Steam 2012 Summer Sale

[DeeBye]

And thus the Steam Summer Sale 2012 comes to a close.

I realize two things. First, I only bought six games.

I got the Alan Wake pack, Dead Space 1 and 2, Half Life 2: Episode 2, Bastion, and Borderlands. I also bought a few other games to gift to other people. I got my son the Portal games, Battlefront II, Terraria, and gifted Just Cause 2 to a friend for his birthday. I just looked at my credit card statement and I spent less than $35. I really should have bought more.

What REALLY held me back was the fact that my ISP has a 80GB monthly transfer limit, and I went over it. I'll have to wait to install a few games until next month.

[Kylearan]

Hi,

I only bought Legend of Grimrock and enjoy it immensely. I would have bought Fallout 3 and FO: New Vegas, but here in Germany they only offered a violence-reduced version in German and did not allow, like with other games, to install any language. Since translation and voice acting in German versions are usually bad, I reluctantly passed.

I was tempted to buy Braid, Mirror's Edge and Batman: Arkham City, but I know I wouldn't have the time to play them, so...

Steam has really changed the gaming world, when you think about it. I would have never, ever played any of those games without Steam being around to lower prices on older material.

Not only that, but you also wouldn't have so many great indie developers creating small games with original concepts not aimed at the masses. I doubt games like Legend of Grimrock, Braid, Limbo, Jamestown etc. would exist without a platform like Steam. As much as I hate the DRM model of Steam and the danger of a privacy breach by them, I love them for indirectly supporting small game development companies.

-Kylearan

[Kylearan]

Hi,

What REALLY held me back was the fact that my ISP has a 80GB monthly transfer limit, and I went over it. I'll have to wait to install a few games until next month.

You have ISPs offering contracts with monthly transfer limits? Ouch. Wow, I remember those from the early internet days... Here in Germany, we only have flat rates for our home internet connections. I'm glad I don't have to worry about how many movies I watch online, how many podcasts I download or how many games I install.

What happens when you get over your limit? Do you have to pay more, or is your bandwidth reduced?

-Kylearan

[DeeBye]

What happens when you get over your limit? Do you have to pay more, or is your bandwidth reduced?

Gotta pay more.

[Kevin]

I haven't played HL2: Ep 2 yet and it's $5. Shall I?

Um, yes.

Soooo I shouldn't admit to never having played any Half Life game then huh?

OK so I have changed this as I just completed the original Half Life. Yes I got the Half-Life complete pack for like $6.50 during the summer sale, it was 75 or 80% off at some point. It was fun, though I'm not a great jumper in most FPS games (which I think is part of why I liked Halo it didn't really have many jumping puzzles). But it was a neat story, and I'm moving on to Opposing Forces now.

So yeah I'm about 14 years or so behind and I can see why it was so hyped at the time (and I did want to play it back when it first came out but the situation I was in didn't really allow it). I actually still find the graphics/interface quite tolerable. Sure they are dated, but they meet the good enough standard. I admit there are some older PC games that I simply can't play now because I've been too spoiled. I did get annoyed by a few "you're stuck because you were jumping where you shouldn't have" bugs, there was a lot of reloads on some levels, and there were two references to a walk through. But again I was mostly playing for the story, while being entertained by the combat.

[DeeBye]

OK so I have changed this as I just completed the original Half Life. Yes I got the Half-Life complete pack for like $6.50 during the summer sale, it was 75 or 80% off at some point. It was fun, though I'm not a great jumper in most FPS games (which I think is part of why I liked Halo it didn't really have many jumping puzzles). But it was a neat story, and I'm moving on to Opposing Forces now.

You'll be blown away when you play HL2, I think. It's easily one of the best games I've ever played, and I usually detest FPS games. The storyline really is that good.

There are a few points that you might have to make some tricky jumps, but even then I think you can get around that by manipulating the environment. I won't elaborate because I don't want to spoil the gameplay.

HL2 also holds up very well in the graphical department. It still looks as good as some current-gen games.

[Kevin]

Picked up Trine 2 on a flash sale this morning for like $3.75. Enjoyed the original, even if it's a one-play-through kind of game.

Trine and Trine2 are ones that I grabbed (package sale) and I'm now playing Trine. You should have mentioned this was a modernized Lost Vikings, a title I still claim to be one of the best things Blizzard has done. Sure it's a fantasy setting, but it's the same 3 toons with different skills platform puzzler. I loved Lost Vikings. Trine with a modern physics and graphics engine along with a leveling system is quite fun.

Another one I'm glad I got and I had to post because I had never really seen the game described before and well Lost Vikings just came to mind to give an idea of what the game is.

[Kevin]

Trine and Trine2 are ones that I grabbed (package sale) and I'm now playing Trine.

For anyone who might be interested in these 75% of the complete pack (Trine, Trine2, and an expansion for Trine2) for $8.74 this weekend (Sept 7 -10).