Steam Beta Ends Tuesday

[Gwarsbane]

Got this off of http://www.planethalflife.com

Valve's Doug Lombardi just sent along the following press release about Steam:
Steam Beta Ends, Full Version Ships Next Week
The Steam Beta has delivered several Valve games and popular Half-Life MODs to over 300,000 gamers, and will come to a close Tuesday evening (Pacific Daylight Time). The first full version of Steam, Valve's broadband platform for the delivery and management of digital content, will launch at 11 am PDT on Wednesday. Set up installers for the full version, which will be free of charge to existing Half-Life and Counter-Strike players, will be available from http://www.steampowered.com and leading game sites. Anyone interested in hosting the installer or becoming a Steam Service Provider, please email [email protected].

Valve would like to extend its thanks to everyone who participated in this beta.

Basically what this means is that you'll need a working CD-Key to continue playing through Steam after Tuesday. For more information, see this forum thread

[Gwarsbane]

Basically what this means is that with in the next few weeks everyone should move over to the new steam garbage thing. As you can tell I don't like steam. I would prefer to get my updates the old fashon way and download a large file all at once.


It has been said that with in 2 weeks after the official program is released people will be forced to move to it anyway.

So the faster you get the official release the lower your number will be.. or at least I think it will be lower.

From what I understand this will also mean that switching IDs will not be that easy and if you have a stolen serial number you might not be able to play at all.

[Wha?]

Or the person you stole it from....

[soulsolution]

um..nobody is forced to use steam..if you are refering to the ppl that already use steam then yes..they are forced to have a cd-key in order to play...steam is for broadband users only..so 56kers cant use it..but you can still dl your file updates like normal

[_Acid_Head_]

People WILL be forced to use steam in the near future, HL2 comes out the end of this month, it's basically to keep out hackers and cheats, I don't see any major disadvantages when using steam, so I don't really have a problem with it.

edit: I don't think you will HAVE to download updates from Steam, but they will have to start games via-steam.

If I'm way off, someone tell me:P

[soulsolution]

you will not have to use steam period..for anything..steam was suppose to be the "future" of hl..but its not..hl2 is gonna be just like hl "way it starts etc"..and no nobody is gonna be forced to use steam in the future..aslo there are cheats\hacks for steam out right now...and there are lots of disadvantages of using steam..its buggy as hell..you have to have broadband to run it..10 dollars amonth for subscription "which isnt so bad" the servers lag really horrible..

[Power and Glory]

Steam is going to replace the WonID system so Acid is right with what he said. Won will be no more. Those that have bought DOD retail have the new id system.

[Gwarsbane]

I have been reading this forum thread " Steam Status "

I'm upto page 15 of it and so far here is what is pissing me off about steam....

1) Everyone will have to switch over to steam to play regular half-life and its mods

2) when switching to steam you get a new id, this means all the cheaters and hackers and stuff also get new ids so all those once banned are not free to do what ever they want again

3) You will need to have steam running to play the games and need to start the games up through steam

4) If you don't want to switch over to steam you will be shit out of luck to play any valve games

5) You can't just leave steam off and download a patch off some server. You will need to leave it on to get auto updates (which could have viruses in them) I like to scan every file that comes onto my system before I use it.

6) If I need to reformat my drive, I will have to redownload the patch via steam. As it is now, I keep patchs on my drive and if I need to reformat I drop the patch on CD or another drive. With steam I won't be able to do that

7) It also sounds like they will be using my net connection to send stuff to other people. I have limited amount of bandwidth, I don't have enough to send to other people all the time while I'm playing games.

8) I don't care about no stupid buddy list. Give it a little time and I will get that same list in Trillian.

9) If a random key generator is made and someone gets my key that is on the box I buy before I buy it, then how the heck do I play the game even thou I have the actual legal version

10) There are already known hacks for Steam. What if someone hacks it and uses it to spread viruses or other files that install automatically.



These are what I understand from reading the first 15 pages of the thread. I might have missed something, but so far this is my understanding. They might change once I read more, but so far at page 15 I'm wondering about all the stuff above and more.

So don't take any of the above as rock solid, it could change.

[_Acid_Head_]

Wow, I had no clue it was like that at all... I now dislike Steam as much as Gwars:(

edit: How can it be released out of beta if there's KNOWN hacks ALREADY out? That's just plain bullshit. First thing I hear of a virus outbreak through steam and I'm saying good bye to Valve mods.

[jabbahunt]

I can't do all that, and can't let anything decide what will be on my puter, damn and I will miss you guys.

[Guest]

To be honest, I haven't researched Steam... but something tells me they won't just turn off the existing system at the minute... there are too many people using it... I might be wrong on that score. As for scanning for viruses... even if it's streamed down, a virus portion should still be detectable by your virus software, or it's just no good.

[soulsolution]

you will not be forced to use steam people....steam is for BROADBAND users only...you can either buy a subscription for 10 dollars a month...and dl hl2 with all its mods..or go to the store and buy it..you will not have to use steam in order to play


http://halflife2.homelan.com/forums/showth...15&pagenumber=1

[Gwarsbane]

I'm not getting my information threw 3rd parties, i'm getting it directly from the horses mouth.

http://www.steampowered.com

This is steams homepage. They are saying that EVERYONE will be forced to moved to steam with the next couple of patches. If they don't they will not be able to play.

Is Steam really free?

Yes, Steam is really free.

Steam also provides access to several free products and services, like the dedicated game server, instant messaging, the game server browser, etc.

And if you've already bought Half-Life or one of the other Half-Life family of games, several add-ons are available via Steam for no extra cost.

After installing Steam, check your "Games" list to see what's available.

Here are a few more things that bother me, these are all copied out of the FAQ from http://www.steampowered.com

Do I have to be connected to the Internet when I play Steam games?

The short answer is yes.

All Steam-enabled games require you to be connected to the Internet in order to play.

Note: some Steam-enabled single-player games (such as Half-Life 2) purchased at a retail store will allow offline play until the user decides to play online or enable other Steam functionality. From that point on, an Internet connection will be required.

So I play online once, don't like it and goback to playing single player but I still have to be connected to the net to play?!?!?!?

What are the system requirements for Steam?

Windows 98, ME, 2000 or XP
500 MB HD space
256 MB RAM
1.0 Ghz processor
1GB HD space (strongly recommended)
Broadband Internet connection (128kb/s or higher strongly recommended)

It is also recommended that Steam be installed on a hard disk formatted using NTFS. Fat32 drives will work, but performance will be slower.

Ok from my understanding its only a p2p program that is only suppose to download data now and then... why does it require a 1 ghz processor and 500 megs of space?!?!?!



I'm going to send them an e-mail with lots of questions and hope that I get it back this decade (which I doubt).

[_Acid_Head_]

Woah, what's up with those requirements, I hope thats for Steam + Online HL2 put together, and not just the actual Steam program.

[soulsolution]

i guess they are gettin rid of WON and switching over to Steam servers..which valve owns...hopefully its set up the same way as WON..because if you have to dl all the patchs through steam..you can say goodbye to 56ker's :\..btw if you buy hl2 in stores you get a free subscription for steam..if you wanna dl hl2 through steam its 10bucks a month


EDIT: the reason why it requires 500megs is because it dls 500 megs of hl files to your pc.

[Power and Glory]

This is from PlanetHalfLife:

Here's some quotes from Valve's Erik Johnson yanked from this Steam forum thread:Steam forum thread

There will no longer be a WonID system, it will be replaced by the SteamID system.
When we convert the userbase to Steam, a single WonID will be valid for all of the products.

If you're purchased a product from us at retail, you're going to have access to all of our products via Steam.

No, you do not have to pay for Steam.

So sometime in the near future, Valve will be releasing an update to Half-Life that will require you to convert your old WonID CD-Key into a SteamID. We asked Mr. Johnson if this meant Steam would be required to play Half-Life online:
That is correct, you'll have to have Steam installed to play the most current version of Half-Life.

[FreeFall]

So, If i never get HL2 I won't have to get steam? 'Cause I'd be ok with that

[Power and Glory]

Wrong FreeFall. What people are getting confused by is that they think this only pretains to HL2 it doesn't. It means all products. When the next HL update comes out you will have to update/change over otherwise you will get that "your dll does not match the servers" message cause you will have an outdated version. When the patch comes out Holdouts like all other places will update and if you don't you will not be able to connect.

[[CAKE]anonymity]

It sounds better then it did at the beggining of the thread, no update to HL can be 500 megs, thats about how much room hl takes on your hard drive.

[Quickening]

Ok I finally read all this..and I'm not likin steam at all..its makes no sense to have to d/l the files THROUGH steam and then say you do reformat then you have to do it all again instead of havin the files on a zip disk or cd..That is what I always do and that is the part that pisses me off..and shit if hl2 is truly comin out 9/30 I got to go and order myself that new comp now..I thought I had some more time..but ahh too much stuff happenin..

[Gwarsbane]

Few new things I have seen people post about Steam...



It has spyware and ads in it. Not sure if this is true, but I will be pissed if it is.



Some people are saying that valve collects and sells the data from steam including personal data and that it says so right in the agreement that you need to accept to install steam. Some people are saying that they will only sell market data and not sell personal data like name and e-mail.



Some are saying that it it captures links to websites that you goto.

[Guest]

Erm. Did no one else spot that it said 500MB space, and then 1 GB ???? That's actually 1.5 GB requirements...

[Wha?]

That's just the (strongly) recommended amount. Basically, you can get away with 500 MB if you plea bargain.

[Quickening]

Well bout the spyware and the ads..just get a norton firewall and it blocks hackers of course but also has a built-in ad..spam blocker stuff like that..so you won't even notice it..IF that is true..yeh I will be pissed if its true but I got my protection from all that shit

Still 500mb is a lot for such a stupid thing lol..but I got like 40GB of space left so I am fine..

And do we have an exact date when its bein released..so I can plan to get inline at fileplanet ;)

[Guest]

I think I'll wait:)

[Gwarsbane]

I have used many different firewall programs. Zone alarm, black ice and norton just to name a few. Everyone of them screwed up my systems so bad that I could not send or recieve anything. I couldn't play games, I couldn't host games. I basically couldn't do anything but surf on the net.

I have lots of friends that run firewalls and none of them could help. It just stumped them all. Even after I stopped the firewalls and uninstalled them they still effected me some how. I don't know.

To fix the problem with them I always had to reformat. I'm not going through all that again.

If I could afford a hardware firewall I would at least give that a try.



I have 120 gigs of hard drive space total. I have about 5 to 10 gigs free total. I have lots of big files that I just can't dump onto a CD to make more room.

500 megs to 1 gig of space is a very big deal for me. It won't be for long I hope as a friend just invested in a DVD burner, I should be able to clean off some space once we test the burner out a few times.

I'm going to end up waiting for Half-life 2 for a bit, but I'm considering jumping on the bandwagon to get steam as fast as I can. I have tried to get onto servers before and it said that my wonid was already in use so I know that people have my current sn out there. Since its so low I'm guessing that it was found with a key generator.

I plan on hitting planet half-life as early as I can and update it every few minutes

[Guest]

Firewalls are easy to configure... most of the time, if you can't seem to send/receive it'll be because there are two firewall components running together. For example, XP's built in Internet Connection Firewall and then Zonealarm Pro... if one or the other chooses to block, then it makes no difference... it's blocked...

[Gwarsbane]

I used them on windows 95, 98 and 2000. They all did the same thing to me. XPs firewall is off, thats how I got my system.

[Gwarsbane]

So much for lan parties....

no more lan parties without internet connection


How can I have a LAN party or similar event using Steam?

Any Steam game, when played on a LAN or otherwise, requires that each individual client be able to authenticate via the Internet.

At a LAN party, this means that Internet access must be available to every machine on which Steam games are being played.

If desireable, the network administrator of such an event can limit internet access to only the TCP/IP ports which Steam needs. These are:
UDP 1200
UDP 27000 to 27015 inclusive
TCP 27030 to 27039 inclusive

At large events, it will be necessary for each attendee to let their games fully update before attending to avoid taxing the shared internet connection with too much content delivery.

[Guest]

Personally, I'd say if things are going that way they will end up in trouble with people not wanting to bother with it... Unfortunately, you are gonna get the newbs who are coming through and just accept it for the way it is....