I think people often hate steam for their success, but fail to see it’s the result of customers’choice in a free market. (I see it enough I’m not sure if people get paid to hate on them… To ruin the thing they have most of customer respect)
Steam is not publicly traded and does not act like every other publicly traded company. It invests in its customers experience and custtomer come back for that. It does not nickel in dime or use its position to hold its customer captive and enshitfify its product. It’s not an ISP…
It invests in hardware and software development it believes the industry needs not to make a massive profit but to be a champion of what gaming should be (Linux, steam link, index, bug picture, steam controller, steam deck) These products are experimental and usually sold at or near cost not to make money but to prove to the market there is a need and a demand.
They are often a champion and voice of the gamer.
They could have tried to be like Bethesda and tried to monetize their workshop but they didn’t.
Sometimes they’re quiet and we don’t hear anything about what they’re working on, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t working on things.
I can’t imagine pc gaming would have survived and resurged without steam. And I hate to think what it would be like if there were just 5 epics, origin, Uplay, whatever other launcher. I think gaming would look like mobile games…,… which takes a 30% cut too and can only sell in apple or android markets… No one bitches there and they offer no services.
I agree with you, but justifying anything by saying they’re successful in a free market is really iffy. There are plenty of large evil companies that are incredibly successful. That said I agree with everything else you’ve said.
I personally think 30% cut is too much for any app/software store. But if anyone deserves it Steam does
My reference to free market is only a means of saying customers choose steam because of its offerings not that they have too.
I agree it would be nice if they charged less. However do we know their full PNL/balance sheet? People just keep taking revenue/employees as if employees are the only overhead.
They provide the servers, and do have an rde cost for development for services we discussed like cloud saves, control support etc. if people have this much energy over it attack pharmaceutical for there insane mark ups that would drive way more positive social change. But the people driving are mostly trying to make more money by cutting there publishing expenses through steam. I’m sure psn and Xbox also take 25 to 30percent cuts.
They also championed low publishing costs of only 100 dollars to list a game. I don’t know enough to speak to their update charges though. Hell psn been known to charge 25k for visibility in top of their 30% cut and there are no other market options Reference
Everyone focuses here cause developers and publishers want more of this cut and to me seem to try to push steam into regulator cross hairs as a way to force the changes they have failed to negotiate.
I would also point out brick and mortar sellers also take 15 to 20% cut and then also charge for storage, disposal, fulfillment, return on and on. Amazon does the same. It’s the nature of a market place. Reference
Overall it doesn’t make sense to me as a community that we attack our best example of what a game market place should be.
No harm meant. I do think Steam is the golden example of a big business done right. All I’m saying is that there’s room for improvement.
However do we know their full PNL/balance sheet?
We can make an educated guess. Amazon’s S3 charges roughly $0.025 per GB, so an 100GB game would cost $2.50 for Steam to upload to a user. For a $30 game, that’s around ~8.5% or just over 3 downloads before it’s unprofitable.
Obviously Valve isn’t paying consumer level S3 prices, and obviously users can download multiple times. But I would be extremely surprised if they didn’t make a rather large margin on each sale
Having an AS does not make you an ISP. It just means you have a public AS, which you can use to peer with providers on the Internet, if you have an agreement to peer.
That’s kind of why they are successful though, right? They were the ones that figured out how to supply games digitally for a profit, which required a way to prevent people from sharing the product for free. This was previously done with CD keys, but the advent of the internet rendered that mostly ineffective.
I think publishers value the fact that steam is essentially a form of DRM, so we got fairly lucky all things considered. Imagine if steam didn’t exist and we had to deal with software like Uplay and Origin.
You can play:
Half-Life 1: Source
Half-Life 2
Half-Life 2: Episode One
Half-Life 2: Episode Two
All with steam closed. Original half life expansions aside, your take is senile. I suppose alyx could’ve done without it.
I think people often hate steam for their success, but fail to see it’s the result of customers’choice in a free market. (I see it enough I’m not sure if people get paid to hate on them… To ruin the thing they have most of customer respect)
Steam is not publicly traded and does not act like every other publicly traded company. It invests in its customers experience and custtomer come back for that. It does not nickel in dime or use its position to hold its customer captive and enshitfify its product. It’s not an ISP…
It invests in hardware and software development it believes the industry needs not to make a massive profit but to be a champion of what gaming should be (Linux, steam link, index, bug picture, steam controller, steam deck) These products are experimental and usually sold at or near cost not to make money but to prove to the market there is a need and a demand.
They are often a champion and voice of the gamer.
They could have tried to be like Bethesda and tried to monetize their workshop but they didn’t.
Sometimes they’re quiet and we don’t hear anything about what they’re working on, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t working on things.
I can’t imagine pc gaming would have survived and resurged without steam. And I hate to think what it would be like if there were just 5 epics, origin, Uplay, whatever other launcher. I think gaming would look like mobile games…,… which takes a 30% cut too and can only sell in apple or android markets… No one bitches there and they offer no services.
I agree with you, but justifying anything by saying they’re successful in a free market is really iffy. There are plenty of large evil companies that are incredibly successful. That said I agree with everything else you’ve said.
I personally think 30% cut is too much for any app/software store. But if anyone deserves it Steam does
My reference to free market is only a means of saying customers choose steam because of its offerings not that they have too.
I agree it would be nice if they charged less. However do we know their full PNL/balance sheet? People just keep taking revenue/employees as if employees are the only overhead.
They provide the servers, and do have an rde cost for development for services we discussed like cloud saves, control support etc. if people have this much energy over it attack pharmaceutical for there insane mark ups that would drive way more positive social change. But the people driving are mostly trying to make more money by cutting there publishing expenses through steam. I’m sure psn and Xbox also take 25 to 30percent cuts.
They also championed low publishing costs of only 100 dollars to list a game. I don’t know enough to speak to their update charges though. Hell psn been known to charge 25k for visibility in top of their 30% cut and there are no other market options Reference
Everyone focuses here cause developers and publishers want more of this cut and to me seem to try to push steam into regulator cross hairs as a way to force the changes they have failed to negotiate.
I would also point out brick and mortar sellers also take 15 to 20% cut and then also charge for storage, disposal, fulfillment, return on and on. Amazon does the same. It’s the nature of a market place. Reference
Overall it doesn’t make sense to me as a community that we attack our best example of what a game market place should be.
No harm meant. I do think Steam is the golden example of a big business done right. All I’m saying is that there’s room for improvement.
We can make an educated guess. Amazon’s S3 charges roughly $0.025 per GB, so an 100GB game would cost $2.50 for Steam to upload to a user. For a $30 game, that’s around ~8.5% or just over 3 downloads before it’s unprofitable.
Obviously Valve isn’t paying consumer level S3 prices, and obviously users can download multiple times. But I would be extremely surprised if they didn’t make a rather large margin on each sale
Total fair always room for improvement, no ones perfect.
Appreciate the good discussion!
For storage or for download?
Valve has AS number, so it is an ISP
Having an AS does not make you an ISP. It just means you have a public AS, which you can use to peer with providers on the Internet, if you have an agreement to peer.
I hate them for forcing me to use a kind of DRM which will stop working once their servers stop.
Halflife was just fine without steam. Adding steam seemed to be a way to stop players from sharing CD keys.
That’s kind of why they are successful though, right? They were the ones that figured out how to supply games digitally for a profit, which required a way to prevent people from sharing the product for free. This was previously done with CD keys, but the advent of the internet rendered that mostly ineffective.
I think publishers value the fact that steam is essentially a form of DRM, so we got fairly lucky all things considered. Imagine if steam didn’t exist and we had to deal with software like Uplay and Origin.
Imagine if securom was everywhere again.
You can play: Half-Life 1: Source Half-Life 2 Half-Life 2: Episode One Half-Life 2: Episode Two All with steam closed. Original half life expansions aside, your take is senile. I suppose alyx could’ve done without it.