> because they don't give publishers the option to distribute their games using an offline, DRM free installer.
What does this mean? You can still publish your game through other channels if you publish through steam right? I mean there are games that are on Steam and other platforms.
I think he means that you can't have the thing you get when you buy from steam be an offline installer (though actually I think some older games are just this, or you can copy the installed files around afterwards; think running Morrowind with OpenMW).
Exactly. I don't get why people keep repeating the "but not all games are DRM" mantra. Everyone with a minimal experience in PC gaming knows that without a proper installer most of the time you'll be in trouble just by doing a game folder backup and restore afterwards. Not to mention as well that the DRM free games lists aren't supported in any way by Valve itself (Information about that in the game profile? A filter in the search page?), as they are simply a community effort.
Have to say I'm not anti-Valve at all, I appreciate their commitment to the PC platform and their contribution to the free source cause. I'm just very critical about lack of proper support of DRM-free options AND allowing people to not to depend on a working account after some product is supposedly purchased. DRM is the wrong answer to the wrong question aka how to stop people from doing something that current technology makes incredibly easy to do, instead of properly thinking about the real issue, how we keep fairly paying authors.
PS. Also I think that people should be a bit more concerned about data harvesting through the launcher.
What does this mean? You can still publish your game through other channels if you publish through steam right? I mean there are games that are on Steam and other platforms.