Examples of Damage Control in Gaming: A Very Steamy Christmas

No, that title isn’t referring to the unusually warm weather in many parts of the world.

It would have been a surprise if some online services didn’t have problems on Christmas Day, and perhaps beyond, given disruptions which have occurred in previous years. It’s a time where many friends and family members gifted or received various electronic devices, be they game systems, phones, tablets, or any other device you can think of. A plethora of people activated those and connected to various online services simultaneously, leaving some companies unable to handle the load. Admittedly, most of them have improved in the last few years, and are prepared to withstand that traffic.

It’s tough to forget when Nintendo had online issues for about a week during Christmas two years ago, or when Xbox Live experienced similar issues back in 2007. Though some services had minor hitches during Christmas, most refreshingly handled the load well…except for one in particular: Valve’s Steam service on PC.

Who would have figured Steam, of all services, would have problems during Christmas? Especially considering they didn’t offer a free game this year, as they did with Left 4 Dead 2 two years ago. Plenty of people have enough free time for gaming during this holiday season, but as far as PC gaming goes, other seasons have gone by without finicky service. Yet it suffered some downtime in the early Christmas afternoon hours (Eastern Time), though service was quickly restored. It appeared everything would remain optimal for the rest of the day, but things worsened again — considerably so.

Later in the afternoon, people began stumbling into account information pages that weren’t their own. This entailed seeing others’ email addresses, phone numbers, purchase history, the last four digits of credit/debit card numbers (assuming users chose the option to store it), and, worst of all, their Steam wallet. This apparently happened due to a bizarre Steam caching error, which led people to the accounts of those they likely didn’t know thanks to similar IP addresses. For example, I saw account of someone in South America upon merely visiting the account page despite being logged off; of course, that also means someone could have seen my information, which is at least a little frightening.

Good thing Steam doesn’t display full credit card numbers, but it’s bad enough that people could and did spend money in people’s wallets. While a few did it as a prank (“for the lulz,” as the cool internet kids say), unsavory individuals used that opportunity to gift games to their accounts. I assume those transactions were reversed, if they went through at all.

That I can only assume every problem was fixed is an issue in itself, thanks to Valve’s peculiar lack of communication. People were accessing alternate accounts for nearly an hour before Valve took the service down, which was a little too long. People should have time off for the Christmas holiday, but this incident proved that someone always has to be paying attention, perhaps more than some did at Valve. And if they were, they should have informed their customers of what was happening.

In fact, the only response Value issued was a vaguely-worded one to Kotaku, assuring users that service had resumed. At the very least, they should have explained precisely what happened, and the steps they’re taking to ensure it doesn’t happen again. While I’m sure they’re taking them, it’s always good when services actually give assurances. It almost feels like Valve believes they can sweep this incident under the rug with little repercussion. Given the responses I’ve seen, they’re probably right.

This goes beyond Steam’s other more traditional customer service issues that they haven’t fixed after all these years. But with the service’s overwhelming benefits, most will continue to use it without hassle — and honestly, I can’t blame them. Steam provides games with unobtrusive DRM stipulations, which also makes selling games beneficial publishers who demand a level of security on titles they feel some would otherwise pirate. If you play games on PC legitimately, you don’t have many other options given the amount of developers and publishers afraid to release their games without DRM, especially if they’re AAA games.

Basically, this is one of many reasons why competition is a good thing. If Steam had a viable competitor, Valve would have been much more humble in providing an apology and explaining what went wrong. But it will be a while before any other service reaches Steam’s level on PC…if it ever happens.