Bellular News reported on some emails that came up in Discovery from a recent lawsuit. Many people have heard the story “They just don’t want devs to sell Steam keys below their price.” This was not that. There is E-mail evidence of Valve preventing Ubisoft from selling a version of Siege for $10 on their store, while the Steam price was $15; and there may be similar examples coming up.
This is more important for indies than a shitty AAA store, but basically a dev should be allowed to run their own store and skip Valve’s fees if they are committed. Minecraft did it, for instance. Part of the issue is, while I’m pretty sure people can come up with counterexamples, Valve doesn’t seem perfectly consistent with any one policy.
I still love Steam and I consider most “monopoly” claims to be Epic-paid astroturf. But I won’t default to defending them on all fronts when they also tacitly allow child gambling.
They‘re a de facto monopoly, and they pretty much started the whole drm protected license tied to account thing for video games. They also charge quite some fees for devs.
But they haven’t been in the news for anything specific lately, besides maybe the price of the stream machine, which definitely isn’t their fault.
Steam did basically invent the digital games marketplace, but that’s not a bad thing in my eyes. It brought games to many many more people, and helped make the industry what it is today. Without Steam, PC gaming might still just be an obscure hobby, and there might not be many games there at all. People forget what it was like before Steam, console gaming was extremely more popular than PC gaming. Like the numbers aren’t even close.
PC Games up to 2003 (Steam release date) were like: SimCity, Age of Mythology, Neverwinter Nights, Civ 3, Zoo Tycoon, Baldur’s Gate, Unreal Tournament.
Notice what these games genres and playstyle is like. You had to use a mouse and keyboard because game controllers didn’t even plug into your PC, even Microsoft Xbox used proprietary connectors not USB. My computer didn’t even have an USB port back then. The games had to be basically completely remade for PC, and game dev tooling was bad, so most didn’t bother porting at all. “Console-type games” were rare or extremely delayed PC releases.
This all changed after Steam made PC gaming popular, especially with the Orange Box. I remember thinking Steam was stupid back in the day. Like why do I have to make a dumb account just to use the CD I bought? And the interface was hot garbage. But of course it got better over time.
A digital marketplace for games existing is indeed in no way a bad thing.
Neither is Steam, per se. I use it myself happily and valve has done a lot of good for gamers, even more so as someone gaming on Linux.
However: That doesn‘t make it better that they’re still at least partially responsible for online drm (although ea, ubisoft and microsoft aren’t exactly innocent either).
Platforms like gog, which sells games without drm, get way more goodwill from me though.
Also, I find it a bit naïve to think that steam singlehandedly made PC gaming popular. There were a lot of AAA games, even well into the 2010s, that used either disc based drm, no drm or – starting around 2010 – other, non steam online drm.
I didn‘t have the need for a steam account with more than goat simulator until like 2016 or 17 and I did play a lot of games.
What I do give steam credit for is making indie games popular. Prior, those just weren’t really a big thing. Thanks to steam, you didn’t need a big publisher.
Also: I do have gripes with the gaming community hating drm and other game launchers (and especially here on Lemmy being anti capitalist and anti billionaire) but then pulling out the pitchforks of anyone points out that Valve maybe isn’t perfect either…
No one is expecting them to work for free. But they’re expected to not use their market dominance to collect significantly higher fees than the competition, while pressuring game devs to not make their games cheaper on platforms with lower fees, which is something they’re currently being sued over.
So, only gog is as expensive for devs on PC as Steam.
And of course they would ask as much as steam would, if they were in valve’s position.
But they aren’t and valve is actively using their position of power to keep them there (besides the stores being worse, feature wise, but a lot of people would ignore that for 20% cheaper games on epic, for example).
I‘m not saying there isn’t a reason they’re in the position they’re in. They provide a good service and – so far – haven’t made a notable faux-pas. But I‘d still rather buy a game on gog than on steam.
They aren’t a monopoly. But they are monopolistic. They have a market share of 80-90% and are using that power to make it harder for competitors to gain market share (for example by pressuring developers to not lower their prices on platforms with lower fees).
That’s why I said „de facto“. They have the power of a monopoly. They can do whatever the fuck they want, like charging developers more fees than almost any other PC games storefront. Because what can the devs do? Not use steam? Who’s gonna play the games then?
And valve is currently getting sued for abusing their market dominance for anti competitive behavior, pressuring devs into not offering their games for cheaper on other platforms, which do offer a lower cut, for example.
So yea, they aren’t a monopoly. But, at least within the PC games market, they do act monopolistic.
From what I remember, individual publishers started it, but they used a combo of cd-based drm (which would install rootkits on your pc and sometimes kill your cd drive) and online activation of your key to your account. Steam just made a much less invasive system that lets you access your purchases easily instead of making it risky and hard.
Ive had this argument with people multiple times and it ALWAYS boils down to, Steam is too successful and no one else wants to compete with what steam is actually doing right.
But, there are enough other platforms who are trying to get a foothold and valve doesn’t exactly make it easy for them.
They’re currently being sued for anti competitive behaviour by pressuring devs into not offering cheaper prices on platforms with lower fees.
What did Steam do?
Alright, fuckit, I’ll be Devils Advocate.
Bellular News reported on some emails that came up in Discovery from a recent lawsuit. Many people have heard the story “They just don’t want devs to sell Steam keys below their price.” This was not that. There is E-mail evidence of Valve preventing Ubisoft from selling a version of Siege for $10 on their store, while the Steam price was $15; and there may be similar examples coming up.
This is more important for indies than a shitty AAA store, but basically a dev should be allowed to run their own store and skip Valve’s fees if they are committed. Minecraft did it, for instance. Part of the issue is, while I’m pretty sure people can come up with counterexamples, Valve doesn’t seem perfectly consistent with any one policy.
I still love Steam and I consider most “monopoly” claims to be Epic-paid astroturf. But I won’t default to defending them on all fronts when they also tacitly allow child gambling.
Probably mad about GabeCube price.
I can’t really blame em for that. I blame Sam Altman and the army of Clankers that spawned from it
Sam Altman’s AI Slop did it, not the godly Gabe.
They‘re a de facto monopoly, and they pretty much started the whole drm protected license tied to account thing for video games. They also charge quite some fees for devs.
But they haven’t been in the news for anything specific lately, besides maybe the price of the stream machine, which definitely isn’t their fault.
Steam did basically invent the digital games marketplace, but that’s not a bad thing in my eyes. It brought games to many many more people, and helped make the industry what it is today. Without Steam, PC gaming might still just be an obscure hobby, and there might not be many games there at all. People forget what it was like before Steam, console gaming was extremely more popular than PC gaming. Like the numbers aren’t even close.
PC Games up to 2003 (Steam release date) were like: SimCity, Age of Mythology, Neverwinter Nights, Civ 3, Zoo Tycoon, Baldur’s Gate, Unreal Tournament.
Notice what these games genres and playstyle is like. You had to use a mouse and keyboard because game controllers didn’t even plug into your PC, even Microsoft Xbox used proprietary connectors not USB. My computer didn’t even have an USB port back then. The games had to be basically completely remade for PC, and game dev tooling was bad, so most didn’t bother porting at all. “Console-type games” were rare or extremely delayed PC releases.
This all changed after Steam made PC gaming popular, especially with the Orange Box. I remember thinking Steam was stupid back in the day. Like why do I have to make a dumb account just to use the CD I bought? And the interface was hot garbage. But of course it got better over time.
A digital marketplace for games existing is indeed in no way a bad thing.
Neither is Steam, per se. I use it myself happily and valve has done a lot of good for gamers, even more so as someone gaming on Linux.
However: That doesn‘t make it better that they’re still at least partially responsible for online drm (although ea, ubisoft and microsoft aren’t exactly innocent either).
Platforms like gog, which sells games without drm, get way more goodwill from me though.
Also, I find it a bit naïve to think that steam singlehandedly made PC gaming popular. There were a lot of AAA games, even well into the 2010s, that used either disc based drm, no drm or – starting around 2010 – other, non steam online drm.
I didn‘t have the need for a steam account with more than goat simulator until like 2016 or 17 and I did play a lot of games.
What I do give steam credit for is making indie games popular. Prior, those just weren’t really a big thing. Thanks to steam, you didn’t need a big publisher.
Also: I do have gripes with the gaming community hating drm and other game launchers (and especially here on Lemmy being anti capitalist and anti billionaire) but then pulling out the pitchforks of anyone points out that Valve maybe isn’t perfect either…
Of course Steam charges fees they provide a service! Why is Valve the only game company expected to work for free?
No one is expecting them to work for free. But they’re expected to not use their market dominance to collect significantly higher fees than the competition, while pressuring game devs to not make their games cheaper on platforms with lower fees, which is something they’re currently being sued over.
The only distributor that has lower fees is Epic.
If you believe, in a Steamless world, Epic wouldn’t raise their fee to 30%, I have a Half-Life 3 to sell you.
And Microsoft and itch.io.
So, only gog is as expensive for devs on PC as Steam.
And of course they would ask as much as steam would, if they were in valve’s position. But they aren’t and valve is actively using their position of power to keep them there (besides the stores being worse, feature wise, but a lot of people would ignore that for 20% cheaper games on epic, for example).
Itch.io doesn’t provide anywhere near the service Valve does, it would be ludicrous for them to charge the same.
hard not to be a monopoly when you make a decent service and your opponent is (gestures vaguely)
Yeah, somehow I feel like this claimant never saw the original variation of this meme.
I‘m not saying there isn’t a reason they’re in the position they’re in. They provide a good service and – so far – haven’t made a notable faux-pas. But I‘d still rather buy a game on gog than on steam.
and you can, is steam was a monopoly you wouldn’t be able to
They aren’t a monopoly. But they are monopolistic. They have a market share of 80-90% and are using that power to make it harder for competitors to gain market share (for example by pressuring developers to not lower their prices on platforms with lower fees).
How are they a monopoly when you can buy most of the games on Steam elsewhere if you want? Most people just choose not to.
That’s why I said „de facto“. They have the power of a monopoly. They can do whatever the fuck they want, like charging developers more fees than almost any other PC games storefront. Because what can the devs do? Not use steam? Who’s gonna play the games then?
And valve is currently getting sued for abusing their market dominance for anti competitive behavior, pressuring devs into not offering their games for cheaper on other platforms, which do offer a lower cut, for example.
So yea, they aren’t a monopoly. But, at least within the PC games market, they do act monopolistic.
From what I remember, individual publishers started it, but they used a combo of cd-based drm (which would install rootkits on your pc and sometimes kill your cd drive) and online activation of your key to your account. Steam just made a much less invasive system that lets you access your purchases easily instead of making it risky and hard.
But doesn’t gog especially show, that you can do completely without drm and not have any issues?
That’s always been the case but the anti-home-copying paranoia has had media executives wringing their hands since the tape recorder at least.
Ive had this argument with people multiple times and it ALWAYS boils down to, Steam is too successful and no one else wants to compete with what steam is actually doing right.
Steam is doing a lot right, don’t get me wrong.
But, there are enough other platforms who are trying to get a foothold and valve doesn’t exactly make it easy for them.
They’re currently being sued for anti competitive behaviour by pressuring devs into not offering cheaper prices on platforms with lower fees.
So is iTunes and they’re still around
People still use iTunes?