SiN Q&A

[Evil Avatar]

Recently re-launched site, Next Generation has posted an interview (http://www.next-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=324&Itemid=2) with Ritual CEO Steve Nix, talking about the plan to release SiN 2 via Valve's Steam service.

Ritual CEO Steve Nix told Next Generation, "There is strong evidence that customers are getting more comfortable with content in non-traditional chunks. It's now common to purchase one song from the internet as opposed to buying the whole CD at the store. The same should hold true for our market and digital episodic content delivery."

He added, "When you think about the purchase decision, it's a fairly major time and dollar commitment to plunk down $49.99 at the store for a 20 to 30 hour game. A product that is easily downloadable from a Steam account and is longer than a DVD in length but at a similar price should be an easier thing to commit to.Is he just a clueless noob or what? I think significantly more people are comfortable buying a $50 CD and getting the CD/DVD, the box and the manual than paying for downloaded games.

If Steam is such a great service, why has Valve never announced Steam sales figures for Half-Life 2, the way most companies do when they hit big sales goals???

[DevDict]

Touche, Evil Avatar.

For some obscure reason I am not seeing myself idly sitting and downloading 2 DVDs of content through Steam. When you buy a game, you do pay for the game and not the packaging. However, I feel I spent my money better when I can feel what I have purchased, even if it's a CD.

Everyone I ever knew who bought Half Life 2 bought the CD version.

[Draft]

I may rag on Valve a lot, but I think STEAM and services like it have potential. I bought HL2 thought STEAM, and I'd buy ALL my PC games like that if I could.

[Cr4sh]

Ya know Evil, I would think you'd be a little more forward-thinking about the game industry. Sure as it stands right now alot of people would perfer a hard copy of whatever they're buying but as Mr. Nix mentioned it's becoming more common place to purchase 'digital' items. Music is the best example but there are others. Many individuals forked over cash just for some MAPS for Halo2 on the Xbox, and I believe Guild Wars intends to release content updates that cost roughly the same as an expansion pack but won't show up on store shelves. Digital Content Delivery is the future of gaming. It's already becoming the present of music. The movie and tv industries are gearing up for this as well. And this isn't just about Delivering Content Digitally, it's about game developer's selling their games directly without having to rely on and abide by big name publisher's like EA, Sierra, etc. Without having to sell their souls to a publisher game developer's will have more freedom to innovate with their titles. Give the guys at Ritual a chance, they're pioneering new territory in the gaming industry and a deserve something better than less-than-well-thought-out ridicule.

--Cr4sh

[thecrazyd]

Get with the times people. Fuck boxes, and fuck publishers.

[Draft]

and fuck publishers.Really, I only want to play games from the Blizzard and Valve because no one else can afford to make anything.

[rickmus]

There is absolutely no reason / benefit for Valve to release this info to the public. They are a private company, so no stock holders to encourage. The public can't invest in steam in any other form. Only publishers and developers are interested in potential numbers / rates / sales, which they would get during negotiations and other mechanisms.

[Draft]

There is absolutely no reason / benefit for Valve to release this info to the public. They are a private company, so no stock holders to encourage. The public can't invest in steam in any other form. Only publishers and developers are interested in potential numbers / rates / sales, which they would get during negotiations and other mechanisms.
Also because steam sales were probably the pits since most PC gamers, for all their technical savvy, are seemingly scared shitless when the data they buy doesnt' come on a convenient plastic disc.

[Chiggs]

He's just rationalizing his strategy to himself, Evil. But as we all know... this is SiN we're talking about, AND it's coming to us in "chunks". Yeah, this has success written all over it.

Oh, Ritual, you have some genuinely talented people working for you, why must you make them toil on a shit - and this is being extremely generous here - "franchise" like SiN? Furthermore, what the fuck even makes you think anyone gives a flying fuck about totally badass John Blade and his totally badass HardCORPS group? THERE'S A FUCKING REASON WHY PUBLISHERS WOULDN'T TOUCH THIS!

[if76]

Evil are you kidding me? Seriously.

A lot of people aren't as sentimental as you and don't really care about having the box to proudly display on their shelves.

They also probably don't care about the flimsy ad-loaded manual the majority of games come with these days.

I doubt they really want to have to keep track of the 5+ cdroms that the majority of games come with these days. I certainly doubt they'll mind having to go through the disc-swapping ordeal of installing your average PC game via cdrom.

I certainly doubt people mind not having to pay the costs of manufacturing and shipping said box accross the country. Nor would they mind not having to pay the retailer markup and sales tax.

I bought Half-Life 2 on Steam and it was an incredibly nice proccess. 1 hour and 30 minutes the whole thing was downloaded. I hope more games are distributed this way.

[Chiggs]

I bought Half-Life 2 on Steam and it was an incredibly nice proccess. 1 hour and 30 minutes the whole thing was downloaded. I hope more games are distributed this way.


Except that you got the whole game through Steam; not episodes. Plus, HL2 was a highly anticipated game; can the same be said for SiN 2: John "badass" Blade Fucks Big-Titted Sluts with His Raging Twelve-Incher While Blasting Bloodthirsty Mutants?

[Draft]

Remember in the first game when you could watch the evil sexy mad scientist chick get herself off in a hottub? That was pretty sweet.

[DevDict]

1 hour and 30 minutes the whole thing was downloaded.
25 minutes and I am leaving EBGames with a nice printed bag containing the gamebox. Sure if you live on a solitary peak in Himalayas, you may like the downloading process but I like to buy my games in stores.

You are right about the lacking manuals, though. The days of Fallout 2, Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights are sadly behind.

[51|RandoM]

I love Steam, now that it works. I don't have to remember where I put the damn media whenever I build a new system, or rebuild an existing one. I just install Steam, login to my account and tell it to stage my games.

I don't know about buying the games in chunks, though, I don't think I'd be up for that, unless, UNLESS, I can just buy the multiplayer component(for FPS), lol. Q3A or any of the recent unreals, I'd have been quite happy to pay a lesser fee and just get the multiplayer.

As far as Evil goes, you have to remember he has the collector gene. If he doesn't get a box to stack up somewhere, he doesn't really feel like he got anything.

[Evil Avatar]

I certainly doubt people mind not having to pay the costs of manufacturing and shipping said box accross the country. Nor would they mind not having to pay the retailer markup and sales tax.

Discount? I don't remember anyone offering Half-Life 2 for a discount via Steam vs. Retail. In fact, the retail boxed verison of Half-Life 2 is significantly cheaper than the Steam version.

Until I see some sales figures that justify the decision to distribute content digitally, I'll stick with the idea of publishers selling millions of copies on CD/DVD and I'll stick with picking up those DVD's for $19.99 six months after they are released. (Vs. the $59.99 Valve charges for the Steam version of Half-Life 2.)

[Rafer]

I bought Half-Life 2 on Steam and it was an incredibly nice proccess. 1 hour and 30 minutes the whole thing was downloaded. I hope more games are distributed this way.

Heck soon you won't even have to wait that long. Over at Scott Miller's blog (http://dukenukem.typepad.com/game_matters/2005/06/digital_distrib.html) he talks about the xStream delivery system, after you decide to purchase a game you can start playing the opening level just a few minutes later while the rest of the game downloads in the background. Of course you'd have to wait 5 to 10 years for 3d realms to release a new game but the concept of downloading while playing sounds plausible.

As for Valve not promoting Steam more by releasing sales figures, isn't there a tense relationship between them and Vivendi? Like Steam is going to be competing directly with Vivendi in the future (though I think they have a deal where Vivendi currently gets a cut of sales of HL2 over Steam).

[dr_qwandry]

Remember in the first game when you could watch the evil sexy mad scientist chick get herself off in a hottub? That was pretty sweet.

Now imagine that with the next UT engine. my moniter is going to jack me off while Blade cries like a bitch.

*sigh*
when will Ritual know that things that worked in the past won't exactly work in the future.

[Groo]

I bought Half Life 2 from the store. I regret that to this day. I paid $54.99 + tax from GameStop for the game ($54.99 is what I see the game priced as everywhere, even to this day in some places), as apposed to $49.99. What I got for my nearly $10 (after tax) was a box that is now sitting collecting dust, and a bunch of useless CDs. Honestly, a DVD would have been 100x nicer than the mess of CDs I got. On top of that, no manual, no nothing. And I had to waste time driving to GameStop to physically purchase the game as well.

On top of that, it took hours to install and verify it with Steam. After all was said and done, I had to insert a CD into the drive every time I wanted to play Half Life 2, while my friend who bought it off Steam didn't have to deal with that bullshit (I realize they've fixed this now, but I beat the game before I installed that patch).

Final verdict: I would much rather buy games from Steam than from retail.

[EyesNoMore]

All I have to say is, you couldn't wipe the smile off my face when, a few minutes after midnight, I heard the classic Valve music preceding a brand new game. Ahhh, what a feeling.

[Deadend]

I like the downloading games method.
It saves me energy, as I have all my CDs kept in a large binder in a closet, and everything with a cd key on it in another box nearby.

I would rather just goto Steam, user-name/pw and ta-da! I have just reinstalled HL2.

Buying games it works just as well, I was a sissy though and bought Guild Wars in a store (it was cheaper in the store).

I don't think 2-3 hours of gameplay for $20-30 is a good deal, espically for heavily scripted gameplay.

It works for old school, vertical shooters since they are about the score.

[RMan]

I think significantly more people are comfortable buying a $50 CD and getting the CD/DVD, the box and the manual than paying for downloaded games.
Although I agree with this statement, I think it should be clear that this is WAY more about conditioning than an innate desire for physical materials (CD, box, etc). A good recent example is the content purchased on cell phones, which the vast majority of which is electronically delivered. Cell phone users would likely be skeptical of and less likely to buy physically delivered content for the same reason, electronic delivery is what they're accustomed to. 15 years from now the average consumer will probably be skeptical of buying music on physical media because at that point they will be conditioned to getting it electronically since the physical counterpart is so inferrior. In time the clearly supperior electonic delivery will win out, but it will take time for people to accept it.

[HaZer]

25 minutes and I am leaving EBGames with a nice printed bag containing the gamebox. Sure if you live on a solitary peak in Himalayas, you may like the downloading process but I like to buy my games in stores.

You are right about the lacking manuals, though. The days of Fallout 2, Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights are sadly behind.

Yet it's not always a time saver, I mean if developers can go from gold to release in 5 mins, we could see games being released faster than waiting for stores to stock them.

[Varsity]

Vs. the $59.99 Valve charges for the Steam version of Half-Life 2.That VU charges. You should know they do, and certainly before you go mouthing off about it.

Edit:We are going to reach one audience by delivering episodes through the internet and we will expand to another consumer group when the retail collection of episodes hits store shelvesWhat did I tell you? ;)

[Mason]

I bought HL2 through Steam. And since I'd absolutely never buy a SiN game if it involved having to look another human being in the eyes, offering it on Steam makes all kinds of sense.

[Mason]

This was funny. From the ancient Gamespot review of SiN:

But no one wants a game that doesn't work well out of the box, and it isn't fair to force a customer to download a multimegabyte patch just to justify the purchase (the beta version of the patch is more than 10MB). Activision should be shipping the patch to every registered customer, complete with a rebate and personalized apology.

How amazingly naive we all used to be...

[CapnAJ]

I like having the option of buying and downloading a game online without any fuss and in my own leisure, the box and crappy manuals I don't really care for and don't miss from doing it this way.

I really hate driving into town, looking for car parking space, fighting my way through dithering crowds of slow moving people, making my way through a tightly packed software store past sweaty youths and arriving at the till to have sarcastic comments thrown at me about my choice of game by a pathetic spotty youth who could clearly do with discovering women.

[AspectVoid]

25 minutes and I am leaving EBGames with a nice printed bag containing the gamebox. Sure if you live on a solitary peak in Himalayas, you may like the downloading process but I like to buy my games in stores.


I don't know about you, but I work 8 hours a day since I have things like bills and college loans to pay. Setting up a game d/l in the morning, and having the game when I get home with no need to go into an EBGames, Gamestop, or other store to waste more of my little remaining free time in a day is a good thing.

[TrackZero]

Ya know Evil, I would think you'd be a little more forward-thinking about the game industry. Sure as it stands right now alot of people would perfer a hard copy of whatever they're buying but as Mr. Nix mentioned it's becoming more common place to purchase 'digital' items. Music is the best example but there are others. Many individuals forked over cash just for some MAPS for Halo2 on the Xbox, and I believe Guild Wars intends to release content updates that cost roughly the same as an expansion pack but won't show up on store shelves. Digital Content Delivery is the future of gaming. It's already becoming the present of music. The movie and tv industries are gearing up for this as well. And this isn't just about Delivering Content Digitally, it's about game developer's selling their games directly without having to rely on and abide by big name publisher's like EA, Sierra, etc. Without having to sell their souls to a publisher game developer's will have more freedom to innovate with their titles. Give the guys at Ritual a chance, they're pioneering new territory in the gaming industry and a deserve something better than less-than-well-thought-out ridicule.

--Cr4sh

I've got to agree with the comment about 'time' as well. I simply don't have time to finish many of these 20-30+ hours to beat games these days (that's why I still haven't finished Psychonauts, Metroid Prime 2 and Resident Evil 4 yet, even though I'm in the final areas of all them). I'd definitely prefer games to be smaller and more episodic (that's one of the big reasons why I LOVED Republic Commando). If I can get away with paying $25 (Canadian) for a 10 hour long game with quality gameplay, that's good enough for me.

Now, I do still have a preference for a hardcopy however. It'd be nice to get a few chapters via steam and then after a few chapters are finished (let's say I bought chapters 1-3) to have a DVD copy mailed to me (as I don't like the idea of paying for a game that can end when the company goes under/vanishes).

[lpmiller]

all he said was more people were comfortable with downloading content (than the were before), which is true. Not that people prefered it in general.

[Ernst_Jager]

If it is a good game I don't care how I get it. Downloading is fine as long as it is availble to me when ever I need it again. Downloading a game with the ability to burn it to my own disc is fine as well.

[mister_slim]

I mostly rent games now, so not receiving a physical product is not a big deal. One of the primary reasons I rent is that I want to check out as many games as possible but most don't justify completion, much less full retail price. So I'm down with episodes, depending on price.

[Nakor]

Online distribution is fine ... until every company decides to use their own distribution method. How many of these content delivery/DRM systems will there be? I can think of four already off the top of my head; Steam, xStream (okay, that one's theorectical), TotalGaming.net and WildTangent. I'm betting there will be more. Will they all "play nice" together, or will they suck your system resources dry?

The other nice thing about buying a traditionally distributed game is that I can trade it, sell it, or install that game years from now, all without having to get "permission". I suppose it's possible that the DRM will be unlocked on these games if the company folds or whatever, but if it's a download only game, hopefully there is a method of making backups of the downloaded content (I know Steam has such a method)...