Windows live and steam game delays

If you look at reviews submitted by amazon users, any game which utilises the steam delivery system comes in for, erm, a certain degree of criticism.

For example for Dawn of War 2, 48 reviewers give it one star, (and the game, while not perfect, is pretty good) most have some gripe about online game organising and updating system steam.

But the drawbacks for users by the parallel expansion of Windows Live were brought home to me while having a blast on DOW2 the other day.

Why the publishers decided to insist on users logging onto Steam and then Windows Live before playing the SINGLE PLAYER campaign is quite beyond me (Windows Live really exists to enable players to find each other online).

When I last played I had to wait for Windows Live to update itself, quitting to the desktop as part of the installation, and I accidentally closed it down while cycling through DoW2's intro screens meaning I had to go through it all again.

All the time a little message was playing across the bottom of the screen saying that since the Windows Live 3.0 update game players had been experiencing DoW2 crashes, that they were investigating why this was and 'thank you for your patience.'

I don't play DoW2 online, so my enforced Windows Live membership is entirely superfluous, adding to load times, and increasing risk of crashing. Nice.