/mehates Steam
TommyVercetti
Join Date: 2003-02-10 Member: 13390Members, Constellation, Reinforced - Shadow
Join Date: 2003-02-10 Member: 13390Members, Constellation, Reinforced - Shadow
in Tech Support
<div class="IPBDescription">How Do I Uninstall?</div> How do you go about uninstalling Steam? I hate it very much, GameSpy is much better. Just a tool for Valve to monitor everything. How do I uninstall it and get Gamespy working again? NS was much nicer on Gamespy, and there were no freaking errors.
Comments
If you can't get it working come and talk to me in irc.gamesnet.net on #naturalselection and I'll help you.
Steam may not be perfect but it's getting better. In a year or so you'll have no option but to use it. It's time to learn to live with it. Here is a list of all the advice I've given about steam on the forums:
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->When windows tells you steam is "Not Responding", that's windows being an ****. Nothing wrong with what steam's doing. It's probably reorganising it's cache or something.
The best piece of advice I can give R.E. Steam: Let it be. Patience is your friend.
--Scythe--
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Just to address a few issues brought up in this post:
You will NEVER have to pay to play a game you bought from valve UNLESS you choose the subscription model in which you pay a certain amount per month and you have access to ALL valve software released. This includes HL2 and it's official mods. Think Opposing Force and Blue Shift. TF2 too.
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->
Offline/LAN play
Work on offline/LAN play is now nearing completion. To play any Steam game while not connected to the Internet it will only be necessary to let Steam finish downloading all of that game’s content, at which point you’ll be able to play games without connecting to Steam. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It's just a matter of time before steam can run over a LAN. Get a grip on something and wait it out.
Let me tell you the story of my installation of steam.
The Big Day arrives. The final version of Steam is available for download. I download the 500k version and install. I register an account (SteamID: 0:0:7574 Winnar!). It converts my existing install to it's cache, recognising my mods and porting them over too. All's well. I upload the 500k installer to my personal webspace for ease of distribution among NS fans. Suddenly someone says on IRC "DO NOT GET SCYTHE'S INSTALL, IT IS A BETA VERSION". At this point I was rather bemused. After a bit of discussion it turns out I had downloaded it from a bogus site. No biggie, some nice person in IRC gave me a link to the proper install file. I immediately replace the one on my webspace and proceed to install this new one over the top.
Then the porta-loo hit the wind turbine.
I ran steam, entered my username and password, it started up fine. "Woo" I said. Then when I tried to play a game of HLDM for testing I discovered that there was no entries in my games list. Bugger. It wanted to download 400 and something meg of half-life on my 56k. No chance. After a little screwing around I discovered the problem. During the install of the beta I was prompted for a custom location of my steamapps folder. I chose to have it in c:\games\steamapps\. It turns out that the full version doesn’t give you the choice of having a custom steamapps directory. So I copied over the contents of c:\games\steamapps\ to c:\program files\steam\<email>\steamapps\ and it’s being working merrily ever since. I’ve put a shortcut to the steamapps dir in my games dir so it’s easy to get to.
A few pointers with steam:
HAVE PATIENCE. When it comes up with “Preparing to play Half-Life” for any length of time it’s actually downloading some content or reorganising it’s cache or something. The first time I tried to run HL it came up with this. I left it for about two hours (On my 56k) and then it started up. It’s started up instantly ever since.
The friends list is cool.
The updates are released every Wednesday, America time, and are pretty small. No more than a 15 minute wait on 56k.
The new console is cool. You can cut’n’paste from the log and heaps of other nifty stuff.
Alt-tabbing == win.
Steam allows mod makers to make tiny updates to their mod instantly across their entire playerbase. This would be great for playtesting. Remember all those serverside patches released for NS1.04? They could’ve all been automatic.
The NS skins found at <a href='http://www.readyroom.org' target='_blank'>http://www.readyroom.org</a> make it much nicer to look at.
Most importantly: NS2.1 works 110% on steam.
Here’s a post I made in the constellation forums on filtering custom mods:
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Go into the server browser.
Click on the "Change filters" button.
Press Crtl + Alt + Shift + b
Click in the game filter box.
Change the "editable" value in the haxor thing to "1".
Type "nsp" in the filter box and press "Apply" then "Exit".
Refresh.
Shout "WOO" loudly.
HARKEN UNTO MY WARNING: You can screw up steam nicely if you aren't careful with the haxor thing. So be careful.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You can replace the “nsp” with any mod of your choice.
Steam DOES WORK. It’s just needs patience and a fair bit of fiddling to get right. It will improve.
--Scythe--
P.S. If you need help getting steam working. I seem to be cursed to help anyone that asks for it. Pop into #naturalselection on irc.gamesnet.net and we'll talk.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--><!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->
my only problem with steam at the present time:
You do need a network conenction to play single player half-life, and it's other campain mods.
Which **** me off to little end when my friend's cable went out... (god I hope it's just configured wrong, and you -can- play without a connection) <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I can play offline.
I've loved steam since about an hour after I installed it. Initially I though exactly what all you steam-haters were thinking. Unrequired, bloated, buggy, unstable, imcompatable, etc... But after a while I began to explore all the features of it. I discovered some really nifty doovies.
I've not been without my troubles with steam. In fact right now my steam menu is showing "#SteamRoot.blah" on all the buttons and and headings. Steam is a very new and ambitious concept. It just needs development time and support from mod makers (Like Flayra already has) to mature.
Have patience!
--Scythe-- <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->YES! Steam currently has issues with stability!
YES! Steam currently has issues with bandwidth!
YES! Steam currently has issues with HD use!
YES! I hate people that assume steam is worse than Satan because it doesn't work for them!
Valve are not idiots.
They know there are issues.
They are working to fix them.
I will eat my good hat if the WON servers go down without at least 95% of people happy with steam.
--Scythe--<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Steam is:
A server browser:
No one said you had to use it.
A buddy tracker:
It tracks buddies in all valve games and mods and allows you to message them ingame. You can also play chess, checkers and whatnot with them.
An automatic update system:
When HL2 comes out steam will be constantly modifying it's base code to foil leet haxors. Hours after a new cheat being discovered steam clients around the world will be patching HL2. For the moment steam allows lazy broadband users to have HL1 updated automatically. Us 56kers are still able to disable the automatic updates and download them the old fashioned way.
A replacement for WON:
When the steam registration comes online you will enter your CDKEY and your email. Steam will then assign you a STEAMID number. From then on, instead of authing to WON when you connect to a server, you will auth with steam. You must have steam running in the background (Almost sure)
FREE:
When you purchase HL2 you will have full access to steam’s automatic update facilities and some other goodies like movies and whatnot. Instead of buying HL2 at the shop you can subscribe for USD$10 a month and have access to ALL of the games that valve produces. This includes HL2 and it’s official add-ons. Think Opposing Forces and Blue Shift. NOT mods. Alternatively you can just buy HL2 via steam (For a reduced price), download it and play as if you bought it at the shop.
AFAIK.
--Scythe--<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
--Scythe--
Uh huh...
I would really like to see some evidence from you.
I would also like to say exactly what I want to say with respect to your intelligence. But I shan't.
--Scythe--
(I like steam, but some people don't, and that's OK, it's their problem/benefit/whatever.)