LeonardoCornejo: Don't be so pessimistic. All Steam is doing is what they should always do, placing the customer first. If it is only for the sake of avoiding legal action that does not matter. They are basically making sure third parties won't cause their business to collapse with false advertising and displeased customers. They are just doing business. Don't expect them to create a Steam STASI soon.
Catrhis: You know, when i read the first part of your comment i thought i was actually reading the wrong forum...then i saw the rest
Perhaps you are a better person then old cynical me for giving steam and valve so much credit as actually giving even a moderately low damn bout customers and their rights, or at least the phantom of what customer should have as rights, anyway, i still believe that that your
are giving steam too much credit
I mean seriously, now you are gonna tell me, that steam actually treat it's customer like human being or that they don't actually consider pretty much everyone a pirate because it doesn't want their drm, or any drm, in their games...
Preposterous, unconceivable, absurd......you are a spy aren't you
Shadowstalker16: Yeah it isn't voluntary, but its happening and whether steam acknowledges it or not, this is a good step against false advertising. And most big businesses don't change their established systems much without a court order anyway. Which is probably good as well, since it encourages competition to spring up in the meantime and offer long term competition. If DRM was outlawed, we wouldn't have GOG which is now a small but sure competitor steam as well in addition to being a DRM free store.
As to other changes, I hope not much. The current ease of getting a game on steam is a good thing IMO, as it allows anyone with $100 to release a game that is, in their opinion, the best. Its offering a low barrier to entry to potential competitors of the big dev studios and publishers.
Steam refunds are not a limited / restricted system when compared to others. No questions asked refunds within 2 weeks of buying or 2 hours of play are a very very liberal when compared to others, even GOG's. Not saying one or the other is better, but its important not to forget how liberal the system is.
I hope the forums never change. I know they never will. Steam / Valve itself seems to have no control over forums that aren't general steam discussions and of their own games. So they're unlikely to be caught with any heat about trying to control the content int hem. It seems to be fully up to the person who owns the steam-page to moderate the forums, in which case any order to censor will probably mean they'll shut it down, especially in case of indie games and not have a forum at all to avoid suits from offended idiots. And the loss of the forums is a loss since help and advice can still be communicated through them.
No offense, but 2 hours of gameplay is ridiculous, it should actually be based on an average length of the game plus a minimum of 1 hour
So a 2 hours game should not get the same refund timer as a 50 hour game where the unfinished and incomplete part may hide deeper in the code, after all phantom pain doesn't really show up with anything amiss till you reach midgame, then the mess actually start
Last time I checked Valve did not enforce any form of DRM at all. The problem is that they have no actual rules on DRM. And therefore other companies such as Electronic Arts and Ubi Soft enforce horrible DRM. I am pretty much sure most users did not mind DRM when it was just a short key input included on the disk. The problem is shit such as SecuRom and more recent forms of DRM such as persistent online DRM.
I AM against DRM, but I am not going to take Steam as guilty by association for having no rules about DRM.
