ACCOUNT RESTRICTIONS PETITION (STEAMDECK RELATED)

[SirHallin]

I have been an extremely loyal customer for the 13-ish years i have been on here. I have spent an insane amount of money in that time. This is not about entitlement based on sunk cost, but a plea for something that is a tough decision on valves part, family sharing and more importantly a single account spread across multiple devices. The ability to access all of your purchased content unrestricted is a feature of different launchers, by different companies with different goals and ethics.

There are scenarios that pop up, such as the adoption of a steamdeck, where in spite of designing a portable device which could encourage a household spread of gaming and result in more games purchased with less barriers to play, they (valve) are still limiting the customers to playing one game on one device. Those of us with a spare laptop have experienced this, you cannot offer your computer up to your child or sibling or spouse while you simply game on another device, no there is a seemingly arbitrary restriction of how those games can be launched and played. One user, and one user only.

Having multiple users with multiple accounts does not necessarily encourage game sales, i can think of many scenarios in my household where its actually prevented me from buying a title. I think many of you can as well.

I am asking for feedback from those of us who feel this way, and even a little criticism, because i know that what im asking for leads to fear of a netflix style slippery slope of account sharing fears.. I get why valve would protect that policy. But they are turning a corner by introducing the steamdeck, and have in the past offered up many good guy valve features such as family share. I think there is an argument that could persuade them.

Maybe it could come with some compromises and restrictions such as geolocation features, or maybe its too much of a hassle...but i dont think valve think in those terms, I have read about their company structure, and how they operate, and while there may be reasons to be pessimistic, i think there are genuinely some great things to like about the people at valve and what they hope to achieve in this space. If there is some level where this argument not only reaches some valve eyeballs, it might mean a naive hope for some of us who want to continue to see them grow.

Im aware that this is a forum that they hardly get the chance to look at, but i think its worth saying something, even if it only attracts trolls and seaguls swooping in to drop a load on the whole idea.

(Skip to page 6-7 for when actual productive conversation begins)

[SirHallin]

Originally posted by Tito Shivan:

Originally posted by Quint the Alligator Snapper:

Um, dude, you literally just ended up arguing against friends coming over to play games on the basis that "Devs and publishers turning a blind eye to enforcing certain uses does neither imply permission nor future avaiability."

Wonder why I don't see so many couch coop games anymore.

Corporate apologism aside, do you really feel like the rentseeking megapublishers of the video game industry are managing their money or IP well enough to the point where the choice to not include local co-op is the customer's fault? Or is it because they are minmaxing and doing game design by information gathering to create the common denominator most profitable money vacuum? Because if that's your argument against sharing, that the types of games don't exist because of players or profitability metrics you are exposing yourself as a schill.

[fluxtorrent]

Oh ok, I was wrong, the intent was definitely not there. Definitely just entitled with phrases like "corporate apologism" used to dismiss honest points.

[SirHallin]

Originally posted by fluxtorrent:

Oh ok, I was wrong, the intent was definitely not there. Definitely just entitled with phrases like "corporate apologism" used to dismiss honest points.

Honest points how? Corporate apologism is rank in this chat.

[fluxtorrent]

Originally posted by SirHallin:

Originally posted by fluxtorrent:

Oh ok, I was wrong, the intent was definitely not there. Definitely just entitled with phrases like "corporate apologism" used to dismiss honest points.

Honest points how? Corporate apologism is rank in this chat.

So is "entitled tantrum" if we are just going to be dismissive rather than actually address the points

[SirHallin]

Originally posted by fluxtorrent:

Originally posted by SirHallin:

Honest points how? Corporate apologism is rank in this chat.

So is "entitled tantrum" if we are just going to be dismissive rather than actually address the points

Are you aware that people can see a history of your posting behavior? Mine only goes back to about this chat, maybe some smaller conversations...yours is a massive history of you being constantly available to dunk on threads without contributing much. Are you not ashamed? self reflection is good, it's how people improve. Being equipped with rebuttals is not being dismissive, it's being capable of argument.

[fluxtorrent]

Then feel free to actually provide rebuttals instead of dismissals. Kinda funny you'd go this route with the one person in the thread who disagreed with you but actually defended you before this point.

[Quint the Alligator Snapper]

Originally posted by SirHallin:

I would rather stick to the main arguments, but some people keep cycling back to weak defenses of policy over function and it definitely gets under my skin how people keep passively rattling off the EULA like it's a biblical verse or axiom that can't change.

The irony of using legal documents to say that stuff is what it is and won't change is that legal documents are amended regularly and frequently. Neither GOG (whose user agreement keeps getting copypasted by someone) nor Steam itself are exceptions.

[SirHallin]

Originally posted by fluxtorrent:

The people who consider themselves customers rather than users get stuck in the middle of that cold war.

WELL SAID! This is the productivity I want.

[SirHallin]

Also I completely admit that I AM FALABLE. which is why I was hoping for other people to engage on behalf of the topic when I can't. I'm at work right now and it's easy for me to let that bleed into my posts. Lol

[fluxtorrent]

Originally posted by SirHallin:

Also I completely admit that I AM FALABLE. which is why I was hoping for other people to engage on behalf of the topic when I can't. I'm at work right now and it's easy for me to let that bleed into my posts. Lol

No worries man, it happens. And I wont deny my return on the "corporate apolgism" was caustic, just how I am, part of my sarcastic Canadian upbringing lol

[SirHallin]

Originally posted by fluxtorrent:

Originally posted by SirHallin:

Also I completely admit that I AM FALABLE. which is why I was hoping for other people to engage on behalf of the topic when I can't. I'm at work right now and it's easy for me to let that bleed into my posts. Lol

No worries man, it happens. And I wont deny my return on the "corporate apolgism" was caustic, just how I am, part of my sarcastic Canadian upbringing lol

Oh I can imagine. I also think your country would love to dig into steams anti consumer policies, your people don't play around with that!

[fluxtorrent]

Originally posted by SirHallin:

Originally posted by fluxtorrent:

No worries man, it happens. And I wont deny my return on the "corporate apolgism" was caustic, just how I am, part of my sarcastic Canadian upbringing lol

Oh I can imagine. I also think your country would love to dig into steams anti consumer policies, your people don't play around with that!

Eh most of their policies are supported by law here, our government LOVES regulation like that.

label everything, write out what is and isnt allowed in the agreements, and then thats that.

You agree to buy peaches as is, you get them as is! Oh, they are rotten, well thats as is!

[Tito Shivan]

Originally posted by SirHallin:

Originally posted by Tito Shivan:

Wonder why I don't see so many couch coop games anymore.

Corporate apologism aside, do you really feel like the rentseeking megapublishers of the video game industry are managing their money or IP well enough to the point where the choice to not include local co-op is the customer's fault?

In a simplistic manner? No.
In a complex set of intertwined factors, far from the black-or-white world the forums love so much? It is definetly a factor.

Why spend time in developing couch-coop options when the internet exists, people got used to play through it instead, allowing us to sell twice the copies?

[Nx Machina]

Originally posted by SirHallin:

Epic being anti consumer doesn't bother me, it's not a gotcha. I agree with you. This is about how steam could be better than it's objectively WORSE competition. Deception is built into markets, it's something that is already considered. To make an omelet you have to do what??

Steam is already better it has Family Sharing.

Abuse of this system on the other hand is why it is the way it is and there is the very obvious developers, publishers agreed to it and can disable it at any time.

Personally i think Valve should remove it.

As for deception - trust if worthless when those willing to deceive take an amoral low ground and rewrite, reinvent their own interpretation of what is acceptable and CDPR doomed themselves by actually trusting others not to share but to actually BUY a copy for others including immediate family.

As stated they should rename DRM free to WaC (Want a Copy) because that is the amoral low ground some stand on to justify sharing a copy they only purchased once. They would take a moral high ground if their income was affected.


It hasn't changed since it was introduced - may be that is the part you are missing especially when numerous threads have not changed the status quo.

It is like GeForce Now - it is optional for developers, publishers, it definitely not mandatory nor is the requirement to open up Family Sharing further.

[Black Blade]

Originally posted by Quint the Alligator Snapper:

...despite local co-op games still being quite common and one of the most successful game franchises ever (Smash) having local co-op -- if you're looking for something to "blame", you should blame the following first:

"local co-op games still being quite common," I wish... I so wish that was true
I am honestly hunting down local Co-Op games for a while, and there is so little out there outside of
1. Fighting games
2. racing games

I really find it a shame for myself I love playing with someone else locally but finding games for it is harder and harder to do, besides the topics above that honestly are getting old
I want somet,hing with some progress and story going on.. and for now, the latest I got was It takes two, is amazing but sadly rare.
I do however agree that I do not think it's related to here and is not showing developers trying to block it or anything

Originally posted by Quint the Alligator Snapper:

And right now if you're playing a shared game from another library and that library's owner starts playing something, you have like 5 minutes before you're kicked off. So the same would happen if the owner of that game changes IP (which includes changing location, unless perhaps everyone in the family shares one mobile hotspot).

Now, sure, you could also have the owner play with Offline Mode, but that's something you can already do, as I've pointed out.

What I am mostly trying to say is this opens a lot of possible bad experiences for users and confusion, such as users in the same household where one turns to mobile network for one reason or another.. suddenly you got a warning you going to be kicked out while in the same home

The network changes its IP the owner just got back in or something and it thinks your not in the same place

And this ignores how easy will it be to create a central station that will act as a redirector of the communication to make a house for a network of accounts

Originally posted by Quint the Alligator Snapper:

The whole point of this change is to provide more flexibility to a player within the same family (which, as a practical matter, can be approximated as a household), while cutting down on the ability to let one's friends walk off with access to the game. The IP address restriction would allow Family Sharing to do more of actual sharing in the family, allowing more simultaneous play from the same library, while preventing the abuse that could come from just loosening that on its own.

Maybe but IP honestly is a terrible way to do this whatever the case, its not reliable for detecting anything honestly that is what I am mostly trying to get at
As said before, if at all, you be much better using in house network (LAN) to beam connection between accounts and make sure they're in the same house
It's easier most likely to put in, less prone to issues of the network going down or the like, and is much more direct
Even though it does don't block the option to create a virtual local network to bypass it as well

Originally posted by Quint the Alligator Snapper:

The irony of using legal documents to say that stuff is what it is and won't change is that legal documents are amended regularly and frequently. Neither GOG (whose user agreement keeps getting copypasted by someone) nor Steam itself are exceptions.

I can't tell about others, but I personally think we need to take the legal matter not as "things will not change" but as the idea of where developers and publishers put their limit on what they can or can't allow and to try and apply from it what they may want to apply
As we are unlikely to get all the developers to come by and talk to us about their views and is what we got to see about it
Mostly about cases of no DRM that is what most talk about
That is the reason of what is allowed and not without DRM, which is basically the same rules as much as I can see as Steam has

About the part of you allowed or not allowed to share
And we need to remember that yes people will abuse it if you open the door for it
And for developers to even agree to take it, we need to balance what is good for users and what is good for publishers and not try to say "its great for users" and ignore the publishers and developers

Regarding offline connection, I do not think its a mistake, its part of the benefit for users to cut down issues that can happen to the users
As said before its all about balancing if they did not do it, it would have likely made family sharing very problematic for the users to use