If you take anything to extremes it all starts to sound the same as the extremism is all that is left. That said, KavazovAngel's post is something that most publishers, indie developers and Steam users will disagree with. Not to mention Valve themselves. So take what you will from that.

Also, for what it's worth, GOG releases aren't perfect either. I have to manually tweak every DOSBox release to get it playing well, and a couple of other releases take a hell of a lot of effort to get working properly, like Planescape Torment (and in the case of Interstate 76 and Gorky 17, have never really worked properly at all).

I'm going to run the risk of negative rep here and say that some (not all, but some) releases seem to be mostly along the lines of 'well, that's the best we can do' efforts leaving the community to fix it up. I appreciate that their hands are probably tied legally in a lot of situations, especially when it comes to unofficial patches, but it still invalidates the 'you just download and play with no problems!' argument.

(from a purely personal point of view, I actually enjoy the tweaking aspect anyway, back in the DOS days sometimes configuring the perfect autoexec.bat and config.sys was more entertaining than the game itself)

You don't know much about the Baltic nations' history, do you?

i prefer steam over crappy clients like gfwl any day, but the gog model is the best so far i have seen

Just like retail. Still doesn't negate the fact that you don't actually own any of your games (unless you're the developer who holds the IP rights of course).

Well, I believe GOG's support for quite a few releases could be improved (the DOSBox issues would be extremely easy to fix - they already include a program to adjust the scaler in the config file via a simple dropdown list, there's no reason they can't include further options with it, even ignoring the fact that there's no valid reason they leave the default sound config as it is), so my answer to your question would be 'yes'.

Yes, Steam could, as well as the developers / publishers of those games themselves. They just don't care.

I'll be honest, I don't like it. However, all of the things I'm going to say in this post are facts rather than opinions. I'm sure plenty of people will tell you the good things so I'll just warn about the bad ones.

1. Europeans are most of the time charged as if €1 = $1. So a game that is a reasonable $50 in the US will be €50 ($70) for you.

2. You don't own the games, you subscribe to the games. Before someone comes along saying "you don't own games anyway, it's just a licence":

When you buy a game, you own the licence to it and the company cannot take it from you.

Valve can can terminate your subscription at any point and you have no rights regarding that. I'm not saying they do it often, but they can.

If you're ok with that then enjoy, because they have some awesome sales.

Some people have a way of justifying purchases there which is basically to think of it as a maybe lifetime rental. If the price is lower than it would cost to rent the game then they'll get it because they'll probably get to keep it longer than a weekend, this way of looking at it might work for you.

I haven't read the rest of the thread because I'm worried I'll get drawn into a big debate, so apologies if everyone has already told you all of this. :P

Personally, I am not a big fan of Steam, and the reason is simple. I hate what it is trying to do gaming. Valve is pushing away from the traditional model and trying to turn games into a service. They are also creating a system that benefits the publisher far more than the consumer, allowing them greater control over the selling of their games and consumer data.

Essentially, Steam is a "subscription" service where they are under no obligation to the consumer according to all the fine print you agree to. Your account is a limited, terminable subscription that they are in full control of, not you. A simple billing error can get your account locked down for months if not indefinitely depending on the situation. Overloaded servers can keep you from accessing your titles, since Steam wants to authenticate you every time you launch a game, etc.

The only digital distribution services worth supporting are those that provide you with an installation file, and theoretically you would never have to access that website again. GOG is a perfect example of this. I could purchase a game right now, download it, and have it indefinitely without returning to the service (although you are crazy if you do not want to return here!).

For me, there is still a significant difference between retail and most digital distributors. Yes, when you "purchase" a game, you are only obtaining a license for it, no argument there. With Steam though, you are getting a subscription that another company is in complete control of. A license still affords the user some basic rights, with Steam, good luck if something goes wrong.

I'll just add that EU zone is divided into 2 tiers, the Western countries being more expensive. However that doesn't change a thing that only >50%-off deals are actually worthy of purchase.
EDIT: tiers only apply for Valve's own games.

There's no doubt that GOG's system is the best when it comes to giving the buyer his game with no strings attached. Once the buyer backs it up, he has his game forever and even if GOG disappears his game may remain.

Steam is a mix of a service and DRM. They give you great sales, chat and voice options, friend tracking, achievements, all your games in one place, automatic updates, back up option (still needs the client program) off-line play (not permanent) and new titles. They tie your games in one account and if they suspect you of doing anything illegal, they can cut you off from all your games. It doesn't happen often, but so far I've known of two people who've had their accounts temporarily suspended.

So it's pretty much up to you if you want to run the minor risk and if you enjoy the community, multiplayer aspect of it. There are doubts of what would happen to your games if Steam closes down but that seems unlikely right now.

If you're into single player games, don't mind them being old and are not interested in the latest offerings, stick to GOG. If you like great deals, newer games (including free ones, like Alien Swarm and Team fortress 2), multiplayer community and don't mind your games attached to an account that potentially could be taken away, you can try Steam.

I've got both and have no complaints with either.

I don't know if this is a big deal to anyone but me, but one thing I find repellent about Steam (and other client services like Impulse and GFWL Marketplace) is the blackbox download, installation and backup. I don't like clicking "Get this game" and having the client do everything for me. I just want a nice .exe that lets me step through the installation process myself. To me, that is the most convenient delivery method, not proprietary archives, client dependencies and directory configurations.

I don't like / dislike Steam as it's just another source for games. I did my research and found that it was not for me. The subscription aspect, multiple DRM types and the required Steam client being the most glaring reasons for me to not use it.

I've not seen any change in the good / bad debate that has gone on for years. Those who like it defend it to the death, those who hate it do the same. Almost useless to read threads like this as the get out of hand quickly with the two extremes battling it out.

Also, my GOG backlog is so large that I really don't need another source. Every time I think I want to use Steam . . . I Google "Steam errors" and quickly change my mind. The attached image is not meant to inflame (I made it for a GOG contest) but the errors shown are pulled directly from Steam errors posted by Steam members. I've not seen any of these errors with GOG games so far . . . hope I never do . . . =)

"I admit I have never tried it myself, but I find it very disquieting that a piece of software used by millions of people every day sometimes throws out an error message."

That is beyond ridiculous.