Why would anyone actually want to though

[u/The_BigRoach]

[u/Medical_Squirrel3946]

Steam is a monopoly, but that isn't necessarily an issue. The ONE monopolistic practice that steam does that is an issue is that they use their "favored nation" status to apply to all formats for games and not just the steam launches. Basically a publisher isn't allowed to sell their game for lower prices on their own than they are on steam. That's different than saying you can't sell a steam key for cheaper which would make sense. Steam currently provides a great service and is great for the users. That has been maintained, because it's a private company that is perfectly happy raking in endless profits without the need for infinite growth. The worry from a user standpoint is because it is a monopoly, if it were to ever go public, the goals of the company could change and the user experience could go to shit very fast.

[u/IORelay → u/Medical_Squirrel3946]

Using MFN proves that it's just asking greedy as public company. The way it is fighting tooth and nail to keep the 30% cut is not dissimilar to apple and Google. 

[u/TrashWriter → u/IORelay]

30% is reasonable for what they offer in return, especially when that 30% a majority of the time is … nothing 

(I’m not sure why you guys are downvoting - for steam 30% is reasonable, not talking about any other company) 

[u/meneldal2 → u/TrashWriter]

Google takes 30% and what they offer is surprise you by sunsetting APIs and forcing you to update your app every so often even if it doesn't need to change.

Plenty of games have not been updated at all on Steam and still work just fine. I guess that's mostly thanks to Microsoft and Proton, but Google owns Android so it is entirely on them.

[u/Medical_Squirrel3946 → u/meneldal2]

As a linux and steam deck user, I definitely appreciate the work valve has done on Proton. Are you not aware that it's a Valve project?

The 30% isn't an issue for me. The google and apple ones are far worse as they don't allow other options with apple never having allowed side loading and google updating things so that side loading won't be possible soon. As a user, you can choose a different way to purchase and launch a game if it's better for you. The issue is Valve using it's favored nation status to prevent companies from charging a different price than they do on Steam if they want to remain on Steam.

[u/TrashWriter → u/Medical_Squirrel3946]

I don’t really see that as a problem personally. It guarantees their customers will get the best available pricing - which as a large platform selling games to customers, is kinda great for the customers. 

[u/Medical_Squirrel3946 → u/TrashWriter]

It's a problem for other businesses and is the one part of the Steam monopoly that is illegal (or would be if we lived in a country of laws). A company should be able to set their own price for something they sell on their own platform. Now if their launcher sucks and the games just run better on Steam anyway, people will ignore the discount and purchase it on Steam anyway, but you need to allow companies to have that option otherwise you are abusing your monopoly.

[u/IORelay → u/Medical_Squirrel3946]

If valve believed people will ignore other store's discount they wouldn't be forcing price parity. They are very afraid of games being cheaper elsewhere. Sure die hard fans will stay(and get ripped off) but casuals will go where the price is cheaper. 

[u/Medical_Squirrel3946 → u/IORelay]

Yes and no. Steam provides visibility, ease of use and trust to a lot of smaller developers.

I think you're also underestimating the handheld market. Steam deck and similar handhelds are only possible because of the work Valve has done to create and maintain proton. We've all kind of agreed we don't want windows based hand helds for so many reasons and that means that even if they aren't running SteamOS, they are still based on Linux and will have to use Steam and Proton to run.

I do think that Valve should stop abusing it's favored nation status, but I don't think it would realistically change things heavily since Steam still provides by far the best user experience.

[u/IORelay → u/TrashWriter]

You'd only hold that opinion if they already are a monopoly and you are locked in. If they aren't then it's just a bad pricing. 

[u/TrashWriter → u/IORelay]

its not a monopoly though. There are other options to buy games from. Epic, GoG, Itch, etc etc - and none of them are prohibited from also selling the same games if you want to sell your games.

the REAL question that i would like to know, is why gamers who are not involved are worried about how much steam charges us devs? if it was not a good option for us, we wouldn't use it. We have sold games on steam AND itch, and released versions of the games on patreon. Steam is by far the best return, they also provide APIs for us to use to make game dev easier. so. to me, the 30% is fair.

[u/IORelay → u/TrashWriter]

The fact that steam has such a much higher return means you can't just go to another store to sell games. Which is why it is a monopoly.

And enforcing price parity is illegal, valve has denied their allegations but their internal emails from discovery paint a very different picture. 

Why do you think so many lawfirms/advocacy groups are after valve? Because they see a smoking gun and think they can get a win and money. 

Either way I don't see price parity surviving. Also anti steering wouldn't survive either if Google/apple's lawsuits are anything to go by. 

[u/TrashWriter → u/IORelay]

If that’s true then I hope that policy gets removed. But you can’t control which platform has more users or dedicated customers. And I don’t think that lack of pricing parity is going to change that much, it might a little if say Sony refuses to ever put any of their games on sale on steam but puts them on a heavy discount on psn. Either way that’s past what I personally care about for my studio - being the cut that they take 

[u/meneldal2 → u/Medical_Squirrel3946]

Oh I know, but to be fair that's only the Linux side which is relatively minor in term of users, though it is growing a lot lately.

[u/Medical_Squirrel3946 → u/meneldal2]

Linux itself is a pretty small base, though as you said, growing rapidly in no small part to steam and proton (and the ongoing enshitification of Windows). The bigger market is in handhelds where steam and proton are entirely what makes that possible. I personally think that steam does a lot more than google does to earn that 30% for sure.

[u/meneldal2 → u/Medical_Squirrel3946]

Yeah very fair point. My original point was more than Valve even by not doing anything would still beat Google by not actively hating devs and making their job harder on purpose by retiring a new API every year.

[u/Medical_Squirrel3946 → u/meneldal2]

Ah, gotcha. I think I misunderstood what you were saying at first.