@bmcclure, I agree the box version is not a valid comparison. I was pushing the request to the extreme, that's true.
I fail to see why the iTunes comparison is not valid though. As you say, one major point of having it on Steam is the ability to reinstall from a single account. That's why I was refering to iTunes and the will to move music bought from another site to iTunes so that it's all in the same place.
Some people complain that they were lied to about the Steam release. The only links I found about tweets from Trent Oster in several topics requesting steam keys are refering to the launch being exclusive to Beamdog. I remember that, between announcement and first availability, he mentioned that the game would be available form other platforms later, also possibly in box form. Searching on Twitter didn't go far enough in the past to give me any confirmation of a statement about the game never being available on Steam. So I'm still unconvinced about the so-called lie. Besides, as you wrote, it's not Overhaul decision anyway. I believe people upset with Atari should express their feeling to Atari, not here, in order to get more chance. And maybe we don't need several topics for that purpose, in any case.
Things change and sometimes you feel you are out of luck. I bought the games from Atari in DVD form, with a CD check, a while before they became available on GOG without such restrictions. Too bad, but that's life. I still have my games available at will, as people who bought the game from Beamdog.
But even so, if that producer said you have to buy it from them because it will never be on iTunes.
I don't understand why people keep saying that they were told it would never be released on Steam, or that they were under the impression that it wouldn't be released on Steam, and that Beamdog now owes them something. No one from Beamdog has outright said that it would never be available on Steam, quite the opposite.
That's not the quote I was referring to. I would have to search around to find it again I'm sure, but people keep saying they were told it would never be released on Steam because there were multiple statements indicating that it would not be released on Steam, and this was possibly embellished even further by all of the articles that were floating around the Internet from gaming news sources indicating that the game will not be on Steam (likely stemming from the same comments).
Beamdog doesn't owe us anything necessarily, but I still do feel that Atari should honor previous purchases with a Steam key, like has been done for many, many games in the past.
The iTunes comparison was certainly more valid than the boxed comparison, but I'm mainly referring to the precedent--I haven't heard of iTunes users getting retroactive copies of things they've purchased elsewhere, but it is extremely common practice for Steam titles.
You're right, people should probably express their opinions to Atari instead, however I have the sense that Beamdog would have better luck negotiating with Atari than individual customers who purchased the game through Beamdog would. People should still make their position known to Atari, but they aren't notorious for caring much about their customers.
I also bought the games originally on disc, and that's not really a valid comparison either--there were no digital distribution outlets around at the time. In addition, it's GOG that puts games up on GOG (not publishers directly), so there's no way they could honor previous purchases. Plus in their case they are inexpensive enough that rebuying them for the benefit of having them on GOG is a valid option. The landscape has changed drastically since the days before digital distribution was so huge. I gladly repurchased many of my old titles on GOG, Baldur's Gate 1 + 2 included.
Your position is valid as well--you don't have to care about getting a copy on Steam, but I'm certainly glad that a lot of other people do. I don't want to spend another $20 just to get the game in my Steam account, but I'll likely forget about the game next time I reinstall Windows if I have to go to Beamdog to redownload it.
Although Beamdog also did not honor previous purchases of MDK2 HD either, which was another Overhaul title that they indicated had no plans to be released on Steam. I begrudgingly waiting for it to go on sale and purchased it again on Steam, but I don't want to have to do that. At least I know now that there's a good chance all of Overhaul's titles will be on Steam if I just wait a while before purchasing...
That's not the quote I was referring to. I would have to search around to find it again I'm sure, but people keep saying they were told it would never be released on Steam because there were multiple statements indicating that it would not be released on Steam, and this was possibly embellished even further by all of the articles that were floating around the Internet from gaming news sources indicating that the game will not be on Steam (likely stemming from the same comments).
@bmcclure, I think I know the quote you're talking about. @Jalily, the quote I think is being used is this tweet.
And, I will be honest here, I take tweets with a large amount of salt. Especially a tweet like that. Far too often are tweets dissected and twisted, meanings get lost in the simple fact that you are limited to 140 characters. Trent's tweet was 133 characters long; leaving 7 characters, which is not long enough to add "temporarily" or "for now " into the middle of it. Remembering that spaces also count as characters, "for now " is eight characters, one over the seven remaining, and "temporarily " is twelve characters.
The actual FAQs here on this site never stated anything beyond a temporary exclusivity .
Not to be facetious, but iTunes gives access to original, high-quality versions of your entire library--including those purchased, heck, even pirated from other channels. But whatever.
I will pay Overhaul or Beamdog or whoever is being stingy here in the face of a PR mess their 30% to hand off to Steam. Just give me my key, alright? I just can't bring myself to buy twice a newly released game I haven't even had the chance to play yet.
Not to be facetious, but iTunes gives access to original, high-quality versions of your entire library--including those purchased, heck, even pirated from other channels. But whatever.
Wait, what? Are you referring to the fact that all your songs show up in your iTunes library, even if they're, say, from a CD? That's really not the same thing as them being linked to your apple account (which in my mind would be the equivalent to getting a Steam key for BG:EE). Also, AFAIK, you are able to add non-Steam games to your Steam library, which would be the equivalent to your music being in your iTunes library even if it isn't from iTunes.
Edit: Looks like I'm kinda off base with this post. I hadn't heard of iTunes Match.
fact is we were given information that it probably wouln't be on steam any time soon, if we had knowen it was coming to steam this quickly we may have waited "a steam key would be nice" to keep supporting customers that want it on steam happy. i have a huge steam collection now and want to keep them in one place my choice and choice is all we asked for?
i hope atari come to the party on this would be nice 8-) if not oh well but i always tend to stay away from companys like that once bitten twice shy!
That will probably be the stance going forward, because it was a cash out option, and filling Chapter 11 will ensue nothing gets done until they come out of it if they do.
Don't worry about the "oh noes, it is in steam now!". I bought it from Steam, and it's outdated and the whole thing on Steam deppends on Atari (wich recently went bankrupt). So the version you bought its actually the good one.
Trent Oster twittered today: "On a positive note, We helped Atari do a QA pass on 2012 for Steam so it should be up soon." I must say that the dedication of this dev team is quite something.
I was upset it ended up being on steam after I bought it...until I started it and found out the steam overlay works...which is all that matters to me...I'm not overly paranoid about beamdog vanishing and I cant get the game again...but what is sad: my roommate and her friend bought the steam version..so right now I cant play with them....and i tried playing with a stranger today, and we couldnt connect any way at all, they even tried their ipad version...unless they were being a troll, but i highly doubt that.
For me it is against the spirit of the customer client relationship.
I trusted BeamDog to do the right thing, every reasonable person's expectation would be that they would get a Steam key should it end up being available there and I had purchased it already.
Then came the release date and an postponement was announced and there was some upsetness but in general people were ok if the quality improved because of the wait.
Again People trusted BeamDog.
Now the game becomes available on Steam and Beamdog/Atari/Trent says "Sorry patient customer, WE DO NOT TRUST YOU "
And now I can only say "Sorry it damages the trust I have in any of the three entities I mentioned above"
On previous posts when one of the reason for not just giving out STEAM keys was about the possible exploit of me giving that key to someone whom has not purchased it so two installs at two user location with one purchase, in my books that is mistrust, if you do trust me and other users give us each a key.
Steam is not every distributor, like MANY other indie titles, IndiaGala and the likes you get the install file link as well as a STEAM key. All of these have reported great success not worrying about giving out keys to legit buyers. This method is almost an excepted standard.
I could have just not purchased the product, download one of the many pirated copies and play without STEAM, as I have to do now
I chose to support the developer and the team that worked on the game give them the message that we want these enhanced redoes.
Now many of the users feels screwed over because the they can not have there game in one easy place.
Come on, we are asking for excess to an industry excepted distribution platform.
I have entered a game in Greenlight, they offer as many STEAM keys as you want for people already having purchased the game prior to being Greenlit, can not imagine it being different for you guys.
Come, show a bit of faith in your dedicated customers and do the right thing.
I don't know where this idea comes from that we're somehow not doing everything we can to get Steam keys for people who want them.
For final clarification: Atari released the game on Steam without consulting Beamdog. Since then, we've been negotiating with them to get Steam keys for the people who purchased the game through Beamdog and who want to keep their game in their Steam account.
As you may or may not know, Atari is going through some changes of its own (Google "Atari bankruptcy" to learn everything you need to know about it), which has understandably made that process take a bit longer.
This doesn't mean that we're not doing everything in our power to negotiate it, but there are other factors in play here beyond just what Beamdog wants to do, so it's going to take some time.
@SagaN The comment you're referring to is from Rhulqdahr who is not a developer from Overhaul but a player just like you. Do you think it's fair to blame Beamdog for a player's opinion?
It has been explained over and over that Beamdog has no control over the issue. The decision to release the game on Steam was from Atari. Neither Beamdog or Overhaul had any say in the issue. The developers are still trying to negotiate with Atari to give Steam keys for anyone who purchased from Beamdog and is interested in getting one but it's not Overhaul's or Beamdog's decision to do so.
You ask the developers to have some faith in the players. I really can't see one single occasion where they didn't. Why don't you try to give them some good faith back? The free Steam key you request will deprive them of profit and yet they ARE trying to get one for you and everyone else who purchased from Beamdog.
Thanks for keeping us all informed with your posts . I don't need a Steam key ( I'd be really nice to have on and I would surely use it) but I like how you keep us informed about the situation and make everything clear.
As much as I like having games on Steam. @Aosaw and the devs, just make sure that if you do give out steam keys that they are well tied to beamdog accounts so.. some... people dont go around re selling their steam keys. Thats my opinion anyway.
@Razor there's no real way to tie the steam key to an external account. Best they can do is having to login to beamdog to obtain the key, but once users get the key there's nothing stopping them from selling/trading the key.
Comments
I fail to see why the iTunes comparison is not valid though. As you say, one major point of having it on Steam is the ability to reinstall from a single account. That's why I was refering to iTunes and the will to move music bought from another site to iTunes so that it's all in the same place.
Some people complain that they were lied to about the Steam release. The only links I found about tweets from Trent Oster in several topics requesting steam keys are refering to the launch being exclusive to Beamdog. I remember that, between announcement and first availability, he mentioned that the game would be available form other platforms later, also possibly in box form. Searching on Twitter didn't go far enough in the past to give me any confirmation of a statement about the game never being available on Steam. So I'm still unconvinced about the so-called lie. Besides, as you wrote, it's not Overhaul decision anyway.
I believe people upset with Atari should express their feeling to Atari, not here, in order to get more chance. And maybe we don't need several topics for that purpose, in any case.
Things change and sometimes you feel you are out of luck. I bought the games from Atari in DVD form, with a CD check, a while before they became available on GOG without such restrictions. Too bad, but that's life. I still have my games available at will, as people who bought the game from Beamdog.
That's not the quote I was referring to. I would have to search around to find it again I'm sure, but people keep saying they were told it would never be released on Steam because there were multiple statements indicating that it would not be released on Steam, and this was possibly embellished even further by all of the articles that were floating around the Internet from gaming news sources indicating that the game will not be on Steam (likely stemming from the same comments).
Beamdog doesn't owe us anything necessarily, but I still do feel that Atari should honor previous purchases with a Steam key, like has been done for many, many games in the past.
@Isaya:
The iTunes comparison was certainly more valid than the boxed comparison, but I'm mainly referring to the precedent--I haven't heard of iTunes users getting retroactive copies of things they've purchased elsewhere, but it is extremely common practice for Steam titles.
You're right, people should probably express their opinions to Atari instead, however I have the sense that Beamdog would have better luck negotiating with Atari than individual customers who purchased the game through Beamdog would. People should still make their position known to Atari, but they aren't notorious for caring much about their customers.
I also bought the games originally on disc, and that's not really a valid comparison either--there were no digital distribution outlets around at the time. In addition, it's GOG that puts games up on GOG (not publishers directly), so there's no way they could honor previous purchases. Plus in their case they are inexpensive enough that rebuying them for the benefit of having them on GOG is a valid option. The landscape has changed drastically since the days before digital distribution was so huge. I gladly repurchased many of my old titles on GOG, Baldur's Gate 1 + 2 included.
Your position is valid as well--you don't have to care about getting a copy on Steam, but I'm certainly glad that a lot of other people do. I don't want to spend another $20 just to get the game in my Steam account, but I'll likely forget about the game next time I reinstall Windows if I have to go to Beamdog to redownload it.
Although Beamdog also did not honor previous purchases of MDK2 HD either, which was another Overhaul title that they indicated had no plans to be released on Steam. I begrudgingly waiting for it to go on sale and purchased it again on Steam, but I don't want to have to do that. At least I know now that there's a good chance all of Overhaul's titles will be on Steam if I just wait a while before purchasing...
All the articles I found on the subject said it wouldn't be on Steam at launch.
And, I will be honest here, I take tweets with a large amount of salt. Especially a tweet like that. Far too often are tweets dissected and twisted, meanings get lost in the simple fact that you are limited to 140 characters. Trent's tweet was 133 characters long; leaving 7 characters, which is not long enough to add "temporarily" or "for now " into the middle of it. Remembering that spaces also count as characters, "for now " is eight characters, one over the seven remaining, and "temporarily " is twelve characters.
The actual FAQs here on this site never stated anything beyond a temporary exclusivity
I will pay Overhaul or Beamdog or whoever is being stingy here in the face of a PR mess their 30% to hand off to Steam. Just give me my key, alright? I just can't bring myself to buy twice a newly released game I haven't even had the chance to play yet.
Edit: Looks like I'm kinda off base with this post. I hadn't heard of iTunes Match.
But you do still have to pay for the service, something that @WoodsieLord didn't mention.
i hope atari come to the party on this would be nice 8-)
if not oh well but i always tend to stay away from companys like that once bitten twice shy!
I must say that the dedication of this dev team is quite something.
I trusted BeamDog to do the right thing, every reasonable person's expectation would be that they would get a Steam key should it end up being available there and I had purchased it already.
Then came the release date and an postponement was announced and there was some upsetness but in
general people were ok if the quality improved because of the wait.
Again People trusted BeamDog.
Now the game becomes available on Steam and Beamdog/Atari/Trent says
"Sorry patient customer, WE DO NOT TRUST YOU "
And now I can only say "Sorry it damages the trust I have in any of the three entities I mentioned above"
Sad reaction towards your trusting customer.
A product released by multiple distributors does not mean you are entitled to getting a copy of the product from every distributor.
Steam is not every distributor, like MANY other indie titles, IndiaGala and the likes you get the install file link as well as a STEAM key. All of these have reported great success not worrying about giving out keys to legit buyers. This method is almost an excepted standard.
I could have just not purchased the product, download one of the many pirated copies and play without STEAM, as I have to do now
I chose to support the developer and the team that worked on the game give them the message that we want these enhanced redoes.
Now many of the users feels screwed over because the they can not have there game in one easy place.
Come on, we are asking for excess to an industry excepted distribution platform.
I have entered a game in Greenlight, they offer as many STEAM keys as you want for people already having purchased the game prior to being Greenlit, can not imagine it being different for you guys.
Come, show a bit of faith in your dedicated customers and do the right thing.
For final clarification: Atari released the game on Steam without consulting Beamdog. Since then, we've been negotiating with them to get Steam keys for the people who purchased the game through Beamdog and who want to keep their game in their Steam account.
As you may or may not know, Atari is going through some changes of its own (Google "Atari bankruptcy" to learn everything you need to know about it), which has understandably made that process take a bit longer.
This doesn't mean that we're not doing everything in our power to negotiate it, but there are other factors in play here beyond just what Beamdog wants to do, so it's going to take some time.
It has been explained over and over that Beamdog has no control over the issue. The decision to release the game on Steam was from Atari. Neither Beamdog or Overhaul had any say in the issue. The developers are still trying to negotiate with Atari to give Steam keys for anyone who purchased from Beamdog and is interested in getting one but it's not Overhaul's or Beamdog's decision to do so.
You ask the developers to have some faith in the players. I really can't see one single occasion where they didn't. Why don't you try to give them some good faith back? The free Steam key you request will deprive them of profit and yet they ARE trying to get one for you and everyone else who purchased from Beamdog.
Charlie Roselius @Jozrael
"@ TrentOster Atari CS directed me to BeamDog for a Steam key
Trent Oster
"@ Jozrael Awesome. Now I just need to have Atari agree we can give them out."
This is good news!
Thanks for keeping us all informed with your posts