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General discussion (archive)Stronghold Crusaders 2 wil be Steamworks only(41 posts)(41 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted June 17, 2014
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Grargar: On GOG's release date, the developers put Botanicula on a Humble Bundle which you could get for a mere $0.01 for DRM-Free or $5 for a Steam key along with the game's full soundtrack in both cases, whereas in GOG the preorder saved you a mere $1 (for a final $9 price) and you didn't get the full soundtrack (neither do you now).
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Lugamo: Who would think in feature a brand new game in a bundle?
My guess, someone who didn't have a lot of "faith" in the game to make any money.
Posted June 17, 2014
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skeletonbow: I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean by that. People buy games from just about everywhere (Steam, Steam resellers, GOG, bundle sites) all the time and resell/gift/trade them all over the Internet. I don't believe Steam offers anything to prevent this although they do have region codes which might mitigate it slightly for some games.
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Pheace: The point he's making is that once someone activates/plays the game, it has no resell value.

Steamworks offers a ton of stuff to developers which is a bonus that's hard to overcome. I've also mentioned this in the Galaxy thread but even with what they are planning on offering I'm struggling to see why developers would pick Galaxy (matchmaking) over Steamworks. Especially if DRM-free Single-player is one of the demands to use GOG Galaxy.

Another benefit for Steamworks to some devs is the fact that they can go with one version of the game, upload it to Steam, upload the patches to Steam, and that's it. Steam handles everything else. No messing with different versions, and the only thing they need to do to sell games on other retailers is hand them a bunch of Steam keys. It saves a lot of work. From the sound of it, at it's best, a game with GOG Galaxy matchmaking will still require 2 different versions of the game (GOG Galaxy version and whatever version they put up on Steam, which they will since that's where the bulk of the players are), which is another drawback some developers may not feel like dealing with.

On top of that, it's quite likely that will mean the game will get listed on Steam with a '3rd party DRM' tag, which is more and more frowned upon by Steam users, and could negatively impact sales (where the bulk of their sales should be)
Why have a GOG Galaxy version on GOG and a Steamworks version on Steam why not just have a GOG Galaxy version on both services?
Posted June 17, 2014
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ShadowWulfe: Crossing my fingers that Galaxy delivers.
This :)

When it comes down to it, it's all a matter of incentives and where the developers/publishers think the money is, both in production, and distribution. If Galaxy does it right, it could be a DRM-free alternative to Steam, Origin, and even Uplay and others. I refuse to think that a game with steamworks can be steamworks only with no way around. It's more like they signed an agreement with steam for the time being, or they feel they don't have a choice in the matter.

It's time to give them more options so they know DRM-free, non steam is viable.
Post edited June 17, 2014 by JinseiNGC224
Posted June 17, 2014
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! WHY, GOD, WHY?!?!
Posted June 17, 2014
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Kristian: Why have a GOG Galaxy version on GOG and a Steamworks version on Steam why not just have a GOG Galaxy version on both services?
if by that you mean my remark of needing 2 different versions. Nearly every game added to Steam is adjusted in some way or another, to work with Steam. My assumption is that that would be no different for the GOG Galaxy version. (I was assuming a GOG Galaxy version of the game on both GOG and Steam there, but they'd most likely still be different versions)
Posted June 17, 2014
I didn't even know there was a Stronghold 2. Sad. Stronghold/Crusader was such a great game. I've been keen on replaying it again, too. Seems like, sadly, they're publishing through 2k, one of the bigger valvesluts.
Posted June 17, 2014
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Kristian: Why have a GOG Galaxy version on GOG and a Steamworks version on Steam why not just have a GOG Galaxy version on both services?
We don't know enough information about GOG galaxy to speculate about that hypothetical option just yet I don't think. Not in any conclusive way that is. Ultimately though it will always be the developer of the game who decides this sort of thing solely themselves of course so even when we do have the information there will never be one answer, but one answer per video game being developed. ;)
Posted June 17, 2014
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JinseiNGC224: This :)

When it comes down to it, it's all a matter of incentives and where the developers/publishers think the money is, both in production, and distribution. If Galaxy does it right, it could be a DRM-free alternative to Steam, Origin, and even Uplay and others. I refuse to think that a game with steamworks can be steamworks only with no way around. It's more like they signed an agreement with steam for the time being, or they feel they don't have a choice in the matter.

It's time to give them more options so they know DRM-free, non steam is viable.
I'm no expert on the underlying processes involved in Steam or the nature of any agreements however it appears to me from the publicly available information on Steamworks for developers that the various APIs provided by Steamworks are conveniences to developers to consider using if they choose to do so in their games, with certain perceived advantages to the developers if they decide to do so, but that none of it is mandatory or forced upon them by Valve for any reason. I've come to that (perhaps incorrect) conclusion from perusing Steamworks documentation and information and by observing that there are games on Steam that are completely DRM-free which do not appear to link to Steamworks at all, some actually being the GOG version of the game simply wrapped up in Steam's installation process and installed to a different directory. Tomb Raider 1-3 is an example.

It isn't conclusive but it appears to me that Valve more or less allows anyone to sign up to become a Steam developer, allows anyone to download their SDK and read their Steamworks documentation and use their APIs if they wish to do so, or to not use their APIs if they wish to do that, and to sell almost anything on the Steam service that qualifies as being called a game. Presumably there are some quality checks done and legal related checks and balances, but what APIs a game uses seems to be completely up to the developer without GOG saying to them "you must use our Steam API for multiplayer or xyz or mnlop" etc.

If my perception of this is wrong however I'd like to understand how it works better and welcome any pointers to documentation or other information that can make heads or tails out of it as there are some projects I have underway that might possibly be sensible to try to offer on Steam some day if I complete them successfully and want to get them out there. I'm sure others are interested in how it works too. If someone has went through this process and knows that'd be cool to hear from them too.

I just get the impression though that Valve throws stuff out there for people to use optionally if they want to and doesn't care if people use it or not as long as they make money selling the product and it passes legal and QA expectations etc. I'm sure it's a bit more detailed than that, but they don't appear to be a power wielding strongly restrictive control freak type shop. My perception could be way off though too, and if it is I'd sure like to know about it. :)
Posted June 17, 2014
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skeletonbow: and to sell almost anything on the Steam service that qualifies as being called a game
And not even thus limited.
Post edited June 17, 2014 by Maighstir
Posted June 17, 2014
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skeletonbow: and to sell almost anything on the Steam service that qualifies as being called a game
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Maighstir: And not even thus limited.
Yeah, I didn't finish my thought there to include non-games... The app I'm working on is actually a piece of music/musician related software as well. ;o)
Posted June 17, 2014
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Crosmando: I've said this before, but Firefly making SC2 Steamworks only is a huge stab in the back to GOG, after all it was GOG who promoted the HD re-releases of Stronghold, Stronghold Crusader and Space Colony some time back, and this is how they respond.
I don't see how it's a stab in the back.

It's not like they promised that they would bring other games to GOG, did they? Stronghold games, except for S3, and Space Colony were all favourably reviewed on release, so it's not like no one would have paid attention to these games.

But true, GOG started the trend of bringing old games back. Though, it's not like Steam hasn't picked up on that.
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skeletonbow: Some of the reasons why developers are choosing to create their titles to be Steam-only might change once GOG makes the GOG Galaxy platform available, as it sounds like it will provide some of the functionality that developers want the distribution platform to provide. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see some Steam-only games expanding and supporting GOG Galaxy at some point in the future, of course only after the service is actually available. The cool thing being that unlike Steam, Galaxy wont require the customer to have the Galaxy client installed or to use any of the Galaxy services.

Of course Galaxy isn't going to convince every publisher to support it either, but it will likely make some titles available to us that otherwise wouldn't be. Hopefully we get some exciting games out of the deal even if it isn't this particular game. :)
Yeah, this is a good point- it's likely that Steam-only versions will happen less once the Galaxy rolls around.

edit because I can't write..
Post edited June 17, 2014 by cmdr_flashheart
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General discussion (archive)Stronghold Crusaders 2 wil be Steamworks only(41 posts)(41 posts)
(41 posts)