What's up with Steam/HL2 ?

[WOWmagnet]

I read that to even play single player, you need Steam? WTF? is it? I get a free copy of HL2 (download) because I purchased an ATI vidcard.

[WOWmagnet]

So go download steam - whats the problem?

Not really a problem, Sweetie. Just asking what Steam actually does.

[WOWmagnet]

It keeps everything up to date, very slick actually compared to the cluster-f that is downloading unreal tournament updates.

Oh, and don't call me sweetie.

Thanks and sure thing, Shnookums.

[pooter]

Steam = content delivery. You can buy Valve games thru Steam, and it'll download the game to your harddrive. Also keeps all your Valve games up to date with patches. Can also get mods thru it too.

I'm ambivalent to Steam right now.