ArmA 3 on Steamworks?

[Trauma.au 10]

Steam. It's reundant. Period.

I don't think that word means what you think it means. You also misspelled it.

[sander 14]

By making Steam mandatory for this game BIS forces players to cede their control over their machine to what in effect is a botnet, albeit one that advertises its presence more openly than the average one. Making the game exclusive to Steam violates a key principle of sound computing, that of running with the least set of software services and privileges. It is not just an extra cost incurred in a claim on computer resources by having to run Steam in order to play the game online, it has also other implications. Removing the option of choice for the customer introduces the user to an unwarranted additional set of vulnerabilities as another party's software must be run even if this software adds no features for which an identified user need exists.

http://revuln.com/files/ReVuln_Steam_Browser_Protocol_Insecurity.pdf

The decision to go Steam exclusive provides benefits to the developers, but devolves the unwanted effects onto the customer. Luckily that customer has his own freedom of choice how to spend his or her money.

Regards,

Sander

[chortles 263]

A bunch of people alrady explained that there are some games which allow lan multiplayer in offline mode. But what gets me worried is this:

"It will be possible to run Steam in Offline mode, and still play the game (with the exception of online services obviously, including multiplayer itself)."

For what it's worth, those people seem like they're saying that Steam itself allows offline mode LAN multiplayer, or at least that Steam itself (the service and client) does not disallow LAN multiplayer, which is good, so now the question is whether Arma 3 itself will... this is what I'm hoping a dev will come in here to answer!

First it downloaded somewhat 120MB of what I assume was steam update. And then it just stopped at "verification" or "authentification" or whatever. Then I got disconnection. Then I started it again and it stopped at the same point. And again and again for 4 hours of this shit. So... GRRRRR :mad:

That really sucks though :( what game was this?

[Hellhound 10]

I wonder how all the people who are so in favor of steam and telling the nay sayers to deal with it would feel if we were to replace the game with a real life object, lets say a car. Say your favorite car maker comes out with a great car you've always wanted and have the money to spend on. However, instead of just buying it at your local car dealership they decided that you can only get it from a special dealer. When you buy the car there, you don't actually own the car because you can never sell it later on. You are only renting it for the full purchase price of a car.

[nodunit 397]

Does Arma 3 being steam exclusive garuntee that there will be a steam workship for Arma 3? Arma 2 has been on steam for some time now and I have yet to see anything of a workshop about it..

[maddogx 13]

Just installing the game for the first time? Too bad, you can just throw your store bought game disc out the window since you will be downloading

the whole 30GB+ game from steam all over again. Check Total War forums if you don't believe this.

That was before Steam introduced delta patching - a topic that was specifically addressed in the dev blog.

[sabre 244]

There has been no 'garuntee' of it, however I think it's best people are voicing there opinion on it.

Therefore if it is under consideration BIS has more dot points for a nice long pro's and con's notepad document.

[chortles 263]

Does Arma 3 being steam exclusive garuntee that there will be a steam workship for Arma 3? Arma 2 has been on steam for some time now and I have yet to see anything of a workshop about it..

Arma 2 is not Steamworks, so of course not -- plus Arma 2 was a "niche"/no-name title on Steam until DayZ anyway.

As far as mod implementation... oh gosh, why do I get the feeling that the devs are/were still undecided (even ignoring the anti-Steam backlash)? :eek:

[Maxzy 12]

...this is what I'm hoping a dev will come in here to answer!

I'm totally with ya on this :).

what game was this?

A really shitty one, as it turned out - AvP :).

[chortles 263]

I'm totally with ya on this :).

And I'm totally with ya on this :) you've been cool and reasonable throughout this discussion, and I really look forward to hopefully having some good answers for you re: how Steam implementation is done for Arma 3.

At least you didn't pay full price in preordering Napoleon: Total War... or BRINK!

[sapped 10]

That was before Steam introduced delta patching - a topic that was specifically addressed in the dev blog.

No, the issue still exists to this day and nothing's been done about it, apparently people with the original game disc still needs to download

the whole game from steam plus the whole 30GB+ update which includes compatibility with the fots expansion pack. You simply cannot

skip this step.

So if you just bought it for the first time and want to play it on your precious break, good luck with that! If your internet is any good it will

prob take a few days to a week. And if it's bad, I can just imagine how pissed ur gonna get waiting for months just to download a patch

to play a game you bought from store.

[maddogx 13]

No, the issue still exists to this day and nothing's been done about it, apparently people with the original game disc still needs to download

the whole game from steam plus the whole 30GB+ update which includes compatibility with the fots expansion pack. You simply cannot

skip this step.

So if you just bought it for the first time and want to play it on your precious break, good luck with that! If your internet is any good it will

prob take a few days to a week. And if it's bad, I can just imagine how pissed ur gonna get waiting for months just to download a patch

to play a game you bought from store.

Then apparently something huge has been screwed up with that specific game. Having purchased several games on disc and then installed/activated them through Steam (L4D 1+2, AvP etc.), I can say with absolute conviction that redownloading an entire game after installation on Steam is not the norm. The negative example you have brought up is an exception.

To claim that the same thing must necessarily also happen with Arma3 is ludicrous and smacks of FUD.

[Maxzy 12]

What is FUD? =)

[Dwarden 1124]

so let put flat out some claims to death

1. STEAM adoption will not block any possibility to use 3rd party tools (let say sixupdater)

2. STEAM adoption will not replace content hubs like armaholic

please see Skyrim and Civilization 5 modding

3. i/we do fully understand the concerns about STEAM offline mode issues (login/LAN etc) and we will try improve / tweak that as much as possible

4. try guess what games and which developer is one of main reasons STEAM has now differ byte delta patching ? :)

5. arguments about chance something being stolen because it's easier to upload them to STEAM ... well i bet if we adopted e.g. Desura it would be same argument all over again, there was always someone trying steal our and mods content since 2000 so i guess that's moot point

[LeeManatee 4]

just to clarify: will we able to launch game with sixupdater?

or how it's gonna work?

[maddogx 13]

so let put flat out some claims to death

1. STEAM adoption will not block any possibility to use 3rd party tools (let say sixupdater)

2. STEAM adoption will not replace content hubs like armaholic

please see Skyrim and Civilization 5 modding

3. i/we do fully understand the concerns about STEAM offline mode issues (login/LAN etc) and we will try improve / tweak that as much as possible

4. try guess what games and which developer is one of main reasons STEAM has now differ byte delta patching ? :)

5. arguments about chance something being stolen because it's easier to upload them to STEAM ... well i bet if we adopted e.g. Desura it would be same argument all over again, there was always someone trying steal our and mods content since 2000 so i guess that's moot point

Quoting for new page so people don't miss it. :)

What is FUD? =)

"Fear, uncertainty and doubt." A tactic used mostly in marketing and propaganda to negatively influence peoples opinions on something. Google it. ;)

[Maxzy 12]

3. i/we do fully understand the concerns about STEAM offline mode issues (login/LAN etc) and we will try improve / tweak that as much as possible

Yay!

4. try guess what games and which developer is one of main reasons STEAM has now differ byte delta patching ? :)

Errr... Creative Assembly? Total War? Hehe, just kidding :). Thank you for all your hard work.

---------- Post added at 03:48 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:45 PM ----------

"Fear, uncertainty and doubt."

Hey, I heard it somewhere recently. "Madmen" maybe?

[toxim 0]

Maybe Dwarden or someone else could make a sticky covering most if not all the concerns about Steam & questions about the integration people have pointed out here

and in the dev blog & reveals -thread?

*** Ah Dwarden already sort of did that while i was writing this short novel.

Personally im just happy its Steam and not Games For Windows Live or Origins. I have tried both of those and oh boy they are bad. From these, Steam is the lesser evil ;)

I have retail/BI Store versions of ALL the BIS games(+ 2 copies of OFP and ARMA2:CO), and i am not really a Steam fanboy but not a hater either.

I have Steam running in the background always. I have used it since 2004. And it really sucked back then, but it has gotten much better.

About Steam ram usage:

When fully minimized to tray: around 10-16 MB (sometimes climbs to around 37 MB)

Store window open: 50-60 MB (lots of images there)

Game collection window open: 20-25 MB

Personally i cant say anything about Steam Workshop since i have yet to use it, in the case of Skyrim i have always used the Skyrim Nexus website instead (and lately their downloader which is a bit like SixUpdater).

Maybe i own or play the wrong games, but when Steam has lost connection to its servers, i have yet lost connection to the mp game i have been playing at that time. Same with singleplayer games.

About reselling games: I think i have read that Valve is working on that. But who in their right mind would want to resell their copy of Arma?

Edited February 22, 2013 by Toxim

[Steiner34 12]

Im huge a fan of the Arma series since the old Operation Flashpoint days and have since then bought every game of the series. In the case of Arma 2 I was a day first buyer of the games and the DLC's itself. Reading these news about exclusive Steam Account binding makes me very sad and disappointed in Bohemia Interactive cause I ALWAYS liked the way that you could install the Armagames from your disc and could start playing without having to bind you whole game to second a company account which effectively takes away your freedom as a paying customers. The problems I personally have with Steam are the following:

1.Account binding

You as a paying customer are being forced to bind a full priced game to an online account of a second company which means that youre vurneable to fraud and hacking. Just imagine Steam gets hacked or your pc gets hacked and someone steals your personal information and effectively takes over your account. In the worst case you can rebuy the game and create a new account. Also with account binding youre on the mercy of Valves policys(False claims of hacking/cheating) which can also lead in the worst case to the banning of your account.

2.So called Steam offline mode is in fact a fraud

As many others have already stated the offline mode will only work for 30 days after the last login which in effect will force you to login every 30 days just to play it in Singleplayer or Edit missions. Of all the the DRMs I have seen so far its comparable to the ridiculous DRM of UBISOFT where are you being forced to always stay online just to play in Singleplayer. I personally develop small realistic missions for a small ARMA 2 community and I dont want to stay online just to develop a mission.

3.In the case of a Steam bankcruptcy all your games not only Arma 3 are srcewed.

With these personal reasons I just stated I will NOT GONNA buy Arma 3 at all. Im just not willing to give up the personal freedom to play a game where and when I want to play it. Im not willing to be at the mercy of account binding company. Unfortuantely BI you lost another long time paying customer and if you continue this policy I will never ever buy a game from you again. There are still enough good games out there without this fraudulent Steam system.

Edited February 22, 2013 by Steiner34

[Varanon 892]

If that is what they choose then that's what they do, and you can't change it. Even if you release something on here, what's to stop some asshole from taking your work and publishing it on the steamworkshop without crediting you and such?

So, it could never happen that someone takes my work off Armaholic and re-uploads it somewhere else ? I wonder how theft is automatically only possible on Steamwork but not anywhere else ?

[jumpnjack 10]

Fack Steam!!! I like my addons organized in folders and thats it!!! SAY NO TO STEAM!

[gunny1979 3]

Fack Steam!!! I like my addons organized in folders and thats it!!! SAY NO TO STEAM!

Can say No all you like, it's not going to change.

[dsi24 12]

so those of us who run large lan networks for games aka I run with many copies of arma and arma 2 and ofp now I will have to have always online and individual steam accounts per machine... same reason others games that requires accounts I dont integrate in my closed lan network Example 6 copies of COD till they made it steam then 1 copy just for myself....currently own 8 copies of arma 2 + expansions sets

That is entirely up to BIS, they can decide to throw in a non-steam exe or not.

[Kuskov 1]

It's been quite a long time since I last used Steam, but after reading through this thread it does appear that it's gotten much better. Will Steam have any effect on my ram usage if playing in offline mode?

[Placebo 28]

The problem is about people stealing others work and even re-uploading complete mods without permissions and often even taking credit for it. The support on Workshop isn't strict and serious enough to deal with this actively, but instead the original authors will have to waste their time on dealing with the support, which can take weeks to delete any stolen work, and often not even punishing the thief.

I like to think I and others have been very pro-active in taking a stance against addon theft, both content taken from Arma addons and used in Arma addons as well as content taken from Arma and used in other games, this won't change if and when Arma content is used on Workshop, anyone who finds their Arma content used in a way that they don't agree to on the Workshop or elsewhere is always welcome to PM or Email me (Placebo@idea-games.com) and I will do everything possible to get it taken down ASAP, that hasn't changed nor will ever change whilst I work for BIS/IDEA :)