+1

Is it possible for FE:LH to receive this treatment please? It would be very very nice if I didn't require steam to load to play the game.  

Depending on the game this will still launch steam, all you're doing is jumping straight to that game without having to navigate in steam, but steam will will load.

Playing without having steam load, online or offline, is the goal.

it depends on what the dev/publisher did to the game or what they want to use steam for. if a game's exe tells it to run steam, it'll run steam.

even playing games with steam offline would still require steam loading 1st.. for games that loads steam upon execution.

My computer is a 5 years old bargain priced Dell and I really haven't noticed a problem with having Steam running in the background as I play games, am I missing something?  Seems like a lot of work for little gain.

Why even bother killing steam after launching a game. Steams footprint is minuscule, any machine made after 2004 isn't going to be struggling to run it.

I dunno, I mean, I get wanting a physical copy of games "in case" (which is why I try to support GOG, they come close with letting you download the installer). But I just don't get the vitriol for Valve. They are probably one of the most benevolent game companies out there. They still update their games that are 5+ years old!  

So basically just no good reason other than paranoia?  Thanks for answering my question.

Not at all. Apples to asteroids.

I chose what I buy and what I ignore. For some games, be it future GalCivIII or present XCOM, I'm willing to "suffer" Steamworks (I survived Dawn of War 2's Steamworks+GamesForWindows...). But let's say that in general, except for those few exceptions, when I run a game, I don't want to also run the Notepad++, or the VLC player, or the Paint or who knows what else. I just want to run the game which I paid for. I don't car about footprints or mumbo jumbos. If I don't need the Notepad++ to run in order to play my game, it should stay off.

And then you say: "But Steamworks requires you to run Steam so GTFO". Steamworks offers me nothing but publishers/developers insist of trying to convince me that I love it. I don't. Neither do I hate it. I don't need the social stuff (never used it). I don't need the achievements. I don't need the screenshot feature. I don't need it to autoupdate my game (I can check myself that stuff, thanks). I couldn't care less about multiplayer stuff. I don't care about the adds when I close a game (WTF???). So basically, having to start Steam to play the (very few) games bought in Steam with my hard earned money is quite pointless to me. It'd be almost like requiring Facebook integration to play GalCivIII (I have never cancelled a pre-order but for this, I would cancel it).

As I see it, and probably I'm alone, developers/publishers (in general, big/middle ones) are becoming very lazy and greedy (it has been like that for a while). Abusing internet use to release crappola that may or may not be fixed ("It's ok, we have internet so you can download the patches!"), force undesired features by suspicious/baffling reasons (Sim City what?),...

I'm not a Steam(works) hater. I'm a Steamfanboy hater though. Steam(works) takes away some choices while giving others. I may accept that for some games (which I can count with the fingers of one hand) but that doesn't mean that I like it, just that I have already assumed that the shortsight of the industry has already doomed us.

The good news are all those indie gems out there...

What has paranoia to do with this? Making sure that no unnecessary software is running seems perfectly logical to me. It reduces the risk of software-incompatibilities, and the possibility of security vulnerabilities. I had enough crashes due to the Steam-client, when I was trying it, two years ago, that it isn't just a ungrounded fear. At least now it seemed to have gotten a little better, but I haven't played LH that much yet.

The only time it's really a problem is when your internet goes out, and you're trying to launch the game, and Steam tries to connect to the internet first.  Will cost you a minute or two.  Mainly been a problem during power outages- but I try to keep a couple of non-Steam games on my PC (single-player) for that purpose.

I don't hate Steam, I used to, not so much.  Steam does have some drawbacks and nuisances, and sometimes I want to not have to deal with it- I do see it as a form of DRM, though one that so far hasn't been too bad.   If it ever did become bad, I used to crack every game I bought, I'd do it again for the games I need to crack.

It's why I'll probably get AOW3 on GOG instead of Steam, and this is also why I wish Stardock had a command line parameter for LH that allowed it to run without Steamworks starting.

Steam does have some functionality for me that makes me wish to keep it on though- namely it's friends-client- Steamworks has almost replaced AIM. 

One or two good responses, most of the rest sheer ignorance.  Welcome to the internets.

I would argue that complaining about Steam is like about complaining about Xbox or PS3 consoles... not windows OS. You don't NEED steam to use your computer for non-game purposes. You only need steam to play steam contracted games. Xbox and PS3 work the same....you can't play those contracted games unless you meet the software/hardware requirements of the console.

What makes steam unique is that it only has software requirements; utilizing your computer as the hardware components. This is a can of worms though, as developers have a choice as to what their distribution platform will be. That said, the more that jump on the steam ban wagon, the more pressure will be placed on those that would not want to use steam....ultimately it becomes harder for those developers to distribute their product.

What's frustrating is steam's business practices. The forced advertising. The forced EULA upates. The forced platform updates. It's all about control...and the people running steam are not stupid people. They know what they are doing. They know they CAN offer a flexible product like gog, but chooses not to in order to flex that control. By requiring steam, they are pushing to create a monopoly on PC gaming.

While this in and of itself is the purest for of capitalism, it's not condusive of a free market economy.