Gamers, do you enjoy using Steam to play your games?

Well as the title say, do you like using Steam?

For me personally, I like games. I don't care what store I'm buying them from, but Steam seems to have more games I want than Origin etc. I don't spend hours using the actual program since I already know what I want to play. The library is organized and nice to look at, the big picture mode works as intended, the sales are still interesting enough for me, and the client itself is very non-intrusive. Also, Steam now has a refund system, making it even better to use. Overall, It's just a means to an end.

So gamers, has Steam been good to you over the past years?

Yeah, i love it. Some evenings I will sit with a bottle of red and just spend hours clicking through the menu's, going into system setting and all that lovely UI stuff steam has. I don't even have any games I just love using Steam.

Eh it's alright.... If we have to have something like that.

I use the store and the chat and that's about it.

Eh. It's alright.

Not particularly. With Origins customer service, I'd rather use that quite frankly. I also think Valve may allow to much garbage on the platform.

However the download speeds are great compared to most services and the sales are fantastic. The UI is better than Origin, but it's still a bit clunky with Steam Link and the DLC/Store links in game.

I would like to see Amazon or Google create a platform to directly challenge Steam. It feels like Valve doesn't invest much in improving the platform or half asses it.

Steam is the reason I find PC gaming to be a lot cheaper than consoles these days, so I'd say I like it. It's where I buy the vast majority of my PC games. It also helps that it's the store that gets most support from places like Japan. Japan has had an indie renaissance on PC, and I think that's pretty great.

The main thing I wish is that the Steam in-game overlay wasn't something you only got in-game. It gets a bit screwy when you try to play non-Steam games, or old games at low-resolutions. Sometimes it doesn't even show at all. I'd rather the whole function not be tied to the game your'e playing, and simply be something that can always be accessed at your desktop resolution regardless of game.

The service is a lot better now than it was a couple years ago. Their customer service was absolutely horrid but with competition it's something they had to improve on. I would prefer if the games were DRM-free like GoG but overall it's an alright service.

@davillain-: Has steam been good to me? In regards to sales , definitely.

Not to mention the convenience in having all titles stacked in one place, easy install and updates.

So yes steam is good, but to be fair digital has been the way forward for a long time, and no reason to buy physicals today.

I like the Big Picture mode, I boot directly into it as the shell so it's basically my entire UI for interacting with everything I have. Regarding prices I find it odd no one mentioned Cdkeys, their regular prices are often better than Steam sales. Dishonored 2 preorder for $35? Steam won't see that price for it even at next years summer sale.

Bought a few games on Steam, but mostly check gog first. They did a much better deal for Mother Russia Bleeds on release.

Overall still not fond relying on downloading games because I prefer them physical, that way my purchase is mine. But haven't had that option since Dragon's Dogma Online for a P.C. game.

Back onto Steam, not a big fan with how misleading some of the reviews on games are, that's user reviews for you I guess. . But Steam users really seem to troII.

Not to mention how awkward the web pages are when deciding if I'm interested in the game. So many blocks with useless information, webpages for purchase exchange should be designed with simplicity in mind, Steam ignores this and adds as many as they can fill.

Criticisms aside, I just prefer gog for my P.C. purchases. Games I usually want have better deals, has a less fussy web page layout, only giving me the information I needed. And has a better community for review information.

Steams still ok. Better than eShop or PSN Store.

I dont really care. It's good for what it is. Its where I have most of my games. On steam its probably around 50, origin maybe 12, uplay maybe 10, and GOG 10-12.

@davillain-: I enjoy it for the most part, mainly because there is a real lack of another viable platform for PC. It's kind of sluggish and big picture mode still could use a lot more refinement but overall it's ok.

Except, I am so tired of all the garbage that floods the store, Steam needs some standards, early access should be a completely thing all together.

The worst thing we can do is give a developer our money before the product is complete it completely kills any motivation for real refinement.

No I'm not a PC gamer so It don't interest me.

I play mostly consoles, but P.C. has its advantages, for one, it's the number one place for the top Indie games_

Owlboy could be a potential GotY candidate.

Steam is almost solely responsible for drawing me into PC gaming, so definitely. It's especially convenient for me since I've moved several times, and it's difficult transporting more than one or two home consoles at a time.

Yep. Steam guides in particular is very useful.

Playing yes. Buying? Wherever is cheapest or beneficial to developers. Humble Store gets first priority because of the generous cut from the Humble widget; bonus is that you get a Steam key. I also buy from GMG regularly for 'AAA' releases since it's almost always cheaper than steam and you ket a steam key as well.

Ignoring the awful customer support. It's just a good service. The overlay. The quick access to guides/forums. The Steam Workshop. The community features as all my friends that game are on it. I got a Steam Controller which works surprisingly great after getting used to it + Steam has the profiles. The streamlined/seamless patching process. The wishlist. The discovery 'curation' (though needs more improvement). Big Picture. Gifting/trading. Steam Cards (though there were far more lucrative in the first year) and the existence of DRM actually benefits the service to now provide a no-questions asked refund policy--something that DRM free doesnt usually offer (because you can 'duplicate' the content).

@davillain- said:

Well as the title say, do you like using Steam?

For me personally, I like games. I don't care what store I'm buying them from, but Steam seems to have more games I want than Origin etc. I don't spend hours using the actual program since I already know what I want to play. The library is organized and nice to look at, the big picture mode works as intended, the sales are still interesting enough for me, and the client itself is very non-intrusive. Also, Steam now has a refund system, making it even better to use. Overall, It's just a means to an end.

So gamers, has Steam been good to you over the past years?

I have no isse with using any online service (As long as it's reputable) to download PC games but what I have a problem with is signing in to these services to simply play the games.

Plus, Steam downloads are poorly optimised for newer systems and I haven't been able to get KOTOR 2 to work on my windows 10 PC at all. The steam staff and community are useless too.

Yeah, it's good. I like how it encourages a sense of community with games you enjoy and is very user friendly. Plus I get a weird kick out of organizing my games by any method I want. This is not even to mention how great the sales are.

Pretty much the only thing I use, as I only game on PC. Only time I don't is if I play a newer EA title, or an especially older game I need to get on GoG (which is incredibly rare).

If anything I probably don't use Steam enough since I don't participate in the community at all. It's probably better than this one, I would wager. Maybe not...

^This. I love Steam, although it's not perfect.

110% yes.

I have had no complaints for the past 11 years.

I know a lot of die hard PC users have some issues with it, but for my purposes, a guy who just plays primarily indie games on his laptop, it functions exactly as I need it to.

I usually prefer buying my games on GOG. No DRM >>>>>>>>>(towards infinity)>>>>>>>>> any sort of DRM. But I gotta admit that Steam does mostly a good job with supporting the games and making sure things run smoothly and also has a much higher selection. I'm not sure what will happen if Steam goes bankrupt though. What will happen to our games???

I've only used it once to buy pCARS on the PC but it worked fine and so far I've had no problems with it. It sits in the background and I check to see what offers they have regularly but really I don't have much to do with it.

I'm with you. The client doesn't matter to me, the games do. I like steam sales. But Steam doesn't mean anymore to me than GOG or any other

Yes for PC gaming steam is by far the best and most organized platform.

I don't use any of Steam's features. I play the game, quit, and I'm done. All that other stuff such as stats and achievements are junk.

I tolerate it. But, that's about it.

Anyone ever find that they only seem to play games from one service?

I've got a GOG account, and quite a number of games from that store. Some I've played, some I got for free, some I've never bothered to open despite some interest in the game. I don't think I've even opened up GOG for a few months now.

I think Steam manages to lure me in simply because it's always there. It's the staple of PC gaming. My computer boots up, there's Steam immediately with my whole library of games staring me in the face. GOG, on the other hand, is basically "out of sight, out of mind".

Maybe that'll change once I clear up a bit more of my Steam backlog... The ever present beast. I may not open up other game stores simply because Steam already occupies that time. If I had no games to play on Steam, I'd probably find myself on a variety of stores to explore all the various games each offers.

I guess to me is, I just prefer Steam over GOG due to Steam great prices, its very practical. However GOG is still great and I would support it all day. If I knew it, I would have bought the Witcher 3 on GOG rather than steam, because it's DRM-free. I just find Steam to be more convenient than GOG. GOG is good and all but it doesn't have the amount of games that Steam has but what GOG makes up is that it's DRM-free.

Edit: I would say this, go for the lowest prices on a game you want to buy from ether Steam or GOG.

I assume this is the same for me, but I won't know until I actually have zero Steam backlog, and no real reason to open up Steam for gaming purposes.

But yeah, Steam's competitive in terms of prices, it has basically all new games, and it's the one with the robust social network to it where all my PC friends are. Like said, it's always what starts up immediately when I boot up my PC, and I'm sure it will be even if I had no backlog.

The other game services are really just one extra step to getting to my PC games, and it's amazing how much one single step can get in the way of actually using some other programs. Luckily, many other sites actually sell Steam copies of games, so I'm not really against shopping around for good game deals. GOG, specifically (along with things like Origin), do seem to alienate me being separate from Steam. At least for the time being.

I'm not going to lie, it took me a while to get used to Steam (I began to use Steam in 2004, boy was it buggy back then), but now I think it's a pretty good system.

It works great and has loads of quality games (and also loads of shit games). It can be hit or miss but I still find it to easily be the best game manager of the bunch.