What is your opinion about Steam?

I recently bought a licensed copy of Empire Total War. The box says "internet connection and a STEAM account are required for activation." There's no mention of how much time and bandwidth it will take. After installation and creating a STEAM account, it kindly informed me that it had started installing the game through itself, STEAM, meaning downloading 16 GB would take about 16 hours with a corresponding speed. :eek: And I don't have unlimited bandwidth. :( Moreover, this program also generates a significant amount of outgoing traffic. StarCraft 2 is nothing compared to it. I searched the internet for a solution. Reinstalling, restarting, and stopping the process didn't help. It stubbornly refuses to install the game from the disc. After installation, it automatically starts downloading its 16 GB. After losing 250 MB of traffic, I gave up and deleted everything I had installed. And while deleting, this pest corrupted my modem settings. :mad: System restore saved the day.