Unread postby Coconut » 21 Jun 2011, 20:42
To add to the discussion about the good or bad of Steam, I'm noticing something going on with the patches for Civ V that is interesting. The patches are huge; it's major surgery that is still being applied to the game. It's not just a bit of repair work, they're seriously changing things, even adding features, resources and buildings!
I think this is Steam related; I don't think the Civ team would have done this if all Civ V owners would have had to manually patch their game all the time with this new stuff. However, since patching happens automatically when the connection to Steam is enabled it seems the game makers have taken bigger liberties when applying patches.
Not everybody considers this a good thing. Read the Civ V forums and you will find some fans saying the game should have included all the new stuff already from the start. Also some are complaining that they have to learn to play the game again, so radical are the changes. Most seem to be happy with what they view as ongoing improvements of the game, though.
I'm in the camp that holds the positive view. Not about Steam itself; initially I hated the idea of being lumped with that, but if it leads to ongoing development of the game, and eventually a better game, then I'm changing my mind.
I've seen too many games released that were promising, but would have been great if only the game developers had spent more time on it instead of only applying the most basic of patch work. If the Steam deal helps game makers actually finishing their game, which in itself is a great thing of course, then I'm more than willing to live with Steam. In the end it's about the game.
