Here we go again, yet another lawsuit has been filed against Steam developer Valve Software over an alleged abuse of their market position with their 30% cut. This time around it's a noted developer, Wolfire Games (Overgrowth, Receiver), along with two individuals William Herbert and Daniel Escobar "on behalf of all others similarly situated".
According to the documents, the argument is similar to one we've heard before. They're claiming that of the huge market that PC gaming is, "75% flow through the online storefront of a single company, Valve" and that "Valve uses that dominance to take an extraordinarily high cut from nearly every sale that passes through its store—30%" which results in "higher prices and less innovation" and that Valve can do this because of their market position so developers "have no choice but to sell most of their games through the Steam Store, where they are subject to Valve’s 30% toll".
One of the cited people is former Valve developer Richard Geldreich, who famously tweeted:
Steam was killing PC gaming. It was a 30% tax on an entire industry. It was unsustainable. You have no idea how profitable Steam was for Valve. It was a virtual printing press. It distorted the entire company. Epic is fixing this for all gamers.
The suit also mentions clauses Valve have that prevent developers selling at cheaper prices on other stores, "Valve blocks pro-competitive price competition through two main provisions—the Steam Key Price Parity Provision and the Price Veto Provision".
It goes even further to mention the likes of Microsoft, EA and more companies that tried and "failed to develop a robust commercial strategy away from the Steam Gaming Platform" arguing that it shows how vital Steam is and so the behaviour is anticompetitive. On top of that it even pulls in the Steam Workshop and the Steam Market, to claim this keeps developers even more tied to Valve and Steam and that Valve takes a big cut.
What are they hoping to achieve with this lawsuit? On top of damages and the usual, they want "injunctive relief removing Valve’s anticompetitive provisions" to "bring competition to the market and benefit the public as a whole".
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Quoting: GuestValve need competition against Steam. The reality is that it's the main place to get most games, and it's the primary point of purchase for just about anything. I've seen a good many comments on this very site that if a game isn't on Steam, they won't buy it. If a developer wants a game to be successful, they've practically no choice but to put in on Steam (exceptions exist of course, but for the vast majority this is quite true).
Valve have far too much influence as a distribution platform. It's not healthy for the gaming ecosystem. They can pretty much do what they want with impunity, and that's really not good.
At about this point I'm sure several people will be foaming at the mouth and already typing out something furiously, but at no point above did I say Valve were bad or evil. They've reached this position by being good at the business. My point is that the situation is bad, and the situation is harmful to gaming, particularly on GNU/Linux.
On a parallel note, the flood of crap on Steam is really harmful to developers, and customers too. Part of the reason I continue to support GOL is for discovering nice games. Something like Vaporum I'd never have seen were it not covered on this site. Valve's so-called "algorithm" is basically just a way for them not to have a hand in any sort of store curation. While there are arguments for and against that, if Valve don't have a hand in it, they shouldn't take money for it. That 30% cut of theirs is, I believe, too much.
The real solution is some competition to force the market to be a little more friendly. The problem with that now is being really difficult to get into the market: Epic did it by spending an awful lot of money to get exclusives, and personally I think they botched it (to say nothing of completely ignoring GNU/Linux).
In what way would a reduction of Valve's share change this situation? It would actually force remaining alternatives out of the market.
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Quoting: RoosterI would say actually owning the games you buy is quite the groundbreaking feature in this day and age.
That's why I mentioned itch.io and GOG as an exception.
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Some indie developers like to blame Steam for their indie game not being profitable as Valheim, Undertale,Stardew Valley or other successful indie titles, but they ignore the fact that all those games have some quality factor that highlights them from the others. They also usually lack of proper marketing their games around the community.
Again, unfortunately due to nowadays saturated market you need something different if you expect your game to sell well enough, and no one is obligated to buy your game so you need to convince the costumers somehow. That's how any non-essential service works.
The only thing you can obligate people to give you money despite the quality is public services, which is why judges and politicians have high paychecks.
Again, unfortunately due to nowadays saturated market you need something different if you expect your game to sell well enough, and no one is obligated to buy your game so you need to convince the costumers somehow. That's how any non-essential service works.
The only thing you can obligate people to give you money despite the quality is public services, which is why judges and politicians have high paychecks.
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Quoting: ZlopezQuoting: elmapulthe issue is that the public dont want competition, they want convenience at all costs.
people want netflix to be an monopoly so they can sing an single bill and have everything that netflix decides to licence (while ignore that there are a lot of good content unlicenced by netflix), and at the same time they have an single user interface to browser for all the content (lets ignore that its possible to have this by another aproach: separate the content from the presentation, wich is what google tv want to achiev, so you can browser an single ui for the content avaliable on all streaming services)
people want the same convenience on pc gaming, all games in a single user interface, all achievments in a single account, and those steam stickers and other gimmicks on every purchase.
consumers can be quite stupid sometimes, i can understand when an linux user complain that other stores dont support linux at all, the issue is: are we willing to sacrifice everything to push linux foward /keep using it?
backward compatibility is pretty much non existent already.
I personally like to see what I own in one place. I would be really glad, if this was just a frontend that supports thousand of stores and allows you to buy from them, but this means that every store needs to have open API and this will probably never happen.
For now I'm using Steam for most of my games, MiniGalaxy for GOG games and I actually don't have any idea what I own on Humble Bundle (I'm not buying from it that often, so it's OK for me).
For e-books I'm using Callibre, still I would be rather to have them somewhere online, so I don't need to bother with storage, with option to download them if I want.
And the situation is much worse for music (where streaming is standard these days) and movies (there is literally no way to buy DRM free movie, which you could play where you want, except indie movies).
So from a consumer perspective if there would be one Callibre like app for games, that just let's you buy from different stores and allows you to manage the game library in one place, it would be awesome. The same for music, movies, books and any other multimedia content you can think of. And if it would be Free Software, that would be just EPIC. Oh the dreams, the sweet dreams :-)
google tv want to do that, i mean, be able to browser the content from netflix, amazon prime etc all in one user interface, maybe even games with gfn, stadia and xbox gamepass...
the difference is that instead of fighting for an open APi they plan to use their market pressure.
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Quoting: x_wingQuoting: RoosterI would say actually owning the games you buy is quite the groundbreaking feature in this day and age.
That's why I mentioned itch.io and GOG as an exception.
Ah sorry, I misunderstood you.
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Turncoat_Tony Apr 30, 2021
Apparently, I have an unpopular opinion but as a solo developer, the reason I choose Valve is simple. They have the best store with the most features that enable me to build a community around my game. It's all in one central place. I don't have to get people on discord, my games personal forums or anything else.
The other stores simply refuse to add features which I need on top of other stores refusing to properly support GNU/Linux. 12% cut is nice from Epic and now Microsoft but their stores are garbage and I'm not sure I'll make enough of a profit off of their stores to justify the time I'll have to spend supporting said stores.
The other stores simply refuse to add features which I need on top of other stores refusing to properly support GNU/Linux. 12% cut is nice from Epic and now Microsoft but their stores are garbage and I'm not sure I'll make enough of a profit off of their stores to justify the time I'll have to spend supporting said stores.
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So the 30% cut is an issue now, 15 years after they started publishing because of their current market share?
How did they ever manage to reach this market share if their cut was so unreasonable/unacceptable/abusive for the past 15 years?
Who was mad enough to put their game on steam if it was so unsustainable?
Last edited by poisond on 30 April 2021 at 5:12 pm UTC
How did they ever manage to reach this market share if their cut was so unreasonable/unacceptable/abusive for the past 15 years?
Who was mad enough to put their game on steam if it was so unsustainable?
Last edited by poisond on 30 April 2021 at 5:12 pm UTC
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Quoting: GuestBuy who said Valve took money for this, or for their algorithm?Quoting: x_wingValve creating a feature were game journalists can freely share reviews of games of the platform isn't doing something for you? What's your point here? That Valve should contract reviewers for the platform?My point, as I wrote originally, was it's not something Valve should take money for.
Quoting: TheSHEEEPThe very article you link to also has Epic stating that 12% is enough to cover their running cost. Yes, no profit from that alone. So increase it to 15%. Now you've got profitIf a 12% cut doesn't make profits with their barebones storefront, how in the world can you imagine a service like Steam could make some with 15%?
I understand developers need to eat, and if you want to maximise profits and scale down services, it is your own right. But it also means Steam is not the place to sell your software.
Quoting: GuestSidestepping the issue there. Valve have far too much control over gaming.So much control that they can't prevent Epic from buying exclusives and enforcing a lower cut upon the whole market.
Last edited by omer666 on 30 April 2021 at 5:15 pm UTC
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Quoting: TheSHEEEPQuoting: TuxeeIf you don't sell anything, you won't pay. And if you have to rely on the additional few percent per sale you can get on alternative stores you have been doomed from the get go.Obviously, but if you think in the low-margin world of indie development a difference of 10-15% in income cannot make the difference between "can live from it" and "nope!", then you are sorely mistaken.
Makes sense from your perspective since you also state that
Quoting: TheSHEEEP3% is a very good profit margin as every trader on this planet will tell you
(Haven't met a trader who assured me that 3% is really all they would strife for.)
Quoting: TheSHEEEPEpic stating that 12% is enough to cover their running cost.
I have never been on the Epic store (naturally), but from what I have heard the whole thing is laughable in comparison to Steam. Which makes me wonder whether these 12% would suffice for all the things Steam (potentially) has to offer. Let alone their contributions to the - definitely not profitable - Linux gaming world.
Take this a step further: Valve becomes "less greedy" and drops the quote to 15%. I suppose even if they wouldn't make any profit from it, it would help them to take GOG out of business, with Epic to follow. If it takes longer to wipe the slate clean, well, they could drop this Linux crap. And/or cut down a few servers.
I what way would that help anyone? Apart from a few desperate developers of "me too" indie games? (There might always be a few games and developers not making it into the limelight despite being good - has been the same for the last 35 or 40 years.)
I don't know whether 30% is excessive or adequate but neither does anyone else on this forum.
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Quoting: GuestQuoting: TuxeeIn what way would a reduction of Valve's share change this situation? It would actually force remaining alternatives out of the market.
Reduction of Valve's share would mean people are using somewhere else - so overall share to the customer wouldn't be decreased. Unless shady deals are pushing people elsewhere without choice (and that's not really competition), then it's by offering better deals, better services, better value to a customer.
Or, Valve would do better to keep people.
Either way the customer wins.
That's some wacky reasoning... (Or maybe I am too dim, but I doubt that.)
The prices for the customer stay exactly the same. Valve might drop services. The customer has no benefit whatsoever except the vague promise of "better games" because the developers earn more. (Wasn't that one of the selling points of the Epic Store?)
The Epic Store is there. And from what I can tell: Apart from the free games people get there, there is nothing that can be counted as a "win for the customer".
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