Valve Finally Addresses Electronic Arts' Problems With Steam

#51 Posted by Hef (988 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@DoNotBanMe: Troll harder sir

#52 Posted by Dustpan (1683 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@Leadcat said:

I wonder if the huge ad for MW3 on the Steam front page is Valve saying "This is what you're missing out on EA!"

Didn't think of that, nice catch.

#53 Posted by ribeye (410 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@Vegsen said:

EA has to give in to Steam in the end, people don't want to go to their Origin platform no matter how good or bad it is.
Steam's where it's at.

agree

#54 Posted by Meowshi (2876 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@ShaneDev said:

It's yet more PR talk the same kind that EA has been spouting. It's not worth a damn and if anything just highlights that this is a business decision between two businesses and not some grand war between two empires. They came to an impasse and they will probably work it out.

What? This sounds nothing like EA's statements. Valve isn't playing the blame game.

I mean, it's frustrating to see someone just say something so blatantly untrue.

#55 Posted by RustySpoon (143 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

If I had to guess, EA wants Valve to make massive concessions to keep their content on Steam and was fully ready to use the "we'll take our ball and go home" approach. Good on Valve for not burning those bridges.

#56 Posted by eccentrix (1179 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

I thought EA were saying "We'd love to have our games on Steam if Valve let us." Clearly I'm not following this thing closely enough.

#57 Posted by heatDrive88 (1846 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@crusader8463 said:

@Brodehouse said:
Well that's kind of informative, Gabe? I want the future to be every major publisher having it's own download service.
Why would you want something as stupid as that to happen?

CHOO CHOO OH DAMN, IT'S THE SARCASM TRAIN.

On a more serious note, what happened to the people who bought some of the EA games that were subsequently removed? Were all the purchases just refunded? Or did they allow all the people who bought it access but just blocked off any new purchases from the point of removal?

#58 Posted by crusader8463 (13080 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@heatDrive88 said:

@crusader8463 said:
@Brodehouse said:
Well that's kind of informative, Gabe? I want the future to be every major publisher having it's own download service.
Why would you want something as stupid as that to happen?
CHOO CHOO OH DAMN, IT'S THE SARCASM TRAIN.
On a more serious note, what happened to the people who bought some of the EA games that were subsequently removed? Were all the purchases just refunded? Or did they allow all the people who bought it access but just blocked off any new purchases from the point of removal?

If you read his reply he was sadly serious. As for your question, you still have the games, but if you hadn't already bought them before they were taken off then you can no longer get them. I bought DA 2 through Steam when it first came out and I still have it in my library.

#59 Posted by The_Nubster (1544 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@CosmicQueso said:

@The_Nubster said:
@CosmicQueso said:
@The_Nubster said:
Gabe is very nice
He is business and fanboys who confuse Steam's brand identity with their own personal identity.
He is very nice, have a video conference with some high school students . Probably cares about gaming and his customers.
No doubt, Gabe is Big League for sure. Other than his somewhat disturbing love of knives he seems very warm, sincere and legit.
But yes, business is business. There is room in the world for GameStop/Impulse, Origin, Blizzard, Steam, D2D, GG, GMG and many others. Steam has the highest share because they've done the best at creating value for us. And who knows, Origin may be the same (I enjoyed the free copy of Dead Space 2 after I preordered BF3) and their customer service is much, much better than Steam's.
I just don't get all the emotional responses and hatred for EA/Origin to what's a legit service offering. Whatever, I'm crazy.

Maybe you should let EA know about Gabe's collection of knives. There are just some people in this world you don't fuck with. . .

Steam right now is home to almost every major release on the PC, and the service, while not perfect, is pretty well rounded. With friend lists, the overlay, achievements, groups and all that jazz, Steam is an extremely convenient package. I've never used Origin, and I don't plan to because I don't like the way EA has been over the last few years. If they're going to win people over full-time, instead of just for Battlefield and Mass Effect, they really need to step their shit up and push Valve. Right now, as it stands, Steam is head-and-shoulders above Origin in terms of overall practicality and it's gonna be a tough sell for EA.

(Sorry for trimming the original few posts, it's getting sorta wordy.)

#60 Posted by NickL (2246 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@Leadcat said:

I wonder if the huge ad for MW3 on the Steam front page is Valve saying "This is what you're missing out on EA!"

Or maybe Activision paid them a bunch of advertising money...

Yeah, I'm gonna go with that.

#61 Posted by Brendan (6784 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@Brodehouse said:

Well that's kind of informative, Gabe? I want the future to be every major publisher having it's own download service.

That sounds terrible. Even if many of the physical games on my shelf are from different publishers, they still occupy the same organized and easily accessible place. Having 6 or 7 different accounts with my different games all separated into those accounts sounds incredibly annoying.

#62 Posted by MordeaniisChaos (5731 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Woah, wait. Are they pissed that DA2 and Crysis 2 under-performed on Steam and now they are blaming Steam for that?

I actually thought EA games were always very well, what was it, communicated? on steam. Lots of big banners. The only thing I didn't see was any real awesome sales for EA products.

#63 Edited by Swervinmonkeyz (24 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

I don't really hate origin as a program, it works I suppose. However, I don't like the precedent it sets. A different distribution system per publisher?  It seems like complete overkill.

And to me the whole situation boils down to this: EA just wants to cut out the middleman in its DLC sales while Steam wants DLC to run through them so they can get a cut AND keep the update/patch system running without some outside DLC to worry about. I don't really see why we can't have both. If an EA game is on steam use the steam DLC system. If i buy some shit retail then fine, I'll use origin since I didn't buy it on steam.

Oh...and Gabe's reponse was pretty classy :D

#64 Posted by eroticfishcake (7745 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Yes! Listen to the man, EA! It's better for EVERYONE if you use Steam!

#65 Posted by TPoppaPuff (206 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

"I don’t think Valve can pick just one thing and think the issue would go away if we fixed that." Actually, it IS that simple. If Valve quit trying to limit EA from selling DLC directly to consumers through the game (which does not cost Valve a penny because EA is hosting that DLC and bandwidth for the DLC) EA would have kept those games on Steam. Actually, it was not that it was their decision to pull them at all. No other digital retailer has pulled these games because no other digital retailer is that greedy.

At this point you can make an argument EA only wants games on Origin from now on. With that said, you can fight it all you want but Valve's ridiculous restrictions are at fault and these restrictions are motivated by greed.

#66 Posted by Evilsbane (3895 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Valve continues to show how awesome they are....NOW WHERE IS HALF LIFE 3 GABE??!!

#67 Posted by cyber_nicco (3 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@Sinful: You're kidding about the proof reading, right?

This message was deleted

#69 Posted by xaveri (151 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@TPoppaPuff: @TPoppaPuff said:

...With that said, you can fight it all you want but Valve's ridiculous restrictions are at fault and these restrictions are motivated by greed.

I'm afraid you're not looking at the big picture. Granted Valve has some monetary interests but their philosophy has been always to offer customers better service and to offer publishers a better platform.

In this case, it si said that EA wishes to sell DLC inside the game. This would cause your version of the game to change if this DLC is applied. Since it was not done through Steam, then Steam can't validate your game and the whole process of Steam protecting users and publishers from pirated content goes out the window. They have to be able to validate the version for a game like for example Modern Warfare 2, or it could potentially lead to cheating and piracy.

Things are not black and white. Valve may always keep their plans ultra private but they are a trustworthy company, which is more that can be said for EA, and I for one give them a vote of confidence.

#70 Posted by afrofools (1130 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

If they want to sell their games on Steam they can't degrade the customer's experience by making them go through another payment system. Simple as that. It won't be too long after Battlefield 3 is out that they will release all these games back onto Steam without any tie-ins to their own service.

#71 Posted by cyber_nicco (3 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

I like what he had to say about not having a right to publish their stuff and needing to "add value". He completely avoided the pointless willy-waving that EA has done regarding this.

#72 Edited by xbob42 (356 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@TPoppaPuff: Funny that you say Valve is the greedy one, yet EA is the only publisher in existence making these claims. It also turns out that EA is the only publisher trying to launch a platform to sort of compete against Steam, and they were real quick to throw Valve under the bus, weren't they? Commenting preemptively and all. It's almost as if they planned it so they could get a lot of word-of-mouth about Origin out via lots of news articles like this one.

The writing's on the wall, you're just choosing not to read it. Claiming that out of Valve and EA that Valve is the greedy one. I mean, fucking Christ almighty, Valve doesn't re-release TF2 every year and shut down the previous games' servers so you're forced to buy the next installment to play online. Madden, anyone?

#73 Posted by YukoAsho (1524 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@cyber_nicco said:

I like what he had to say about not having a right to publish their stuff and needing to "add value". He completely avoided the pointless willy-waving that EA has done regarding this.

I loved the high road approach as well. The implication seems to be that they don't have any obligation to publish EA's games either and that the user is more important.

#74 Posted by avidwriter (663 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Valve 1, EA -10000.

#75 Posted by mrhankey (695 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Im sure others have said it, but Valve to me always comes off as the much wiser old man we all hope to become someday, bequeathing knowledge to our grand-kids and what not. They don't throw people under the bus, they acknowledge their are issues between the two companies, but that they see it as a chance in which to demonstrate why their system can push more units of EA's games than any other system.

#76 Posted by Ronald (1186 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

I love how people get on Patrick for having one misspelling every once in a while, when I've read books in the double digit printings that have sold millions of copies and they still have mistakes in them.

#77 Posted by tehsorrow (20 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

If BF3 comes out on Steam after EA forced me into buying retail I will be livid.

#78 Posted by doomocrat (65 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

EA Origin represents a commitment to the PC in publishing rounded PC titles regularly, which they have really never done. Many sports franchises and EA games have gotten either terrible ports or when it comes to EA Sports, outright reskins.

It's a shame that the accounting & institutional research is going to have to clean this up when the cross platform sales numbers come out.

#79 Posted by Xpgamer7 (2259 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

I wish the issues could just be made more specific by EA because there's not much more to say about appreciating Steam other than the fact that it's STEAM, the biggest PC distributor and moneymaker there is.

#80 Posted by Protonguy (291 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Gabe really said nothing but he does say it in a nice way :).

#81 Posted by Sammo21 (2000 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Obviously this has to do with EA wanting to be dicks about Origin exclusivity.

#82 Posted by Grillbar (1625 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@eroticfishcake said:

Yes! Listen to the man, EA! It's better for EVERYONE if you use Steam!

all i have to say is i have never been to origins untill just now... what a clusterfuck. i will rather buy it on steam or as a retail box then this. in other words just cave in ea and save some time, pr and face

#83 Edited by SexualBubblegumX (476 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

They kinda just seem like they're going, "Pleeeease EA let us make money off you? Pleeeeeease let us be greedy, we're sorry!"

#84 Posted by TPoppaPuff (206 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@Swervinmonkeyz said:

EA just wants to cut out the middleman in its DLC sales while Steam wants DLC to run through them so they can get a cut AND keep the update/patch system running without some outside DLC to worry about.

The update/patch system isn't affected at all so there's no need to "worry." The game patches aren't made by Valve. It would be no different from the current situation of "some people bought DLC and some did not" that EVERY game with DLC currently faces and is always handled perfectly fine before Steam ever existed. That has nothing to do with it.

@rebgav:

Acttually, it's been pretty clearly outlined: Steam restricts games from selling DLC directly from the game. No Activision PC on Steam game lets you do that. So no, it's not that weird. It's actually very simple and exactly what you'd expect.

And your second half about PSN/XBL doesn't make sense so any sort of point your trying to make is lost. EA does sell DLC throughPSN/XBL.

#85 Posted by Riboflavin (1255 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@Sinful said:

yep i see....just more jibber jabber PR talk. by the way pat...still need to lrn to proofread your stuff....it's spelled "Bus" not "Buss" maybe if you cut your beatuful hair youll be able to see what you post. and send your locks to me for my "things to sniff" collection.

"lrn" "beatuful"

I hope you were being ironic =P

#86 Posted by drakesfortune (260 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

All I know is that I won't buy ANY EA games until they are on Steam. I don't want 50 places where I need to log in and buy/play games. Steam works great, they are the best service in the business, and not putting your game on Steam is like not having GameStop carry it in my book. It's insanity. EA is STUPID if they think people want to buy direct from them and have all of their games exist in 60 different places.

#87 Edited by BawlZINmotion (605 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

All I know is this has nothing to do with how DLC is sold.

I also really don't care what it's about. Valve and EA can tussle all the way, I like a lot of EA games and have no problem with Origin. The UI is clean, it runs smooth and it works more like Battle.net than anything else.

*shrug*

#88 Edited by dagas (2609 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Alternatives to Steam is a good thing, if Steam becomes too big and has a monopoly they can start charging whatever they want. I still buy most games in retail though since it is much cheaper than Steam or Origin at least here in Sweden (unless it's a sale). The Old Republic can be found for as little as €43 thanks to the power of price competition. if only one place sold the game it would never be lower than the MSRP. I've not buyed a game at MSRP price of €60 for years.

#89 Posted by SexualBubblegumX (476 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@dagas:
Exacly, Valve is a greedy company trying to run a monopoly. May I shake your hand for having common sense sir?

#90 Posted by Foxtrot0245 (319 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

As much as every business where I live would like to move away from Comcast as their ISP, the fact remains that if they want productive employees and optimized output, then the higher speeds and reliability afforded by the "asshole conglomerate" is necessary.

Shitty analogy, I know, but if EA wants to optimize their install base, they have to suck it up and go with what is proven. Everybody and their brother has said "Aw shucks, I could have invented that and I'd be rich!" at some point in their life. The thing EA doesn't realize is that most people/corporations shrug it off and move on, not create a "rival" product (Origin)... Especially one that many people giggle over when it is even mentioned.

If Battlefield 3 (or any PC game, for that matter) doesn't come out on Steam, without a doubt I will not purchase it. I was going to buy both, but if EA continues this money-grubbing mess (Project Ten Dollar, anyone?), it looks like I will have a lot more time to play MW3 in my future.

#91 Posted by Foxtrot0245 (319 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@dagas: I can still buy the games offered through Steam on a physical disc. I believe that may disqualify Steam as a monopoly. In fact, there are many games that we can only have outside of Steam... StarCraft II, for example.

#92 Edited by TPoppaPuff (206 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@xaveri:

"their philosophy has been always to offer customers better service and to offer publishers a better platform."

That same argument could be applied to Microsoft when they were taken to court for anti-trust laws over Internet Explorer way back when.

And again, it only changes whether they have the DLC or not. It doesn't change the "version" of the game. The version that accepts and plays DLC content is the very same regardless of whether you downloaded the content or not. It does not interfere with the updates and patches in the slightest. Nor does it at all interfere with the validation process of your copy of the game. You still have the Steam purchase and it is not being conflicted with by any of this additional content.

"Valve may always keep their plans ultra private but they are a trustworthy company, which is more that can be said for EA, and I for one give them a vote of confidence." That's what they said about Enron. Truth be told, if the names of each company were changed, the majority perception would be far different from the current popular opinion.

@xbob42:
What "claims" are you referring to? Their statements have been completely factual.

EA said: "It was not our decision to remove these games." The truth: Valve, not EA, pulled these games.
EA said: "No other online distributor has pulled these games." The truth: No other online distributor has pulled those games.
EA said: "Our games were pulled because of our DLC distribution methods." Valve said: "The DLC distribution methods are against the Steam ToS." The truth: The games were removed because of their distribution of DLC in the game itself.

So please tell me and explain how EA is lying. I'd love to hear it. The only thing that EA has said that is even debatable is whether they really want those games or future games back on Steam, which is most likely false.

Of course they "threw Valve under the bus." People were complaining to them asking why their games weren't on Steam. EA replied in about the nicest way possible by saying "it was not our decision, we hope to get this changed." It was VALVE'S DECISION to pull the games, not EA's. Explain to me why you think EA should be held responsible for Valve's actions. Nothing about it was preemptive at all. Their statements were completely accurate to the situation (likely because EA and Valve have been arguing this for weeks before any games were pulled and were very well aware of what needed to be changed to keep from getting delisted). Their statements only came once games were getting pulled. That's not preemptive.

It's almost as if they planned it so they could get a lot of word-of-mouth about Origin out via lots of news articles like this one.

And you know what? I believe that's a very strong possibility. I believe EA did likely plan this all along. It makes sense. It's working.

The writing's on the wall, you're just choosing not to read it. Claiming that out of Valve and EA that Valve is the greedy one. I mean, fucking Christ almighty, Valve doesn't re-release TF2 every year and shut down the previous games' servers so you're forced to buy the next installment to play online. Madden, anyone?

...THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE, MAN. Lol, now before you go all into full-on-hippy conspiracy-theorist, can I just say that they're both businesses run by adults trying to make money? Cause it's true. The only reason Valve has those Terms of Services is so that they can make more money. But you just wanna shoot the messenger for pointing out the egregious policies they enforce. Or maybe you just don't care how egregious those policies are because one is multimillion-dollar publisher/developer who publishes dozens of games a year, of which only a couple are AAA titles a year and some are for kids or movie tie-ins for casuals or sports titles, while the other is a multimillion-dollar publisher/developer who publish a AAA title once every couple years or so who used to be the "little guy" a long time ago and has been "the man" for longer than they've been the "little guy."

Also, if we're talking about greed I'd like to point out Madden wasn't released once with near perfect game balance, only to later add a ton of weapons (and hats...) to microtransaction the hell out of people's money and lose the game's great balance in the process. I dunno about you, but that sort of fall from grace seems a lot worse to me than yearly $60 titles trying to find perfect game balance with roster updates and new collision detection systems and game mechanics and slight graphical updates in the process. That's just me though; you can have a different opinion.

#93 Posted by smiddy (320 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Gabe - "EA needs to understand that we're the best, we're better than them, Steam is awesome and we can make a shit load more money if they keep selling their stuff on Steam. Origin sucks, so they should just give up on that and keep giving us money"

#94 Posted by dmann05 (2 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Valve's point about DLC is perfectly valid and made even clearer when you try to download the DLC for Crysis 2. Where is it? You can't buy it from mycrysis.com or even find a link to buy it from there. You can't buy it on Origin and you couldn't find it in the EA download store before Origin launched. When it came out there was literally ZERO information about where to actually purchase the map packs for Crysis 2. The DLC is apparently exclusive to Gamespy, which I found out later after I gave up trying and stopped playing the game entirely. Gamespy. What year is it?

I bought every piece of DLC for my Steam copy of Mass Effect 2, and I bought it directly from Bioware but even that process was a pain in the ass. Same goes for the DLC for Dragon Age. The process is too fucking cumbersome. Compare that to buying addons and extras on PSN or XBL...there is no comparison. Valve wants to make it as easy as those services because those are fairly analogous and EA doesn't seem to have a problem with MS and Sony imposing the same restrictions.

#95 Posted by TPoppaPuff (206 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

@Foxtrot0245 said:

If Battlefield 3 (or any PC game, for that matter) doesn't come out on Steam, without a doubt I will not purchase it. I was going to buy both, but if EA continues this money-grubbing mess (Project Ten Dollar, anyone?), it looks like I will have a lot more time to play MW3 in my future.

Project Ten Dollar? You mean the system virtually every publisher has adopted to protect themselves from the massive amounts of money they lose in the process to the used game business? The system that is rare NOT to see in some form on every game released? The problem is we the money-grubbing consumers have been repeatedly greedily trying to get more out of our money than what we paid for because everyone deep down is more concerned about themselves than others. Kill a potential sequel or new IP to save $5 by being used? You and Gamestop do it every used game sale. Before that? Kill a potential sequel or new IP by returning a game you finished by claiming it didn't work for some other new title (decades ago when you could actually do that sort of thing). How about cracks? That doesn't kill the next potential game? Whether you want to admit it or not, we as a whole pushed the developers to have to protect themselves and demand such high prices. Should a game like Enslaved or any other single-player game cost $60 for 20 hours of entertainment? No. Does Ninja Theory deserve at least some monetary compensation for offering you 20 hours of entertainment? Yeah, but your not giving them any just to save $5.

#96 Posted by TwoLines (2602 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Well that's a bummer. I like my games to be on Steam.

#97 Posted by Sooty (6709 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

EA are only hurting themselves and Dice's fantastic game by shunning Steam.

This message was deleted

#99 Posted by Slydotcom (58 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

EA = want more money. They want to grab some money for small DLC and patches... that's why they got origin and forces all the battlefield people in that stupid program... it sucks so bad it's not possible. Origin needs to meet it's maker....

#100 Posted by BabyChooChoo (3579 posts) - 1 year, 9 months ago

Origin is the reason I'm not getting TOR (well...one of the reasons), BF3, and probably ME3 (assuming it won't be on Steam). Do I want to play those games? Yes. Is this absolutely batshit crazy of me? Definitely. However, there are sooooo many other games coming out that I literally could not care less. The fact is I just like having my games on Steam. It's the reason I bought Eve twice and the reason I'm 2 seconds away from buying Guild Wars again at any given moment.

Like I've said before, I'm well aware that taking 2 seconds to log onto Origin or whatever won't kill me, but I just don't want anything to do with it.

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