Call of Duty 2, other Activision games on Steam
by Zack Stern 
{ Oct 12th 2006 at 9:00PM }
Just after our keyboards cooled from typing the Psychonauts-on-Steam story, we learned that four Activision titles -- Call of Duty, Call of Duty 2, Call of Duty: United Offensive, and Gun -- are on the way to Valve's game download service. Oh, we'll play your game, Activision/Valve PR, and give you another post now. But you're on thin ice.Despite the PR play, we're interested in a big publisher putting somewhat-recent, top-tier games on Steam. We're not convinced that all games will shift to download-only sales -- brick-and-mortar is still magical to us -- but we expect most games to be offered as a physical/virtual choice. (And we don't think downloading in a physical store is the answer.)
However, we expect to save money downloading a game, and these releases will cost about the same as the ones with glossy boxes and printed manuals. Where's the value? We never have to leave home? Call of Duty 2 will be $39.95, and all of the others will cost $19.95. All four will be 10%-off for their initial two weeks, but Valve couldn't tell us the exact launch schedule other than that it will happen this month. Maybe the company is saving the date for another press release.
See also:
Psychonauts and Valve make steamy, Steam-y love
RoboBlitz hitting Steam
EB-Gamestop launches download service, "largely garbage" declares 1UP
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
panzerjedi @ Oct 12th 2006 9:57PM
Direct2Drive has had these games for quite some time.
ryro @ Oct 12th 2006 10:59PM
I'll buy games via online services when the price really, and I mean REALLY drops. I understand it costs money to develop games, but fudge, I don't get a box, legit cd/dvd, or a manual (PDF does not frickin count, ever try to quickly switch between a full screen game and the resource hungry Adobe Acrobat?).
grapes are still fun.
Chiablo @ Oct 12th 2006 10:14PM
Why do people keep using the no box/manual/physical media debate as an argument for not using the Steam download service?
When was the last time you actually read the manual from a game outside of the car ride home from Gamestop? And most games that actually need a manual (X3, generic flight sim 4, etc.) don't come with a paper manual in the boxed copy anyway, it's usually a .pdf manual on the CD.
The box? You're complaining about the loss of a box? The only game box I kept for more than a day was System Shock 2, that was back when box art was actually art and not just a cheap 2-ply package that allows for more shelf space at Wal-mart.
The physical media itself is easily lost and or damaged over the years (particularly if it is an often played game) and due to the need of having the media in your drive at all times (no-cd cracks are frowned upon by game developers) makes extended playtime games tedious to play on a multi-use PC.
2 years from now, when I want to play the classic that is Half Life 2... I can just load up steam, tell it to load up Half Life 2, it automatically patches everything for me and I'm up and running. And I don't need to worry about cracking it or installing anything like Starforce due to the Steam platform's built-in copywrite protection.
Discard your old ways and embrase digital distribution. And pray that EA doesn't get their filthy paws too deep into the fertile ground yet.
Anthony @ Oct 12th 2006 10:28PM
any chance they'll let you transfer a real serial for the steam version? i'd love to throw all my game cd's in a box and be done with them.
TheCapn @ Oct 12th 2006 10:35PM
What upsets me about digital distribution is they're saving all sorts of money (not printing DVDs/CDs, not printing manuals, not printing boxes, not paying for physical distribution), and passing all the savings to themselves.
tomato @ Oct 12th 2006 10:45PM
It's called capitalism. Why should they decrease the price? If you feel it is too much, then you can wait for a price drop, or just choose to *gasp* not purchase it at all. If they wanted to sell the games for $80 or even $100 nothing is stopping them except the fact that very few people would purchase it. They feel that these prices will net them the most profit, which is, if I recall correctly, what all companies strive to maximize. Oops, I forgot we live in a fantasy world where companies love to throw money at consumers.
Liquidize @ Oct 12th 2006 10:51PM
Personally I'm just happy to see more developers moving toward Steam or steam-like publishing. Yes I know there are alot of games on Direct2Drive but from my knowledge there's not a whole lot of people who are aware/use that medium.
My only fear is that the CS freaks realize there are more games in the world....yes I know CoD S&D is CS, but it usually has not had the CS pyschos.....any word of anti-cs blocks for the activision games? please?
Dave Silva @ Oct 12th 2006 11:17PM
The Capn hit it right on the head. I don't hate Steam, but I do hate the pricing of their titles. Fer cris'sakes, Valve is selling the stock version of Half-Life 2 for $30! The Game of the Year version is $40, and that includes HL1 Source and CS: Source. And it's still too freakin' pricey for a three year old game.
Steam is a decent system, but dammit, why can't they lower the price?!
Chiablo @ Oct 12th 2006 11:41PM
Dave, those are first party games, so they are going to be pricier by default. Look at all of the first party Nintendo titles, even games that are years old by now are still twice to three times the cost of similar games made by EA or other third party developers.
If you want a good example of cheaper games as a result of digital distribution, look at the third party developers who are now able to spread their game through a commonly used medium. Games like Darwinia or Defcon are fantastic games and are very cheap compared to their big name rivals.
Game Artist @ Oct 12th 2006 11:29PM
One of the biggest issues with digital distribution is that you can't resell your copy of the game when you're done with it. Now if they gave you a steep discount, that wouldnt be an issue, but they want full price still.
GL @ Oct 12th 2006 11:37PM
I absolutely love Steam. Not worrying about CD's destroyed/lost or having to install patches and being able to DL your games to any computer is very nice and is the way to go. I hope more and more developers start doing this.
Dave Silva @ Oct 13th 2006 3:12AM
Chiablo,
To me, even those games seem too pricey. Again, -to me-. My opinion represents no particular group, okay?
I always thought part of the high price of PC games was due to the media, manuals and packaging. Yes, some of us actually like having a book to read, because some games can't teach you every single basic thing about the gameplay as you go along. Valve has no excuse to the games for the same price online... let alone a version of the game that is crippled in comparison to the retail version. *shrugs*
I admit to being cheap, but dammit, it's just too much.
Bales @ Oct 14th 2006 10:49PM
How much does the packaging/cd actually cost for the developer? How much does the bandwidth cost to push a 1 gig game download across the internet? How about the licensing that I'm sure Steam is charging Activision? Add those up and then come back with a valid argument.
Rince @ Oct 13th 2006 7:06AM
Digital distribution is escpecially interesting for me since prices are in US$ and much lower than local prices in Switzerland. I can save as much as 50% by combining the low dollar rate and the general lower prices in the US. That's a big difference.
I know that some games are only downloadable from a north-american account (in case of Direct2Drive) but this can be circumvented easily.
So I for one welcome the shift to downloadable games.
Rince
Breachless @ Oct 13th 2006 9:00AM
Yeah, that's kind of a ripoff when Best Buy is selling a bundle that consists of CoD, CoD United Offensive, AND CoD 2 for $49.99...
Steam will never get my business until they start to price their stuff accordingly. They are not paying manufacturing costs, and that equals HUGE savings on their part. If they charged a fair price, I would be all over Steam, but as it stands, I like having my physical copies of games: friends can borrow them, I can sell them if I do not want them anymore... it's just better. Period.
otakucode @ Oct 13th 2006 9:13AM
Digital distribution will be a success when there is a significant savings in downloading it over purchasing it in stores, AND games are available (and this is critical) NO MORE THAN ONE HOUR AFTER THE GAMES GOES GOLD!
solomonrex @ Oct 13th 2006 9:36AM
This is an argument that can't be won:
"They are not paying manufacturing costs, and that equals HUGE savings on their part."
You don't know what their costs are, mk? And the publishers are going to be able to host old, cheap games (can you find the original half-life for sale anywhere else? no). So as a store, there is already good variety and good prices. But the bottom line is, they can charge anything they want and if they make more profit, they'll re-invest in better games. Valve isn't a complete profit whore like EA.
They are hosting great multiplayer servers (this is the emphasis of steam) and the games available don't require a cd/dvd drive to play. I love that. That's the whole selling point. As for manuals, they still exist, they're called "strategy guides" or "Collector's Edition Bundles". Frankly, that's what the single player missions should be for (but I know this is an antiquated notion like games that don't need patches and games without sequels).
Eventually, the prices will go down, as they do more business and build their servers out. If it was soooo cheap to do Steam, every publisher would do it (eliminating piracy and not working with Walmart would probably triple their profits). But there are real costs with a download service. You don't have to buy their games, but eventually everything on the PC will sell like this. The PC isn't going to Blu-Ray or HD-DVD, it's going to downloads. There's just too much piracy otherwise. Valve took a huge gamble, and it worked.
I'm shocked that Vista didn't include a Steam-like service for all software, but this just shows how the Windows group is in disarray. The xbox guys know how this is going to work already: XBLA is the future. Sony knows already: GTHD requires downloads to work.
Every day I wish that Blizzard and Firaxis would do the same thing, and I wouldn't have to swap out CDs every time I want to play a different game. Or wait a day for Blizzard's ftp server to respond for a patch.
So I think Steam is great, but it doesn't matter. It's the future, like it or not, Dell will stop shipping PCs with optical drives someday.