Bad New Games, AKA "Steam"
Relic has developed a lovely game in Dawn of War 2. Unfortunately, that lovely game is packaged inside a turd known as Steam. I've never gotten a game from Steam before, but I decided to just buy online because playing Dawn of War 2 requires a connection to Steam to play.
In owning Dawn of War 2 for less than 24 hours, I have had to download it twice, had repeated problems installing it once it was downloaded, and been told for over an hour now that Dawn of War 2 is "unavailable" when I wanted to play it (despite having a working internet connection). I just found out that "unavailable" really means "Steam updated in the background and has to be restarted, but we're too dumb to tell you that."
In short, I will never buy another game which requires Steam. Ever. Period. When I buy a game, I own that game. I want to be able to play the offline portion of that game whenever the hell I want to, even if my internet connection is dead.
The other part of Dawn of War 2 which sucks rocks is the "Windows Live" connection. I guess Microsoft is trying to do XBox Live for Windows. My first impression is very negative, as it really likes to pop things over the game while starting up. It also whines horribly if you have the gall to want to play an offline profile. It also has the world's worst UI. It also is not XBox Live, so you need to make a new profile instead of just using your existing one. In short, it has entirely detracted from my enjoyment of the game. I will factor in Windows Live as a negative in all future purchase decisions. The part of Windows Live that is most bizarre is this - I'm already logged into Steam with all its network crap, so why do I need another layer of network crap for chat and online play?
In short, the Dawn of War part of the game is lots of fun, but all the rest of the crap bolted onto it sucks. I really hope Relic listens to those of us bitching about this. I now own: Homeworld, Homeworld 2, Dawn of War (+3 expansions), Company of Heroes (+2 expansions) - a total of 9 games. I've enjoyed every one of these games made by Relic. Until today, I'd have said that I would buy any Relic game sight unseen without a qualm. As of today, I'm going to have to consider the effects of the crappy DRM and the crappy online play module they're using.
In owning Dawn of War 2 for less than 24 hours, I have had to download it twice, had repeated problems installing it once it was downloaded, and been told for over an hour now that Dawn of War 2 is "unavailable" when I wanted to play it (despite having a working internet connection). I just found out that "unavailable" really means "Steam updated in the background and has to be restarted, but we're too dumb to tell you that."
In short, I will never buy another game which requires Steam. Ever. Period. When I buy a game, I own that game. I want to be able to play the offline portion of that game whenever the hell I want to, even if my internet connection is dead.
The other part of Dawn of War 2 which sucks rocks is the "Windows Live" connection. I guess Microsoft is trying to do XBox Live for Windows. My first impression is very negative, as it really likes to pop things over the game while starting up. It also whines horribly if you have the gall to want to play an offline profile. It also has the world's worst UI. It also is not XBox Live, so you need to make a new profile instead of just using your existing one. In short, it has entirely detracted from my enjoyment of the game. I will factor in Windows Live as a negative in all future purchase decisions. The part of Windows Live that is most bizarre is this - I'm already logged into Steam with all its network crap, so why do I need another layer of network crap for chat and online play?
In short, the Dawn of War part of the game is lots of fun, but all the rest of the crap bolted onto it sucks. I really hope Relic listens to those of us bitching about this. I now own: Homeworld, Homeworld 2, Dawn of War (+3 expansions), Company of Heroes (+2 expansions) - a total of 9 games. I've enjoyed every one of these games made by Relic. Until today, I'd have said that I would buy any Relic game sight unseen without a qualm. As of today, I'm going to have to consider the effects of the crappy DRM and the crappy online play module they're using.