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Forums - PC Discussion - Kane & Lynch 2 to drop GFWL and use Steamworks

http://www.pcgamer.com/2010/06/16/kane-lynch-2-ditches-gfwl-and-its-good/

"I’m enjoying watching Square Enix hammer another nail into the Games for Windows Live coffin. A week ago, Bethesda announced that Fallout: New Vegas would drop Live integration in favor of Steam for all its achievement and DLC needs. Today, while getting my hands on the surprisingly promising crime shooter Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days, it came out that the cops and robbers sequel would also drop Microsoft’s reviled copy protection and match-making system.

One of K&L2’s best-looking features is a revamped version of the first game’s Fragile Alliance multiplayer mode, in which you and your team cooperatively rob a bank, then (optionally) turn on one another during your escape to take the loot for yourself. The mode was the best part of K&L 1, but it was nearly impossible to play online due to GFWL’s crappiness. I asked IO Interactive game director Kim Krogh if I’d have the same experience this time around.

“No, for that reason. We’re using Steamworks,” he said. Awesome. Music to my ears. Steamworks is Valve’s free set of tools for integrating multiplayer and copy protection via Steam – it’s a lot more reliable, and a lot less intrusive."

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We'll see if it turns out to be a decent game or not considering the last one. Still, with Fallout: New Vegas dropping GFWL for Steamworks recently, will this be a continuing trend? Microsoft has claimed that they'll be trying to make a PC gaming push, but it seems like they'd need to make some big changes and start cranking out more games on PC as well as fixing the problems with GFWL.



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good to know I doubt I will be picking up the game tho...



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1. This has been known for a long time. Only officially announced now.

2. Why do we need a thread everytime a game uses Steamworks?



For the same reason that there's a thread every time there's information about something else, to let others know and discuss it.

 



IllegalPaladin said:

For the same reason that there's a thread every time there's information about something else, to let others know and discuss it.

 


If anybody was interested in knowing about this, they would have realized that Eidos is the publisher, which Square Enix now owns. SE has been putting every one of their PC games unding Steam so there's no surprise that this one would also use Steam. Nothing new here.



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Now others know if they didn't already know.



Just wanna interject that I actually dug the orginal. I know, I know I must be a freak, but iO interactive games are always a favorite of mine. Freedom Fighters for instance is one of my most loved games of the last generation of console/PC games. I played in on Gamecube- fell in love and replayed it in PC glory last year. I'm excited, and lack of GFWL makes it sound even better! Steam isn't perfect, but at least it isn't a walking abortion like Windows Live.



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I just never understood of what makes Steamworks different from GFWL. I'm a console gamer, and I first heard about Steamworks from Portal 2 which is coming out for the consoles as well. I just want to know a couple of things. 

1. What are the pros?

2. What are the cons? 

3. If a game comes out onto the consoles with Steamworks enabled, what features does it provide to console owners that which they didn't already have to begin with? 



<a href="http://us.playstation.com/playstation/psn/visit/profiles/isti1122"><imgsrc="http://fp.profiles.us.playstation.com/playstation/psn/pid/isti1122.png" width="230" height="155" border="0" /></a><br/><a href="http://www.us.playstation.com/psn/signup">Get your Portable ID!</a>

Am I the only one on VGC excited for Kane and Lynch 2?



hasanwhy said:

I just never understood of what makes Steamworks different from GFWL. I'm a console gamer, and I first heard about Steamworks from Portal 2 which is coming out for the consoles as well. I just want to know a couple of things. 

1. What are the pros?

2. What are the cons? 

3. If a game comes out onto the consoles with Steamworks enabled, what features does it provide to console owners that which they didn't already have to begin with? 

The DRM implementation and features I suppose. I think the general experience with GFWL is that it's not that great and hasn't been doing much compared to how Valve has been evolving Steam. Then there's Microsoft's ignoring of PC gaming. They say that they'll be making a PC push, but who knows.

Anyway, back to Steamworks.

1- The pros are that it can be a less restricve DRM while offering a number of features. There's also stuff like cloud saves, steam achievements and tools for developers to update games and such. Then there's the fact that you're using Steam so you get the friends list, voice/text messaging, community features, ect.

2. The cons are that it's still a form of DRM. Steam has an offline mode, but you'll generally be logged onto Steam to play your games. However, Steam is a service while Ubisoft's always on DRM doesn't exactly offer any features for the paying customer except a possible headache.

3- What I've talked about is about the PC. I don't think we know anything about what's going to happen with the PS3 version of Portal 2 other than it will 'implement' Steamworks. So I don't think there's an exact feature list for the PS3 version yet.

According to Gamespot,

http://e3.gamespot.com/story/6265808/portal-2-steamworks-ps3-bound-in-2011

"Newell's reason for crowning the PS3 edition of Portal 2 was that it will be supported by Steamworks. Released in 2008, the free toolset allows developers to integrate support from its Steam content delivery service into their games. Steamworks will allow for Portal 2 auto-updates, downloadable content, and community support directly from Valve, a feature the 360 edition of the game will not have. How it will exactly work on the PlayStation Network is unclear."