I did not know this. I wonder why Frontier changed their model then? They used to allow you to launch without Steam, but last year changed it so you need Steam to play ED. I assumed this was a Steam requirement...
I still launch ED from the Frontier Launcher. But my install is the one from the Frontier website, as I bought the game on release day and it was not on steam until half a year later. Maybe it's just the steam version that requires steam (probably for achievements / cards and similar crap)?
Nope. It means that the Steam version of the launcher uses some aspect of the Steamworks API.
To be fair, it has grown quite substantially over the past couple of years, and is quite general purpose now. It could be anything. But most likely a marketing metric or something. Frontier probably just want to know how many players are playing via Steam.
Blessing. I wasn't happy when it started peddling questionable stuff (Filter blocked my word of choice for it) and thought about parting ways but ended up learning the plethora of privacy and family mode options.
I remember having to drive to Electronics Botique and Babbages all over the state to find pc games I read about online. Not getting the game I would want forever. Getting out of work and having to drive to the city to find Galactic Civilizations lol.
I don't miss that stuff, we are spoiled today and have it good. Also bank account got hacked in early 2000s from online stuff. I don't like using payment options and credentials in more places than I have to. Been on Steam for sixteen years and very happy with it for the most part.
The thing that annoys me more than anything is games sold on steam that then redirect you to another store to play (EA/Ubisoft). So many things I miss out on because of things like that. If you cant play it from Steam it shouldnt be sold there in my opinion.
I remember having to drive to Electronics Botique and Babbages all over the state to find pc games I read about online. Not getting the game I would want forever. Getting out of work and having to drive to the city to find Galactic Civilizations lol.
I don't miss that stuff, we are spoiled today and have it good. Also bank account got hacked in early 2000s from online stuff. I don't like using payment options and credentials in more places than I have to. Been on Steam for sixteen years and very happy with it for the most part.
The thing that annoys me more than anything is games sold on steam that then redirect you to another store to play (EA/Ubisoft). So many things I miss out on because of things like that. If you cant play it from Steam it shouldnt be sold there in my opinion.
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I don't like this either. In fact, I stick with PS4 for games like this (Star Wars Battlefront, RDR2, Fortnite, Overwatch, etc) despite the obvious quality reduction, because at least on console everything is easy and simple and just works without launchers and always-running anti-cheat spyware and 100 different stores (I'm looking at you, Oculus device driver that doubles as a store front).
Thankfully I don't need that many games to totally fill my allotted time for entertainment, so Steam has worked pretty well for me.
Nope. While that's generally the case, Valve doesn't force anything, any game that requires the Steam client to run is doing so out of developer/publisher's choice. See the list below:
List of DRM-free games
This is a list of games and software available on Steam that do not require the use of the Steam client itself (after the game or software is downloaded using the client), do not contain any third-party DRM (Digital rights management, e.g. Games for Windows - LIVE, Uplay, Denuvo Anti-Tamper...
For example Kerbal Space Program - if you download it to your Steam, you can just move the entire directory and start it from other location with no Steam. Very useful if you want to keep one default and one modded KSP on your HD.