I Hate STEAM

[RickAJ]

I decided to play ETW after taking time off from it. Well, during that time, STEAM ended my registration with it. I couldn't remember my password. After trying for and hour, I gave up the game. During that I hour, I tried reinstalling, which ended with Activation Code Already being used, then starting a new user, but when that seemed to work, I would have to buy the game AGAIN (just so everyone knows, I have the CD, I didn't by through that accursed STEAM). Anyone else had similar problems?

[ne'er-do-well]

Go into task manager and set steamraging.exe to low priority and rememberingpasswords.exe to high

[barrrp86]

Just one of the reasons I hate steam.
you bought and paid for empire, why-the-*%$# should you have to verify that every time you want to use it.
maybe you could ask steam for support? but no. steam support is uber gay, they will say its your fault not theres.

[Ahlerich]

Just one of the reasons I hate steam.
you bought and paid for empire, why-the-*%$# should you have to verify that every time you want to use it..

..so i wont be able to use it

[Heavy Weapons Guy]

I hate Steam too!

[Bleda]

Just one of the reasons I hate steam.
you bought and paid for empire, why-the-*%$# should you have to verify that every time you want to use it.
maybe you could ask steam for support? but no. steam support is uber gay, they will say its your fault not theres.

it really adds to the incentive to crack and pirate the game.

[karamazovmm]

glad that you´re not calling CA gay, this is in the ToS might watch what you´re saying

[Antissa]

Have you tried contacting STEAM Support? If not, you should give it a try.

https://support.steampowered.com/

[Abspara]

I heard Steam has support for things like this.

[karamazovmm]

with those ears you're supposed to eh?

and yes they have support for that pretty easy and fast if I might add.

[hip63]

They do have a password reset feature:
https://support.steampowered.com/kb_...4988-DHXV-7272

hip63

[♔Drewoid13♔]

ah, the lovely "Forgot Password?" link...always seems to run away when we need it...

Seriously, I do hope you can get back into your account. If its just the matter of a correct password, they should be able to fix that in some way.

[psyclog]

I've done some thinking.. about how much time this Steam App has cost me so far, about its benefits and downsides.
Fact is that I now have to wait a week or so before being able to play my ETW again. Due to Steam.
The 1.6 update apparently made Steam download the entire game again, which quickly ate up my transfer limit of the current month. I am now throttled down to a tiny bandwidth until May.

And back into my mind came all these moments where I wanted to play a Steam game and couldn't because Steam was offline, or it just absolutely needed to download some patch first. There never were such issues on "ordinary" games, you clicked on the shortcut and the game started loading no matter what.

Add the fact that firing up Steam takes forever since it always has to "update" the platform, probably to download some new advertisment screens to pop into my face when the platform finishes loading.

And then there's the ETW specific problem with me being unable to use the new Multiplayer Campaign mode of TW because Steam will disconnect for a few seconds every other hour, killing all game progress since the last possible save point.
And before some know-it-alls come at me all like "lol save the game after each battle": During the AI's turns, you will often have multiple battles in a row when AI armies keep attacking you or your opponent, without any possibility to save between those battles.


I have made my decision and joined the ranks of the true Steam haters. I hate it with a passion, and it will definitely influence future purchase decisions.

Steam is fine for mini-games at bargain prices, but it doesn't work for large, proper games like ETW.



In a related matter, I bought the boxed version of Mount & Blade: Warband. No mention of Steam anywhere on the cover, or in the manual. When I put the CD into the drive, Steam popped up. rage
Fortunately, it is possible to download the 500mb M&B game files from their homepage as an .exe file and then just install it by entering the serial key to go without Steam. (You can also try it out without serial key, if you are interested - it's a good game).


Hey, let's turn this into another really long "I hate Steam" thread!

[Condottiere SOG]

The STEAM move was a bad one...gotta go through another company to get updates...slow, uploads wrong, password errors...I am not a fan. I have enough issues trying to keep up with an old system without them making things tougher for me. I just want to game...not go into debt so I can keep up.

[Ahlerich]

The STEAM move was a bad one...gotta go through another company to get updates...slow, uploads wrong, password errors...I am not a fan. I have enough issues trying to keep up with an old system without them making things tougher for me. I just want to game...not go into debt so I can keep up.

i d be surprised if steam doesnt even use up some performance. this is neglactable for high end pc users but not people that have to kill every unnecessary process to get games run smoothly. one of the worst aspects is that steam is pretty much adware.

the post box and the internet is full of ads. even the phone rings due to advertisements and now i am supposed to download and install adware locally on my computer just to run a game?
a few years back that was only a merchandisers wet dream..

one really should not support this as well as ubisofts idea to force people to register online just to be able to play a game. that should always be a matter of choice.

[♔Drewoid13♔]

I have to disagree with you ahlerich. steam is far from ad ware and certainly less malicious than ad ware is. if it eats up significant system resources (which for me it doesn't) then you could call it bloat ware. I don't think there can be even a reasonably equitable comparison between Steam and Ubi soft. Steam only needs to validate itself once, allows the user to enter an offline mode and still play all their games, and has a backup feature so redownloading isn't entirely necessary. Its all accessible by right-clicking the game, under preferences (for those who don't know). Ubi Soft on the other hand requires a constant internet connection (so its sapping even a tiny amt of bandwidth, but constantly), boots the user from playing his own game when the connection is disrupted, and has no way of letting the player start his game offline. Ubi's method is far more intrusive, controlling, and abusive to the end user than steam is. Sure, Steam is FAR from perfect but I don't think it can be put at the same level as Ubi Soft. Both of these examples aside, I prefer Impulse above the rest, but that's a digression I won't continue here.

@ Psyclog, try using the game's backup/archive feature. This should preserve the critical files for the game and help avoid full re-downloads.

[ginger_hammer]

Rarely had a problem with steam, however I agree that it takes them a while to update with patches.

[Ahlerich]

i call it ad ware as each time u start it u get a pop up with the latest on there. i used steam before empire - when i installed a shop bough day of defeat cd. if it wasnt for that i d never installed steam.

not having a choice is bad in my book. i dont care if they sell the game on steam and everybody who wants to buy it there can. force customers upon steam is not good. whats next? force them to buy a nvidia card? force them to buy a life insurance with them?

[♔Drewoid13♔]

i call it ad ware as each time u start it u get a pop up with the latest on there. i used steam before empire - when i installed a shop bough day of defeat cd. if it wasnt for that i d never installed steam.

not having a choice is bad in my book. i dont care if they sell the game on steam and everybody who wants to buy it there can. force customers upon steam is not good. whats next? force them to buy a nvidia card? force them to buy a life insurance with them?

that can be turned off I believe...check under preferences (i'd look but don't have steam on my work computer )

and I agree here. I'm all for choice and forcing players to use Steam isn't cool. It would be more cool, though, if it said on the box in something larger than size 4 font steam is required. Then at least there's full disclosure of info and the consumer can make a wiser decision. I felt the same way about SecurRom and Starforce, etc as all of those installed on your computer with absolutely no warning, disclaimer, note, etc. The end user doesn't even know they're there unless they enjoy searching through every folder in Windows Explorer or found their cd/dvd drives started failing (starforce caused a lot of this).

[micheljq]

I have Steam installed since a couple of months. There are good things, like access to Demos and discounts.

However as a whole I am really against it. Having to sign to Steam to be able to install a game I purchased at the retail store or from other sources, Direct2Drive for example is not normal from my point of view and certainly not a positive side. I play most of the time solo and was always accustomed to get the patch from the internet myself, which from my point of view is the best way.

It's not acceptable that a sole company is distributing the patches of games from other distributors. I am asking myself if it puts Valve in a kind of position of "unloyal concurrency" against other distributors like the retail channel or online ones like Direct2Drive. I am surprised the game editors allow this and hope they will open their eyes.

I have nothing against users who like it, let them use it if they are happy. But now what is going on, is that Steam is forced in the throats of many gamers who would be as happy or even more happy without it, like myself.

Some say it helps fight piracy, piracy, piracy. Look gaming industry was 13 billions dollars in 2008 and 15 billions dollars in 2009. When i had my first computer in the '90s, gaming industry was just a tiny portion of this. So, I think piracy is not so much an issue as some company wants us to believe it. I have nothing against DRM on my desktop, as long as i can play without internet and not limited on the installs.

Steam or companies who force internet connections to play or install (like a big company U.......), do not fight piracy, they encourages it, many will be tempted to buy Empire Total War for example the normal legal way, and then install the crack it so they do not need Steam at all.