I bought this game on disc so why does it require a massive ridiculously slow download from steam?

Sega should correctly show this in the system requirements.. 

Hello Legion5,

I am sorry for this unexpected delay. The fact is that manufacturing a retail version of a game takes time (more than a month sometimes), while the development of the main game continues in parallel. New content is created or content is modified. 

For example, reducing the compression of game textures to optimize performances, can result in changing 1or 2 GB of data in the game, requiring a download. We are sorry about this and try to keep it to a minimum.

Thanks for your patience.

If you're seeing slow downloads from steam's content servers you can try to change your download region in the steam client

Steam->Settings->Downloads

Then select a download region. You may have to play around with regions, even far away ones may work better than local ones

If you're seeing slow downloads from steam's content servers you can try to change your download region in the steam client

Steam->Settings->Downloads

Then select a download region. You may have to play around with regions, even far away ones may work better than local ones