• Yokozuna@lemmy.world
    69·
    3 months ago

    Man, steams user base has more than tripled since I started using it… and I thought I came in a bit late.

    • astrsk@fedia.io
      22·
      3 months ago

      Using it in 2004 was like a dream. It was already incredible to have all my valve games in one place that I can redownload whenever (overnight slowly on DSL) without having any discs and it just worked. Didn’t have to insert a disc just to play the installed game via activation, didn’t have to clone the disc and mount the iso to pretend the same. It just worked and has just worked ever since.

      • gaylord_fartmaster@lemmy.world
        29·
        3 months ago

        I was also using it then and most people hated it at the time. People generally saw it as useless DRM they had to install to play the games they had already paid for. The biggest complaint was needing to install it and register Counter-Strike to get the 1.6 update.

        This gif comes to mind:

        • umbrella@lemmy.ml
          24·
          3 months ago

          many youngns here are missing this bit of context.

          it was also very prone to endless issues at the time.

          • astrsk@fedia.io
            3·
            3 months ago

            Absolutely it was. It’s definitely had its growing pains, but I was in a generally advantageous place where most of the issues hadn’t caused problems for me. In this case, I was sorta golden path user.

        • Dave@lemmy.nz
          6·
          3 months ago

          I joined Steam when I bought Portal on disk from a store and couldn’t play it without signing up for Steam and installing Steam just to play my game.

      • xploit@lemmy.world
        4·
        3 months ago

        And looking for some good low latency servers to play (CS at the time for me) before even opening the game…only to have to choose 150-200 ping ones with the fun mods I wanted to play and be booted from them from for having high ping 🤣

  • boaratio@lemmy.world
    10·
    3 months ago

    I am an avid steam user today, but I’m still bitter about valve requiring you to connect to steam back when Half Life 2 came out to “decrypt” the install from CD. I bought it launch day and couldn’t actually play it for 2 days because steam was essentially DDOS’d

    • fuzzzerd@programming.devEnglish
      3·
      3 months ago

      I remember when they shut down the WON servers and forced me to migrate to steam. I could have had a 4 or 5 digit steam account number if not for resisting the migration.

      R.I.P. counter strike 1.5.

      • Max@lemmy.world
        4·
        3 months ago

        To be fair, Steam was terrible on launch. IIRC the friend system didn’t work at all for months.

      • GoodEye8@lemm.eeEnglish
        1·
        3 months ago

        You’ll still have the email as username which newer users don’t have.

  • xploit@lemmy.world
    9·
    3 months ago

    Damn, I’ve been on steam for over 20 years…and I thought maybe like 15 tops. Now I feel old 😑

  • SmoodleDoodle@lemmy.world
    5·
    3 months ago

    Wish steam would have a way to play offline like galaxy gaming does. Doesn’t have to be all like on gog but just would be nice. I would love to have USB keys with games on them.

    • LeLachs@lemmy.ml
      1·
      3 months ago

      You kinda can? You can register your USB as a storage and use steams offline mode. You just need internet once to log in

      • UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.mlEnglish
        2·
        3 months ago

        Be careful if you ever do reconnect to the internet. I had games stop working after a patch doenloaded because you have to start it at least once for the patch to finish or something.