Well I purchased Alpha Prime off Amazon and guess what? Discovered it carries Steam activation. Tried activating it and the code was already used. Talked to Steam about it and they said they can't transfer activations for used games. Sent it back in the mail today. Bought the game off of GamersGate instead. No activation code, no nothing, just install, up and playing. Now I'm happy.
Lesson learned don't buy used games that require Steam activation.

Isn't this you striking back at Steam..?

they both struck back..we just need another strike and someone's out

No I meant that Steam was unexpected during the installation of the game. I guess if you consider I sent the game back and bought it from a rival company then yes. I would say it was more retaliation then anything else.

Unfortunately, a growing number of games are using Steam for DRM at retail (and even on Direct2Drive, oddly enough).

Yeah it's sad, very sad. I guess everything is going that way, movies, music, soon wandering minstrels will want compensation before they play you a song.

Well, if you researched your purchase even a small little bit you would have known it was a Steam game at retail, and thus the used version is useless.
Second, I would trust Steam to be around in the future much more than Gamersgate, and I think Gamersgate has some crazy hidden DRM of their own, so beware on that.
Lastly, the game is pretty cheap anyway... I got it on Steam during some sale for like $2.50...

I really don't like how often the word 'research' shows up when discussing game purchases. It shouldn't.

Well I struck the GOG lottery by winning the code from the caption contest. Does that eliminate me from the game?

This is another case for the series "Crack that fucking game". Seriously, if they want more "pirates" out there so desperately, you should listen to their praying and make the morons happy :-D

PC games have always, always required you to look at the box and examine the requirements.

Do all Steam-only games say so on the box?

As consumers, we PC gamers get treated very badly.
Restricted or no return policy, no guarantee that the specs on the box will be realistic or not (minimum spec can mean anything from just about loads up, to perfectly playable but worse graphics).
On the subject of Steam, I've had to avoid buying Empire: Total War and Dawn of War 2, both which I would have liked to play. But they both would require Steam, and I really don't want to use it. AFAIK, there's no alternative (legally).

Unfortunately it depends on the game; while Alpha Prime clearly shows the Steam logo on the back of the box in North America, it doesn't in the UK. Saints Row 2 shows no logo on any release and ambiguously states "Internet Connection is required to play", which could just as easily refer to SecuROM-based activation; the copyright blurb mentions GameSpy and Havok but makes no mention of Steam or Valve even though Steam is just as much an integral part of this release as the other two are.

As far as I know they do... it should state you need to accept the Steam license agreement to use the software.