Quote:
I've looked at Valve's answer to this question (as well as the more technical details), and it seems satisfactory for my needs.

The problem with this is that offline mode doesn't always work. For some reason, it will randomly decide "Hey, I really need to connect to the internet", and *blam*, that person can't play anymore.

I think about it this way. People throw a fit at the one time activation stuff in Windows. Why are people tolerating constant online "activation" of their games that support offline modes of play?

I haven't played Half Life multiplayer since they now basicially force Steam to be installed. The Won authentication servers for online multiplayer only play were taken down a while back, disallowing me to just play with a normal HL install. If HL2 in any way tries to force Steam, I'm taking the game back if the box doesn't say online access required.