Sam and Max on Steam

edited February 2007 in Sam & Max
I believe that Steam would be an exellent way to distibute the Sam and Max series through. I would be more tempted to purchase through steam because if I ever reinstalled windows it would be there for a straight download.

I dont buy off the website becasue i dont feel very comfortable with that and not having it linked to my steam account or have a disc.

It would be brilliant !!!!!

Comments

  • edited February 2007
    After purchasing a game through this site you may download it again at your leisure by going into the past purchases section. So you have it straight for download even without using steam.
  • edited February 2007
    I've never had any problems or felt insecure about purchasing Sam & Max with the current system, though I do find Steam to be more user-friendly, which maybe isn't too surprising, as I am assuming Valve has a bit more money available to their distribution system budget than Telltale games ;)
  • edited February 2007
    I've got to agree with this, distributing via Steam may well allow TellTale to distribute to a larger audience, and certainly get more recognition. Consider recent additions to Steam in the last few months: Combined with the standing of Valve's Half-Life series, ActiVision's Call of Duty series has gone up, SimBin looks slated to release its future racing games across Steam, Creative Assembly have hooked Medieval II: Total War onto it, even Sid Meier has gone on with Civ 4. Steam is expanding, and as it does its user base is increasing. Its not like Sam & Max will be without company, Tim Schafer's Psychonauts is there as well.

    I don't think it could be done this season though, with GameTap most likely holding a legal contract grip on Season One. However Steam's major advantage lies in how it has an international market; unlike GameTap, Valve is not just limited to the USA. It certainly seems a distinct possibility though, Steam provides the perfect UI for the distribution of episodic content, even if Ritual's SiN Episodes has been kicked into the long grass (a good number of their staff left, give them that.) and Valve is moving a bit slow with Half-Life Episode 2.
  • edited February 2007
    Regarding Gametap versus Steam, it is not automatically true that you can't be on one without being on the other--Civilization 3 is actually on both Steam and Gametap--but nobody knows the details of S&M's specific contract with Gametap.
  • edited February 2007
    Steam?! Why didn't I think of that!
  • edited February 2007
    The problem with using Steam is that it's too expensive -- Valve charges quite a bit for it.
  • edited February 2007
    mill wrote: »
    The problem with using Steam is that it's too expensive -- Valve charges quite a bit for it.

    No they don't. Steam is free. :p
  • edited February 2007
    No they don't. Steam is free. :p

    What?! It is?! Hmm I read somewhere that it was too expensive. Oh well, sorry for that then.
  • edited February 2007
    mill wrote: »
    What?! It is?! Hmm I read somewhere that it was too expensive. Oh well, sorry for that then.

    You sure they didn't mean the games on steam are too expensive then? It's not true, most games are pretty reasonably priced and Steam is a fantastic platform for delivering updates and patches, it's very secure and stable despite what some people might have you believe.
  • edited February 2007
    You sure they didn't mean the games on steam are too expensive then? It's not true, most games are pretty reasonably priced and Steam is a fantastic platform for delivering updates and patches, it's very secure and stable despite what some people might have you believe.

    No.

    Found it:

    "Hollenshead: I’ve spoken to them about Steam and I’ve looked at it for our back catalog, and the royalty Valve was getting—and we have a publisher that still has distribution rights we’d have to share—and by the time we go through all of the royalties, you end up making less money distributing it over the Internet, which is the opposite of the way you think it should be."

    from http://www.gameinformer.com/News/Story/200701/N07.0109.1737.15034.htm?Page=5
  • JakeJake Telltale Alumni
    edited February 2007
    No they don't. Steam is free. :p

    Steam is free to end users, of course! Charging for Steam would be like charging someone to walk into an EB Games.

    Valve does take a cut from every copy of a game sold over Steam, though, (which, to continue the analogy, is just like EB Games making a profit off of a sale done at their store).
  • edited February 2007
    Okay, so basically, here's the deal, I think:

    GameTap offered a better deal. They took it. Don't complain.
  • edited February 2007
    Maratanos wrote: »
    Okay, so basically, here's the deal, I think:

    GameTap offered a better deal. They took it. Don't complain.

    I'm not complaining. The current system works fine. Steam would work fine too is all I'm saying. But, if it's more expensive, then of course GameTap is better for the moment.
  • edited February 2007
    I would have preferred Steam since it's so easy to update your games and also it's available almost everywhere.
  • edited February 2007
    I'd be curious about Telltale's agreement with GameTap.
    GameTap probaby sees the S&M exclusivity as a way to increase their visibility, and hopefully compete with Valve's online distribution system, so it wouldn't surprise me if there was a clause in the exclusivity agreement about not using another commercial digital distribution dohicker.
    Of course, it also wouldn't surprise me if Telltale was smart enough not to enter into an agreement with those types of restrictions.
  • edited February 2007
    Why does everyone assume that Gametap is the reason Sam & Max isn't on Steam? How about the fact that Telltale built its own digital distribution channel, Telltale Now, which serves the exact same purpose as Steam? The whole point of using the online space to sell games is to not have to resort to a second party. Why would Telltale sacrifice part of their revenue by putting their games on Valve's service, when they have their own, perfectly acceptable one? Having control over selling your own products is the point of digital distribution. What makes it so worthwhile and exciting is the fact that any company can conceivably make their own service and sell their games their own way. Saying that everything should be under Valve sort of defeats the purpose.

    Obviously I'm not saying Telltale's games will never be on Steam or that it makes zero sense for them to ever be there, but what compelling reason is there for that to happen right now? Telltale's system allows for you to re-download games that you deleted or want to put on a different computer just like Steam does. Steam is useful for games like Psychonauts to show up on because it gives games that may not have had the best performance at retail something of a second life, sort of like Telltale offers Ankh and Al Emmo through its service. But Telltale itself is trying to do what Valve is doing with their own games. It's like asking why Valve doesn't have Telltale sell Half-Life. I don't see how Steam would get it out to more people, either...this is the Internet. Telltale's games are as available to Steam users as they are to anyone else. I don't understand why everyone wants the games on Steam so bad in the first place...most of the reasons I've seen were based on inadequacies with Telltale's system that don't actually exist. Sure, it would be convenient for me if every single game I ever bought online were under one service, but I don't exclusively shop at Walmart.
  • edited February 2007
    Just that people (myself included) thinks that telltale games made an exclusive contract with Gametap to make Sam and Max games. I mean, Gametap gave them the money to Telltale to make the series, which is why their logo is displayed when you load the episodes regardless if you got it from telltale or Gametap. I am sure Gametap inquired Telltale games to make the game and give them money way before it was announced on this site. With that said, I believe Gametap doesn't want to compete with another company that they helped paid for.

    I checked yahoo games which previously sold the bone eps for 20 to check if they have sam and max. They techincally do as in there is a short description of the game and they tell you to check it out, but they send you to the gametap page. I suddenly realized from the banner on the main games page on yahoo that they sponser gt, so no surpise there.

    It is pretty much like if Nintendo (or any other console manufactors out there) helped some third company to make a crossover game like super mario and [insert game developer company's mascot here] Surely, you won't see this type of game on the xbox 360 or ps3
  • edited February 2007
    I didn't read this thread as thoroughly as I should have. It seems like there's two discussions going on, Steam vs. Gametap and Steam vs. Telltale's system. Obviously I was responding to the latter.

    To me the question of why Telltale chose Gametap over Steam as their co-producer doesn't really matter. We can assume Telltale made the choice that served their best interests. How do we even know Valve was a potential partner anyway? Do they normally fund games for the same reason? The (apparent) deal with Gametap is that they help fund the game in exchange for the exclusive period. After that Telltale seems to have complete control over how they sell the games. If you replaced Gametap with Valve in the above deal (again, where's the evidence that this is something Valve was even interested in?), it's hard to believe that Telltale would have the same freedom. After all Steam and Telltale Now more or less serve the same purpose; Gametap is a different animal altogether. The only issue with Gametap is the fifteen days. That's a pretty small issue.
  • edited February 2007
    Udvarnoky wrote: »
    Why would Telltale sacrifice part of their revenue by putting their games on Valve's service, when they have their own, perfectly acceptable one?
    For the same reason that Valve also sells their products through traditional retail outlets - increased visibility and accessibility, translating into increased sales. Sure, they make less off of each copy they sell at Best Buy or Wal-Mart than the ones they sell through Steam, but they still make money that probably wouldn't have been coming in otherwise.

    If it were strictly about money, I'd think that offering the product through every feasible avenue would be a no-brainer.
    However, I think it's also about validating Steam as the digital distribution service. To the suits, it probably seems that making your product available via Steam is like admitting that Valve's got the best solution.
  • edited February 2007
    For the same reason that Valve also sells their products through traditional retail outlets - increased visibility and accessibility, translating into increased sales. Sure, they make less off of each copy they sell at Best Buy or Wal-Mart than the ones they sell through Steam, but they still make money that probably wouldn't have been coming in otherwise.

    Sure, but at the moment Telltale isn't at retail, only the internet. And on the internet the only obstacle is finding out that the product exists in the first place, not where it can be found. Having Sam & Max on Steam would not increase its availability...it's available right now to anyone who wants it.
  • edited February 2007
    The coming of the distributron may soon solve our collective moaning about Telltale's digital distribution methods:

    http://telltalegames.com/company/jobs#distributron
  • edited February 2007
    Hopefully this is the beginning of the end of Telltale's dependence on digital river.

    Also, Telltale is hiring up a storm lately!
  • edited February 2007
    Udvarnoky wrote: »
    Hopefully this is the beginning of the end of Telltale's dependence on digital river.

    Also, Telltale is hiring up a storm lately!

    Yeah they must be struggling.
  • edited February 2007
    ...under the immense weight of success!
  • edited February 2007
    Just for the record, distribution on Steam is free if the game uses the Source engine (Valve aren't stupid enough to charge a premium for the engine AND a cut for distributing it).
  • edited February 2007
    numble wrote: »
    Yeah they must be struggling.

    Oh, come on. Telltale is merely expanding as a company. They're getting bigger, becoming more established, hiring more people.
  • edited February 2007
    It's a joke.
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