It's getting so annoying to hear people piss and moan about how horrible Steam is. Let me start by saying that in the 5 years I've been using the software, I've never encountered a problem. There have been faults with the Steam network from time to time, but that's Valve's doing, and is completely irrelevant to the functionality of the software; the software is fine.

So often, people complain about everything wrong with Steam or how Steam is so unnecessary, which leads me to my first point: why do you care? If you don't like Steam, you can make the choice to avoid Steam gossip like you would avoid rape. That's what I do when I come to the conclusion that something isn't worth my time: I separate myself completely from whatever it is. It's not that difficult. Don't visit the Steam website, avoid forum threads discussing Steam, avoid articles on your favorite websites if you think they might be discussing Steam. It's as simple as not caring, which is surprisingly simple.

Now, Steam is first and foremost a digital distribution service. Steam was originally a simple update to the WON network, bought by Valve from Flipside.com, as well as a means for Valve to distribute their products digitally, thus maximizing profit and offering the user the convenience of buying a game online, never having to go to the store, and then receiving their game a mere hour or so later, depending on their internet connection speed. Valve Co-founder Gabe Newell had an idea that by distributing games digitally, manufacturing costs would become non-existant and profit would become 100%. In addition to this, the user would never have to worry about clumsily losing their copy of a game, or something happening to their CD-key. Upon making a purchase of a game, you simply register your CD-key with your Steam account, and that's it. You download/install the game and you're ready to play. That game is tied to that account forever, no matter what. No hassle. Some people argue, "Well, if you want to keep an ever-lasting copy of a game, turn it into an ISO". ISO is a disc image format allowing you to copy large amounts of data with relative ease. I wouldn't keep an ISO on my hard drive forever simply because it makes no sense to waste that disk space. With all of the games I own, that space quickly adds up, especially with those games also installed. You're effectively doubling the space you use by using an ISO over a digital format like Steam uses. The data you download is all there is. Very convenient.

The next big thing is Friends, Steam's built-in instant messenger. When first introduced (with the initial launch, I believe, but I could be mistaken), Friends wasn't seen as particularly useful. Why not just use AOL Instant Messenger, or (a little later) Xfire? However, over time, Steam users came to understand the convenience of not having to alt-tab out of game to respond to an IM. Instead, they could simply press ESC at the end of a round, check whatever IMs they have, respond, and then get right back to playing, all without ever having to exit the game. You could monitor the games your friends were playing, the servers they were in, as well as full details of those servers. No more asking for a server IP from your friend, as was necessary prior to Steam unless you knew the servers your friends played in regularly. Recently, Steam made many improvements to Friends, including an in-game overlay giving you full access to everything you had before, with the addition of the ability to browse the entire Steam Community website. This allows you to edit/view your groups, recruit new members, etc. Anything you could do on the Steam Community website, you could do in-game, without ever having to exit. Now that's convenience.

Next up is auto-updating. Steam has a built-in feature that allows your games to be automatically updated for you. No more searching for patches, no more trying to join a server only to receive some error because you're not up-to-date. Now you can always be up-to-date. With this you receive full, detailed changelogs and the ability to pause an update should you wish to continue it later, a convenience not offered by many web browsers (no, not even Firefox). Take that, standalone patches!

A lot of people wonder, "If Steam is so dependant on an internet connection, what about the people without one?". The answer is simple: you should not be using Steam. That may seem harsh to some, but it's true. Why are you using Steam if you have no internet connection? Steam is a digital distribution service which uses an online network. If you do not enjoy the benefits of an internet connection, you will not enjoy the benefits of using Steam. Now, of course, Steam has an offline mode. But it's only used during times when your internet connection is temporarily out. Think of it as Valve's way of saying, "Look, we won't leave you stranded if your internet sucks, but you really should try to fix your connection, because otherwise what the hell are you doing using Steam?"

Recently, many game developers began making deals with Valve to distribute their products digitally through Steam. If I may quote Wikipedia briefly, "As of January 29, 2008, over 250 games are available on Steam, and as of February 7, 2008, there are over 15 million accounts". Very nice. Now it's not just Valve's products, but all of my favorite games! Hooray!

Valve recently (about four months ago) announced their newest addition to Steam: Steamworks. Steamworks is a full development kit for games using Steam. Not only that, you receive full support from Valve themselves and a lot of neat features come with the package (taken from the Steamworks website):

• C++ code, including all currently-available platform features
• Sample Steamworks application
• Complete how-to documents
• The ability to edit your game's Steamworks metadata
• The ability to add and edit achievements
• The ability to add and edit game images for use in the Steam Community
• The ability to author gameplay stats definitions and descriptions

If you ask me, that's quite a nice list of features for a Steam developer. Speaking as a programmer, those features make the development process far easier than it otherwise would be.

In conclusion, Steam is quite the stride forward in making both gaming and game development easier and more convenient than ever before. If you don't like Steam (although I can't see any reason for someone to dislike it, it's everything a game could ever want), then don't use it. In fact, I'm begging you not to use it because that means I will never have to see you online, thus making me quite the happy gamer.