ArmA 3 on Steamworks?

[celery 8]

Those terms of service agreements existed for OFP as well and long before. It's not something the digital market created, just check your old games booklets if you have any...

Please tell me exactly how the transferring of licenses is prohibited, and provide examples of people who have been convicted because their country deemed reselling of games illegal.

Pirates don't show any will to spend money on their media. Therefore you really cannot piracy mesure the impact it has on the market. However used games which mostly goes through retailers wether you like it or not really hurts the market... It's a fact not an opinion.

You keep saying that buying used games is more hurtful than outright piracy but you're not rationalizing your claim at all. How is it more hurtful? I already explained why it isn't the case, so you can start by deconstructing my argument and showing at what point the studios lose more money than from piracy.

Also consider that pirates may be willing to buy a game if a) the total cost is right for them, b) they think the game is good or otherwise worthy of support, or c) a bought copy isn't more tedious to install and operate than a pirated one.

The PC gaming industry was literally suffocating before the emergence of digital retailers.

Yes, but for reasons other than you think. The elimination of logistics and marketing costs signaled the beginning of an era where small projects with negligible budgets became profitable again, and cutting the physical middle man generally brought more dollars to the studios and publishers. The reselling of games had nothing to do with that.

Operation Flashpoint was a massive success for Bohemia Interactive and it allowed them to become independent and buy real estate and other studios and start a publishing operation of their own. Anyone was free to resell or give away their copy of Operation Flashpoint.

As for your last point, cool story bro... I'm not into that hippie bullshit though, some lucidity on your side would be nice.

Businesses dependent solely on the trampling of consumer rights having the moral right to exist and make money is your idea of a good and healthy opinion, nice to know.

It's especially nice since I didn't imply any existing company to actually be that way, only that it's a damn ridiculous concept. So who's not being lucid here again?

What do you mean by a whole account? Like it's a big thing, you can just create an account for that game... I know people who do it that way. And at least if you sell it, your "client" will know for sure you won't be keeping a copy of the serial key for your own use.

How does someone's certainty of you not pirating the game you sold them factor into the easiness at which you can transfer a license? Knowing or deciding which games you want to get rid of afterwards is very tedious indeed, and there aren't that many people who are even willing to juggle with multiple Steam accounts just so they can buy used games.

Edited February 23, 2013 by Celery

[dunedain 48]

Please tell me exactly how the transferring of licenses is prohibited, and provide examples of people who have been convicted because their country deemed reselling of games illegal.

I hardly see how they could convict people individually for violating a ToS... Doesn't change the fact that when you installed OFP for the first time 12 years ago, you agreed to their ToS, which only granted you a license for your own and personnal use.

You keep saying that buying used games is more hurtful than outright piracy but you're not rationalizing your claim at all. How is it more hurtful? I already explained why it isn't the case, so you can start by deconstructing my argument and showing at what point the studios lose more money than from piracy.

I already explained that. The used games market, as it is for consoles, usually works through retailers which mostly involve people exchanging their games for coupons to buy other used games. it is more hurtful because retailers themselves encourage it. An endless loop of people exchanging used games and retailers taking their cut while they keep less full price games in stock. Publishers show sheets with ludicrous figures regarding piracy but fail to see most of these people wouldn't care spending a dime on their game to begin with.

Also consider that pirates may be willing to buy a game if a) the total cost is right for them, b) they think the game is good or otherwise worthy of support, or c) a bought copy isn't more tedious to install and operate than a pirated one.

Well that's pretty obvious and has been discussed in every possible way everywhere. This is also why Steam has been so successful in the digital market.

Yes, but for reasons other than you think. The elimination of logistics and marketing costs signaled the beginning of an era where small projects with negligible budgets became profitable again, and cutting the physical middle man generally brought more dollars to the studios and publishers. The reselling of games had nothing to do with that.

I never thought any different as for the digital market giving a new breath to the PC gaming market. You're the one saying that "Yet somehow the game industry had survived and become mainstream before draconian ownership restrictions were implemented". And yet it was dying long before, and would again if people could just buy a game on Steam or anywhere else and sell it the day after, a month, a year without the product having lost any of its value being digital. This would be catastrophic for every single market players, including BiS...

Operation Flashpoint was a massive success for Bohemia Interactive and it allowed them to become independent and buy real estate and other studios and start a publishing operation of their own. Anyone was free to resell or give away their copy of Operation Flashpoint.

And yet the problem was still there back then as you needed a CD key to play and Gamespy would kick players using the same serial. So much for being free to resell your copy of Operation Flashpoint. It only worked if you knew and trusted the person you traded the game with.

Businesses dependent solely on the trampling of consumer rights having the moral right to exist and make money is your idea of a good and healthy opinion, nice to know.

The very notion that you should legally be able to resell any unalterable digital product just like you would a bike, a car or a computer screen is nonsense. Consumer rights are how we write them. This is not a question of moral or principles but common sense...

Edited February 23, 2013 by dunedain

[NoRailgunner 0]

BIS won't make a turnaround and create an A3 free of Steam / "important social online services". It's too late BIS signed the contracts and Steam is the new overlord. Hail to the $$$!

[chortles 263]

So why not do it like the real life resell? Remove the game from one's account and add it to the other. After all Steam hides the "owner's" key (which I find to be really annoying) if it's a steamworks game anyway and you can't play the game if it's not in your account (which is like - duh). No need for new keys.

I'm interested in this personally, and I know that Green Man Gaming implements trade-in... albeit only back to GMG, and Dwarden already gave an answer re: user to user.

Hey I wouldn't have a problem with Steam if multiplayer wasn't entirely connected to Steamworks.

For example Blood Bowl Chaos Edition has steamworks but it also allows you to play non-steamworks LAN/direct IP game. So when online servers are down (which does happen and one time it took several days when servers were on some major maintenance) I can always keep playing in MP although with no stats and team ladder advancement.

With BBCE I'm not treated like a pirate by the developer.

I'd then say "demand non-Steamworks LAN/direct IP play support", since as I told our friend in Russia, Steam itself is not the impediment to offline LAN play, it's lack of dev implementation thereof.

[kualus 1]

Ah well, typical behavior from Steam fanboys. Painting enemies of the state as Luddites, "elitists", "12yr old on COD with a microphone", and the list goes on. That in itself speaks for why so many here don't want ArmA 3 to be exclusive to Steam.

[-Coulum- 35]

LOL even the release of the community Alpha wouldn't quell this Steam shitstorm, the community backlash is beyond control now.

You're probably right. Think the best thing BI can do is release a very detailed report on how exactly steam will effect Arma 3. Probably won't help to bring back many who have already made their decision, but I think it would do well to help those who are unfamiliar with steam, and are on the fence about whether they can handle it or not.

I doubt that honestly because here's some speculation. DayZ standalone was mostly finished before the development even began. After all almost all of its assets were already there. And if BIS indeed sold additional 1.5 mln units because of DayZ - that's quite a big sum of money, especially for Czechs. If 1.5 mln sales did happen and let's say BIS got ~10 bucks per each one - that's $15 mil. Besides if BIS was in trouble would they be able to develop 3 games at the same time without cancelling any? (at the time of ArmA3 announcement it was ArmA3 itself, Take On and CC - all are no small projects by any means)

Yeah I believe the same thing. It is very unlikely that Arma 3 isn't seeing any of the dayZ profits. But at the same time dayZ has probably taken a good chunk out of arma as well.

Or maybe they just moved a lot of funds and Devtime intended for the development of A3 over to DayZ.

I think that is very likely.

Just look at what Ivan Buchta is doing now, working on DayZ.

Could very well be. I think definitely more than the devs are willing to admit. I was disappointed to hear Ivan wouldn't be back working on A3. But who knows, Maybe after being gone so long, the Arma 3 project found a "replacement" for him thus he was no longer needed in that project. Even I have trouble truly believing that, but it is a possibility...

[ProfTournesol 956]

Could very well be. I think definitely more than the devs are willing to admit. I was disappointed to hear Ivan wouldn't be back working on A3. But who knows, Maybe after being gone so long, the Arma 3 project found a "replacement" for him thus he was no longer needed in that project. Even I have trouble truly believing that, but it is a possibility...

I must say that i was concerned by this too, and by the recent dev blog hint ("not happy with how the project was going").

[metalcraze 290]

I'd then say "demand non-Steamworks LAN/direct IP play support", since as I told our friend in Russia, Steam itself is not the impediment to offline LAN play, it's lack of dev implementation thereof.

Dwarden said there will be some kind of developer Q&A soon about Steam in detail and so I'm interested. If BIS really cares about players as they say and not just go the pointless paranoid-DRM route - they will give us options. Focus/Cyanide did that and so I didn't care when BBCE went steam-exclusive.

[Maio 293]

Could very well be. I think definitely more than the devs are willing to admit. I was disappointed to hear Ivan wouldn't be back working on A3. But who knows, Maybe after being gone so long, the Arma 3 project found a "replacement" for him thus he was no longer needed in that project. Even I have trouble truly believing that, but it is a possibility...

I must say that i was concerned by this too, and by the recent dev blog hint ("not happy with how the project was going").

Remember that before the incident, there were 2 creative directors:

Ivan from team Bravo (Brno studio)

Jay from team Mike (Mníšek studio)

As I see it, Jay is now the only creative lead, while Ivan is consulting for Dayz

/OT

[-Coulum- 35]

I must say that i was concerned by this too, and by the recent dev blog hint ("not happy with how the project was going").

Add in the fact that they are looking to hire for several positions and I think it is more than reasonable to be concerned. I guess all we can do is wait for them to "unveil our plans", hopefully in the next devblog, and wait.

Dwarden said there will be some kind of developer Q&A soon about Steam in detail and so I'm interested. If BIS really cares about players as they say and not just go the pointless paranoid-DRM route - they will give us options. Focus/Cyanide did that and so I didn't care when BBCE went steam-exclusive.

what do you mean by "options"? How did Focus/Cyanide do this?

[Hicks_09 10]

How many people here would accept the idea of a sreamworks free release down the line, once the patching is taken cared of? That way it is a complete distributable that doesn't need subsequent patching. Fair enough it would require some patience but I would hope that we can have enough patience to wait for something that would be a more complete product without restrictions. Something that we have bought and enjoyed previously with earlier entries in the Op Flash/Arma series.

There's always going to be this push and pull over drm. The customers that are buying these products have for some reason a tendency to put up with restrictions as long as they get to play. Until they say No - this will continue. Just look at the main three. Valve launched steam, they still haven't sorted offline mode after nine years - shows you how much of a priority that is... They've essentially been the primary vector for online drm. EA jumped on the bandwagon with Origin which when it was EA Downloader was a nuisance but at least not bloated unnecessarily as it is now. Ubisoft is the most interesting case. They pushed peoples tolerance the hardest and got the most vociferous reaction which has caused them to back-pedal. Now it'll likely just be a case of them mollifying customers before they try to push the boundaries again. Ubisoft do it by scaling back drm and acting apologetic - bringing back beloved series', Valve do it with sales and relying on curried favour and EA... well they just blindly stumble into one pr screw up after another. Gog have gone for the drm free approach but even their pr stunt when coming out of beta status earnt them a slapped wrist.

If these clients acted purely as stores to buy from then the issues that are raised from the drm side wouldn't keep on raising their ugly heads. It's all the more puzzling when BIS have removed the drm subsequently. Now they've clambered on the drm choo choo and gone "full steam ahead"...

If you make a good product, support it and treat the customers fairly then they will buy it, encourage others to purchase also and likely continue to support the company.

The people that will pirate because that's what they do... they're going to do that regardless. Drm clients are only going to hurt legitimate customers, some might be totally unaffected, some might have a torrid time - GFWL anyone? Why add those issues when they can be avoided?

[celery 8]

I already explained that, used games as it usually works through retailers mostly involve people exchanging their games for coupons to buy other used games. it his more hurtful because retailers themselves encourage it. An endless loop of people exchanging used games and retailers taking their cut while they keep less full price games in stock. Publishers show sheets with ludicrous figures regarding piracy but fail to see most of these people wouldn't care spending a dime on their game to begin with.

And without the option to buy or sell used games the customers have less purchasing power, i.e. they will buy fewer games and not as often at full price.

I never thought any different as for the digital market giving a new breath to the PC gaming market. You're the one saying that "Yet somehow the game industry had survived and become mainstream before draconian ownership restrictions were implemented". And yet it was dying long before, and would again if people could just buy a game on Steam or anywhere else and sell it the day after, a month, a year without the product having lost any of its value being digital.

No, it wasn't "dying": it was catching up to the music and movie industry every year even before digital distribution. And no, the slow growth (compared to after the digital boom) wasn't because of used game sales. The digital rejuvenation would have happened regardless of the ability to buy and sell secondhand digital copies.

Regarding your apocalyptic scenario of reselling Steam games, riddle me this:

There are places on the Internet where people are giving away their product keys for games that they've bought in a bundle or as a duplicate by accident. I've started one such thread on another forum and in that thread even free games sometimes go unclaimed because it's too much trouble to post your email address to get a game that would otherwise cost like a few euros. How many people do you think would be bothered to look for secondhand alternatives that cost money if the game they want is already being sold at a good price by a distributor?

And yet the problem was still there back then as you needed a CD key to play and Gamespy would kick players using the same serial.

How does that have anything to do with used game sales making games like Operation Flashpoint unprofitable? OFP was a success story in the times when no license transferring restrictions could be enforced, and even then it only sold moderately compared to the actual hit games.

[kualus 1]

How many people here would accept the idea of a sreamworks free release down the line, once the patching is taken cared of? That way it is a complete distributable that doesn't need subsequent patching. Fair enough it would require some patience but I would hope that we can have enough patience to wait for something that would be a more complete product without restrictions. Something that we have bought and enjoyed previously with earlier entries in the Op Flash/Arma series.

I'll repeat it again for your convenience: if a Steam-free version of ArmA 3 is released, I will definitely be interested.

[metalcraze 290]

I already explained that, used games as it usually works through retailers mostly involve people exchanging their games for coupons to buy other used games. it his more hurtful because retailers themselves encourage it. An endless loop of people exchanging used games and retailers taking their cut while they keep less full price games in stock. Publishers show sheets with ludicrous figures regarding piracy but fail to see most of these people wouldn't care spending a dime on their game to begin with.

What you "explain" here is you repeating the actual brainwashing by publishers. Because you repeat all the marketing BS they spew to excuse putting stupid forms of DRM into the game.

It's the same as saying that used car market is evil because it killed GMC.

You sold your stuff, somebody else bought it. You don't have it anymore, somebody else has it. To the publisher it's invisible because you paid for it to begin with. You didn't make a copy and made profits with it. Used games always sold at a loss compared to the original price - which is already paid for.

So please stop repeating marketing brainwashing.

[gammadust 12]

I'll repeat it again for your convenience: if a Steam-free version of ArmA 3 is released, I will definitely be interested.

Hopefully BI-Steam lock in is not contractual and "merely" a technical imposition, in which case it will still be in BI's power to provide Steam's functionality given the necessary time and resources.

[chortles 263]

maionaze, the Greek incident already necessitated Jay being sole publically-acknowledged creative director... it may just be better for Ivan personally to only be doing one project at once right now, especially considering all the catching up and reconciling of ideas that might be needed if Ivan disagreed with Jay's moves over the past five months, plus both the daughter and the bail... nothing nefarious in that as a reason for Ivan only doing DayZ now.

This is what gets me. Steamworks is not a magic wand that will make maps, code ai or create art assets to hit a release window. It won't do QA either.

The implication behind "2013 or bust" is that they wouldn't even have time for all of the above (except maybe art assets and maps -- I imagine that that was basically taken care of long ago) were it not for Steamworks, and did you really expect DnA to say "Maruk said that either we ship in 2013 or we're getting cancelled and it's going to take 2013 just learning what our AI does, much less getting it to not trip over its own shoelaces"?

If this is an issue of Multiplayer matchmaking requiring a client - with the issues surrounding gamespy coming to an end then I can understand them wanting a Multiplayer service. If it's about piracy then they're going to maybe stem release date piracy.

I'm actually skeptical about Gamespy's downfall being a factor, unless BI got wind of that news months ago... though frankly, the news about Valve apparently lending pre-made server browser/connectivity support and anti-cheat to DayZ Standalone couldn't have hurt in BI's eyes, I'm sure that the Arma 3 devs noticed, especially after Maruk's "do all that we can to get Arms 3 out in 2013".

If it is concerns related to financial pressures on releasing Arma 3 as soon as possible then yes distributing via Steam will get them a wide audience.

The devblog does imply as much...

As far as you citing other digital distribution outlets though, Steamworks does mean that do have your choice of where to buy from while still getting it for Steam... but Valve has leveraged that a lot better than BI PR-wise :-P admittedly thanks to the "people who like having a unified digital distribution library" part, even though previously people could add Steam Library shortcuts to run non-Steam games with Steam Overlay.

---------- Post added at 10:57 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:56 AM ----------

I must say that i was concerned by this too, and by the recent dev blog hint ("not happy with how the project was going").

This is what's telling -- in conceding how controversial the move would be, the devblog implies that Maruk decided "better to go all in on Steam and take the forums backlash than let that continue".

[metalcraze 290]

what do you mean by "options"? How did Focus/Cyanide do this?

When they went Steamworks they could've disabled the multiplayer entirely like BIS is planning to do (according to the article) - but they only disable the "online" multiplayer. As in - when you try logging into their server (which tracks stats, allows your teams to gain exp and develop players etc) in offline mode it says "Steam must go online bla bla" and kicks you out.

However there is still LAN and direct IP multiplayer available. You won't have all the aforementioned features from the full online play (e.g. your team will remain static without any exp gain) - but it's a very nice back up. And it can be useful - once their servers went down for 5 days straight due to some large moving. Could've been very annoying yet multiplayer was still an option. But they could've simply disabled even accessing MP menu using steamworks DRM to begin with or not give those options at all.

[dunedain 48]

you repeating the actual brainwashing by publishers. Because you repeat all the marketing BS they spew to excuse putting stupid forms of DRM into the game.

It's the same as saying that used car market is evil because it killed GMC.

You sold your stuff, somebody else bought it. You don't have it anymore, somebody else has it. To the publisher it's invisible because you paid for it to begin with. You didn't make a copy and made profits with it. Used games always sold at a loss compared to the original price - which is already paid for.

So please stop repeating marketing brainwashing.

Except in the case of cars, or any physical product for that matter, you pay less for a lesser product, it's also true for console retail games with no activation. However a digital product is unalterable, doesn't matter if you buy it directly from the store or from some other guy. Try hard to think and guess what impact an online market of ArmaIII "used" copies would have on BIS sales figures?

Edited February 23, 2013 by dunedain

[ProfTournesol 956]

Except your used car will always be of less value than a new one because it gets old, it is also true for console retail games. However a digital product is unalterable.

Well, that's not true. Try Windows 3.1 again.

Ok, i just saw your edited post.

[gammadust 12]

Except in the case of cars, or any physical product for that matter, you pay less for a lesser product, it's also true for console retail games with no activation. However a digital product is unalterable, doesn't matter if you buy it directly from the store, or from some other guy.

If you try and resell a car with a meager 10Km years after it was originaly bought (for all effects just as new), you will have a cut in value. This is a kind of value loss which also affect digital products.

[zoog 18]

You're probably right. Think the best thing BI can do is release a very detailed report on how exactly steam will effect Arma 3. Probably won't help to bring back many who have already made their decision, but I think it would do well to help those who are unfamiliar with steam, and are on the fence about whether they can handle it or not.

wait till they see everybody play arma 3 including most of their arma 2 buddies, they see cool gameplay videos on youtube, etc. I bet 90% will still cave in, the other 10% probably have such an principal aversion to Steam they won't succumb, no matter what.

[kualus 1]

wait till they see everybody play arma 3 including most of their arma 2 buddies, they see cool gameplay videos on youtube, etc. I bet 90% will still cave in, the other 10% probably have such an principal aversion to Steam they won't succumb, no matter what.

Not happening, we've seen enough of ArmA 3 through previews that "cool gameplay videos on youtube" won't work, as we've already seen them.

[Hicks_09 10]

This is what's telling -- in conceding how controversial the move would be, the devblog implies that Maruk decided "better to go all in on Steam and take the forums backlash than let that continue".

If they are having difficulty securing distributors then there's nothing to stop them from releasing via steam, there's still no reason to shackle it to steam works drm. Also, unless Valve are now making BIS's game for them then how exactly is tying it to steamworks going to get the game made any faster? Unless this is all geared around multiplayer net code and implementation - in which case there is then a framework that can be applied. That I can understand. The assets and testing that will go into that portion of the game will still need to be made, tested, adjusted and tested etc. Tying a game to steamworks, uplay or origin isn't going to get those assets made any faster. This then draws it back to the ability to have singleplayer and multiplayer separate as was done with Dark Messiah - and they even used Valve's engine to make the title.

Unless this is all a big hoo-haah over those pesky achievements... :rolleyes:

Something just doesn't smell right about this at all.

[zoog 18]

Not happening, we've seen enough of ArmA 3 through previews that "cool gameplay videos on youtube" won't work, as we've already seen them.

If most of your favorite arma friends and/or communities are all playing arma 3 it's hard to keep refusing steam though.

[metalcraze 290]

Except in the case of cars, or any physical product for that matter, you pay less for a lesser product, it's also true for console retail games with no activation. However a digital product is unalterable, doesn't matter if you buy it directly from the store or from some other guy. Try hard to think and guess what impact an online market of ArmaIII "used" copies would have on BIS sales figures?

None? You buy the game at $50 price point. Then year later you re-sell it. It doesn't matter at which price. You lose it. Somebody else gets it. BIS still got its 50 bucks. To them you may as well still be using that copy. It's not a lost sale because there's only 1 copy, it just switched hands with one party always losing the game.

As for "but real life stuff loses its value" - so do even digital games. A year ago TOH was 50 bucks. Now it's 33% cheaper anywhere. Games lose value no matter what happens. You won't be able to resell a used copy of a digital game at $50 either.

Edited February 23, 2013 by metalcraze