Prez wrote on Apr 8, 2014, 10:09:
The best thing I can say about Uplay is that it doesn't piss me off much, so it's not a deal-breaker. I am excited about Watch Dogs enough to put up with the extra few seconds delay before the game launches via Steam and Uplay.

Same here

theyarecomingforyou wrote on Apr 9, 2014, 18:48:
Put simply, EA is doing it to be greedy; Blizzard is doing it for the games.

Don't kid yourself, Blizzard is doing it for the money too. When they only sell it digitally through their own platform they can 100% control the price. Notice how they rarely offer a digital sale?

Beamer wrote on Apr 8, 2014, 16:36:
UPlay was easy to ignore with FC3 for me. I'd launch via Steam and it would launch. When I closed out, it would tell me I had some rewards or something, and I'd close it. I never looked into what those rewards meant or were.

The rewards vary. You can redeem the points for rewards, usually things on the line of pre-order goodies. Usually some are external to the game (like backgrounds for your desktop) and some are in game rewards (like an unlockable goody)

This comment was edited on Apr 15, 2014, 07:03.

Creston wrote on Apr 9, 2014, 12:43:
How is Blizzard not putting their games on ANY digital platform somehow better than EA just not putting their games on Steam?

Because Blizzard isn't singling out any digital distribution service - it simply includes a shared one with its games and doesn't allow other developers to use it. EA allows its games to be sold on various services but specifically boycotts Steam to benefit its bottom line. Put simply, EA is doing it to be greedy; Blizzard is doing it for the games.

Creston wrote on Apr 9, 2014, 12:43:

theyarecomingforyou wrote on Apr 9, 2014, 06:33:
Blizzard is different as it doesn't sell games through other stores (Steam, Origin, GMG, etc) and because it isn't done for anti-consumer reasons.

How is Blizzard not putting their games on ANY digital platform somehow better than EA just not putting their games on Steam?

Yeah, I'm not really seeing the difference. Blizzards games all tie you into their proprietary system in order to play them. He says it's not for "anti consumer reasons." Well what's the fucking reason then?

theyarecomingforyou wrote on Apr 9, 2014, 06:33:
Blizzard is different as it doesn't sell games through other stores (Steam, Origin, GMG, etc) and because it isn't done for anti-consumer reasons.

How is Blizzard not putting their games on ANY digital platform somehow better than EA just not putting their games on Steam?

Slick wrote on Apr 9, 2014, 01:13:
the solution to this isn't what people want to hear, but buy the game from their own publisher's service only. i'd buy the next Portal game from Steam, i'd buy Watch_Dogs from Uplay.

I don't WANT to use UPlay, so I have no intention of buying it through UPlay. It is much more convenient for me to keep all my games in one place and Steam has the best overall service (profiles, achievements, events, trading, etc).

Steam is nothing like the "mega-publisher they once fought against". The reason publishers don't want to turn it down is because that's where the consumers are. I really don't have any interest in managing dozens of digital distribution accounts when it's much more convenient to buy my games in one place. EA made things very simple for me by boycotting Steam - I no longer by any EA games. Blizzard is different as it doesn't sell games through other stores (Steam, Origin, GMG, etc) and because it isn't done for anti-consumer reasons.

ColBlister wrote on Apr 8, 2014, 13:33:
The cool thing is that for games you buy on Steam that require Uplay, it doesn't matter which service you launch the game from, it will also launch the other service. Twice the waiting, twice the updates, twice the fun!

the solution to this isn't what people want to hear, but buy the game from their own publisher's service only. i'd buy the next Portal game from Steam, i'd buy Watch_Dogs from Uplay.

people forget that it was Valve telling the 3rd party publisher Vivendi to fuck off which resulted in the famous law suit which Steam was born from. It's ironic that very few developers are confident enough to tell Steam to now fuck off, and ONLY publish their own titles under their own exclusive service. Steam has become the mega-publisher they once fought against.

why should anyone be chastised for selling their own product, in their own store? and not feeling obligated to just give a 3rd party store a cut of everything they make, forever? seems a bit mad.

I didn't realize that Watchdogs was Ubisoft and I forgotten aboout UPlay even existed until I read this headline.

Not really sure why anyone would be surprised by this. UPlay is standard Ubisoft stuff at this point. If UPlay was a dealbreaker for you, you should have stopped following Watch Dogs at the first mention of Ubisoft. Don't pretend like this is some kind of unexpected ambush.

PHJF wrote on Apr 8, 2014, 18:27:

I've gotten over bitching about them, they're here to stay and we already deal with plenty of em...

You deal with plenty of them. I'll keep not buying games I'd otherwise love to play because of such fucking arbitrarily intrusive and wholly unnecessary schemes.

Oh poor grandpa you.

I've gotten over bitching about them, they're here to stay and we already deal with plenty of em...

You deal with plenty of them. I'll keep not buying games I'd otherwise love to play because of such fucking arbitrarily intrusive and wholly unnecessary schemes.

Not that I was going to get this for the PC, but Uplay means its dead on arrival. After the uplay rootkit fiasco of HOMM6, never again.

GOG is my preferred choice.

Current game clients/services:

Steam
Uplay
Origin
GOG
Battlenet
1 downloader client for every online multiplayer (PoE, WoT, MMOs etc)
Other (minecraft etc)

I've gotten over bitching about them, they're here to stay and we already deal with plenty of em...

U-Play means no buy from me. I voted.

I dont see the big issue. I bought FC3 on steam and all Uplay did for FC3 in that instance was provide the achievements, Steam did all the downloading & updating.

This time around I have pre-ordered watch_dogs from Green Man Gaming (who only sell Uplay keys). It just means I need to have Uplay running to get the automatic updates which is a bit of a pain but it was worth the $20 which I saved from buying it on Steam.

PHJF wrote on Apr 8, 2014, 16:12:
No surprise there, another game I don't even have to ponder buying.

Unfortunately this practice isn't relegated solely to big publishers. I was about to jump on Age of Wonders 3 the other day until, imagine that, I find out it involves some dumbass fucking login.

You don't need to the login to play single player... you can play it in "offline" mode.

UPlay was easy to ignore with FC3 for me. I'd launch via Steam and it would launch. When I closed out, it would tell me I had some rewards or something, and I'd close it. I never looked into what those rewards meant or were. I once forgot to close it and clocked 50 hours in FC3 on Steam without actually playing. But it was just another layer, something that opened on its own and I had to close.

It was redundant, it was stupid, it offered me nothing, but it wasn't horribly detrimental.

No surprise there, another game I don't even have to ponder buying.

Unfortunately this practice isn't relegated solely to big publishers. I was about to jump on Age of Wonders 3 the other day until, imagine that, I find out it involves some dumbass fucking login.

Agent.X7 wrote on Apr 8, 2014, 12:50:
Uplay kind of sucks, but I will be getting this on PS4 so I don't care.

Same here!

Steam >>>> origin >>>>>>>> uplay

Prez wrote on Apr 8, 2014, 10:09:
The best thing I can say about Uplay is that it doesn't piss me off much, so it's not a deal-breaker.

Ditto. I don't even have a problem with Origin, it's just that I can't buy EA games on Steam. The main service I've had issues with is GFWL, as that was a disaster - constant updates, corrupted saves, difficult to backup saves, etc. Rockstar Social Club is pretty fucking tedious too.

UPlay doesn't bother me. Sure I'd rather not have it but it's not going to stop me buying a game.