Forums | MacLife

So I figured that for Father's Day, I'd send my dad a couple of games he could play on his Windows or Linux box. I was thinkin' Stalin vs. Martians and that new game, Prototype.

The Stalin vs. Martians site can't sell you the game directly, but they do display buttons for four different online gaming services. So I click on "Steam," am able to put both Stalin and Prototype in my basket and am able to flag it as a gift order for somebody other than myself. So far, so good.

Then I go to check out, and they want me to become a subscriber to their service. This is presented as the only way of proceeding and placing an order.

WTF!?

And subscribing to their service requires downloading and installing some sort of software?

Double WTF!!!?

I have neither the time nor the inclination to wade through their user agreement's fine print, but it wouldn't surprise me if there was something in there about me getting charged a monthly fee for this service that I don't want or need, and that monthly fee automatically continuing until the end of time if I forget to cancel, and I'm sure the fine print only hints at the hoops I'd have to jump through in order to do so.

You wanna sign up? Fine, super-cool! Do it right now! Just click here, it's fun and easy!

You want to cancel? Kindly download and print out the following form, fill it out in triplicate, and personally hand-deliver to our office in Koidu Town, Kono District, Eastern Province, Sierra Leone...

I vaguely recall hearing somebody once mention Steam and OS X in the same sentence, but it wouldn't surprise me if their mandatory software install isn't even available for the Macintosh, anyway.

For crying out loud.

So what about it, people? Where would you go to place this gift order if you just wanted it to be a nice, simple, one-time-only transaction, as opposed to the start of a forced relationship?

And furthermore, who do I have to blow to get hard copies of these games shipped to my dad's house, as opposed to this downloading crap? Yeah, yeah, digital fulfillment is the wave of the future and all, but when it comes to gift-giving, it's really nice to actually have a package arrive at your home that you can physically tear open.

Furthermore, when it comes to software you've actually paid for, especially games which may have gigantic libraries of graphics and sound files associated with them, physically owning an install disk seems like a very good idea.

Please guide me accordingly.

Thankew.