Terrefeu

Wait....now I'm confused even more...you can download it anywhere, but you still need Steam?

I'm not trying to be nit-picky on your wording, but what exactly does this mean?

It's the same as if you buy a Steamworks game at retail. You can get the installer files off the disc (or downloaded from the DD outlet you bought from), but Steam is needed to complete the installation. You don't actually need to use Steam to perform the download unless you were sold a key only.

It means exactly that:

1) Buy game from store X.

2) Download game files from store X or fire up retail disc.

3) Run installer (Steam).

Incidentally that's exactly how Impulse handles Steamworks games (which can often be faster than buying from Steam since it utilizes Impulse's faster CDN).

Thank You for the response.

Indeed, that's my problem too, why would I buy a game that uses third party software I don't need? Steamworks doesn't offer anything that ICO didn't already have as far as I am concerned, and ICO works well enough for my purposes.

Don't worry guys, every cancellation because of Steam will be balanced off by a sale because of Steam. So I doubt they're overly worried.

I'm pretty excited that it's totally divorced from Gamestop and using something where the social integration actually exists. I was worried they were going to try to use a new Stardock client or whatever and I'd need yet another thing.

So if I preordered Rebelling on the second day of pre-order (march 2011) when can I expect my beta key?

I have to agree with Ryat here.  Steam has really nice multiplayer features allowing folks to join friends games MUCH easier then it was with Ironclad Online.  I would pay extra for that functionality.  I have a couple friends who've had issues with Steam in the past, but frankly they were being stupid about their dealings with them and made their own issues.  I have multitudes of games on Impulse and Steam, and I can honestly say that the social/multiplayer features are better in Steam.

I just had to post about this guy. Let me throw in my 2 cents worth, stop complaining about how bad you think steam is. First you complain about its "security", I am highly certain once you download what steam needs you can go into offline mode and play the game. This would just be like any other game (downloading a patch). Second steam is one of the best sits for not only dl games but also way more streamlined than any other thing out there (Origin, GFWL). This helps the developers a huge amount for patch support (did you know that to push a patch through GFWL it takes almost 2 weeks to get "Certified"). Third steam has tons more downloads per day than impulse ever had, so I wouldnt doubt that it would be a bit slower. That being said you can always try a different server region to dl from. Fourth, as mentioned above steam has great muliplayer support and makes it easy for friends and communities to get together.  And my last point is CD/DVD are going bye bye and you will see more things like steam. Face the facts. Like I saw before, for every 1 person that leaves do to "steam" 4 more will take their place.

Edit: I have a 10mb connection currently downloading at 1.8mb average. Must be your net or your server location you are choosing

harpo

I'm not quite sure why you have an issue with Steam, and not with impulse, both of them are (well were now) needed to get the mots up to date versions of Sins, as far as I know you could not get the most up to date version, except of Impulse - which is (frankly) like steam, but worse in a a lot ways. Frankly, if there were as many problems with steam as you seem to believe there are, its (many) competitors would have overtaken it a long time ago - it is obviously not perfect, but frankly is the best solution around.