A Message On Football Manager 2012 Activation

[milnerpoint]

We were loyal, but not any more.

There's nothing wrong with that. We have no duty of loyalty.

You hear companies worried about losing loyal customers all the time - customers who have stuck with the brand as the brand gives them certain benefits. However, once that brand ceases to give them certain benefits, the loyalty goes out of the window. It's a capitalist world, and loyalty is an unexpected surprise and benefit for a company. Lose that, and...

I do find it illuminating that you stuck "good and bad" in your posts - is this a bad thing? I can't see why someone's loyalty would be swayed if something "good" happened.

We have been loyal to SI all this while, and we would like to maintain that loyalty. That is why we are aggrieved. Loyalty is one thing - betraying that loyalty is another - we feel that this has happened.

As for SI screwing us over - yes they have. Look at the complaints! Some of us have had bad experiences with Steam, whilst some will stay away out of principle, and this is known.

Just because you don't feel screwed over, don't think that you are morally right and therefore everyone else is wrong. People are aggrieved, just as they have the right to be. You don't have a problem - brilliant. Now listen to those who do. And don't tell them to calm down - if you care about the game, it is better that SI and Sega set themselves higher standards, and only complaints will get them there.

Then you are no longer loyal, simple as, my local football team are rubbish, lose most weeks, only scored in two league games this season, but im loyal and go watch them every week, thats what i mean through good and bad, loyal people are not just there through what could be perceived as the good times, they are there through everything, even decisions they dont agree with because loyalty is sticking with something through thick and thin.

Again no one is screwing anyone over, not in the slightest, they are asking you to install a free program, nothing more. Anyone staying away is doing so by choice, not because SI have screwed you over.

[CaptainPlanet]

I didn't buy FM11 and I won't be buying FM12.

Am I not loyal anymore then?

[swirlypop69]

Just pre-ordered my copy through Steam Happy chap!

Great to see SI using Steam more, wonder if there will be any TF2 hats next!

Fully expect FM to become a digital download game only in the near future, would be a good move imo.

[pigfacemonkeyman]

Because i have used steam with FM since 2009, and steam does not start when you open the editor. If steam does not start you will never need it to use the editor and hence he will never have an issue unless his computer breaks

But this FM12 with Steam embedded in the game, unless you have experience of this, how do you know? You don't appear to be an employee of SI/Sega, but maybe you have inside knowledge.

[swirlypop69]

If he bought previous FMs through steam then he already had it "embedded in the game". Why would it be different because now the boxed people have to use Steam?

[Kriss]

It irritates me that people even use the word loyalty in the context of a game, we aren't loyal, we play the game because we like it, if we stop liking it we stop playing it, if it gets too expensive (in our opinion) we don't buy it, if it gets released with a DRM method we find obnoxious we refuse to buy it (apparently)

Stop misusing the word loyalty for Gods sake:D

[BayernMB]

Would you please tell me how you know this?

Since FM 2009 it's always been like this...

[The Welsh Lad]

We don't need to know those options. What SI apparently didn't do was provide an alternative, or take a stance against the 'options' they were forced to 'choose' from.

If I am not allowed to stipulate what might have been said or read into it a different way. How it it right for you then? I stated in the qoute you posted of mine, Where I said none of us where in the meeting to know what was said or done but it seems you know.

[Kriss]

But this FM12 with Steam embedded in the game, unless you have experience of this, how do you know? You don't appear to be an employee of SI/Sega, but maybe you have inside knowledge.

He happens to be correct in this case, the editor doesn't attach to Steam.

[Keyzer Soze]

It's funny how suddenly steam activation became the most important new feature in FM2012.

And there is so many doubts about it, that i really hope SI, or Sega, can answer them.

Patching the game could be a serious problem for people without internet conection at home. At present, people can download the patch from other place to a usb disk and then install it at home. But if the patch only work with steam how will they do it?

[CaptainPlanet]

It irritates me that people even use the word loyalty in the context of a game, we aren't loyal, we play the game because we like it, if we stop liking it we stop playing it, if it gets too expensive (in our opinion) we don't buy it, if it gets released with a DRM method we find obnoxious we refuse to buy it (apparently)

Stop misusing the word loyalty for Gods sake:D

Indeed. It's worse on MMO forums where people don't seem to understand that you can buy a game if you like it, play it until you don't like it any more and buy something else.

You have to commit yourself to one game, or franchise otherwise you're odd. Human need to categorise everything? AMD vs Intel, Fifa vs PES, Xbox vs PS etc. we don't seem to like shades of grey you're either one or the other, you're either loyal or you aren't!

[CaptainPlanet]

A general question to all, is it unreasonable for a successful game developer in 2011 to expect 99.99% of their customerbase to have a broadband internet connection?

[Kriss]

Indeed. It's worse on MMO forums where people don't seem to understand that you can buy a game if you like it, play it until you don't like it any more and buy something else.

You have to commit yourself to one game, or franchise otherwise you're odd. Human need to categorise everything? AMD vs Intel, Fifa vs PES, Xbox vs PS etc. we don't seem to like shades of grey you're either one or the other, you're either loyal or you aren't!

I'm loyal to my wife, she makes sure of that:D in spite of the fact that I know and like most of the staff at SI and many at Sega if I stopped liking FM I'd stop playing it, and anybody who tells me they're different is severely testing my belief.

[phnompenhandy]

Well unfortunately, even if every member of this forum boycotted the game, which is around 150k people, really that's nothing compared to the amount of sales FM11 got.

I'm no marketing guru, but I can't help envisaging thousands of customers who do not visit this forum and go into the shop to buy FM2012. Not quite heeding the info on the box, they will get home and try to activate. If the warnings from many Steam-users such as Mantrlux here come to pass, many will be deeply frustrated and advise their friends by word of mouth to avoid buying a boxed copy of FM2012. And you know what they'll do? Download the game from pirate sites instead.

I really fear sales will be hit badly by this policy decision, and as I've said already, I suspect the SEGA analysts will blame the fallen sales on piracy and avoid looking at themselves and their own decisions.

[phnompenhandy]

A general question to all, is it unreasonable for a successful game developer in 2011 to expect 99.99% of their customerbase to have a broadband internet connection?

I've already insinuated that the developers are based in London, and SEGA is based in the most technologically developed part of the world. Piracy is particularly a problem in the developing world, the very areas that have expensive, unreliable, non-broadband internet. i just don't think the policy-wonks have thought about their PR blurb about FM being a global game with a worldwide market. This will make it even more Euro/US-centric.

[Cougar2010]

A general question to all, is it unreasonable for a successful game developer in 2011 to expect 99.99% of their customerbase to have a broadband internet connection?

I would say yes, its unreasonable to expect 99.99%.

Even if the question said UK customers I would say its still unreasonable and thats not taking into account the less developed nations in the world.

[Pangaea]

When Playstation, the NHS and Swiss banks can get hacked and/or lose personal details, Steam sure as hell can be too. And then the personal details of millions of users will be available to whoever hacks them. What would happen then? Steam service will get shut down for weeks or months on end. What do you think will happen to your gaming days then?

Many concerns have been raised in this thread. I'd be amazed if SI hadn't considered these before, since practically all of them are well-known.

I've been a loyal CM/FM buying customer since when SI was a tiny, tiny company. This change means I will not buy FM12, or any future game from SI if this policy persists.

People in today's world don't have many principles. Perhaps we're too used to getting rammed up our behinds 24/7. It's sad to see SI do this, as I have always considered them a company that cared about their customers. Maybe that isn't so any more. Maybe they have gotten too big now. It's how if often goes. But I'm fed up of it and will draw a line in the sand.

Only time will tell if this hurts SI's sales more than it benefits them. I hope they suffer so the policy will be reversed.

[BenjC]

This is great news. Steam is leading an almost single handed revival of the PC gaming market, with over 35 million active users world wide.

Sure it had a shaky start but that was years ago. It is a wonderful piece of software and whenever I get a new computer is one of the first things I install.

There is a lot of paranoid hate on here from people that have never used it.

[CaptainPlanet]

I really fear sales will be hit badly by this policy decision, and as I've said already, I suspect the SEGA analysts will blame the fallen sales on piracy and avoid looking at themselves and their own decisions.

Wonder how those deus-ex sales figures are doing.

[Dinu]

A general question to all, is it unreasonable for a successful game developer in 2011 to expect 99.99% of their customerbase to have a broadband internet connection?

Yes it is.

[Super Bladesman]

The majority of games, I suspect and as Miles pointed out in his post, ship with some form on online activation these days. Unless it's idiotic DRM from Ubisoft, I don't think it has any real effect on sales. Neither will this decision.

[phnompenhandy]

It's funny how suddenly steam activation became the most important new feature in FM2012.

To be fair, it's looking like there will be fewer exciting major new features in this game than any previous FM release. I may not be in such a tiny minority in considering sticking with FM11 since it's fine and the minor additions to FM12 maybe won't make it worth the hassle to jump through these Steam hoops.

[El Zar]

[milnerpoint]

But this FM12 with Steam embedded in the game, unless you have experience of this, how do you know? You don't appear to be an employee of SI/Sega, but maybe you have inside knowledge.

i have experience that is the key;)

FM09, 10 and 11 bought and installed through steam, no need for steam for the editor, now obviously i could be wrong but i think its safe to say it will follow the same trend.

[Pangaea]

I'm no marketing guru, but I can't help envisaging thousands of customers who do not visit this forum and go into the shop to buy FM2012. Not quite heeding the info on the box, they will get home and try to activate. If the warnings from many Steam-users such as Mantrlux here come to pass, many will be deeply frustrated and advise their friends by word of mouth to avoid buying a boxed copy of FM2012. And you know what they'll do? Download the game from pirate sites instead.

I suspect sales won't be hurt too much, because people don't expect to be fooled like this and will buy the game anyway. Then they get home and notice the Steam crap. At that point SI has gotten their money anyway, but what about FM13? These customers may not buy it next time around.

I hope sales will be hurt so SI change their policy, but quite honestly I don't think they will be.

One thing's for sure, the only way we can convince SI to change their policy is by now buying the game and by causing such a stir that they change the policy for future games.

I really fear sales will be hit badly by this policy decision, and as I've said already, I suspect the SEGA analysts will blame the fallen sales on piracy and avoid looking at themselves and their own decisions.

[eddymunster]

This is great news. Steam is leading an almost single handed revival of the PC gaming market, with over 35 million active users world wide.

Sure it had a shaky start but that was years ago. It is a wonderful piece of software and whenever I get a new computer is one of the first things I install.

There is a lot of paranoid hate on here from people that have never used it.

OR have used it, found it to be poor and therefore hate it. There are also people that think it is undoubtedly wonderful because they personally have never experienced the problems and are therefore ignorant to others opinions.

[milnerpoint]

When Playstation, the NHS and Swiss banks can get hacked and/or lose personal details, Steam sure as hell can be too. And then the personal details of millions of users will be available to whoever hacks them. What would happen then? Steam service will get shut down for weeks or months on end. What do you think will happen to your gaming days then?

If you have steam set up in offline mode then the servers being down will not matter, you will still be able to play the game. Anyway the same could be said of PSN or Xbox, should we just not ever use an online gaming service?

Many concerns have been raised in this thread. I'd be amazed if SI hadn't considered these before, since practically all of them are well-known.

I've been a loyal CM/FM buying customer since when SI was a tiny, tiny company. This change means I will not buy FM12, or any future game from SI if this policy persists.

People in today's world don't have many principles. Perhaps we're too used to getting rammed up our behinds 24/7. It's sad to see SI do this, as I have always considered them a company that cared about their customers. Maybe that isn't so any more. Maybe they have gotten too big now. It's how if often goes. But I'm fed up of it and will draw a line in the sand.

Only time will tell if this hurts SI's sales more than it benefits them. I hope they suffer so the policy will be reversed.

your a "loyal" customer who hopes to see SI fail and suffer?

Surely the stance should be "im a loyal customer and i really dont agree with this but i will give SI a chance to prove me wrong" ?

[CaptainPlanet]

I suspect sales won't be hurt too much, because people don't expect to be fooled like this and will buy the game anyway. Then they get home and notice the Steam crap. At that point SI has gotten their money anyway, but what about FM13? These customers may not buy it next time around.

I hope sales will be hurt so SI change their policy, but quite honestly I don't think they will be.

One thing's for sure, the only way we can convince SI to change their policy is by now buying the game and by causing such a stir that they change the policy for future games.

I really fear sales will be hit badly by this policy decision, and as I've said already, I suspect the SEGA analysts will blame the fallen sales on piracy and avoid looking at themselves and their own decisions.

I keep hoping the same, but around the quality of the game rather than having to use Steam. Which I feel is a far more valid reason to want sales to be hurt in my eyes.

Unfortunately the vast majority of the buying public really aren't very fickle, a few vocal forum users does not a majority make and sales will continue to flourish.

[Keyzer Soze]

I suspect sales won't be hurt too much, because people don't expect to be fooled like this and will buy the game anyway. Then they get home and notice the Steam crap. At that point SI has gotten their money anyway, but what about FM13? These customers may not buy it next time around.

I dont see any issue with this, unless theres big problems with steam activation or playing the game because of steam failure. But i dont really think that will happen.

People will buy the game, will activate with steam, and next year nobody will remember this confusion! People will get use to it, and start thinking about steam as a "must have" software in order to be able to play FM.

Didn't last year, or 2 years ago, also were a big fuss about installing directx SDK in order to be able to play FM?

[Richard76]

Just so I understand correctly, I HAVE to have steam running every time I play FM AND be connected to the internet?

What if I want to play my game on a train or whlie I'm on holiday?

[Latimerinho]

It's one thing having sales possibly effected (debatable), it's another thinking Steam is the key to solve piracy. Suppose SI will get some useful stats out of Steam that they wouldn't otherwise get, but from a consumer's point of view I couldn't care less about that.

P.S. I don't mind Steam, so doesn't bother me. It's just so annoying that there has been no consistency for the last few years. In fact, it almost feels like every release is an experiment which shouldn't be the case when you have opportunities to test these kinds of things well in advance.

[Cougar2010]

Just so I understand correctly, I HAVE to have steam running every time I play FM AND be connected to the internet?

What if I want to play my game on a train or whlie I'm on holiday?

No.

You have to have Steam running everytime you play FM.

Steam has an offline mode for when you aren't connected to the internet that works most of the time.

[milnerpoint]

Unfortunately the vast majority of the buying public really aren't very fickle, a few vocal forum users does not a majority make and sales will continue to flourish.

Thats the thing, the vast majority of the PC gaming public will not see the issue, they will prob use steam already, or something similar, its becoming industry standard, its just SI and SEGA have not used it until now. The big complaints on here are from a select few older players on the most part but obviously not exclusive, average joe bloggs wont really see the problem.

[milnerpoint]

Just so I understand correctly, I HAVE to have steam running every time I play FM AND be connected to the internet?

What if I want to play my game on a train or whlie I'm on holiday?

no you just need to activate the game online once, then you can set steam to offline mode and never have to go online again unless you want to update the game.

[Richard76]

No.

You have to have Steam running everytime you play FM.

Steam has an offline mode for when you aren't connected to the internet that works most of the time.

Thanks.

Most of the time??

Not exactly reassuring.

[taylorsmen]

No.

You have to have Steam running everytime you play FM.

Steam has an offline mode for when you aren't connected to the internet that works most of the time.

Offline mode in Steam has never let me down once, but i guess i'm one of the lucky ones.

[milnerpoint]

Its also never let me down at all, but like all software there can be issues for specific people, windows wont work properly on one persons system yet perfect on millions others.

[Blackwolves]

Just a quick question!!

Will the disk be needed after I activate it through steam???

[Keyzer Soze]

Just a quick question!!

Will the disk be needed after I activate it through steam???

NO, you wont be needing the disk anymore

[Richard76]

How much is the game on Steam?

[milnerpoint]

Just a quick question!!

Will the disk be needed after I activate it through steam???

no the disk will not be needed, the game will run through steam, which takes the place of the disk.

[milnerpoint]

How much is the game on Steam?

its £29.99 right now on per-order.

[Crispypaul]

Plenty of other games in my collection are Steam-only, so this doesn't really bother me to be honest. Digital distribution in some manner is the way forward, and at the moment I'm of the opinion that Steam is the number one choice in that. Plus their sales are pretty good - I got Battlefield Bad Company 2 + Vietnam + some DLC for a tenner a while back and I've played it nearly every day. Some of their games are free too (including Alien Swarm, which is good fun if you haven't played it yet).

At least its not GFWL, which is a terrible piece of software IMO.

[Kriss]

Somebody asked about Uni port blocking earlier, the Steam forum has this list http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=723595 in case you want to choose your uni subject to whether or not it's FM friendly:D

[Romanista.]

something still hasnt been answered by SI/sega. what are FM12 holders to do if steam goes out of business/crashes/gets hacked???

[pigfacemonkeyman]

Hmmm fair enough. If that's how it worked with other games, I don't have any other games with Steam.

I'll still wait for clarification from SI on it though.

No need to wait.

Miles: Thanks for taking the time to reply. There's a few points in there that I concur with and a few that will only spark further debate, possibly over the best place to buy a seed-free sandwich.

However you have posted two questions that need answering. I would be grateful if you could answer these two as well, as they are important in relation to the customer experience using Steam:

1) "Can we download a patch from any other source rather than Steam's auto update feature"

2) "Can SI/SEGA assure us that when a user activates the game, Steam will not automatically download a patch"?

Because IIRC, people firing up the most recent Total War found themselves downloading a 1GB file when activating. Which might not be an issue for those blessed with superfast broadband connections, but even with FM 'relatively small' updates: for people on relatively slow connections it's a pain, for people with dowwnload limits it's an expensive mistake, and for people on dial-up it'll be an absolute nightmare. And it will render their purchase unplayable until they are able to complete the patch download.

3) Can you assure your customers that all patches will be 100% save game compatible in all territories? Because all hell will break loose if a patch that people have no choice whether to install or not crashes or unbalances their long-term saves.

1) No - the patches would only work going through that system.

2) I'm pretty sure there is a way to stop this, and that's been put on this thread, but it'll be looked into and if there is a way, we'll let you know when we build up an FAQ.

3) I can assure that we always do our level best to ensure that that is the case, and I don't think we've had a patch for many, many years that has required a new game to be started. I can't recall that happening at all in my time here.

You just need to read the thread. And as I said People should be careful when posting information that they do not absolutely know to be correct.

[spankie]

something still hasnt been answered by SI/sega. what are FM12 holders to do if steam goes out of business/crashes/gets hacked???

If that ever happens and if FM12 is still being manufactured then they will release a patch that won't need Steam to run. If it happens in a few years time then SI have no obligation to release a patch to remove the need for Steam because there have been new versions of the game that use different anti-piracy solutions.

[Wakers]

Why are people pre-ordering through steam when its £10 more expensive?

[eddymunster]

If that ever happens and if FM12 is still being manufactured then they will release a patch that won't need Steam to run. If it happens in a few years time then SI have no obligation to release a patch to remove the need for Steam because there have been new versions of the game that use different anti-piracy solutions.

Really? So if every FM 2012 stops working in say 2013/14/15 or whenever, even though you have paid for it you have no choice but stop using it. So your only really renting this game until steam stops you playing it?

I know this is unlikely, but still seems wrong.

[phnompenhandy]

Just a quick question!!

Will the disk be needed after I activate it through steam???

No, but it seems you can't sell it because you've already activated that disc.

What I'm not sure about is what happens if your computer crashes and needs reformatting, or you buy a new computer. Can the Steam activation be shifted to the new or reformatted computer? If you've bought the disc, have it, but can't play the game for those reasons, I think that would be really out of order. Can anyone clarify this scenario?