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Certainly that's what's said at the official forums, and it seems to be true. Retooling in those cases is a matter of retiring it and rebuilding fresh.
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# ? Mar 5, 2013 08:52 |
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# ? Mar 29, 2024 02:20 |
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Does this mean that mining stations and the like don't get upgraded unless you intervene or is that taken care by automation?
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# ? Mar 5, 2013 15:15 |
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Upgrading mining stations means "let the constant stream of pirates blow it up and then let the AI rebuild it sometime (or do it yourself if you MUST but I would go insane)."
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# ? Mar 5, 2013 15:48 |
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Playing a game, got the difficulty and aggression on second highest setting. Get into war with one of the bugs. Rather than invade even the smallest pop planets of mine he just glasses them from orbit. This is a huge pain because he takes out half a dozen of my worlds before I can stop him. Is this a result of either my difficulty or aggression level? or do the bugs do this every time? E: Also I noticed after they glass one of my planets their rep doesn't go down. What's that about? It was a low pop world, but is it based on number of civies killed or the fact they wiped out a planet? Bad WolfZxc fucked around with this message at 14:12 on Mar 6, 2013 |
# ? Mar 6, 2013 14:07 |
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Looks like Shadows has been pushed back to April because the developer is moving house.
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# ? Mar 9, 2013 01:26 |
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PUKED posted:If anyone hasn't checked out mods in a while the Graphics Enhancement Mod is amazing, I've been using it + the Gloom Mod + Explosion Mod + Tampa Sound Mod and it makes a massive difference. Holy poo poo, the Graphics Enhancement Mod looks to make a hell of difference. For some reason the custom cursors are what do it for me, they make knowing what you're about to do so much easier. I've used DW:Extended before and it is pretty neat, I'd recommend it to anyone who plays a lot of DW.
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# ? Mar 18, 2013 11:51 |
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Was on the Matrix Games site, they have a sale hidden in some Easter eggs. I found this 30% off code for whoever: 447-554-224
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# ? Mar 29, 2013 04:35 |
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DW Infodump incomingquote:Hi Erik, how is Distant Worlds doing?
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 05:53 |
It's unfortunate that they have such a wrong-headed view of how Steam works. I'm sure there are many thousands of people out there who would take a chance on this game if only it was available on Steam for a less cash.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 06:40 |
Matrixgames and the one or two other similar sites that cater to super hardcore strategy all have that philosophy. They somehow convince the developers they publish that it's in their best interest to remain available solely on their website using whatever crap distribution they have. I have no idea how they manage it anymore considering how much most developers love what Steam lets them do.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 06:44 |
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uber_stoat posted:It's unfortunate that they have such a wrong-headed view of how Steam works. I'm sure there are many thousands of people out there who would take a chance on this game if only it was available on Steam for a less cash. Yeah, I would at least. Steam, gog or some other decent one at a decent price and I would buy it.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 06:50 |
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From the 'financial support' line, I would say Matrix requires devs to pay a fixed $ amount from sales. With high prices, you need a lower amount of sales to reach the figure. Matrix no doubt has data showing what the 'hardcore' audience is and likely sales targets. With high volume low price sales, you have to make a lot more sales before the Matrix payment is met, if ever.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 07:20 |
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But why would anyone choose Matrix Games over Gog or Steam? A-Sharp was vehemently against Steam for the longest time but they eventually made bank with King of Dragon Pass on iOS. I don't have numbers for Gog sales but I imagine they're quite decent. There really is no data to suggest that Distant Worlds wouldn't be crazy successful on Steam for a $15 pricetag.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 08:35 |
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Demiurge4 posted:But why would anyone choose Matrix Games over Gog or Steam? A-Sharp was vehemently against Steam for the longest time but they eventually made bank with King of Dragon Pass on iOS. I don't have numbers for Gog sales but I imagine they're quite decent. There really is no data to suggest that Distant Worlds wouldn't be crazy successful on Steam for a $15 pricetag. A question asked time and time again. I can ALMOST see it for WITP or another of the really complex games, but DW is a RT space strat game! that's almost bankable!
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 09:33 |
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Yeah it's really bizarre. A-Sharp and Spiderweb were both vehemently against the low margin/mass sale approach until they made all the money from it. I would think those two high-profile converts would be sufficient for a semi-mainstream title such as Distant Worlds to pursue the same strategy.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 13:05 |
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Bouchacha posted:Yeah it's really bizarre. A-Sharp and Spiderweb were both vehemently against the low margin/mass sale approach until they made all the money from it. I would think those two high-profile converts would be sufficient for a semi-mainstream title such as Distant Worlds to pursue the same strategy. I forgot about Spiderweb. I'd be really curious to know how much money they made from Steam, compared to their lifetime sales before Steam. I played the original Exile games (before they became Avernum) and I went ahead and bought the new ones on Steam just for convenience because they were cheap anyway. I do kind of prefer the old ones though, they simplified the classes and stats a lot for the Avernum upgrade but the better graphics and UI is a good tradeoff.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 13:13 |
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Here's Jeff Vogel on what changed his mind: http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2011/10/why-all-our-games-are-now-cheaper.htmlquote:I'm a dumb person in plenty of key ways, so it took me a while to observe the key fact:
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 13:23 |
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It seems like the only thing that might change their mind is a combo of a literal intervention by the Illwinter chaps who have at long last finally branched to Desura and Steam after being on Shrapnel, the other of these sorts, for ages now at a high price...and some sort of horrid implosion of Shrapnel outright that clears the fog of mystique that has been built up.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 14:35 |
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They increasing a dollar profit by x% is totally irrelevant. Not saying that's what happened, but please spare me the percentage increases. Steam offers free marketing and is clearly a successful platform for both established publishers and indie developers. They are simply stupid.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 15:06 |
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I simply can not get into the mindset that selling to a broader audience somehow means you make less money. I just can't. No one is stopping them from selling for 60 bucks right after release and then droping to 30 for a steam season sale. These people literally hate money. Even if the entire process of going on steam only nets them a handful of sales, those are probably sales they would not otherwise have gotten. I think it is a fairly safe bet that the grognards will find your game wherever you may chose to put it, but the casual gamers will not, even if they might want to play - or at least buy - it.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 15:45 |
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Aside from the fact that Matrix is a publisher, thus inserting another cog in the wheel that A-Sharp and Spiderweb don't have to deal with, Matrix has also had games (or at least the developers they've represented) put up on Steam and other platforms before. For all of you that cry foul on their stance, the fact is you are working entirely off heresay and assumptions while Matrix has access to actual data. Granted they still could be insane when the data shows it would work out in their favor, but unless they reveal the actual data or someone reveals hard numbers from a caparable market, you can argue till you're blue in the face but it won't change the fact that they know more than you do on the subject.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 16:21 |
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nessin posted:Aside from the fact that Matrix is a publisher, thus inserting another cog in the wheel that A-Sharp and Spiderweb don't have to deal with, Matrix has also had games (or at least the developers they've represented) put up on Steam and other platforms before. For all of you that cry foul on their stance, the fact is you are working entirely off heresay and assumptions while Matrix has access to actual data. Granted they still could be insane when the data shows it would work out in their favor, but unless they reveal the actual data or someone reveals hard numbers from a caparable market, you can argue till you're blue in the face but it won't change the fact that they know more than you do on the subject. Sorry, but there's such a thing as sound business practices. I'm not working off hearsay, I'm working off my damned MBA. And the work I've done and the studies I've seen all say that for Distant Worlds they are wrong. This specific title (not all of their titles because I don't know or track all of their titles) has more people wanting to buy it and not buying because of the price than I've ever seen, even with Dominions. Basically, you want to leverage marketing power. Matrix Games has little marketing power, few people have heard of it outside of the core space strategy folks. Steam on the other hand is used by millions, if you release on Steam you are guaranteed at least a few days on the front page of new releases. There is no possible way that the number of people who see the new releases on Steam isn't a gazillion times greater than the people who go to the Matrix website and find out about the game there. This means that they are sacrificing critical marketing exposure by not going with Steam. Then they have to price very high, because they are not selling in enough quantity to price low. But if millions of people saw their damned game for a few days, they'd sell more copies than they've sold for three years during that time. There's simply no way that they are reaching more than just their core audience. The advantage of Steam is that people who don't know who the gently caress Matrix is will learn about the game, see all the resulting forum posts and Steam/friend reviews and buy the game. This is what marketing is all about. Sure you have a demographic but the real But they are pigheaded and like not having money so hey, whatever. I cannot for the life of me think of any MBA who would advise them to do what they are doing with this specific title. Logistically it could be a challenge to remove Distant Worlds from the rest of their stable of games, but they need to do just that.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 17:54 |
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Lorini posted:Sorry, but there's such a thing as sound business practices. I'm not working off hearsay, I'm working off my damned MBA. And the work I've done and the studies I've seen all say that for Distant Worlds they are wrong. This specific title (not all of their titles because I don't know or track all of their titles) has more people wanting to buy it and not buying because of the price than I've ever seen, even with Dominions. I'd raise your MBA with my own, but it's meaningless to sit here and say "Oh yeah, well I have a MBA too!" In any case, there is a lot more to consider. For example, if they go to Steam what will that count for in loss of direct sales? Every person who would have bought through Matrix but instead buys through Steam (or other third-party) is a sale at whatever the price sold minus the distributor fee over a direct sale. Just to throw some easy numbers out as an example, if Matrix sells a copy direct they $55 per sale, say a base price of 60 minus an assumed 5 for thier own download service/support. If you switch to selling on Steam, assuming at $60 and Steam gets a 20% cut (no idea what Steam's usual cut is), then you're looking at $48 per sale. For every person that would have bought through Matrix but instead chooses Steam you've lost $7 and given them reason to wait before buying other games through Matrix in the hopes of getting it on Steam, and this can add up. If you assume 10,000 in sales without Steam then you're looking at 550,000 in profit. By switching to Steam let's assume half your customers being purchasing through Steam, then you've got 5,000 sales at $55, and 5,000 at $48. Now of course Steam will certainly bring in more sales than they would have without out, but you already need to make up $50,000 (roughly just over a 1000 Steam sales) before you're ahead of the game for switching to Steam. I think it's safe to assume Steam would definitely make up for that, but sales or price reductions begin to make that number you've got to make up grow, and grow quickly. And for all I know Steam could take 30% and Matrix pays less than $5 for their downloade service per sale which would skew the numbers even further. I'm not arguing that putting the game on Steam would be a bad idea. I'm all for Matrix offering their games through Steam, GamersGate, GoG, wherever they can get it to diversify and expand their market, but it's insane to assume you know more than they do on the subject or that it's not without potential negatives in niche markets. And there is definitely a case to be made that Distant Worlds isn't in nearly as niche a market as their traditional wargame, but it's definitely not a game you can expect to sell millions of copies even if it was on steam for $5.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 21:49 |
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Yeah I agree with nessin. Matrix has the biggest incentive of pricing Distant Worlds at whatever optimizes profit. We can sit here and speculate, and maybe even speculate correctly too, but we'll never have the same data or have spent as much thought on the issue as Matrix has. I still think they're being stupid though.
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# ? Apr 2, 2013 22:23 |
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Ignoring strict profit and money for the moment, though not abandoning it, as people who either play the game or who simply want to, or those who just want others to enjoy the game like they do: we are all staggered by the $90 entry fee, and the apparent choice to entrench the game in an obscure, niche storefront, who say they know what is best for the game itself and its players. It's not just annoying, it's infuriating, at worst, alienating for people who actually like the game. It's just dumb all around. edit: much like my post. doctorfrog fucked around with this message at 10:29 on Apr 3, 2013 |
# ? Apr 2, 2013 22:34 |
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If we were actually talking $55 that would make sense. Not everyone knows everything about business, there are plenty of business people making stupid decisions, unfortunately many of us encounter them every day. $90 entry fee because you don't want to have another company take a cut is ridiculous. Who else charges that for what really is not a lot of code? I totally understand why they don't put many of their games on Steam; historical wargames just don't have much appeal outside of their core demographic so why bother? But everyone I know who is the slightest bit interested in space strategy games would like Distant Worlds. It's far more accessible than most war games and is more polished as well. There's no way that they *know* that their way is better because they haven't tried Steam. They can make what I consider to be poor assumptions about the appeal of the game if they like, but there's no magical data out there that will tell them how many units the game will sell with a price point that is more in line with other indie games assuming Steam's marketing strategy. Sure they can prove that using their marketing they would lose money by cutting the price, but that's not the point. The point is with millions more people seeing the game, they would get more sales at a competitive price.
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# ? Apr 3, 2013 00:18 |
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The concern may be more due to Steamworks than Steam, if that makes sense. Valve have somehow finagled themselves into the position where it's lying over the entire PC gaming industry from biggest to smallest like a lazy cat-god demanding tribute. This despite Steam at start doing terribly at it's start-'it should have died', one could argue. Even old games Steam or Gamersgate or etc sells like UFO:Enemy Unknown, which HAD no 'protection', will say it needs Steamworks now. It's a very concerning thing, personally. How did they get themselves into this position where everyone trusts them with everything that is gaming? And what happens when the whole thing breaks down as it will inevitably?(He says as he plays Warlock: Master of the Arcane. Yes, I'm pretty much a hypocrite after breaking my own 'embargo' for the sake of one game.) ...Regardless, knocking aside GOG IS a very stupid move.
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# ? Apr 3, 2013 00:54 |
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Time to get your wallets at the ready.......SOON. http://www.matrixgames.com/products/466/details/Distant.Worlds-.Shadows ...soon. Start a new empire before the discovery of hyperspace travel and try to expand into the stars, or play as one of the legendary Pirate factions of the Age of Shadows, competing with new victory conditions to establish an alternate history where the pirates triumphed over the planetary civilizations. The pirate options alone include four completely new playstyles (ranging from Raiders to Smugglers) and new smuggling and mercenary missions. Also included are ship boarding actions and ship and base capture, new Ship Captain characters and pirate raids of planets and space stations. New gameplay also includes expanded ground combat, with a full new ground combat tech tree, a ground combat resolution screen and multiple different troop types (infantry, armor, planetary defences and special forces). Ground combat is now animated and resolved from the descent of the first assault pods from orbit to the final battles for planetary control, with new bonuses for combined arms and the effects of the different troop types as well as local space superiority all considered in the outcome. The expanded tech tree also includes Gravitic Weapons and Tractor Beams as well as additional planetary facilities that allow you more customization on character recruitment. Distant Worlds: Shadows also includes an updated and improved graphical engine that allows for much better performance in the epic 1,000+ star galaxies that many Distant Worlds fans enjoy. The AI is also much improved, especially in terms of the economy and a new comprehensive difficulty setting should mean that even the most experienced Distant Worlds player will find a challenge in Distant Worlds: Shadows. As usual, modding support has been kept up to date with the new improvements. Mistayke fucked around with this message at 15:06 on Apr 10, 2013 |
# ? Apr 10, 2013 15:03 |
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May 21 is the release date. e: The new ground combat mechanics are very granular. You actually build lots of different troop types (armour, infantry, special ops) which seem to work in a rock paper scissors configuration. Seems like a lot more micro for little gain. V for Vegas fucked around with this message at 13:42 on Apr 28, 2013 |
# ? Apr 28, 2013 13:35 |
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For anyone that still plays this the sound, graphics, bloom, and explosion mods mentioned in the OP have really improved my experience. I was kinda lukewarm about the game since the ship models looked stretched and bare but the mods improved that. Also that awful digging sound the mining bases make is softer so I don't jump out of my chair every time I zoom into a planet with one. They really do improve the game a lot. Edit: I also hope that the new ground combat mechanic is optional at start if it sucks. Yar The Pirate fucked around with this message at 14:43 on Apr 28, 2013 |
# ? Apr 28, 2013 14:41 |
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Bouchacha posted:Here's Jeff Vogel on what changed his mind: http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2011/10/why-all-our-games-are-now-cheaper.html That is definitely something the people at Matrix Games should read. Also in some other blog post Vogel revealed the exact sales numbers for some of his past titles, and it was about only couple thousand copies total(this was before Steam obviously). I'd imagine the sales number for a fringe title like DW, sold only on their own very poorly known site, can't be much higher. At the very least it would make sense for Matrix to put title or two on Steam to test the waters.
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# ? Apr 28, 2013 15:00 |
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V for Vegas posted:May 21 is the release date. Whoa. Is that shortage notifier new, or has my economy always been such a well-oiled machine that I never noticed it? (as for ground combat, well, as long as the AI can still manage it competently and there's a policy or something to tweak force mixes I give no fucks how much micro is involved. All this game's crazy micro is optional, that's the best part.)
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# ? Apr 28, 2013 18:57 |
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Hopefully it will mean that races that are weaker in ground combat won't be completely hosed-tech and unlocked forces may help with the weakness better now. As it is now, you can't invade(Not nice, but understandable), and you can't resist invasion(Ridiculous). And war isn't always avoidable.
Bloodly fucked around with this message at 19:41 on Apr 28, 2013 |
# ? Apr 28, 2013 19:30 |
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Preview up http://www.spacesector.com/blog/2013/05/distant-worlds-shadows-preview/ This pirate stuff sounds kick-rear end. quote:
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# ? May 11, 2013 23:58 |
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Release of the new expansion is scheduled for Thursday, May 23rd. Sale/promotion will also happen at that time.
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# ? May 20, 2013 22:21 |
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It's going to cost $40, isn't it?
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# ? May 20, 2013 23:30 |
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Demiurge4 posted:It's going to cost $40, isn't it? They are being very coy, but I would expect that from past expansions.
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# ? May 20, 2013 23:40 |
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But Distant worlds, Shakturi and Legends will be 'discounted' to only $20 each, making the whole package a reasonable $100.
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# ? May 20, 2013 23:45 |
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They just released an update for Legends and Shadows is still on schedule to be released tomorrow. Use Check for Updates on the opening menu.
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# ? May 22, 2013 16:57 |
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# ? Mar 29, 2024 02:20 |
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It's a month late but what the hell I'll chime in with a Steam anecdote. I am one person that enjoys space sims and this is my story: I bought Distant Worlds at launch, and remember how odd it was that the Matrix download site would only let me download one time. The game I just purchased. "Be sure to burn a copy to physical media!" the download page warned. I think it was $3 to download again in the future if I lost my backup installer. I never really got into Distant Worlds as the base game wasn't terribly meaty, something the expansions rectified I'm sure. I never found out firsthand because I didn't feel like shelling out high prices for each expansion from the same publisher. I also purchased Sins of a Solar Empire from Matrix Games, and even tolerated installing a launcher just for Sins. I played it quite a bit and bought the first couple expansions when they came out. Much time passed. I grew weary of the Matrix launcher and stopped installing it on new OS builds. One day I saw that SoaSE: Rebellion was available on Steam, possibly on sale. I bought it on Steam and never looked back. Now I can play the game I like with Steam that I can tolerate. I would buy DW and all its content on Steam for about $50, there should be plenty of room there for everyone to get fat and happy.
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# ? May 22, 2013 18:07 |