here's one little quibble with Steam that will be harder to gainsay, I believe. It takes longer to start a game on Steam because it has to start itself first, check itself, and update itself (frequently) before you can get at your games. Plus it always opens a news/ad window that needs to be closed. Minor stuff.

So, the only thing that really is important in this debate so far is the fact that game updates are automatic on Steam. With a well-run company such as OOTPD, that is just fine. Even a bad update around here gets fixed quickly.

With that other game that I mentioned, one that I really like in itself but have little esteem or respect for the developers, that is not the case. A bad update will take months to fix, literally, and there is the suspicion that "they ain't coming back, are they?" always about them.

That's why, for their game, I stick with the downloaded version.

One more thing: It is my impression that OOTPD is getting large enough that I don't need to consider their smaller margin on their games sold on Steam anymore.
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Old 03-13-2019, 09:25 AM   #14
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i've always used Stand-Alone version except in beta testing where i use steam exclusively. however, the very large updates for the stand-alone version are eating at my bandwidth limits since i changed plans ... so i may reconsider and go with steam eventually, as those updates aren't as big. But i DO like to pick when and if i get an update and with Steam that doesn't appear to be an option if/ when i log in. Dunno. Still on the fence with splinters.
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Old 03-13-2019, 09:49 AM   #15
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The dev can allow multiple download branches as beta branches. Very common for many devs

You can often pick between using between the last several updates. Steam itself has the functionality OOTP Devs must be the ones to roll it out.

So the download thing that many people mention isn't a real steam problem in itself it's just a problem how OOTP Devs use steam.
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Old 03-13-2019, 02:21 PM   #16
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Blows my mind that this is still debated in 2019.
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Old 03-14-2019, 04:35 PM   #17
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All good comments about Steam. I happen to be one of those older guys who used to avoid Steam for the reasons I indicated (which still linger in the back of my mind). However, I now "lease" 32 games from Steam.

Here's one little quibble with Steam that will be harder to gainsay, I believe. It takes longer to start a game on Steam because it has to start itself first, check itself, and update itself (frequently) before you can get at your games. Plus it always opens a news/ad window that needs to be closed. Minor stuff.

So, the only thing that really is important in this debate so far is the fact that game updates are automatic on Steam. With a well-run company such as OOTPD, that is just fine. Even a bad update around here gets fixed quickly.

With that other game that I mentioned, one that I really like in itself but have little esteem or respect for the developers, that is not the case. A bad update will take months to fix, literally, and there is the suspicion that "they ain't coming back, are they?" always about them.

That's why, for their game, I stick with the downloaded version.

One more thing: It is my impression that OOTPD is getting large enough that I don't need to consider their smaller margin on their games sold on Steam anymore.
You can disable the news/ad window in steam by going to Settings->Interface-> Uncheck "Notify me about additions or changes to my games, new releases, and upcoming releases" if you wish.

As for Standalone vs Steam, I'm going standalone this year because I only plan on using one or two computers instead of four like last year, so for my use case I don't need the "unlimited" steam licenses and don't have to bother with steam updates before updating OOTP. Since OOTP already notifies me about updates, I'm already covered. I've done one version or the other in the past and most of the pros and cons have already been covered by other posters here. Personally, I'm not a big fan of huge storefronts like steam, origin, and whatever ubisoft has just because it feels unnecessary for my use case. I just want to play the game, if I wanted to add in chat I'd open up one of my instant messengers. However minimal the gain is for not using steam, I can devote those extra resources to running computations for World Community Grid, Seti@Home, and MilkyWay@Home through BOINC.
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Old 03-14-2019, 06:44 PM   #18
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I am a huge Steam user, but for OOTP, I personally like to get the OOTP store version.

Being in an online league it's nice to be able to control when you get an update. I've done some mod myself and it feels better to be closer to the metal I suppose.

I like giving more money to the team too, since I've been supporting them for nearly 2 decades now. I remember when it was just Markus and nobody else.
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Old 03-14-2019, 08:27 PM   #19
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Plus there are always nuances like this:

Name:  Image0064.jpg
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I'm not against Steam; as I said before, I do like it for games by developers that I trust and admire (and to the extent that I believe in Steam's viability, which I do. Until I hear otherwise).

I do stand by the drawbacks that I mentioned in my previous posts, though. I also disparage those who dismiss a debate because they are personally convinced. OP asked for pros and cons about Steam vs. Download and the things that we have discussed here will still be "discussable" in 2029.
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Old 03-15-2019, 08:33 AM   #20
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Well, that all depends on how much you want to start a 2019 MLB game with inaccurate rosters four days earlier than you could on Steam. Otherwise the offers are identical, and your mileage may vary on the single case where this is important.

And I think that OOTPD at some point said that the reason for no pre-orders on Steam was that they could get a better ranking on the storefront etc. by getting all the sales bunched into that release day week, so that is a reasonable business decision, too.
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