Disgruntled about Half-Life 2

Where did you purchase your copy of Half Life 2 from ?

Even though we sort know the guy down at our local EB he still proceeded to say " You know you need an internet connection dont you ? " I just snatched the bag hastily and ran off giggling.

I think the attendent should have informed you....

I was also informed of that when I picked up a copy, though it was hardly a problem for me since I mostly intend to play online anyway. What suprises me is that there doesn't even seem to be a number you can call to do it manually.

Read the specs, its stats it on the box.

..on the bottom, in very small print, seeming to relate to
the counterstrike portion rather than HL2.

Reading through the help on the valve site, apparently it
is possible to play on a machine without internet, but
requires burning a CD of some configuration files. I'm
having a go at this moment.

You dont have to be connected to the net to play solo do you?
Just registering right?

Yes, just registering.

I know it is a pain to need a net connection to register it, but most computers that have the power to play HL2 will have some form of net access. I know not all will, but it's still easy enough to take your computer somewhere that has the net, or use someones dialup access to register.

When you think about it, the costs involved in using the net to access it are significantly smaller than say buying a new video card or processor to play it.

There's a post at the steampowered forum by someone who bought the online version of Half Life 2, but only has a dialup modem. [:O]
I have to say, I've found the steam pre-loading/online activation to be pretty smooth. That is, I have broadband, I preloaded my copy early, and I activated a day after release date (it only took about 10-20 minutes to decrypt and whatnot). I'd imagine everyone else that did different would have run into some problem. I'm sorta mixed about Steam. One one hand, it's yet another hurdle for legitimate buyers (you also can't resell the game, and question whether you can activate the game if Valve goes under sometime in the future), but it could be the beginning of the end for the publisher stranglehold on game developers.

I got my copy off steam...i guess about 5 days after release. I started downloading it last saturday, and it was finished by about tuesday, which is fairly reasonable for the 2 gig or so that it downloaded. The only issues i had when downloading was occasionally it would crash due to network congestion...(having a bunch of torrents open etc.). But no big deal.
As far as reselling games goes though, this would actually be something the developers/publishers would also want to prevent, and cosidering the replay potential of HL2 (with various mods and whatnot) i have no problems not being able to resell HL2 :)
Reselling second-hand games is actually a bit dodgy anyway. It is possibly even more economically damaging to developers/publishers etc. than home piracy. At least with home piracy probably a large majority would not have paid for the game anyway, but with second-hand reselling, you have people who ARE actually willing to pay for a game, and not a cent going to the developers etc.
I'm not sure if the law still exists (or ever did), but i recall someone telling me that even when selling CD's secondhand, a percentage of the sale is still supposed to go to the distributor/artist etc. I wonder if it would be the same for games?
...back to the topic...
I wish they'd hurry up and release the SDK :P

Call me a luddite, but I don't like
the idea of having the net at home.
It's been my experience that it
can harm 'productivity' - websurfing
I find a blackhole for time; those
surveys on internet addiction I think
have some credence. Secondly I do
a lot of programming on my machines
and with the amount of crap flying
around out there the system becoming
unstable is the least that could
happen. One of the reasons I delayed
upgrading MVC++v6 was because I
thought that .net actually required
the net. I really hope this internet
registration business doesn't take
over, or at least keeps the option
of phone registration.

I actually like the idea of the internet registry, especially if it means that games companies can partially cut out the publishers.

I find it strange when a small group of people decide they don't want to use new techniques and think the rest of us should switch to there idea. lol [:P]

There where obvious hickups with steam but its the first time they've done this on such a large scale, I'm sure for HL3 it will be streamlined more.

If people don't like the way valve released with Steam, they don't have to buy there products, its not like they owe us something, pretty easy solution and that those of us who do like it still get to play it. [:)]

Do think you have a point about alternate registration though, phone, mail etc.

quote:Originally posted by Malus

I find it strange when a small group of people decide they don't want to use new techniques and think the rest of us should switch to there idea. lol [:P]

Ever the devil's advocate, whilst reading that I had an image
of you there as a kid scoffing a large bag of chocks whilst
your mates look on hungrily [;)] I ..would.. like to play the game!

If there's any forced switching of ideas, it's Vulve with this idiotic
registration system. And it doesn't seem to be a minority; forums
online seem saturated with complaints about this.

quote:
There where obvious hickups with steam but its the first time they've done this on such a large scale, I'm sure for HL3 it will be streamlined more.

If people don't like the way valve released with Steam, they don't have to buy there products, its not like they owe us something, pretty easy solution and that those of us who do like it still get to play it. [:)]

I wasn't aware of the situation when I bought HL2, as were many
that pre-paid for it. I forked out for a throw-away dialup account
with a few hours on it so as to register (+50 bucks total cost).

I will be playing HL3 when it comes out, but I won't
be buying it. The cracked copies normally surface on Efnet
and even Hotline a few weeks after release. In the end Vulve
will end up with more piracy as a result of alienation.
quote:
Do think you have a point about alternate registration though, phone, mail etc.

That's as far it should go IMHO. If a software company makes
software that I'm going to have, it should make it usable else
I'm still going to have it - but unbought and cracked (and many
evidently feel the same).

quote:Originally posted by Major Clod

I know it is a pain to need a net connection to register it, but most computers that have the power to play HL2 will have some form of net access. I know not all will, but it's still easy enough to take your computer somewhere that has the net, or use someones dialup access to register.

When you think about it, the costs involved in using the net to access it are significantly smaller than say buying a new video card or processor to play it.

Other than getting a pre-paid dial-up account for x days, you
could cajole one of your friends into allowing you to set up
the game using their dial-up. Going to a cybercafe is no good
unless you can get administrator access on the machine you
transfer the config files from, or can get permission to hook
your machine up to their LAN.

hAhaaa..
Malus may get an ironic laff from this.
After 2hrs of using my throwaway account 16 adware/spyware
programs trashed my machine. Lucky I have backups.

I'd never laugh at your misfortune but I had a slight chuckle that you didn't think to get some sort of protection before going online. tsk tsk.

By the way these choccies are to die for. [:P]

Ended up picking them out of the registry manually with a pair of tweezers; was not a good way to spend an afternoon. [xx(] Next time
i'll remember to put up something like ZoneAlarm (a free firewall).

If you were following valve anyway you would've realised that you needed the net to run/register Steam to get any valve game running.

I actually quite kinda like the idea, it means that you can install the game from a friend's dvd image, or copied dvd or something, or even copy the data files over etc, but then use your key to activate/register it. It's all legal too...

Though the downside is that now Valve are selling CD keys instead of games, but oh well.

If you had had internet you would have realised that you would have needed to have internet.

[xx(]

I'm sure they publicised this in some magazines or other?

I mean this is Half Life 2, I'd certainly hope that a magazine or two that has the review of it would include that you need the itnernet to play it?

its only required to register, not play, you can play offline once you register.

How much does a second hand 56k modem cost these days anyway lol, 10 bucks, hell valve should have just thrown one in to satisy the ludites. [:P]

Along with one of these...

http://members.home.nl/gis/

Scott.

You know instead of paying out the wazoo for parts he could have just got an old washing maching from the dump. [:P]
Was a waste of skin that guy must be lol.

quote:Originally posted by Malus

You know instead of paying out the wazoo for parts he could have just got an old washing maching from the dump. [:P]
Was a waste of skin that guy must be lol.

Perhaps he used one to house the net server.

Does anyone get the feeling that the big publishers are more than aware of the potential of Steam, and are working on their own online distribution system? I would be surprised if they sat back and did nothing, considering Steam edges away their market/makes their business redundant.
Of course, if they did come out with something, then we're really back at square one.

The only thing that bothered me was that the CD/DVD was required to play, but that has been removed. The fact that it requires online validation doesn't surprise me, and I rather like the idea. Power to the developers!

I like steam.

Steam can burn you badly [:)] but i do like it, no one can flog my CD key now like in the original Half-Life, but now i have Source too [:)].

My point was, publishers are probably thinking of their own online distribution system to take back the power. [;)]