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Comment by rvschuilenburg | Hacker News Reader

Isn't Steam itself also DRM?

No. Game devs can & frequently do distribute just plain binaries through Steam.

If they integrate Steamworks, these games usually (not always, but exceptions are rare) will not start up if Steam isn't running. I am speaking as someone who cares about and tests this.

Ironically, I have actually had far more success with stuff from the Epic Games Store. Lots of major titles such as Beyond Two Souls and Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart function as completely standalone, DRM-Free binaries once downloaded, it's great.

Okay, but I don't think poorly implemented server integration counts as DRM.

The effect is the same if it means I can't launch my games without authenticating with a remote service that could go bust at any time, and has already dropped support for legacy operating systems which I still use.

Sure. It's still not DRM, which serves no benefit to the player, unlike network capabilities. The risk of Steam disappearing is lower than the risk of me losing the download code or WoG's download servers disappearing, so Steam is the better bet for me.

You could have all of the advantages and still allow games to start up when Steam isn't running.

I don't know what the Steam api looks like for developers, but--I guess I don't really believe that this is some accidental bug. The default behavior should be that everything sans multiplayer still works without Steam. Obviously this is possible to do--because some games do it--but it's also obviously not the default behavior, because so few games do it. That benefits Valve--how does it benefit players?

As I mentioned, I have already lost the ability to play certain games on legacy operating systems because Steam dropped support, so I don't consider this merely a theoretical concern.

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