Steam only release...

[Chris James]

Take heart Steam naysayers, Steam is a great service.

In light of reading of some negativity here about the Steam service, I thought I might share with you a recent experience I had with Steam.

A short while ago, I bought an old title on Steam. I've since finished the title, and noticed that there are 2 DLC's for the title available at Steam, but only as a big package with the game I already bought. The titles were also available at the game studio's website, but to buy them, I would have to spend real money to buy points, then spend the points to buy the DLC's, and create a new account with this company, and get a new e-mail account that I did not want, and give up all of my personal info again. On top of that, it would cost twice as much this way as it would through Steam. I won't name the company, but it rhymes with GreedyGiveMeAllYourInfoAndMoneySoft.

I contacted Steam and told them that I recently bought a game, and that I didn't realize that there was DLC available for that game, and that it would be cheaper to buy the big package. They said "No problem, buy the big package and we'll refund the other purchase." Just like that. No begging, apologizing, or crying. Steam helped me out, even thought I had made a mistake, and they had no fault in that mistake. In that moment Steam earned a loyal customer for life.

I know you're thinking "cool story bro," but what does that have to do with me or Assetto Corsa?" Well, I thought that Steam deserved to have a little good press here after how well they handled my situation. It was argued here by some that Steam sucks. We are all entitled to our opinion, and a negative opinion is certainly to be expected if you've had a bad experience with Steam. But sometimes the good can cancel out the bad. Give Steam a second chance. They certainly earned it with me, and I'm happy to give them my money for AC.

Rant over.

 

[Simon Kaminski]

Thanks it was a good read

 

[Stelios]

Lets keep it civilized people ...

 

[Marcel Pfister]

Steam rocks!!!

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

I f***in love steam! I'll gladly pay up to €5-€8 more for the game on Steam than what it is in the store, just to not have to deal with the physical box, broken or lost CD/DVD, collecting dust, having to keep tabs on a serial etc. It's all there for me to download when I want it, easy and hasslefree, perfect for lazy people like me!

 

[Ian Strom]

I like Steam for the sales.. until my internet connection goes down or it tries to push a 5GB update without asking me and after changing a game back to auto update after I set it to not.

The inability to revert to a previous version of a game can also be annoying.

but yea. Sales are my main reason for using steam and occasionally buying games I would otherwise ignore.

However I am not going to pay steam more for a digital copy that I would pay for a boxed copy. That is completely backward.

 

[Mapu]

[...] Sales are my main reason for using steam and occasionally buying games I would otherwise ignore.

However I am not going to pay steam more for a digital copy that I would pay for a boxed copy. That is completely backward.

This.

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

I don't disagree to that, but in this particular matter I'm willing to pay for convenience, if I can afford it then why not?
If the price is a lot higher on steam and theres a option to register the key then it's a different matter, then I'll buy it and throw the hardware in the trash once it's registered.

 

[Kenny Paton]

Like yourself Chris, I've had no real problems with Steam and have no hesitation in using it. It's fair to say that the vast bulk of users don't have issues. However it seems that when it does go wrong for some it does so spectacularly. Then there is a sense that customer service is badly lacking and doesn't really care about the minority. That may only be a perception but there is enough evidence lying about the internet to make a case for better care for the customer.

Since this is a show Steam some love thread, I will finish by saying I like it for it's sales and convenience and in comparison to some other digital platforms is excellent.

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

The poor customer service perception is true for ANY company of that magnitude though. I've worked at a major company within IT, and even though we focused intently on giving the best customer experience possible, sometimes it just does not work out that way for some customers.
That might be down to the individual the customer happened to get in touch with having a bad day for instance. Also, some of these customers who are screaming loudest about how bad customer service is, are people who demand things they haven't paid for, I'll give you an example;

There was this one case of a customer who called in and said he had accidently dropped his computer in the floor and since it was broken he would like to get a new one on the insurance he paid for. As per standard procedure we asked how it all happened and for him to send some images of the computer so we could assess the damage and if it was repairable or needed to swap.
When we got these pictures it was evident that this was no accident, the damage did in no way relate to his story of what had happened (basically he said he dropped it in the floor, the laptop was broken into an angle on the middle like someone had tried to wrap it around the corner of a house).
We told the customer that we sadly couldn't give him a new computer because this did not look like a accident, that the damage was too severe in relation to what he said had happened. Now he changed his story, he had tripped and fell and holding the computer with both hands in front of him he fell towards a table in the hallway and the computer hit the end of the table with his bodyweight behind and that was why it was bent like it was (if you ask me, an accident like that would still not impose the kind of damage to the computer that the pictures showed).
We told the customer that we still could not repair it, and he got mad, he was going to tell the whole world how bad our customer service was!
And so he did, he blogged about it, my boss was looking at the case and found this guys blog where he complained about how bad our customer service was. On the same blog we also found a video of the same guy, helping a fellow student smash her laptop to bits so she could call support and get a new one (this was actually said in the video).

TLR: he intentionally broke his laptop and called in for a new one on insurance, when he didn't get one because it was evident it was a scam, he started screaming on the interwebs that we had poor customer service and was ripping him off.

Now I'm not saying that this is the case every time, just saying that one can't look at the negative comments alone for several reasons. Sometimes peoples miscontent with customer service is down the the customer having the wrong expectations of what they are supposed to get. Sometimes it's the Customer Service Rep who had a bad day, was new at their job, didn't follow procedure and so on, but that doesn't mean the entire company is bad.

 

[Tom]

The poor customer service perception is true for ANY company of that magnitude though. I've worked at a major company within IT, and even though we focused intently on giving the best customer experience possible, sometimes it just does not work out that way for some customers.
That might be down to the individual the customer happened to get in touch with having a bad day for instance. Also, some of these customers who are screaming loudest about how bad customer service is, are people who demand things they haven't paid for, I'll give you an example.

Thing is: even if 99% of your customers are satisfied, the remaining 1% will still be louder. It's simple: unsatisfied customers are always trying to vent whilst the satisfied ones are unlikely to raise their voice, ever.

As for Steam: I've had to deal with their customer support several times and from my experience it's plain bad. Not only did it take them days to get back to me (well, that can happen depending on the workload) but they didn't even care to check the context (resulting in wrong answers) and subsequently started to ignore me when I asked how to file a complaint about their behaviour. I've spend lots of time in customer support myself, I'm not the kind of person to insult people working in CS - but there's a fine line that no CS employee should cross.

Even when I asked them to read the ticket history, they didn't care to...and sent me the wrong reply (as in asking for the wrong things to send them) once again. I had to copy / paste the whole initial ticket every time I sent them a reply, adjusting it according to the last reply I had gotten.

 

[Paul Bennett]

I'm happy with Steam it's the way forward in PC gaming. Will be interesting to see how successful their valve console turns out.

oh yes I do have one gripe shame they can't find a way to get RBR into the system

 

[Justin Swan]

Contacted steam once and they basically told me try things that I had already explained that I'd tried so they didn't tell me to try what I've already tried!!! Confused?

I googled the fix in the end.

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Sounds like they do have a shitty support then, I've seen that before

 

[Paul Bennett]

I'm happy with Steam it's the way forward in PC gaming. Will be interesting to see how successful their valve console turns out.

oh yes I do have one gripe shame they can't find a way to get RBR into the system

@Shadow Explorer my first dislike oh well

 

[Shadow Explorer]

I do believe steam is THE way for moving backwards,at least as much as costumer\consumer rights are concerned.This explains why.
I assume now you will have the chance to dislike my post as well

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Each to his own, I reckon that in 20 years or so we won't be buying our games any longer, we'll be "renting" them through a service kinda like Netflix and Spotify.
I for one embrace this future, I don't care about owning the game, I care about playing it.

 

[MarcG]

I quite like Steam & Origin, good to have things all in one place but yeah can turn nasty if you lose details and have to go through customer support for a game you blatantly own.
Owning hard copies is soooo last decade for me, stopped buying music CD's about 5 years ago...all that's digital now, time to move with the times people.

*Of course if you are in an under priviledged country and have trouble with payments on Steam I fully understand your predicament

 

[Mapu]

jezz i must be old school still having vinyl at home
back on topic

 

[Samuel Fuller]

I also stopped buying cds.
I started buying vinyl instead.