Grimrock

Dandy wrote: hahahaha, stop-it, I nearly wet myself.

Yeah, well, like it or not, the digital sales are pretty much dominated by Steam (70% of all revenue). Even with Steam as its flagship, PC stands absolutely no chance against consoles. Were you to take Steam away, you'd be left with barely anything. Let's not even mention retail sales...

I know it's hard to believe, but Steam is a blessing for indie games like Grimrock. It gives immense amounts of visibility and customers. Without Steam, games like Magicka, Orcs Must Die, Dungeons of Dredmor, Terraria, Dungeon Defenders, Realm of the Mad God, Recettear and even a game like The Witcher 2 would've never made it, and the same could be said about so many games...

Mameluk wrote:

Dandy wrote: hahahaha, stop-it, I nearly wet myself.

Yeah, well, like it or not, the digital sales are pretty much dominated by Steam (70% of all revenue). Even with Steam as its flagship, PC stands absolutely no chance against consoles. Were you to take Steam away, you'd be left with barely anything. Let's not even mention retail sales...

I know it's hard to believe, but Steam is a blessing for indie games like Grimrock. It gives immense amounts of visibility and customers. Without Steam, games like Magicka, Orcs Must Die, Dungeons of Dredmor, Terraria, Dungeon Defenders, Realm of the Mad God, Recettear and even a game like The Witcher 2 would've never made it, and the same could be said about so many games...

The Witcher 2? Don't make me laugh. That game was going to succeed whether on steam or not. I got my copy from GoG because it was soooooo much cheaper for me.

Visionary's, programmers and artists kept PC gaming alive. Doom had people updating their computers , the few great games made over the years had people buy themselves a PC.

What has suffocated PC gaming near to death, was over aggressive DRM. Now, thankfully all that rubbish is near enough behind us.
Steam had nothing to do with the success of pc gaming, its a fast food outlet for games, nothing more. There are plenty of outlets, to rival steam and actually offer a better and cheaper service.

Dandy wrote: Steam had nothing to do with the success of pc gaming, its a fast food outlet for games, nothing more. There are plenty of outlets, to rival steam and actually offer a better and cheaper service.

Well yes there are now, but steam was the first and has by far the largest group of clients/users. Most of the others are very small in comparison or only cater to a certain brand or niche of games. If steam didn't exist then yes there would most likely be something like it anyway but as it stands now steam is the best place to reach a larger community for indie games.

Digital distribution in general has been a saving grace for PC gaming. Each distribution service has its own specialty and things to offer.

Steam has a great mixture of classic and modern game and one of the more fully featured clients out there. Their holiday sales are mind blowing and they do neat holiday events as well.

Desura is fantastic for its modding and indie scenes. I feel that their client could do with a bit of work, but still a fantastic service.

GOG is like its acronym suggests the best place to go for the old classics of yesteryear among some of the more recent titles. A great service with reasonable prices and purchasing incentives.

Game for Windows Live. I think it still sells new games...


All of these services, except for GfWL, culminate into the ultimate PC gaming experience and really give people a reason to choose PC gaming over consoles. Can we stop arguing now?

Crashbanito wrote:All of these services, except for GfWL, culminate into the ultimate PC gaming experience and really give people a reason to choose PC gaming over consoles. Can we stop arguing now?

I hate to say it but all that is BS. The client you download the game through doesn't mean poot when it comes to deciding what platform you game on. What determines the best place to game (for you) should always be one thing "What platform has the game/most games I want to play?" People can roll out all the silly stuff all day long but if I want to play an EA game on PC I am not going to think twice about having to use Origin. But if the game is a console exclusive (like Fez which just released a few days ago) and I want to play it, I am not going to hesitate about booting up a console either.

You should always follow the games not the "platform" or the distribution method.

That said, 4.5 hours to go woo woo!

EDIT: I also just saw someone posted claiming the Witcher 2 would not have made it without steam. Pardon me while I spend the next five minutes shaking my head. Trust me when I say this, the Witcher 2 did not need steam. How fast "modern" gamers forget that PC games existed before steam did. I don't remember Morrowind having any sales problems for example.

Crashbanito wrote: Can we stop arguing now?

We are not arguing, we are discussing. But maybe we could argue about it.

hi, all

seriously cannot wait to slay some evil/delicious snails! (first ever dungeon crawler i will be playing)

but due to aussie times i have to wait 5 hours (instead of 4.5 ) why can't 3am arrive sooner

ᶘ╯ᵒᴥᵒᶅ╯︵ ┻━┻

I'm not so sure. Convenience has quite a bit of weight when people decide how and where to game.

It's one of the top reasons consoles are doing so well. Why set-up and manage a good computer, when I can just pop a disk in and be done with it? The PC is often the better choice, but it hasn't always been the most convenient method.

Many of these clients stream line the management of games with patches and whatnot automatically. I'm not saying these clients are the thing keeping the PC gaming market afloat, but saying that they are a detriment to PC gaming just isn't fair.

Dandy wrote:

Crashbanito wrote: Can we stop arguing now?

We are not arguing, we are discussing. But maybe we could argue about it.

We could start a topic to discuss digital distribution and what not in the off topic forum. No reason to clutter up this topic about release times with it.