In my last post I finished with
Anyway, my download is almost done and I’ve got Nazis to kill.
Unfortunately this was untrue. You see, I was not actually watching my download, I was in another room. Instead I was using my memory of how long it took to download the patch yesterday, and estimating that it would take a similar amount of time to download from Steam.
Apparently not.
A little investigation (using the Microsoft Search utility and modification times) shows that Steam is not downloading the 115MiB patch file that CoH downloaded from Relic, but instead it seems to be downloading the entire game (or at least some very significant components) for example:
WW2Art.sga: 562MiB, created today.
WW2AlliesSpeechEnglish: 280 MiB, created today.
WW2ArtAmbient.sga: 493 MiB, created today.
This really makes me wish that Relic only used Steam to deliver CoH, basically just replacing the disk. Once installed it should work the same as if it had been installed off of disk. Then I could use the Relic updater. The question is, does integrating with Steam provide any value for Relic?
I’m hard pressed to see any real value. Relic has an online community. Apparently if one joins the community, then CoH does not need the disk to play. Is there something else that Steam provides?
If I were an hardcore gamer, and losing a couple days of game time really mattered to me, I’d be pissed. Luckily for everyone I’m not that guy. However I’m very annoyed that it looks like I need to leave my computer on all night to download what is effectively a 115MiB patch. What year is this, 1996?
Anyway, I’m going to bed. Hopefully by the time I get home from work tomorrow, the Nazis will still be waiting for me to kill them.