Direct2Drive is probably one of the most lame digital providers, although at least its friendly.

It requires no draconian DRM, or "online activation" ... you simply buy the game online and download it. The reason it is the most lame, however, is that (for the most part) it seems to only be a once per computer thing ... meaning that unlike Impulse or Steam, you can't use a D2D drive on multiple computers. This could just be my own experience and not the majority of interaction with D2D however.

Oh, and I make it no secret that I am annoyed with Valve/Steam's business practices.

Yea ... honestly, what they should have done is require the Online DRM/ Steam for multiplayer ... and just had a simple CD-Key for single player retail.

As in, Steam digital version has the Online DRM and Single/Multiplayer, steamworks, ect

Retail version would have an additional CD-key, but only the CD-key would be required to install and play the single-player version of the game. If you wanted multiplayer, you could log onto steam and "upgrade game account" with online DRM and Steamworks in order to access patches and Multiplayer modes.

Once you have a working multiplayer (through the one-time activation thru Steam), you only need to run Steam in the background when accessing the internet (multiplayer) and you can multiplay both on Steam servers AND on independent servers (like hamachi).

THIS, imho, is how they should have done it. In this way, it doesn't alienate single player gamers or modders as much as the current system, and you still need to undergo their Anti-Pirating measures for the ability to play multiplayer.

This multi-tier approach would have been much more User-Accessible.

http://forums.alliedmods.net/showthread.php?t=125721

Valve putting a banhammer on the TF2 mod community for making custom hats.

Another reason to be worried about Civ V and modding.

D2D has limited activations.  They bricked my game after the no-DRM patch came out, of  all ironies.  I had to work around the problem by getting the .exe file from a friend via AIM.

That doesn't make sense at all.  Two different games made by two different companies.  That's like saying "it doesn't look good for Impulse, because EA Downloader only offers download links for games you purchase for one year...don't you see a trend happening here?"  

Nope, doesn't apply.   

Riiiiight.  And when the first mod that adds in the Babylon Civ (which costs $10 in a DLC) gets banned then what will you say?

This whole Steam controlling mods thing is very bad, very very bad because mods are the lifeblood of the Civ community and Steam will cause it to bleed.  I'd have to say that this disturbs me more then the fact I don't want Steam running to play my single player game.

Civ 5 will still sell tons of copies and will be a great success.  Mostly because most people that buy at retail (the majority of sales) will have no idea of the Steam requirement.  Civ is a game that has a lot of "causal" gamers.  Many that don't even have an Internet connection.  Needless to say they will be shocked to say the least.

Borrowed from another site

[QUOTE=Nick Danger;9186285]I think it's pretty clear...
First, when 2K Elizabeth said:

They of course can compile multiple games.  They just chose not to.  I think the reason they chose not to is because steam required it be necessary to run steam in the background, even for store-bought dvd and even with single-player offline games.  The reason being Steam wants to get on, and be running online on, as many computers as possible.  They're also banking on most people not ticking the 'offline' option, so most civ5 players will have steam connected even when unnecessary -- many will have it on even when not playing civ5, but always on.

The why is pretty obvious -- getting on as many machines as possible, and being connected, benefits steam tremendously.  

--More market share: not only to be able to make more deals like the one with civ5, but it also helps keep competitors at a disadvantage, and makes it harder for new competitors to enter.

--More information collected: their privacy policy is too long to quote here (see [url]http://www.valvesoftware.com/privacy.html[/url]) but here's a part:

"By using Valve's online sites and products, users agree that Valve may collect aggregate information, individual information, and personally identifiable information, as defined below. Valve may share aggregate information and individual information with other parties. Valve shall not share personally identifiable information with other parties, except as described in the policy below." (emphasis mine)

--More 'eyeballs' on its ads, so it can sell/charge more advertising.

etc.

While it's valuable for steam to be able to (exclusively?) sell the DD/DLC for Civ5 it's likely even more valuable that steam be installed and running on the number of pcs that will run civ5.

My guess is this was presented to the civ5 devs from 'on high' and not of their initiation, and I take it as a sign that the 'suits' (Dr. Johnny Fever 1978) and not the gamers are calling this (and other?) shots.

So my hunch is that this deal is really about getting steam on as many computers as possible, and 2k is getting a cut for forcing this on civ5 players.[/QUOTE]

That is the only logical assumption I can come up with, I believe 2k is gettting some sort of payola to shut Steam's competitors out.

Again - mods based on direct content taken from a paid DLC release would probably be between the company that made it (ie, not valve/steam), and the modders.  I mean, isn't this already common place?  Or do people normally take direct content from a paid releases, and release it as is free to the community? 

Also, I suspect that the number of people with absolutely no internet connection, but who buy the latest video game release, is pretty low.    

Anyway, interesting post Tas - but what ads?  I only see ads for games on Steam itself...I even loaded up Steam to check, but I didn't see any.  Am I missing them? 

Being worried about PC gaming become a closed platform is hardly "Steam bashing".

Remember this post: At some point if things keep going the way they do, using Steamworks to be sold on Steam won't be an option, it'll be a requirement. 

The problem isn't Valve or Steam. As I said earlier, you shouldn't want Impulse to dominate either or anyone.

Microsoft used to give away Windows basically for free to OEMs and OEMs could do whatever they wanted with Windows (change the shell, change the logon). Now, and I know this from bitter experience, you're not even allowed to change the freaking default wallpaper without special permission from Microsoft on first boot if your'e a PC OEM that bundles Windows. That's the kind of leverage Microsoft has -- now.

As a practical matter, on the PC, there's Steam and Impulse. The others aren't (imo) commercially viable (even Apple only breaks even on their app store and on iTunes).  

Right now, Steam, by no means, is not a monopoly. If Blizzard came out with their Steam/Impusle competitor right now they'd take over or certainly make the claims that Steam is destined to rule seem pretty ridiculous.  But that won't necessarily always be the case.

But that, again, has nothing to do with Steam or Valve being "bad". When you don't have a monopoly, the best way to gain more market share to is be incredibly generous (like Windows for Workgroups + Office being $7 at the OEM level). Once all alternatives are swept away...well, then things are different.

Frogboy:  Given your acknowledgement of Microsoft's anticompetitive behavior, using its deep pockets to under-price its product to eliminate competition (like OS/2) then, when they've destroyed competition, to then start dictating prices and terms ... I wonder why Stardock seems bent on helping it further this by using IE as a basis for Impulse instead of Firefox, Opera or another browser?

I am trying to get Impulse to switch to Webkit. It's purely a matter of cheapness.

You should see what he said regarding DLC and modding...

Frogboy:  Woohoo for any alternative to IE.

Pretty obvious that you don't know much about the Civ modding community.  Right now I could have Civ 4 vanilla (no expansions) and download mods for all the civs included in the expansion packs.  I could also download mods for any of the buildings and whatnot that were added.  I mean, it's not all that difficult to mod in a new civ or building.

So now if they continue with the DLC model of selling off new civs here and there, their financial interest is to shut down these mods.  Before they couldn't, but now if all mods have to be "approved" and go thru Steam it's not hard to leap to the next step of what can and will happen.  And what about the various bug fix mods that actually fix bugs in the game.  Do those also not get approved because they may or may not cause stability issues.  I could go on.  Besides the fact, who in the heck is actually "approving" these mods.   It's something to be very worried about.

The issue of user mods will be highlighted once Civilisation V is released.  Similiar to the way 'Games for Windows Live' works, however on a per developer basis as opposed to the entire approval process being run by the service's owner, 2K will have the option to restrict the installation of mods if they so chose and run an approval process if they want to on mods made by the community.  I haven't seen any offical details stating that they will restrict mods, and some games like Half-life 2 for example, don't apply any restrictions at all.  Other games, like Modern Warfare 2, most certainly do and do so to ensure that their DLC, such as the pathetically named 'Stimulus Pack', have no opposition from fan made mods or maps - turning the PC into a closed platform to ensure that they can force DLC on their customers.  Given how modable Civ IV was, I'd like to think that they'll be nice - however with the Suits making the decisions now at 2K as opposed to the developers, it's a very real possibility that Activision's example of how to use to Steam to milk the ever-loving-shit out of your customers is catching on.  Dark times ahead, fellow gamers.