I've always been amazed at how they managed to cultivate such zealotry in the gaming community despite being one of the first developers to push (what was at the time, onerous and nearly unprecedented) DRM on their current user-base. Not to mention both the Steam client and network were significantly worse than they are now.
From what I remember, people originally got on Steam because that's how you got Half-Life 2, which the world was clamoring for. They put up with the problems until it got better because Steam was how you played CS and HL.
As for the DRM... has it ever really been onerous? The only case I think of is if you don't always have access to an internet connection, and they have workarounds for that, though they admittedly are imperfect.
True, the hypothetical/potential failure modes suck - being locked out of your account and losing your games; Valve goes out of business and you lose your games; you're offline and can't switch to offline mode and thus can't play your games until you find an internet connection. That said, I've always been of the impression that most people don't mind Steam's DRM that much because doesn't stop them from doing what they generally expect to be able to do and want to do with their PC games, which is sit down at any PC where they can log in on Steam and play them. This is unlike DRMed music and movie files: sure, DRM prevents you from making unlimited free copies for your friends, which I think most anyone would agree is reasonable, but it also can prevent you from doing things like changing formats or resolutions or storing/viewing from certain devices.
I'd say it was onerous at the time. Steam brought an "always-online" component (offline mode was utterly broken for years) to games you may have bought years prior, and this was in 2002/2003. In 2013, it's basically the status quo and other publishers have adopted similar schemes.
I think the interesting part is that in spite of that past behavior and almost no PR, the gaming community just rallies around Valve and will vilify most other publishers that attempt to follow Valve's footsteps with Steam.
I agree there's a bit of double-standard, but you don't need to be incredulous. It's simple; the double-standard was earned! Most gamers seem to have found that every time they trust Valve, they're happy with the result (so far!), and it's a much iffier gamble with most other publishers.
No one I know found the always-online aspects of Steam particularly onerous. Especially because when it was introduced, it was mostly used for games that were only interesting online anyway. HL mods, HL2 and mods. That "no one I know" is just anecdata, I admit it. And it integrates features that are actually features. E.g. Steam friends-chat is actually useful, unlike all other inter-game chat I've seen (on the PC).
And the Steam store is such a boon. It makes me want to give game-devs money. As my disposable income has grown (massively), Steam was in the right place at the right time. Brick and mortar game stores don't exactly inspire loyalty. And I like the fact that digital distribution lowers intermediate costs, and I like the fact that I get a share of that savings with the crazy-deep-discount steam store sales.
On the other hand, I can't remember the last time I interacted with DRM from another publisher without being afraid, and without paying a burden that actually was onerous. It messes with my router, or it turns out to be an exploitable rootkit, or it pops up inexplicable warnings, or it eats RAM, or I have to create an online account for one stupid game that I don't even know if I'll like yet, or...
I agree with nlawalker.... getting us acclimatized as a precondition of playing Must Play games (online HL mods after 2003, HL2, Portal) was brilliant.
Of course, if Valve in their wisdom were to decide my account was violating TOS, I'd be pretty boned.
A few people I know actually still had dialup when Steam first started becoming popular (in 2004, U.S. broadband penetration was only around 35-40%), and they found it pretty onerous to have to dial up every time they wanted to start a single-player, offline game. Less of an issue nowadays.
Steam never had always online (obviously this excludes online games like TF2). Steam has (ignoring offline mode here to honor your statement that it was broken for years) "check at start", i.e. the moment the game starts you must be online. Nothing else.
Always online is what Ubisoft tried with Assassins Creed 2, i.e. the game communicates all the time with the server and if the connection dies you cannot play anymore.
There is precedent for software developers to responsibly shut down activation servers, such as Adobe (gasp!) who made available a serial number and software download for CS2.
You don't need to switch to offline mode while online anymore. If you start Steam with no internet access it'll just start in offline mode provided you have it set to remember your password and auto-login.
despite being one of the first developers to push (what was at the time, onerous and nearly unprecedented) DRM on their current user-base
I used to pirate games left, right, and center. I would occasionally buy a new one if it had a good rep or I liked the series, but the default mode was 'pirate'. Since the A500 days (yo-ho, yo-ho, a pirate's life for me!). It also helped that the Australian software market is rapaciously overpriced.
Steam changed that. Steam didn't get rid of the DRM, but it added convenience like never before seen. Almost all the problems with DRM affecting the legitimate user are gone - I've never encountered a 'licensing server offline' or an 'invalid code' and only one 'sorry, licensing too busy, try again later'. I've rarely had a 'failed to install', and when I have, a 'try again' pretty much worked. The same can't be said of my experience with boxed software or pirated software. Updates are relatively seamless - Steam is acting like a package manager here, avoiding the need for everything to run its own updater. It's also a lot easier to check on any sales steam might be running - not so easy with a brick-and-mortar store(s); rare is the store website that shows the right level of stock and is regularly updated with specials.
Now, to be fair, I didn't start with steam at the inception, I've only been on for four or five years (it did get installed when HL2 came out, but I never got the sequels so didn't bother with it for a while), and when I started pirating I was a student and when I started steam I was working full-time, but even so, the convenience of being able to buy software from a trusted source and install it without having to leave the room made all the difference.
Steam does have its problems - the client is clunky (and has no tabs, grr - it's built on IE) and sometimes games can surprise you if your internet is out and they are 'online required' (which is usually invisible otherwise).
One argument that I noticed changed over the many years is "But online DRM means I won't own the game if I want to play it in X years". I've played a lot of games over the years. I return to very few - once a game is played out, it's gotta be pretty extraordinary to make it to my replay list. I still think DRM sucks, but it's largely irrelevant once the game is done.
Nope, they switched to Webkit a couple years ago. [1] (Still no tabs though..)
>I still think DRM sucks, but it's largely irrelevant once the game is done.
Wouldn't the success of something like GOG [2] kind of prove that there's a market and a reason for DRM-free games? I all but guarantee 20 years down the road, we'll still be playing games from this generation.
Sure, absolutely. I was talking in terms of my own experience with that line. I'd prefer there were no DRM, and as makomk says above, it causes problems to others that I don't see. I just meant that that one particular argument of "no ownership in X years" didn't hold much water with me personally.
This being said, I have bought System Shock 2 twice and lost it both times (once stolen, I think) and today I have been playing a pirated version (hooray for the new texture mods). That game is one of the exceptions :)
GOG is pretty badass, and I really really hope they (continue to) succeed in the marketplace.
But, selfishly, if I could buy every GOG game on Steam, GOG wouldn't get a penny of my money. I value the Steam features more than I value the DRM-free-ness. I'm befuddled that this is my position, but it is.
Sadly, that's not always the case with Steam - Portal 2's DRM is really annoying. It randomly broke with cryptic error messages or even just silently exited if you tried to run it under Linux using Wine, or used the wrong antivirus software under Windows, or installed it on a FAT filesystem rather than NTFS, or used NTFS symlinks to move the install, or... Apparently the DRM even caused some AMD CPUs to hard-lock: http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25521...
Because Steam is easy and it always seems to work as expected. They also have a great catalog. I've spent more money buying games through Steam than I have with any other method.
Edit: I forgot the Sales. Those damn Steam Sales get me every time.
Steam wasn't a popular service when it first came out. Many people hated it. It grew in popularity slowly, partly because Valve and Gabe knew how to engage the community and released stellar games. That and it turns out a digital distribution platform is a good idea.
I don't think Steam was onerous compared to widely used game copy protection systems (SecuROM, SafeDisc, StarForce, SafeCast, ...) which installed kernel drivers and who knows what else on your system and had numerous other problems.
