Why Steam for Skyrim is legally dangerous for you

[Jerbsinator]

That's why you don't (or at least I don't) purchase full retail price games on Steam. I only purchase games that are on sale and if there is a new release I just get a retail copy. Steam has GREAT sales on a regular basis and really it's not that big of a deal for me to log onto steam to play a game. If privacy is an issue for you Steam is probably the least of your worries. Any time you go out of your house you're probably being watched by someone.

[Drugas]

Greg' date=' this is a thread for fanatical [s']worry[/s] steam support. Don't try and bring facts into it.

Fixed it for ya.

Seriously, you don't see the "steam is bad" side trying to pretend that their opposition here is something they aren't.

 

I'm not calling anyone a republican nutjob who is sitting on the US/Mexico border with a gun to keep Mexicans out or anything. But the same level of extremism, someone who wears tinfoil hats to keep the aliens out of their brains, yep, that accusation was made against those who "worry".

 

The point of the OP is: Be careful what choices you make, and think of taking some standard precautions to protect yourself.

Less of the "OMG GRAB YOURSELF A HARDHAT AND GET IN THE NUCLEAR SHELTER BECAUSE BOMBS ARE DROPPING!!!" and more of "You live in a place that can have floods and has flooded historically, so prepare an emergency kit in case one happens."

 

Also, EA is older than it's controversies.

[afro-herbalist]

It wasn't my intent to paint anyone as something they aren't' date=' but in my opinion this thread has a lot of misinformation and needless worrying. Even if the worries are valid in principle, it's not an overnight transition from having freedom to government goons breaking down your door over a sex mod.

[/quote']

 

 

Give it 10 years. The whole world will be under a "Cult of steam Personality" regim, like North Korea. The true purpose of steam has nothing to with games, or even PC's, oh no, its something MUCH worse than that. It has something to do with Stone-henge and the phantom island of Hy-Brasil, thats all I'll say, cos "enemies and ears, their everywhere". North Korea has nothing to say on the matter either, not surprising, seeing as Kim Jong Il was discovered to be the secret manager of Steams networks, denied when questioned of course.

 

Wheres Mulder & Scully?

[labrat]

Steam may be OK, or may not. I choose not to have any processes running with an internet connection that I do not control. Therefore I run from the TESV.exe and will only use steam for activation and updates.

 

The principle used to be "better safe than sorry". Those who question Steam seem more reasonable in their concerns than its derisive supporters would have you believe. That in itself is quite telling.

 

If I genuinely thought Steam was a worthy system I would be moderate in my enthusiasm.

 

I would not want to accidentally become or be labelled as a "Judas Goat".

 

 

 

see "en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judas_goat" for further info. (While you still can )

[Mashi]

Well you could simply flip steam into offline mode, and it does absolutely nothing except act as a local launcher for games that require 'on demand' steam execution for DRM. No packets sent, no packets received, it acts in full stand alone mode.

[kengie2]

i believe if you copy the skyrim folder from steam to a stand alone folder and run TESV.exe only the game shouldn't use steam. i think by doing this can be a good thing for people who doesnt want steam running along with Lovers mod or whatever mod they will have in future.

 

i think the main point of skyrim supporting steam is actually to be able to patch the clients right away when its needed.

[Mashi]

Well steam patched the exe today, no more running it without steam. If people want a copy of the unpatched version I'm sure it'll be available everywhere.

[Jexsam]

It's thing like this that only serve to reinforce peoples' irrational fear of Steam...

[galgat]

here is a Point for the steam lovers.

 

 

 

Bethesda quietly rolled out a patch to the PC version of Skyrim last night. The 18MB patch didn't do anything drastic to the game, but it did tie the game more closely to Valve's Steam service, meaning that the game can now no longer be started simply by running the "TESV.exe" file in the game directory -- it must now be started through Steam. This is, essentially, adding a layer of DRM to the game which wasn't present before.

 

You might not think that this sounds like a major change, but it does stymie the use of a popular patch for PC players with more than 2GB of system RAM. The "large address aware" patch improved the stability of the game -- the PC version is occasionally prone to sudden, silent crashes to desktop -- and also allowed the game to support more in the way of modifications and tweaks on 64-bit operating systems, offering the potential to improve the visuals a great deal for those with the hardware to handle it.

 

Now that little tweak is useless.

 

check this one out. pretty good debate going.

 

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/11/22/skyrim-patched-for-the-worse/

 

something else to consider. It is a quote from another user.. Not mine, but it is valid.

 

***********************

 

Steam can just reactivate the auto-updates any ol’ time it pleases, so the feature is worthless. If you really want to stop a game from being updated automatically, you have to go into the Steam folder, find the game, and make everything in that game’s folder “read-only.” I had to do this for Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines. Otherwise it patches my game into an unplayable mess.

 

************************

[Vyrce]

The disabling of being able to use LAA has more or less been fixed.

 

http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=1013

 

though admittedly i had to back up my saves folder and re-install skyrim to get it to work.

 

not that that took very long....

 

Edit: same person responsible for the FNV one.

 

 

[galgat]

If it works, but what is terrible is Beth & steam messe it up, and to some extent a Cracker has to fix it.

[Guest Donkey]

Latest silent patch screwed up 9/10 people. plus the game is now fully unstable.. way to go.. instead of fixing it they broke it even more.

 

Both Bethesda and Steam are to blame for it. The forums every where are flooded with angry customers.

 

Anyway if your windows 7 user seems there is a fix to revert back, just right click Skyrim directory click on previous version and revert the game to working state.

[gregathit]

Goes back to modders first rule. Always back things up. Hell I made a backup of the exe the moment the game was unlocked! So the hell with the patch I just reverted back to the old exe and used CFF to make it large address aware again and BOOM playing. F Beth and Steam for this shameful nonsense!

[pepecristo]

Ok, long time lurker wanting to say a little something about this patch: I doubt Steam had anything to do with it. Let me explain.

 

There are a lot of games on Steam that do not require to be run from Steam, or even don't require Steam to be open, and neither Steam nor Valve ever said a thing, never enforced something like this.

 

However, there is another theory, which I find might make much more sense: Skyrim is, if not the first, one of the first games to force you not to activate the game key at it's intended region, but also forces you to play from it. Those of you familiar with CDKey "grey legal area" sites probably have an idea of what I'm saying, but for those who don't:

 

There are a lot of websites that sell CDKeys for lower prices than retail or digital distributors; in most cases, they buy the games in eastern europe countries where they can find them for cheap, then they resell to the rest of the world for a not-quite-legal-not-quite-illegal profit; it's a very grey and weird area, that in which they operate.

Point is, there've been some games for some time, that enforced the key to be activated at the same region that it was purchased at; most people loopholed this with some methods which I will not name or discuss here, but point is, it's far from being a perfect defense against the CDKey market.

 

Bethesda has taken it to the next level; If you bought the game from eastern europe, you must, at all times, play the game from eastern europe; If their servers find out you're playing from any other region, the game won't launch. But, since this is a Steamworks game, instead of Bethesda, it was Steam who handled the region detection (IP based, I suppose). And being able to run the game from outside of Steam was a pretty, quick and easy loophole to buy the game, activate using X or Y method, then play normally just running the .exe, without further complications; I believe Bethesda probably wasn't very happy about this, and that's what triggered the tighter Steam integration.

 

This all, of course, is just my humble opinion, just my 2 cents (and then some more, holy walls of text).

[galgat]

Latest silent patch screwed up 9/10 people. plus the game is now fully unstable.. way to go.. instead of fixing it they broke it even more.

 

Both Bethesda and Steam are to blame for it. The forums every where are flooded with angry customers.

 

Anyway if your windows 7 user seems there is a fix to revert back' date=' just right click Skyrim directory click on previous version and revert the game to working state.[/quote']

 

Yes I read it is very unstable now.

 

I bought my game, I actually bought 2 copies at wally World $60.00 each or like 59.99 or something like that.. I am not A Pirate.

 

But I have made my own installation, and have not activated with steam Yet.( My registration codes have never been used I may have to eventually, but I will avoid it as long as I can ). So I am fine, and My game has only crashed once in all my time ( which has been a lot..LOL), and I think that was my fault, I was tinkering with settings, and caused it.

 

I do have the first patch installed as well, but not this last, trick that Beth made you all install. So for now I am very happy..

[labrat]

Glad that I've been running off the .exe and watching to see how downloads from Steam work.

 

@Gregathit, I've backed up the .exe, but is it possible for Beth/Steam to jigger the .esm so that a patch will necessitate their steam driven .exe?

 

I reiterate, I have no particular gripe with Steam as a commercial enterprise, carving their slice out of the interweb hog, but on principle I don't like to use anything that reduces the great strength of the internet - privacy. Sure, protect your commercial property, but not at the expense of liberty.

 

Remember that there are people out there who are committed to "putting the genie back into the bottle". The key to that is to end anonymity. The scum who hide behind so many "Thiiink of the CHiiildren!!" campaigns can see the commercial and political advantages of that one straight away. They don't pull strings at Steam, or Bethesda. Probably. But they will use what gifts we give them, and "Give an inch they'll take a mile" is a saying some of us seem to have forgotten.

 

Remember that in the stories it is bloody difficult to force a Djinn back into a bottle, but even a simple fisherman can trick one into getting back in of its own accord.

 

 

Oh, and of course, I get a much better performance if Steam isn't running.

 

 

[oblivioner]

I hate to point this out to everyone, probably because it's likely already been pointed out already, but...

 

All the US ISPs already freely let the NSA and any other government body sift through all of their traffic as is. They don't need to scan your hard drive with steam or origin.

[labrat]

@oblivioner

 

I'm not sure if that is entirely accurate, or rather, if true of the US, globally applicable. However, to counter covert snooping, there is a large "alter-net" that ensures (to a degree) that Internet activity bypasses those who do listen at ISP keyholes. Unfortunately Steam and similar systems may make participation in some areas less easy for those who do not wish to be monitored continuously.

[gregathit]

Glad that I've been running off the .exe and watching to see how downloads from Steam work.

 

@Gregathit' date=' I've backed up the .exe, but is it possible for Beth/Steam to jigger the .esm so that a patch will necessitate their steam driven .exe?

 

I reiterate, I have no particular gripe with Steam as a commercial enterprise, carving their slice out of the interweb hog, but on principle I don't like to use anything that reduces the great strength of the internet - privacy. Sure, protect your commercial property, but not at the expense of liberty.

 

Remember that there are people out there who are committed to "putting the genie back into the bottle". The key to that is to end anonymity. The scum who hide behind so many "Thiiink of the CHiiildren!!" campaigns can see the commercial and political advantages of that one straight away. They don't pull strings at Steam, or Bethesda. Probably. But they will use what gifts we give them, and "Give an inch they'll take a mile" is a saying some of us seem to have forgotten.

 

Remember that in the stories it is bloody difficult to force a Djinn back into a bottle, but even a simple fisherman can trick one into getting back in of its own accord.

 

 

Oh, and of course, I get a much better performance if Steam isn't running.

 

 

[/quote']

 

It is possible that they may force us into using the steam patched exe in the upcoming update (eta is "soon" - whatever the hell that means ). But for now using the original exe has Zero drawbacks. Just keep that original exe backup handy in case Steam turns your Never auto update back on (I really hate it when they do that!!!!).

[calranthe]

There is always going to be paranoia and conspiracy theories no matter what, seems to be human nature just look at 2012.

 

I myself have over 100 people on my steam friends list, some of them the most perverted people you would ever know, long ago we switched from msn/yahoo/aol/icq to teamspeak + steam, these are people some of whome have perversions and fetishes that would not even be allowed in skyrim lol, personally and the way I used to run the greyarchive it was always "anything goes aslong as it is fiction even if laws didn't agree". The whole games related fanfiction genre comes up with things that only the japanese modders come close to.

 

No one I know has ever actually had issues in games or performance hits due to steam, being active, no one I know had ever had a game crash or a modable game cause any hassle due specifically to steam. (and yes most of us are tech heads who build our own pc's).

 

No one I know or have heard of in the news has ever had a steam game removed from there account and access to it removed (that would be comercial suicide for them)

 

 

Whenever I upgrade or build a pc for anyone after drivers/noscript/virus protection is steam and since 2004 when I first installed it (early teething problems) it has never done me wrong or caused those I know who use it wrong.

 

And my steam active pc's (I have two myself seperate accounts one copy of oblivion goty for modding and one on my main machine for playing). are the same pc's I have my greyarchive fiction collection etc.

 

 

I just do not know what to say to people, haters gona hate and lovers gona love, in my personal experience and those of people I trust steam has never violated that trust and thus I will always recommend it to my friends.

 

BTW even though EA and steam had a parting of ways I bought crysis 2 on steam I can still download that title and play it through steam even though it is now nolonger available as a steam game.

 

[galgat]

If you have never heard one of your 100 friend's that use teamspeak say I can't right now steam is doing and update.. I am truly amazed.

Or this last update steam did messed something up my game bigtime.

 

Sony players use to brag about how well everything was there, I heard all the PS3 is great things from them all the time.

 

When you put all your eggs in one basket, dropping the basket can destroy them all.

 

Sony has managed to recover sort of after the hackers laid waste to there system, some people I know could not play for well over a month.

 

I know some that are still trying to get there credit problems fixed from this. and a couple that are still trying to get Sony to believe that they truly had and account.

 

And some of them do not know yet what has been done to there credit. so many accounts pass around all over the world. I shutter to think, which one of the Identities the Hackers will pick to use next ( they still have every thing they took from sony ) They like bank robbers will wait till the serial numbers kool off on the Money they stole.

 

This same thing could happen to your wonderful steam account.. And it probably will. Keep bragging on how you server your server. I think it will catch up to you.

 

And I hate that I will eventually have to join the beast as well. Probably when they do the next patch, or they will tie the Construction kit to it. Which I think will be very sleazy, but is a likely development.

[calranthe]

I am not bragging I am stating facts from my experience and my friends experience please note that, no where in my posts did I at all speak for the entire of the steam world.

 

And no never had steam screw up a game for me.

 

BTW steam is having an absolutely rocking sale atm I just picked up 14 games for less than the price of one normal , Hell I just sent my mum mass effect 2 for 4.99 and mass effect 1 for 2.99.

 

I use a seperate bank account for all my online dealings steam/games etc which has no ability to have an overdraft or even a credit card attached (has a debit) and I only transfer enough money to that account for each purchase, my emails are locked down on a private server hosted in my living room linked to my rss display on my game keyboard giving me instant notification.

 

I am the main tech guy for all my friends like alot of us, self taught then HND and Bsc in computers, There is alot of things I do not trust todo with the internet but steam is not one of them.

 

All I can say is in MY experience and those of my friends steam has been pretty good to us yes it is a business and no I do not look at it with blinkered eyes, we used to have impulse on our pc's too until the day it was sold off to gamestop I sent message out and all of us removed it.

[galgat]

If Steam were and Option, as in a service I could choose to use or not, I think I could embrace it better, but it is forced on me, and I just do not like having someone tell me how I have to act or do.

 

That is probably my biggest complaint about steam. It is not something you can easily choose. You have no choice.

 

Except to do with out. Or be forced to make or use things, programs that make you feel dirty for doing it that way, and by the way it is legal to bypass DRM for software that you personally have purchased, and that you alone use.

 

The bottom line here is if a consumer breaks through the DRM on some software, they have purchased, what they do after that is the crucial determinant of whether they've run afoul of the DMCA.

 

for there own use they are fine, but start trying to sell it , or trade it, give it away in any way, and you are doing wrong stuff.

 

 

http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2010/07/26/judge-rules-that-circumventing-drm-is-not-illegal/

[labrat]

 

 

BTW steam is having an absolutely rocking sale atm I just picked up 14 games for less than the price of one normal Smile, Hell I just sent my mum mass effect 2 for 4.99 Smile and mass effect 1 for 2.99.

 

Sorry Calranthe, Couldn't resist that

 

I remember the GreyArchive with some affection, I think it was my intro to hentai fanfiction. Can't remember why I started avoiding it 'though - did you go down a "must accept cookies" route or something?

 

Oh, found another one.

 

 

 

 

[Siko]

 

Basically' date=' I'm sad to say, I'll buy Skyrim in a shop, but will install only a 'version without Steam' (let's call it that way) when one is available.

[/quote']

 

Then just bypass Steam. I hate Steam myself as it slows the game down with extra processes. Get the game and download a crack for it like I do for every game I buy, and BLAM no need for Steam. You will have to undo the crack for updates though and probaly have to doownload an updated crack to enjoy the updates with out dealing with Steam. Its worth it for me .