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Half-Life 2 Preloading from Steam
Posted by
CowboyNeal
on Thu Aug 26, 2004 11:28 PM
from the chomping-at-the-bit dept.
from the chomping-at-the-bit dept.
Nos. writes "For those of us using Valve Software's Steam platform, we can now begin 'preloading' Half-Life 2. The article explains that this will download an encrypted version of the game that you can unlock when you purchase it. They only say that purchase options will be available soon."
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Half-Life 2 Preloading from Steam
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Don't bother trying (Score:5, Informative)
Boo friggin yah! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Boo friggin yah! (Score:5, Interesting)
(http://www.dpk.net/ | Last Journal: Friday February 11 2005, @12:22PM)
Re:Boo friggin yah! (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://kelora.org/)
Re:Boo friggin yah! (Score:4, Informative)
Jason
ProfQuotes [profquotes.com]
Re:Boo friggin yah! (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh, I don't know about you, but my CDs don't go disappearing too terribly often. Things like networks, servers, companies, etc do. You answered your own question: "as long as Steam is running". I'd rather go with "as long as a CD exists", which is probably a lot longer, barring my house burning down, being subjected to a nuclear blast, or being broken into by a particularly thorough burlar.
And frankly, I trust Steam to be running much longer than I could keep a CD in good shape and not lose the key.
Sorry, but that sounds like your problem. Keep it in the case and don't use it as a frisbee or coaster (AOL CDs excepted), and you should be fine. I have CDs (both audio and data) that are over 10 years old that are in very good if not mint condition. It's not hard.
It's silliness to trust whatever this Steam thing is to continue rather than trust physical media. If it does, great, if not, you have a CD.
Re:Don't bother trying (Score:5, Insightful)
If you look at their status page,
http://www.steampowered.com/status/status.
you will see that they have plenty of bandwidth available. The 'available' bandwidth is actually pretty accurate from what I've seen. They can pump out more than they're doing right now.
It asked you to try again long before it came onto slashdot.
They are intentionally throttling the number of downloaders for it because there is no great rush to make sure everyone has it right now (it won't be coming out for a few weeks at the very least, many retailers are speculating Nov. 1st, but I wouldn't hold much weight in their dates). They are throttling them because they don't want to degrade the quality of service for games already released on Steam (HL series of games).
Try again in a few days, and you'll be no worse off.
TFC2 (Score:4, Funny)
Hrmmn (Score:5, Funny)
"Yup!"
"Boy, I can't wait til next year when we can play it"
Re:Hrmmn (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hrmmn (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Hrmmn (Score:5, Informative)
(http://dugger.notsoevil.net/)
Of course, not every game can be sold via steam like scenarios. The FPS market comes with a lot of assumptions about the demographic. Dominately technical, online (broadband)and expensive computers. Take out any of those and steam just doesn't make sense. If Valve wants to branch out to a broader demographic by making games in the vein of Popcap, you really need something tied much closer to the browser than a standalone app just for shopping. Or if they want to sell something like Deer Hunter to people that don't live on the internet or read PC Gamer magazines, then a nice orange box at walmart is still your best bet.
Re:Hrmmn (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.gekidoslair.com/)
couple of reasons for this:
1) sierra probably forced them to keep the price similar enough so that it's worthwhile for them to sell the game at retail.
2) half-life1 continues to sell for near-full price (30+$ here in canada) almost 6 years after it was released. i don't consider bundling 2 mods that valve didn't have to pay for development (and that can be downloaded for free) exactly worthwhile of a full-priced game...
whether gamers fall for it (ie buy the game online for the same price as retail) remains to be seen.
i personally think this is the stupidest thing that valve could ever do - how long will it be before their 'encryption' is hacked and hl2 becomes a pirate version (potentially) long before retail.
as well, why the HELL would anyone download a game that they can't play? steam is brutal in it's management of system resources and bandwidth as it is, let alone having it download endless games that you can't play...
Re:Full price? (Score:4, Interesting)
Torrent... (Score:3, Funny)
(http://www.fuckjackthompson.com/)
Re:Torrent... (Score:5, Informative)
(http://www.magila.info/)
Re:Torrent... (Score:5, Interesting)
Also in terms of overloading servers, slashdot has nothing over the hordes of counter-strike players.
Re:Torrent... (Score:5, Interesting)
To put it mildly... (Score:3, Interesting)
(http://www.tuxedojack.com/)
And anyone who actually plays with Steam knows what I'm talking about.
yay (Score:5, Funny)
(http://www.rotkiv.net/ | Last Journal: Friday June 03 2005, @03:01PM)
eh, this could be bad for Valve (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:eh, this could be bad for Valve (Score:5, Informative)
(http://www.outrigged.com/)
Re:eh, this could be bad for Valve (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.angelfire...epublican/index.blog | Last Journal: Thursday July 27 2006, @12:00AM)
"Steam Authentication"
I misplaced my Half-Life CD case when I needed to freshly install WinXP. I used a key gen to get the game to work. WON's server wouldn't authenticate my bogus key. I was left not playing for about two weeks when I finally found my CD case and put in a legit serial number.
I don't think that Valve is going to use a more lax authentication regimen for HL-2, especially after the "source theft" that happened last year.
LK
Re:eh, this could be bad for Valve (Score:4, Interesting)
(Last Journal: Saturday September 20 2003, @01:55PM)
Condition Zero) For about 2 months, you could use hlds(halflife dedicated severver)'s update tool to download the conditon zero server files, which included every single client file. All you had to do was put it in your half-life directory and it would load as a third party game, and play online with anyone that bought it.
CS:Source) If you knew the appid (which is in your blob cookie file) you could force it to preload even if you didnt meet the requirements (being a lan center at the time). They patched that after two days, but that preload was unencrypted and easily extracted. Of course, they did encrypt the preload of Codename Gordon, a free buggy/crappy flash game.
Re:eh, this could be bad for Valve (Score:4, Interesting)
finding the key (Score:5, Funny)
(http://www.scrap3r.com/)
Bah, Steam (Score:5, Insightful)
With Doom 3 who needs them!
Re:Bah, Steam (Score:5, Funny)
I actually like Steam. (Score:5, Informative)
Steam comes along and with my CS reg key, I at last get the full version of Half-Life LEGALLY, and quick and easy access to other popular mods, and a server Favorites list (don't remember if original CS allowed this. I used to write down the IP of a good server to play there) so I can find good games faster, and keep it updated VERY easily. I've installed older CS numerous times and version compatibility was a constant headache, even WITH the seemingly appropriate patches. With Steam, all that business is managed automatically. It's heaven. As for buggy or memory intensive, I encountered one bug so far (input lag playing havoc with my keyboard) and that lasted only a few days. And I don't know how little RAM you have, but steam barely scratches my 512mb, which I presume is common for todays FPS player.
As long as you didn't pirate the game(s), Steam is wonderful, IMHO
Re:I actually like Steam. (Score:5, Insightful)
Using Half-Life's in-game server management did allow you to toggle a server as a favorite and even allowed you to browse favorites only. The only problem was that it seemed buggy as hell and would frequently "forget" your favorites from another session (which can really piss you off), but it was there.
With Steam, all that business is managed automatically. It's heaven. As for buggy or memory intensive, I encountered one bug so far (input lag playing havoc with my keyboard) and that lasted only a few days.
Steam had way to many problems on release. It was no where near ready for release and shouldn't have been implemented. I didn't use steam for a long time (pissed off at Valve for buying out (ruining) HL mods), but I know plenty of CS players who were left without playing their precious game for days at a time because problems with content delivery and detection. If you know some young CS players, you know it can be more addiction than heroin for them. It pissed the shit out of them. I can remember hearing, "Steam sucks" every five minutes. At the moment Steam seems to have settled down and most of the bugs are worked out, but there are still problems. A month (or two) ago I was locked out for a week because Steam forgot to remove/update a file. While the system might seem to a nice way to update a game I still prefer just downloading updates off mirrors like the old days. Unfortunately as more games go to Steam (especially since Valve took down WON), less and less use their own sites and mirrors for downloading their mods.
QCrack.exe (Score:5, Interesting)
Valve's distribution idea is interesting, but I hope for their sake that the security's very strong, requiring all sorts of authorizations and whatnots. If not, Doom III's slightly-premature leaking to the internet might seem like a far more ideal scenario than a Valve-aided distribution of compromised content.
Re:QCrack.exe (Score:5, Interesting)
It seems like the only danger of breaking the encryption is getting access to files that may spoil the plot, but I've heard there's already a file out there that does that.
Re:QCrack.exe (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.trifault.net/)
But, at least, if I was valve...encrypt a seperate copy for each player, with an id to identify which key valve needs to give that player when they buy the game.
Thats fine.... (Score:3, Insightful)
(http://crjt.net/)
Re:Thats fine.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Fixing bugs as many little bugs as they can, especially in level design I believe. They've said its very close to being complete, it's just being playtested to death at the moment.
Its an evil plot.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Lets release it with a fancy encryption scheme, when someone cracks it, we'll pull the shame-shame bs, sue some 'hackers' and the push back will 'teach everyone a lesson'.
Give me a break
Already flooded, but....... (Score:4, Insightful)
What will happen is this. Currently, Steam acts as a peer to peer hub (remmeber Valve hiring Bram Cohen, Mr. Bit Torrent?). Anyone with a sizeable LAN Cafe will know this because empty chairs with a copy of Steam running kills their bandwidth. Once people have the preload completely downloaded, they will begin uploading it and add more bandwidth to the mix. The more people that have it, the more it becomes available. I get the feeling LAN Cafes get a little more sway in terms of firsties since they generally have better connections than Counter-Strike junkies at home.
Not that getting the pre-load at this point is a necessity. There will be waves of preloads with content. This first one just being some static art that won't be changed, like textures, voices, and some models.
Re:Already flooded, but....... (Score:4, Interesting)
(http://dugger.notsoevil.net/)
Re:Already flooded, but....... (Score:5, Insightful)
This strategy is frequently discussed w.r.t. cheating, moving more stuff onto the server side, but that's impractical for performance reasons. Performance (network in particular) is pretty important in games.
When I first started playing the Steam versions of Valve's games, I thought this 'security module' was a big, critical piece of the game's code, and you had to download it all the time because Valve changed it frequently to stay one step ahead of the reverse-engineers and there were many versions in rotation at once. But apparently that's not how it works.
A shame too, that method might actually work. You can't prevent people from reverse engineering code running on their own computer, but reverse engineering takes time. If someone on the other side is releasing new versions faster than they can be reverse engineered, then they've effectively thwarted the reverse engineers. I don't think there will ever be a machine which can prevent a human from reverse engineering itself. But if there's another human constantly changing the machine, working against the reverse engineer, they might succeed. It would just be a question of which human can work faster. I doubt we'll ever see this from a video game company though. That would require they have programmers employed to do this. They'd rather just sell the game and be done with it.
The big internet blackout (Score:5, Funny)
I knew it when Valve delayed the preload.
Pre-Releasing DnD Games (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.lifeofalawstudent.com/)
One thing I've never understood is why the publishers of highly anticipated role-playing games (I'm thinking Baldur's Gate and NeverWinter Nights here) don't pre-release the character generator.
By the time a specific release date has been set, the character formats should be firmly decided. Allowing players (or potential players!) to pre-create their characters is only going to create buzz and give people a reason to want to put those characters to use. It's a realizable benefit for the publisher without a significant financial cost.
But alas, I have never seen this happen.
- Neil Wehneman
Re:Pre-Releasing DnD Games (Score:4, Informative)
(http://www.nhaines.com/)
The tool also allows you to export a couple sample clothings items. Naturally, you then grab the textures and can customize your own clothing and such, as well as skin tones and other various things. Now that the game releases on the 17th, there'll probably be a ton of features on the fan sites, and everyone's excited about how customizable their Sims are.
Heck, I am just a casual player who was intrigued by the new AI, and *I* even have the Sim that will be "me" prepared.
Speaking of which... (Score:5, Interesting)
(http://amongthechosen.com/)
When the Playstation came out, I creamed my pants at the potential of memory cards- finally, a company could make an RPG.... and release "add-ons" or "expansion packs" that would be new games or side games but which would use your already existing character. Or a sequel to a game that was ACTUALLY a SEQUEL- picking up where you left off... exactly where you left off, levels, equipment, and everything. I figured games like this would be out within a year.
Boy, was I FUCKING WRONG. Aside from some in-game tricks in games like Metal Gear Solid, memory cards are basically just an itty hard drive that serves as a dumping ground for save data that doesn't overlap or play between games.
WHERE IS THE INNOVATION IN THAT?
Shit, if I knew I could move my NWN character into NWN2 (without, you know, creating a new one...), I'd spend a couple of weeks prior to release leveling like a bastard. And if the game's built right, it should be just as challenging at level 20 as it is at level 3.
Woo. Rant complete.
haha (Score:5, Funny)
Torture (Score:5, Funny)
(Last Journal: Wednesday April 28 2004, @08:54PM)
Anybody remember the Quake I shareware disc? (Score:4, Funny)
It's like giving the entire geek world a good, hard puzzle with an irresistable payoff.
This is a case where it can work (Score:4, Insightful)
However in this case, it's different. What they could do is generate an AES key, say 256-bit just for extra parinoia, and then encrypt the data with it. They then send out ONLY the encrypted data, not the key. The key (and utility to use it) doesn't get released until they actually sell it.
In that case, my friend, you are fucked. This is the same way SSH works. Only you and the remote server have the AES key. Someone else can log all your data, but without the key, it's worthless since the computing power does not exist to crack that in a lifetime (much, much, much longer actually). So if this is how they are doing it, they are secure.
Now, when they release the key it is concievable that people could pass it along to friends to decrypt copies that haven't been paid for but so what? The game will be copied anyhow, as all games are, it changes nothing really.
Remember: Encryption is the tactic of keeping everyone EXCEPT the keyholders out. Copyprotection fails since it must give the key to the end user on the disc to work, but intends to keep the end user out. This can succede since they withhold the key for everyone, until a particular date.
Re:This is a case where it can work (Score:5, Informative)
And, of course, HL2 will be released in less than a year.
So, supposing they are using a reasonable encryption scheme, and why not, AES is freely available, no one can possibly crack it before it's released.
Re:This is a case where it can work (Score:5, Interesting)
(http://chipped.net/)
It might take thousands of years or it might take until tomorrow morning, or anything in between. But I don't see any way to absolutely guarantee that it won't be tomorrow morning; it seems just as likely as "thousands of years".
In that case, why decrypt it at all? If you just create random strings of digits eventually you are GUARANTEED to hit upon the entire halflife2 game, complete with patches, and including additional, SUPER AWESOME content, such as the level that seamlessly merges the entire DOOM3 game and has a character that looks identical to a naked natilie portman who speaks directly to you, in your own voice, perfectly, and then relives your early childhood in grainy 35mm footage before showing that you were, in fact, abducted by aliens.
Sure, it MIGHT take a hundred quadrillion billion zillion years, but you MIGHT hit upon it on your second try, right?
steam = SUCKS (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't want to run your crappy Stream POS in the background all the time. I don't want to be required to play the newest version all the time. I want to be able to play the game I BOUGHT on a LAN without authenticating over the net. I JUST WANT TO PLAY THE GODDAMN GAME I BOUGHT. But Valve can't let me do that, they have to push their crap on me. Valve, you can suck my dick you bitches.
You are a fucking idiot. (Score:4, Funny)
(http://www.f13.net/)
2. You no longer have to authenticate over the net to play Steam games anymore.
3. You don't have to update any of your games if you don't want either. Right click on the game and turn off automatic updating.
4. You are a fucking idiot, in case I forgot to mention it. Die.
Sorry guys, it was worth the karma burn.
New business model (Score:3, Funny)
Equivalency? (Score:5, Funny)
(http://www.lookuplaws.com/ | Last Journal: Sunday November 18, @06:33PM)
So, vapor ware turns into... (Score:4, Funny)
(http://www.chrullrich.de/)
Re:Valve makes _good_ decisions (Score:4, Informative)
predownload? (Score:4, Insightful)
(http://seventhcycle.net/)
Careful if you get a crack ... (Score:3, Insightful)
(http://www.tunny.co.uk/)
Valve has started banning accounts which cracked Steam to obtain the recently released CS:Source.
They could easily to the same to people who get Half-Life 2 in that way.
pre-loading (Score:5, Funny)
(http://www.roalt.com/ | Last Journal: Sunday September 28 2003, @08:51AM)
Will they do that for Duke-Nukem Forever also?
Why Bother? (Score:3, Insightful)
(http://www.samsmith.co.nz/)
Its a waste of steam bandwidth and yours. I'd understand if it was gold, but its not.
Yawn... (Score:3, Insightful)
(http://slashdot.org)
Can you say "Paper launch"? (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Friday October 08 2004, @09:51AM)
Re:Steam.... (Score:5, Informative)
(http://www.encyclope...i_herd_u_liek_mudkip)
Re:Steam.... (Score:3, Informative)
(http://doofsmack.com/)
Re:Steam.... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Hurry man, switch to a gun!!! (Score:3, Insightful)
didnt you play it?
Re:More Valve Bullshit. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:More Valve Bulls*** (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.dhpersonal.com/)
Valve is far far far from intelligent. The WON patches, source code leak, a release date that is overdue one year, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero, content servers that authenticate, run the main website, and deliver content, and the Half-Life 2 plot leak (rumor) all point toward a company that has trouble keeping both of its brain cells in working order. It's far from a smart company. It's a very, very, very lucky company, who was fortunate enough to hit a goldmine of a game. A goldmine only kept alive with the mods that users produce.
Re:Just wait (Score:5, Funny)
(http://www.trellon.com/ | Last Journal: Monday June 04, @07:57PM)
I got the game to boot using a kernel debugger and a little trial and error. SoftICE revealed the installer makes a call to something in _vis.dll, which in turn checks to see if hl2_acf.nfo exists within the steam install directory.
Decompiled _vis.dll with DisC, replaced the function call to a new function that always returns true. Recompiled _vis with Visual C++, nogo, then tried with Borland and the game booted.
Posting a crack tonight.
M
---
Always read sigs for important words like syyyyke.
Re:Just wait (Score:5, Informative)
I call shenanigans. DisC [debugmode.com] was specifically written for taking apart Turbo C dos executables. If you were genuinely following a trace like this, you would have almost certainly just intercepted the outgoing call to "_vis.dll" and loaded the truth value inline - not like you wouldn't have had enough room to work in.
Re:Just wait (Score:5, Informative)
-AC