Penomorph

Personally, I’d take the latter

Okay so some of your (both of yours) links require subscriptions and in not paying, but the about 5 articles I read exclusively talked about the Azov and one talked about the Colonel Melnyk reburial. Calling a Nazi collaborator from 1940s a hero is obviously a bad look, but that does not equal modern day Ukraine being Nazis.

And literally all the other articles talk about some sort of far-right volunteer group of militias (Azov) fighting the Russian separatists. How is Azovs political standpoint in any way indicative of the Ukrainian state’s political view as a whole?

Good luck to you guys!

You really believe that Ukraine is a Nazi regime, and you accuse others for falling for propaganda? Yikes

So? They could’ve sued for anything, doesn’t mean they’re right.

They sued for the money issue because they either can’t comprehend that consumers don’t like what they’re providing, or they (the companies) simply don’t want to invest in improving it so they start pointing fingers instead. That’s all it is.

and other online stores have rarely offered features compelling enough to lure people away.

The fear among some developers is that doing so can lead to penalties or even expulsion from Steam — a potentially devastating outcome for their game sales.

The US lawsuit Newell was deposed in, which has been certified as a class action, alleges that it “is not economically feasible” for game makers to leave Steam in favor of a rival store and that they are effectively “forced to comply” with Valve’s rules and high fees.

The above quotes all point to exactly what I’ve been saying: Other stores/platforms simply don’t appeal to users.

“Customers have enormous choice,” Newell has testified. They can decide “where they purchase their products, whether they buy the game on an Xbox, whether they buy it on Steam, whether they buy it on Epic Games Store or whether they buy it directly from software developers.”

No one is forcing anyone to use Steam.

EA experimented with everything including opening its own PC store and stopping major releases on Valve’s marketplace, only to reverse course and eventually bring big-name titles such as The Sims 4 and Battlefield V back to Steam.

Competing marketplaces, meanwhile, have failed to match even Steam’s basic capabilities, never mind its emotional resonance with users. EA’s original store was filled with glitches and had nowhere near the number of third-party titles as Steam, while Epic’s rival launched without such standard features as user reviews and a shopping cart for purchasing multiple games in a single transaction.

They tried, and failed, to launch BFV and Sims on just their own platform because IT WAS A BUGGY MESS. Not because StEaM hAs A BiG MaRkEt ShArE.

Not even having a Cart in your online store is mind boggling. Also, if I have to go to Steam to see reviews I might as well buy it there.

In 2017, Kassidy Gerber, who works in business development at Valve, wrote to Warner Bros. executives that preorders for its new Middle-earth: Shadow of War game had been deleted from Steam because the price was “significantly higher than what was available at other retailers for the same version of the game.”

So Valve protected their own brand by not wanting to be associated with “significantly higher prices”. Sounds like a sound business decision to me.

Oh my lord. The problem isn’t the pricing!!! If you feel like you can’t sell your game for $55 on just Epic so you must sell it on Steam too but for $70, there’s a problem with your product and/or service. Not Steam. Epic tried the “1 year exclusivity” for a couple of games, like Borderlands 3 did that. People simply didn’t buy the game. Was the game cheaper? Nope.

See my point? Steam had zero hand in people rather not buy a game than installing Epic.

gamers don’t have a reason to use other platform

Exactly my point. Give them a reason. And they can compete. They just don’t want to. It’s easier to shift the blame onto big bad Valve.

Listen. Steam is free. Uplay is free. Epic is free. EA App is free. It’s not like Playstation vs Xbox, where the market is divided because of financial limitations on the consumers. What stops anyone from using any other launcher? What stops any publisher from not selling through Steam? “market share” is not really a valid argument when all options are free and easily available to everyone. Monopoly means lack of alternatives.

Right now the option is buying a game for $70 on either Steam or EA App, for example. People choose Steam.

Nothing is stopping EA from saying you know what, we’ll sell it only on our own page but for $60. Nothing. People who want to play a game would most likely just buy it there then.

My view is that these lawsuits etc are purely a way for the failed competitors to force their way in while still providing the same absolute garbage of a service.

I see how you think I am.

I’m saying that having a clear winner in an open market is not the same as them having a monopoly. Assassin’s Creed games releases on both Steam and Uplay. Same price. Same game. Same everything. Why do people still choose Steam? It’s not because they are forced to. They have the option to simply not buy it on Steam. That is why I don’t think Steam is liable.

Ubisoft wants so sell cheaper on Uplay to pull traffic there. Why not just simply dump Steam and ONLY sell on their platform? I’d really like you to answer this question.

My apologies! Genuinely.

Now, from what I understand, Rosen had his game in early access on Steam for like 5 years. And the game was hosted solely on Steam. Things that cost Rosen nothing. Then, Rosen wants to sell keys directly to the costumers rather than through the very service used to distribute the game, effectively bypassing paying Valve anything. Valve says that’s not ok, Rosen sues them, and somehow Valve is the bad guy?

I agree there, we probably wouldn’t get those rules from GoG. But if you even for a second think Epic would not impose 30%+ fee if they had Steams market share, well, I don’t know what to tell you. Steam enforces No Advertising in games and taking active steps in forcing developers to actually optimize their games. In no universe would EA, Ubisoft, Rockstar, Epic or any other so the same. We’d have commercial breaks in our 2fps games years ago.

Humble Bundle isn’t even mentioned in the article shared my guy.

And Steam is not their fucking platform . If Amazon where to set such a policy, well then just fucking stop selling there. It would come crumbling down on itself. You people don’t seem to realize the responsibility of the sellers in keeping companies like Valve at the position their in. You can’t have the cookie and eat it, which is exactly what they are pushing for with these lawsuits.

But yeah, let’s kill Steam and watch EA put commercial breaks in their games, MTX just to progress in the story, subscription to even continue to have access to your games, always-online for the most basic single player games just so they can keep track of you.

You want to punish Steam in favor of the shareholders of the likes of Ubisoft, who is really gagging on billionaire cock here?

I don’t get it. Steam does not have a chokehold on supply of servers, hardware, software, personnel, investments, nothing. Steam has a huge base because people like their platform.

If the big publishers would pull out of Steam, you think it would survive? If Ubisoft and EA and Rockstar and all of the others decide hey, we’re just gonna sell on our own platforms from now on, you think Steam would prevail anyway? Counter-Strike is not THAT profitable.

The CORE ISSUE is not Steam having a 30% fee, it is THE OTHER PLATFORM ARE CRAP and people rather not play your game than install Uplay.

And again, Valve are not setting any prices. They do 2 things,

1. Set their fee
2. Won’t accept you using Steam as a free advertisement window

Look, I don’t like the 30% fee either. They could lower it drastically and probably still be fine. But make no mistake; if, say, EA had launched an equivalent to Steam in the early 2000s, today it would be common practice to have Ads in the launcher, Subscriptions for “better deals”, Fees for adding more games to your library, Spyware, and don’t think they would have more generous fees for developers. If anything, they would have a HIGHER fee than 30% and if anyone tried to launch a competing game launcher they would buy it up and shut it down.

Stop acting like Valve isn’t the best we could ask for out of all the alternatives.

None of that first paragraph is in the article OP linked lmao, at least not the one I can see.

Why would Steam put your game on their site for free, giving it exposure to potential buyers, just for the buyers to turn around and buy it cheaper somewhere else? Steam only takes a cut on sold copies.

Xbox, Ubisoft, EA, Blizzard/Activision, Epic, Rockstar, all have launchers. Hell, even Amazon has got a game launcher.

Had any of them been better than, or at least as good as Steam, people would probably buy a game there if it was not listed on Steam.

if you want to sell on Steam too

Yeah, if you want to sell on THEIR platform then follow THEIR rules. Like wtf?

Like a said in another reply, Steam has a “monopoly” because 1. Players choose it, and 2. Publishers keep selling there.

If you can’t sell your game solely on your own platform, then maybe there’s a problem with YOUR PRODUCT.

Steam only takes a share on sold copies. Having YOUR game on THEIR site while selling it cheaper on your OWN site would effectively be leeching free exposure off of Steams front page. How is it not reasonable for Steam to not want that?

Speaking of God Given Rights, “we want to sell our games on Steam but not on their terms”. Don’t like it? Don’t do it. “but they have the largest market share 😢” , because you keep selling on their platform. I don’t understand how this shit is so hard to grasp.