I'm a PC guy at heart and have owned gaming PCs since 1995 but I've been stuck with the PS3 in the past 3 years out of convenience since I think PC gaming honestly is very complex and it takes tons of time and energy to maintain your computer to be up to date and make the games work properly, you are constantly in battle against patches, drivers, viruses, bugs and crashes to desktop etc.

Anyway, I plan to get heavily into PC gaming again very soon (mostly because next gen graphics aka PS4Bone are a dissappointment and because CGI Quality and Zarx and others have promoted PC gaming so well on these forums). In the past I torrented (stole) nearly all my games. But now since I have missed several years of PC gaming I feel a li'l left behind and obsolete, so I don't know the current state of what's "the thing to do" in PC gaming, if the torrent thing still is the way to go or if Steam has replaced it somehow.

So simply asking, what downside is there to torrent/pirate my PC games compared to buying from Steam? What I am mostly after is, how is the Steam service made up nowadays, is there any authenticity checks and stuff that will reveal if my installed copy of a game is pirated or legit, and in turn will that affect me in any way when I am online on Steam - say, will my friends not even recognize that I own a certain title if its pirated, and do I risk being shut out from online multiplayer servers, will I not be registered for Steam Trophies etc? Stuff like that.

You can PM me if you want.

Note: forget the "you will get caught by FBI or the NSA" or "it's immoral and your a thief who steals from the poor developers" arguments. Those are important and interesting arguments but beyond the scope of this thread since I live in Sweden where getting caught for piracy is minimal and since the moral issue is subjective and a topic for another time and another thread).

I don't pirate my brother does though. I don't support pirating... but, I will answer your questions to the best of my ability.

If you steal popular games, you will get caught and a notice sent to you IP provider (atleast in US). Whether something actually happens IDK, I don't think I've ever seen anything happen. My brother uses a proxy server which requires the companies to get a warrant to find out your name, which means its to much work and they won't ever do that. If you steal unpopular games you probably won't get caught. Edit: You seem to have modified the OP I will leave this.

You don't get trophies in all cases (unless they're ingame achievements) but you won't get Steam, Uplay, or Origin Achievements, or multiplayer in most cases. Also, a lot of times they don't get patches, because they have to recrack it, and people just don't. 

 In general especially if you're not buying new releases, Steam or Even Origin is more convenient because you can download it whenever you want, over and over. Which is good if you're messing with gamefiles for modding or reformat your computer a lot.  You also don't have to worry about crappy torrents.

Just use Steam. Games are cheap, u get achievements, patches, will have on your steam account forever if u ever decide do play again, online functionality, you support developers and isn't doing anything illegal.

Lazy ass gamers

Yeah I edited the OP.

The conveniencey argument is an important one I think. In the past I would think it was worth it to save a buck by downloading a couple of cracked torrents and hope for the best, but it's convenient to buy a game and be sure it always works and is always supported.

So Trophies might not be supported by torrented games? How about online gaming. I don't remember how that works on Steam, if Steam has any online matchmaking services or if they're all in-game? What about Age of Empires 2 HD? Is that matchmaking through Steam servers or is it in-game (lol how would you know, well I'm asking anyway).

I'd say it all comes down to whether you trust Steam or not. Valve has all the control and you don't actually own any of the games. You can pretty much trust them but should any trouble come, you could be screwed. Of course Steam isn't all bad and it has tons of good sides, too, including low prices. Unless you have trust issues or too little money, I'd advise you to go with Steam. Should you go with piracy, though, I won't condemn you - I'll never do that as long as DRM is present, and Steam is a form of DRM.

It's not stealing. Theft removes the original copy, software piracy doesn't. Also, there's a reason it's not called theft in the law. And finally, I doubt what you say is true because I've generally heard very little of anything like that happening.

I haven't pirated any PC games in years and I did it quite a lot back in the day. But since Steam, the games are so cheap, sometimes it already feels like stealing when I go for a sale or a humble bundle.

You don't actually own the physical copies either, it's just a license. However, revoking your license for a physical copy is much more difficult and never going to happen, whereas banning your steam account is possible.

If you stole a physical copy of a game you're probably stealing 1 dollars in paper. If you "pirate" you're not stealing that 1 dollar in paper. 

If you think about it... it's probably better for the game company if you steal the physical copy, as opposed to pirating a digital copy. Because they'll still get paid shipped to retail. 

You won't get caught for every game, my brother got caught for Arkham Origins. I got caught back in the day for GTA3. Nothing happened ofcourse as a result, and even if you get the 6 strikes it probably wouldn't hold up in court. 

http://gawker.com/5986813/welcome-to-the-us-copyright-alert-system-where-companies-can-slow-your-internet-if-you-download-illegally

But this is completely offtopic
Sorry Slimebeast.

Do as much off-topic as you want. The risk of being caught, I think that's interesting too.

I always wondered, do gamers in the USA feel the risk of being caught for piracy is a real risk? And a risk that would have concerete and palpable consequences? As in, does it make them think twice if to pirate or not?

Online gaming doesn't work for pirated games unless you find a cracked server, which is usually filled with hackers.