Giveaway of the Day Forums

1. 

   Anonymous
   Unregistered

   I think there’s an old adage that goes something like “You can’t spell ‘Valve’ without ‘Impending domination of all aspects of human society.’” To be honest, I never really understood it before today (I can be a bit thick sometimes, you know), but it’s starting to make some semblance of sense. After a sterling few months in which Linux support, Steam Greenlight, Source Filmmaker, Teaching With Portals, and Valve’s very own economist all debuted, the all-consuming PC behemoth is now embarking on a journey into the mysterious realm of non-gaming software.

   The first titles will begin trickling in on September 5. Here’s the official word, written in the English language – which Valve will probably soon own, because why not:

   “The Software titles coming to Steam range from creativity to productivity. Many of the launch titles will take advantage of popular Steamworks features, such as easy installation, automatic updating, and the ability to save your work to your personal Steam Cloud space so your files may travel with you.”

   “More Software titles will be added in an ongoing fashion following the September 5th launch, and developers will be welcome to submit Software titles via Steam Greenlight.”

   For now, Valve’s staying mum on specific pieces of software, but I’ve sent out an email asking for more details. If anything new comes up, you’ll be the first to know, RPS readers – but only because you’ve been so good today. And forever.

   And much as Steam’s continued expansion without a single credible competitor (especially now that it’s attempting to take class-actions off the table) gives me a slight case of the economic willies, I have to say this sounds completely brilliant. It puts everything in one place, and Steam’s convenience features are icing on an already tantalizing cake.

   It’s also interesting in the wake of Gabe Newell’s declaration that Windows 8 will be a “catastrophe,” seeing as much of its closed nature stems from a proprietary App Store. Steam’s non-gaming software, meanwhile, could essentially function as a slightly more open variation on that theme – although it remains to be seen exactly how it’ll all work. Steam’s not entirely open either, admittedly, but this is still a step in the right direction, I think.

   article

   Who would have thunk(thought) this or was it inevitable? (:)

   Posted 11 years ago #
2. 

   Whiterabbit-uk
   Games Guru

   I think this move is brilliant. I've purchased a lot of software over the last 20 years, many of which I no longer use simply because I can no longer find a copy or I've lost the registration details. (I lost one of my emails several years ago that I'd used for registration purposed called freeserver mail {fsmail.net}) They just cut 10's of thousands of accounts with no warning.

   What I'd really like to see now is more older games being offered via Steam. There are literally hundreds of excellent triple A titles from the past 10 years that are not available on Steam for example Men of Valor, Conflict Global Storm, Battlefield Vietnam, Battlefield 1942, Battlefield 2142, Comflict Vietnam, Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault plus the earlier MOH titles, Vietcong/Fist alpha and Vietcong 2, Line of Sight: Vietnam, Mortyr I, II & III, Terrorist Takedown, Shellshock: Nam 67, the early Need for Speed titles, the early Colin McRae titles (the precursors to Dirt 1 to 4) plus many more, (I could list hundreds of titles that I have on DVD/CD that I'd love to see on Steam.

   The first one I mention for example, despite being 8 years old has a brilliant single player and multiplayer game with large scale maps that still look amazing today.

   The first time I played Men of Valor shortly after it was released I felt like I was in a real war. (well, as near as you could get via a computer simulation (with a surround sound system turned up to max), without the smell of cordite, the camaraderie between your fellow squad mates and the palpable fear that you feel when the threat of death is very real.

   Posted 11 years ago #
3. 

   BuBBy
   Teh adnim

   If they start selling non-gaming software, hopefully we will not be limited to only being logged into a single computer at a time. Even though I own hundreds of programs - Steam still restricts me to being online with a single game at a time. If this was to extend to software utilities or productivity apps - that I can only be logged in to a single PC at once, then selling utilities and productivity apps starts to look far less enticing on Steam.

   Posted 11 years ago #

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