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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desura
https://www.pcmag.com/news/microsoft-to-shut-down-zune-services-yes-zune
If it'd ever happen, the most probable chain of events is Steam providing a timeframe for their users to make backups of the games in their libraries prior to closure. See the Desura example above.
But not every game in Steam is sold in GOG.
You are referring to the dumb claim that Steam will just remove DRM from all games? As if it's in THEIR power to decide...
Besides, removing DRM wouldn't help at all, except for the games you happen to have installed at the time. And even then, you'd loose them eventually. The thing is, with Steam going away, the downloads go away as well... it's not like you can go bankrupt and keep your servers running ad infinitum...
There are, however, a few more points to consider. At this stage, I'd say it's unlikely that Steam will just decide "guys, we decided to shut down next week. It was a nice time, but we're moving on now. See you somewhere else!". In other words, there will probably be a noticeable decline, so people will already have purchased a lot of their games elsewhere.
Or, if Steam does want to shut down despite being relevant, they'll probably not just flip that big red handle from "on" to "off", watch the lights and monitors go out and the whirring of the disks turn silent, and lock the door behind them. Chances are, they'll try to sell it off.
And while Steam is alive, and possible even during a bankruptcy, publishers always have the option to offer you a "get license on that platform if you have one on Steam". Many won't do that, but some probably will.
Welcome to 2006 OP. Isn’t DRM great?
Don’t worry about it because the world governments will never let this happen. They need you to be occupied by your videogames so you don’t pay attention to them robbing us all blind. You will always have your videogames, forever and ever and ever and ever….
But, as has also been remarked, that's merely what they say they'll do. It's not even a legally-binding promise, so they don't actually have to honor any of that.
Besides, given the size of Steam's catalogue and userbase, I think it's far more likely that Steam will be sold off than will just go out of business. And even if Valve/GabeN had the best of intentions, all bets are off if Steam is sold to someone else.
Perhaps more practically, instead of considering the possibility of Steam as a whole shutting down, it might be useful to consider that you may lose access to your games due to losing access to your own Steam account, for various possible reasons, including:
* simply losing your login info and also losing ways to recover it
* being hijacked or at least subjected to an attempt at account hijacking (which may lock you out even if the hijacker can't successfully log in)
* losing partial functionality to your account (for various other reasons, e.g. some sort of payment dispute from your credit card) which may cause you to need to make a new Steam account and maybe juggle multiple Steam accounts
Ultimately, being a DRM mechanism, Steam isn't really built to guarantee indefinite service. So long as it's still in operation and you haven't had anything weird happen to you, it'll probably be okay, but if you're concerned, try to get your games in some sort of DRM-free form.
GOG was mentioned, but it's probably useful to keep in mind that they're not the only store that sells game DRM-free.
Heck, even some games on Steam can be made to run without Steam running, thus becoming de facto DRM-free -- though the methods may or may not be legally questionable, so use at your own risk I guess.
Speaking of legality, I don't know that it's ever been tested in court whether you should continue to have legal access to your games. But, in my opinion, ethically speaking, you ought to, as long as you've bought and paid for them fair and square.
Counter Strike is an indie game and the first "non-valve" game was an indie game too. I'd rather say it's the other way around.
Rather than worry about keeping things forever...enjoy them while you got'em. There's no gaming in heaven, so enjoy them while you're down here.
It would largely depend on all the circumstances of why Steam ceased to exist. There are scenarios where you'd be up a creek. But Valve is also one of the most profitable companies per employee on the planet, so instances where they get bought out or run out of money don't seem plausible.
So slow decline seems like the most plausible scenario to me. Going out like K-mart. Consumer wants and demographics shift away from PC games , revenue declines year over year. The writing is on the wall, but there's always hope for a recovery. Until...
But that's not an eventuality, just a possibility, and right now, not on the horizon.
Upside is you can imagine any optimistic scenario that you want, downside is you can imagine any catastrophic scenario that you want.
Valve were indie back then.
For a start the claim about being worried that you COULD lose your games in a heartbeat is obviously true. We CANNOT know the future, so all the sweet words about Valve allowing a timeframe to downlaod the games or have DRM removed may be nice intent but that does NOT mean it'll happen. It might be WAY beyond their control.
So what I do is this. When digital distribution first started, I immediately realised this problem. I wasn't hapy with forking out for something I have no copy of. Especailyl for me - I'm someone who keeps every game they've bought even right back to 1976 or so. I still play them and I wawnt that to continue.
SO my decision was simple - I CANNOT do this with digital distribution. It will always remain a risk that I could lose them at any time. SO I simply made the deceision there and then to pay LESS for these games.
I never buy games anywhere near release anyway on physical copies, so I simply have my own value applied to each game based on how they review, and with digital games I knock more off.
Then it simply becomes an acceptable gamble.
As far as I'm concnered this is the best thing you can do.
Reminder: indie is a bastardization of In-De - Independent Developer, which is any independent development studio - whether they be self-publishing, like Valve is, or actively negotiating with publishers to publish games through them, but not work for them.
The crux is that they hold the rights to their own IPs and build their own games under their own direction.
Contrast with third-party studios owned in whole or part by publishers; or studios that live on publishers contracting out to them to develop titles based on IPs held by those publishers; or e.g. do the work for platform-specific ports.