My LEGO Nexus Organization

Steam (http://www.steampowered.com) is a download-based computer gaming platform (Available on both Windows and Mac OS X) made by Valve Software. No subscription is required to join, and signup is free. (Obviously, you have to pay for actual games, but...  :P ). You can pretty much serve all your computer-gaming needs through it. I highly recommend that you make an account.

Be sure to join the MLNO Steam Group (http://steamcommunity.com/groups/MLNO)!

-Canama

*joins group*

Ditto

Trying to join... phone's acting up...

No, won't work >_< can't do it til I'm back to my laptop

EDIT: joined =D

I made an avatar for the group! It looks terrible but it took me about an hour to make and I am proud of it.

-Canama

Looks very good. =D Nice job. =)

Why does the steam window pop up every time I start my computer and ask me to log in and how do I stop that?

MsRR: Download some more RAM? Try turning it off and on again?

Joking aside, try looking in the 'Startup' section of your start menu, and take the steam thing out of there, if it's doing that. =P

Open Steam, click "Preferences", click "Interface", and uncheck "Run Steam when my computer starts".

It's really annoying that it's turned on by default.

-Canama

Thank You.

I found a bunch of people from BZP! ... Unfortunately, the group is invite only, and I doubt Cholie or any of the others like Swert or so has any clue that I have a Steam account now. =P But I found them! =P

I saw that as well... But there's no way for me to join.

-Canama

oh, that's right! xD Swerty is a portal addict!

who wants to join that group? i'll go poke him with a request. canama, blade, what are your steam account names again?

Exactly. Since it's invite only, we can't join, and since there's no feasible way of pointing out to anyone that we actually are on BZP, since it's down... =/

All this wouldn't be too much of a problem... If it wasn't for the fact that I can't friend people myself. ::)

Ah well; maybe luck will happen and somehow someone will stumble across one of us and realize "Hey, I recognize that guy from BZP!"

MTM: Mine's BZP Blade. I'll go grab my ID link. One sec.

/EDIT: Here: http://steamcommunity.com/id/bzpblade

That's the link to my profile. =)

I'd ask myself; but well, I see Shine deleted my talk page since I haven't edited for years(I keep forgetting. D=). =P

Canama. :P

I even sent you a friend request! (You never responded).

-Canama

i've been on steam online once :P

but sure, i'll get back on.

MTM: I see. =P

Speaking of this; I assume all the 'onlines' I'm seeing isn't in fact meaning logged in on the site; but with the Steam client active? =P

Yep.

-Canama

I thought so... Was wondering why it continually did not show me online for 3-4 hours. =P

K, asked swert to invite us. lets see when he answers. :P

Alright then. =P

Valve's online game service Steam hit by hackers
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15690187

The Steam video game service, used by 35 million people, has been compromised by hackers.

Its owner and operator, Valve, uncovered an intrusion into a user database while investigating a security breach of its discussion forums.

The attackers used login details from the forum hack to access a database that held ID and credit card data.

Valve said that, so far, it had no evidence that credit cards were being misused or Steam accounts abused.

Losing trust
The defacement took place on 6 November and the Steam forums were taken offline when Valve learned of the attack.

At first the firm said the discussion groups were offline for maintenance.

However, a message posted to the front page of the forums by Valve boss Gabe Newell on 10 November has revealed that the sites were shut down because of the defacement.

Valve's investigation of that incident revealed that the "the intrusion goes beyond the Steam forums".

The initial investigation showed that the attackers gained access to a Steam database that held "user names, hashed and salted passwords, game purchases, email addresses, billing addresses and encrypted credit card information".

Valve has not said whether this was the full database of Steam's 35 million active accounts or a subset of that total.

Mr Newell said Valve had no evidence that the encrypted credit card information or personal information on gamers had been taken. However, he added, "we are still investigating".

He said it had only discovered that a few forum accounts had been compromised and used to carry out the defacement.

But Mr Newell added that all forum users will be required to change their passwords when the discussion site re-opens, which the firm is trying to achieve as quickly as possible.

He advised users to change passwords on other accounts if they are the same as the one used for the Steam forums.

"I am truly sorry this happened, and I apologize for the inconvenience," concluded Mr Newell.

Code changes
Steam is a gaming service that lets people buy, download, play and chat about a huge variety of games, only some of which are made by Valve itself.

About 1,500 titles are currently available on Steam including Skyrim, LA Noire and Modern Warfare 3 as well as many independent and free games.

Security expert Paul Ducklin, writing on the blog of security firm Sophos, handed down advice about what to do following the breach.

He said users should change passwords, monitor credit card statements, consider removing card numbers from Valve's servers and sign up for the Steam Guard security service.

He also urged users to insist businesses take steps to make it much harder for hackers to penetrate their systems and use stolen data.

"Community pressure has persuaded many businesses to improve their password-handling code," he said.

I heard about that when it was first posted on the tenth... The forums were down, replaced with a message from Gabe.

Hopefully nothing too bad will come out of it, at least they bothered to encrypt passwords and credit card numbers, unlike, say, Sony.

-Canama

I guess I'll join the Steam group then. (User in sig)

OH MY GOD

Valve is doing this Steam thing for the holidays, okay?

So, by accomplishing tasks, you can win entries in a raffle, coupons, or even free games! (I now have a copy of Half-Life I'm going to trade for something else. Don't know what though.)

The raffle prizes?

3rd Prize: The Valve Complete Pack
2nd Prize: Top 5 items on your Steam wishlist
1st Prize: Top 10 items on your Steam wishlist

Okay, now for the ridiculous one:

GRAND PRIZE: Every game on Steam. No, I am not making this up (http://store.steampowered.com/holidaysale/details).

wow

So even if you aren't going for the raffle, at least click the link (http://store.steampowered.com/holidaysale/). You could still get a free game!

-Canama

Just bought Portal 2. (And I think you need to have bought at least one game to participate in this event?)

I'm not sure if that's the case.

-Canama

I hope you don't; I want to participate in this with only Portal and maybe TF2. When's the thing end? And how do you enter, with achievements?

SALE
http://store.steampowered.com/app/620/

Already called it out in my blog. :P

Seriously tho, buy it. Its a great game ;)

I'd buy it if it wasn't such a huge download.

Saw that, but not everyone reads the blogs...

:D
The Portal 2 Level Editor is out!

I've been waiting for this for so long! :cheer:

Soon, you will all behold the WONDERS OF MY SHEER MADNESS!! MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! >:D :P

BTW, does anyone know a way to modify the recordings and placements of the narration bubbles in the Commentary mode of Portal and Portal 2?  I keep thinking that it would be an AMAZING way to do a Let's Play--you're not just watching someone play the game, you're experiencing it with them.  Add to this the Portal 2 commentary nodes' ability to temporarily take control of the game, and, well... :drool:

If anyone wants to quickly reply about this, can you change your connection settings(Like what rate it goes at) later on, for the Steam client, after it's full installed? Or is it a one-time thing? I'm not entirely certain of the best setting for me. =/

what connection settings do you mean?

The connection speed. ;)

i'd be shocked if you COULDN'T"T change that.

I can change it now; I just don't know if it's a setting to edit, though as you say, it's one you'd think is obvious to be able to edit after the initial set-up.

well if you can change it now, what's the concern exactly?

I don't know the actual connection speed, based off the selections they give. >_^ I'm going to be going with the default, but I don't know if that's wise...

go to speedtest.net. run it about 5 times. pick the closest thing to your lowest speed.

Alright then. I'll try that, then.

Does it basically pick what to bottle-neck at?

/EDIT: Well, what it told me, I believe, is that my internet isn't as good as I thought it was. Yet, at the same time, better than I expected it to be, based on the options given. =P Does it want upload or download speeds?

i would guess download, as you'll be downloading games =P

i say 5 times because the first time or two your ISP might give you a 'speedboost' for small files, single webpages, ect. Steam stuff is big, so you want to move through the speedboost to get to your real speeds.

Fair enough. Well, for DL speeds, I get about... 3 and a half mbps? Give or take maybe ten mbps?

Upload is the weakest link, though, since it only has just over half a mbps, I'd say averaging at 0.60?

I think it can do better, but I can't really do anything about it, since I'm not the one in charge of the actual internet here. =/ And I'm not totally certain, it could already be better than it was. =P

=P well i don't feel too terrible about my home internet then =P

and upload speeds are almost always lower than download speeds, nothing unusual there.

Haha, I bet not. =P

Alright then. *Nods*

FYI, here at work i get 4.8 meg down, .45 meg up

so not too bad =P

19.6 meg up, 12.7 up on my phone (LTE FTW!)

Jeez, that things fast. 0_o But, the question is, can you run Minecraft on that phone of yours? =P Not a total serious question, though. =P

But yeah, not bad at all. =D

Sadly, only Pocket Edition =P

Also, here are the specs.....

Droid Charge:
By: Samsung
OS: 2.3 Gingerbread
Networks: Verizon LTE
WiFi: b/g
Bluetooth: 3.0
Screen: 4.3” 400x800 Super AMOLED+ (217 PPI)
CPU: Single-Core Hummingbird (less than anything on my phone list)
RAM: 512 MB (half is dedicated as VRAM)
Storage: 2 GB internal storage + MicroSD up to 32 GB
Video Out: Micro HDMI
Cameras: 8 MP (rear), 1.3 MP (front)
Root-friendly: low
Hack-friendly: very low

I was getting worried there, as I read the specs, that it'd be better than my laptop. =P

no, that would be my tablet =P

Iconia a500:
By: Acer
OS: 4.0 ICS
WiFi: b/g/n
Bluetooth: 2.1
Screen: 10.1” 800x1280 IPS panel (149 PPI)
CPU: Tegra 2  
RAM: 1 GB
Storage: 16/32 GB SSD + MicroSD up to 64 GB (I have the 16 gb version with a 32 gb SD)
Video Out: Micro HDMI
Cameras: 5 MP (rear), 2 MP (front)
Root-friendly: yes
Hack-friendly: moderate

Get the highest capacity SD card, and yes, you definitely have my laptop crushed in specs, in every way. Maybe except the CPU, but I doubt that very much. =P

im not reading this

Well, not totally 'crushed'; it's more or less equal. MTM takes the win with the equivalent of 80 GB storage, and the slightly taller screen. =P

The Tegra 2 is a dual-core 1 GHz dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 CPU (built off the ARMv7 architecture) with an 8-core ULP GeForce 333 MHz GPU

The only thing my laptop might beat with those, is the graphics card, surprisingly enough. =P I only have one 1 GHz processor, unfortunately. =/

Probably.... IMHO the biggest downfall of my tab is it stutters/jumps when playing 720p and higher video. Not enough to stop me from using to stream HD video, but it gets annoying.

Hmm, that's not good... is it because of it's specs?

yeah... the SoC just isn't that good at video decoding...

Ah, I see...

Also, at Chamber 18 in portal. =)

Yay!

How's it running?

Portal is running excellently. I don't think it can run any better, to be honest. =) In fact, both it and TF2 work rather well, though TF2 was a little choppy in-match; I think it's partially because there were like 15 bots and me, all trying to blow each other up. =P It was playable, but could've been better, so tomorrow I'll test it on the absolute lowest settings. =P

Portal 2 has relitavley low system requirments. If you can handle minecraft and portal, ya just might be able to play portal 2

Well, the two are different computers(Due the stupid java gl problems... I'll have to look into it now that I know what I'm looking for, when I get onto my desktop again); but I'm thinking I can definitely handle Portal 2; and will look into maybe getting it, once I find out if there really are Steam prepaid cards like for the Wii and 3DS, and once I finish Portal 1. =P

If you think portal 1 is fun, portal 2 blows it out of the water.

Ooh, that sounds cool, then. =D

Also, from my calculations, I may have missed two cameras, but I don't know where... =/

I got camera shy, legit, my first playthrough :P

Oh, I'm headed that way, since I'm stubborn and look everywhere, but I think I definitely missed some... Based off my calculations, I'm missing two, but I don't know what from. =/

Steam Expands Beyond Games (http://store.steampowered.com/news/8584/)

But what does this mean? What type of things will it have, besides likely Filmmaker?

Well, it will have more than just games, which is obvious, so it will have other bits of software.

...That didn't really answer it, did it? What type of things will it have? Stuff that isn't a game.

Question: is steam limited to the speed it can download games?

Limited in playing, or downloading? I believe downloading should be capped by your actual internet, but for playing, unless it's an online-only game, it won't affect it, and unless you have dial-up or so, it shouldn't even affect it that much.

Hopefully that was helpful.

I clocked downloading speeds around 45mbps before downloading the game, but it slowed EVERYTHING down when it started downloading TF2. =/ I changed my download server, hoping it would help, but it didn't, if anything it made it worse.

Hmm. That's very odd, then. 0_o Was anyone else using the internet heavily, while you were downloading TF2? Because it will do that, in my experience... Sometimes it'll even do it randomly.

Steam software store released (http://store.steampowered.com/software)

...nearly a month late.

That looks rather interesting.

Mak just bought & downloaded Thomas was alone. It crashed every time he tries to run it.
Any ideas???

Hmm, I've never played that game, but I'm honestly perplexed that it would crash at all. Maybe the computer's too powerful for it's specs? I'm honestly not sure. =/ Because the most costly requirement is 1 GB RAM, but even my laptop can handle that well, and that thing's probably the least technologically advanced of all our computer-like devices. =P

I'll try and see if there's a support thing for it, but I'm not sure if it'll be any help. Did it give an error report, or just straight up crash?

I'm gonna go with "most likely not" on that one.

Speaking of I should pick up Thomas Was Alone

Dell GX Super Computer, 500GB Drive, 3GB RAM, DVD-CDRW, P4 Desktop PC, Windows XP
http://www.buy.com/pr/product.aspx?sku=211222777
Runs minecraft great...
Message was:
The game crashed.
The crash report folder crash_2012_12_07_214710 next to game executable
It would be great if you would send it to the game developer.

I wish he could just get a different game...

Well, Minecraft is more powerful than you might think at first; that said, my desktop can't run it, while my inferior laptop can, so your mileage may vary. =P

Find that crash report, see if it says anything more; because that's what I'm interested in. =P

Minecraft is horribly unoptimized, it's not a good performance test

But yeah it's definitely an issue with him specifically, I was concerned about the processor but it meets minimum reqs too

Also I don't know what Mak is and isn't allowed to play (I know you were concerned about Minecraft last year), but I should mention that TWA has a couple of bad words in it (h### and d###), not anything serious though

Thanks, Canama.. he's swearing on his own now. =P =((

I am sure it's something he has on his comp... but what??
The game runs fine on  mine

Blade.....that is the whole message... =(

That's odd. There's nothing in the folder thing it mentions in the message? 0_o That's a horribly unhelpful error report message from the developers, if that's really it. xD

Under the circumstances, everything should just work. RAM requirements are met well beyond ANYTHING extra it might need(And it's not running 7, so it's not even a problem of needed extra RAM for Vista/7 stuff); the game should otherwise be able to run on a relic from the past; and overall, it just doesn't look like there's anything off. =/ Consider me confused, to be honest. ^^;

Found the problem... had to adjust his graphics accelerator... =P

Say, out of curiosity, does anyone know the current status of Dota 2? The steam page is giving me conflicting answers; since it says 'Play Now' and that I already own it; but yet it has that early access stuff, and says that it's not finished yet. I know it's free to play, but if I was able to actually run it, would it let me, or say 'hey buy this first!' or what?