DRM Free release

[darthcircuit]

I asked about a DRM free release pretty soon before the game released on steam, and I was told there were no plans for the foreseeable future at that point. I couldn't wait, and decided to purchase the game through the Taleworlds Store as soon as it was available, hoping a drm free release would come down the road like all the previous games in the series.

Flash forward to the recent GOG release, which I am overjoyed at. I am wondering if those who purchased the game early on will gain access to a drm free version either in the form of a GOG key or through the my games section on Taleworlds official website? I like knowing that I can keep a backup of my games in the event that Steam one day inevitably shuts down.

Thank you!

 

[sniparsexe]

I mean they cracked the game on day 1 so no point at adding DRM at this point

 

[cyresdog]

I am pretty sure that when steam gets shutdowned they gonna put out a version of steam before that is gonna change the always online necessity for the games that require that

And if not, then another game studio is going to buy steam.

 

[MostBlunted]

Steam prints money, I don´t think it will ever go offline. Just think about them making 30% out of all sold games and dlcs (also ingame currency stuff I think).

Just give me all of their earnings they make in 30 minutes and I guess I don´t have to work ever again.

Of course they have to pay for the servers/employees/support and so on but still...Steam prints money.

 

[darthcircuit]

Steam prints money, I don´t think it will ever go offline. Just think about them making 30% out of all sold games and dlcs (also ingame currency stuff I think).

Just give me all of their earnings they make in 30 minutes and I guess I don´t have to work ever again.

Of course they have to pay for the servers/employees/support and so on but still...Steam prints money.

No company lasts forever. It might take a while but they have no guarantees, game companies especially. The list of failed game companies is quite long. Hell, who's to say that Taleworlds will still be around in 5 years, or even have the option to patch out the drm on the steam version? No one expected that Sears would ever go out of business either, but someone came out with something better. Like it or not, Epic is starting to eat into Steam's bottom line with better payouts for devs. I don't think they will dethrone steam, or even that they are better, but everything has a shelf life.

The concept of ownership in the digital age is meaningless. The only hope you have for "owning" your games anymore is pushing studios to release drm free games. That is the only way you can have some kind of hope that your games will run in the future.

 

[Delinard]

Of course they have to pay for the servers/employees/support and so on but still...Steam prints money.

I think Valve has enough money to keep a firepit last for months, and they aren't even a public company

 

[sniparsexe]

Sorry y'all but there is NO chance steam shutting down. It's even below %0. Steam earns more money in 1 day than some studios earn in a year, or big studios in a month. Like imagine this, you buy a AAA game and steam earns around 5-10 dollars. Imagine this with only like PUBG. It sold around 40-50 million units only on Steam. Steam literally prints money. and there are tens of thousands of games on Steam.

and there is no competition for Steam. Remember people saying Epic will destroy Steam? Steam didn't even get a scratch lol. They didn't do anything and Epic is losing its momentum. Sure, epic grew really fast because they give free games but who actually goes to epic games to buy a game? Too few people. Epic exclusive games launch straight up dead, Borderlands 3 releases as an Epic exclusive dies on PC. Then comes to Steam 1 year later sells more units. Same for %90 of the games. Remember Crysis Remastered? No? I don't blame you. The game literally didn't sell on PC that they had to put it in a discount like 3 weeks after the launch. lol

whatever basically steam > all right now and it won't change anytime soon

 

[darthcircuit]

I'm not worried about now, or even 5-10 years from now. No company is infallible, and really Valve fell into this position by chance. Something better WILL come along someday, and people will move on along with it.

 

[Emil]

That's not realistic since a lot of Steam users are satisfied having the game solely on Steam and would sell their freely given GOG-key, and vice versa. It'd drive the game sales and price into the ground, thus no future earnings at all for TW. You will simply have to buy Bannerlord Special Edition, Bannerlord Anniversal Collection, etc, etc, separately. And yeah, that's a joke aimed at Skyrim. And no, death-wishing Steam or theorize about it is just waste of time. Steam has developed two of the most played games with over a million total players each day, CS:GO and Dota. They won't go bankrupt during this century, especially not whilst getting large percentages of newer, just as popular games, whilst outsourcing support from cheap-labour countries. That's unless gaming itself is overhauled or revolutionized in a way Steam cannot compete, eg, if computers get obsolete and chips are implanted in your brain. But who says they aren't preparing to compete in newer markets with the release of software like SteamVR and hardware such as the Steam controller and Steam streaming device.

 

[darthcircuit]

The way I see it working is for those that have their steam account attached to their Taleworlds account, and being able to download it from there. It worked like that for M&B 1 and Warband. Several other games do this too. Factorio comes to mind.

 

[Emil]

I know it's possible by linkage, but I doubt it since I do not remember a moment when this company has done something similar during the 12 years I've been an active player. Since none of the games has been in a HumbleBundle, and even free weekends has been rare, I doubt they'd consider giving any copy of any game in this series away for free, even if it'd probably benefit them to gain a lot of players by having Warband as a free demo for what to expect in Bannerlord. Linkage is not issue-free though, eg, if you got a Steam account and doesn't care to create a GOG-account, then the extra copy may still be sold or gifted between friends. The GOG account or Steam account with the game could also be sold later, even if that's obviously against the services ToS. M&B and WB had activation keys thus were ''fake'' non-DRM. Keys an old and annoying procedure and games tied to an account is much easier.

Edit: I know they've exchanged keys in the past, I don't remember if it was just a transfer or if there was some reseller going bankrupt since I got my game copy off Amazon prior to Steam, but I doubt you'll ever see an extra copy, unless like you say, Steam disappears.

 

[MostBlunted]

I'm not worried about now, or even 5-10 years from now. No company is infallible, and really Valve fell into this position by chance. Something better WILL come along someday, and people will move on along with it.

Even if this happens (which is unrealistic) then Valve still won´t just lose all their money and customers in a day.

This just won´t happen. Epic tried to beat Steam, they are still faaaaaaaaar away to even offer the same features as Steam has. And Epic (Tencent) also has a lot of money.

There won´t be a new company which will suddenly appear and just "beat" Steam. Never!

Ubisoft, EA and Rockstar also tried to get their own "Store" (Launcher) working, but there are only like a handful of people who but their games directly from them instead of buying them from Steam.

I don´t have anything against DRM free stuff (why should I?) but to have the fear that Steam will disappear and so you can´t play your purchased Steam games anymore is just not realistic. It´s more realistic that I become the next US president #voteme .

 

[darthcircuit]

So in Steam, if you right click on your m&b games, it will show you a cd key. The demo version of Warband on Taleworld's page is actually the full game, just limited by the cd key. If you put the key in that you got from steam, it unlocks the full drm free version of the game for free. I hope something similar happens for Bannerlord.

 

[darthcircuit]

Even if this happens (which is unrealistic) then Valve still won´t just lose all their money and customers in a day.

This just won´t happen. Epic tried to beat Steam, they are still faaaaaaaaar away to even offer the same features as Steam has. And Epic (Tencent) also has a lot of money.

There won´t be a new company which will suddenly appear and just "beat" Steam. Never!

Ubisoft, EA and Rockstar also tried to get their own "Store" (Launcher) working, but there are only like a handful of people who but their games directly from them instead of buying them from Steam.

I don´t have anything against DRM free stuff (why should I?) but to have the fear that Steam will disappear and so you can´t play your purchased Steam games anymore is just not realistic. It´s more realistic that I become the next US president #voteme .

I never said it would happen suddenly. Barnes and Noble was the goto for books for very long time until Amazon ramped up. Sears was in business for a hundred years and was a poster child of American businesses. Gamestop/EBGames were a huge power player for decades, but now are in the process of closing their doors. Blockbuster struggled on for years before giving up. All of them were huge successful companies. All of them are now on the brink of extinction. Digital companies are not immune either. Look at Myspace or Vine. Big companies that were shown up by competition! Twitter is even struggling, and they are huge!

Valve are doing very well for themselves, no one is disputing that. BUT, Today's performance does necessarily equate to what will be there tomorrow. What I'm saying is that someday, Valve will close their doors and their customers will be forced to move onto greener pastures. They are not immune. Epic, Uplay, and Origin may not be there yet, and they may very well not be the ones to kill them off, but SOMEONE, SOMEDAY will. There is no company that has existed for all of time, or will exist for all of time.

 

[Younes]

What exactly are you requesting? A DRM free version of bannerlord? It essentially starts existing the day it is cracked. There is a reason why SteamDRM is laughed at by the pirate community and the fact it takes less then a day for a steam game to be cracked.

 

[darthcircuit]

What exactly are you requesting? A DRM free version of bannerlord? It essentially starts existing the day it is cracked. There is a reason why SteamDRM is laughed at by the pirate community and the fact it takes less then a day for a steam game to be cracked.

A drm free version already exists officially. I’m not here to argue about how or when steam goes bankrupt. All I’m asking for is the drm free version to be made available through taleworlds website for those who own the game on steam, epic or any other store front.

 

[Younes]

A drm free version already exists officially. I’m not here to argue about how or when steam goes bankrupt. All I’m asking for is the drm free version to be made available through taleworlds website for those who own the game on steam, epic or any other store front.

How exactly would this work? You're asking for them to give a copy that has no protection and only requires you to simply run the executable.

 

[darthcircuit]

Like I said above, they already sell bannerlord completely drm free on gog. They have a drm free release of every mount and blade game to date available on their website for anyone that has a key. You can get that key for the drm free version from your steam library, or through linking your account with taleworlds.

all I’m asking is for the same courtesy to be extended to bannerlord as well.

 

[Younes]

Like I said above, they already sell bannerlord completely drm free on gog. They have a drm free release of every mount and blade game to date available on their website for anyone that has a key. You can get that key for the drm free version from your steam library, or through linking your account with taleworlds.

all I’m asking is for the same courtesy to be extended to bannerlord as well.

It wouldn't make sense to buy the game on gog then. You would be essentially removing the only reason to buy on gog.com

 

[darthcircuit]

Not necessarily. If I was coming new to the game now, I would absolutely buy on gog. I try to get all my games there. However, since I am a day one purchaser, it would be nice to be thrown a bone and have the same experience I have had with each previous game.