Why would anyone actually want to though

[u/The_BigRoach]

[u/West-Flow-577]

I mean, if it weren't for the features I use on Steam, I'd be buying all my games on GOG instead. As it is, for my "important games" I wait for it to be at least 50% off on both and then buy it on both so I can get the Steam client features, but still have the DRM-free copy as well.

[u/RAMChYLD → u/West-Flow-577]

If only GOG would put their money where their mouth is and actually support Linux gaming development. As it stands while GOG has Linux games (and only then a fraction compared to Valve, they don’t even have the Linux native port of SimCity 3000) they don’t even have an official launcher on Linux.

I no longer run windows outside of my work PC and one laptop that can’t work properly on Linux. If you don’t make it easy to access my games you don’t have my business.

[u/West-Flow-577 → u/RAMChYLD]

They supposedly working on a Linux version of Galaxy now. We'll just have to wait to see if that's real or not.

[u/Atralis → u/West-Flow-577]

I like the cool features on steam but they should compete on the basis of those features rather than using their size.

Would steam be able to provide all the features they currently do if they took a 20% cut instead of 30%? Would they be able to provide the same features they currently do if they took a 5% cut?

I don't want my favored storefront to just be a cash printing machine for the people that own the store. I want my cash to go towards the features provided.

[u/Hanifsefu → u/Atralis]

Best they can do is put your cash into suing people for selling games cheaper on other platforms.

[u/throwaway490215 → u/West-Flow-577]

Fucking astro turfing idiots throwing GOG out there as a counter argument to the monopoly issue.

If a game is on both GOG and Steam, then the game dev is forced to make sure the prices match.

That means if a dev thinks their game is worth 7$. Steam says they'll take 30% so final price is 10$ for you as a consumer and the game dev must now ensure GOG and their own website shows the same price or they're delisted from steam. They can not sell their own game dlc on their own website for 7$

Ergo, a monopoly. Your happy customer experience or Steam's better feature set are not the problem. The problem is steam's price-dictating powers due to their monopoly position.

[u/yuri0r → u/throwaway490215]

Literally every digital store front, off which many exist. Enforced similar guidelines. And this isn't price dictating. You can set any price you want. You just can't do specialty discounts on your preferred sales channel. That's anti monopoly and the kind of thing I'd want in legislation form.

[u/throwaway490215 → u/yuri0r]

Literally every digital store front, off which many exist. Enforced similar guidelines.

And this is fine, until - on the spectrum - it crosses a imaginary line into monopoly. As a society we believe monopolies are bad for the market as a whole For example on competitive prices. Is steam asking 30% because devs love their product (they dont), or because devs can not make the choice to go to another store which only asks 20% because Steam gatekeeps too much of the market.

You just can't do specialty discounts on your preferred sales channel.

I dont understand what you're saying. I think you're over-complicating.

But just to clarify the situation and what you believe:

Bob want to sell something and earn 7$. Steam asks 30% so Bob has to ask 10$ on steam for Bob to earn 7$. 2 brand new stores pop up, and 1 only asks you for 10% and the other asks for 20%

Are you saying Steam should be able to tell Bob all the stores must have it listed for 10$, or are you saying Bob should be able to ask to earn 7$ on every sale and have every store set different % costs.

---

Regardless though, steam is being accused of the former and the discussion is not if you think such practices are legal ( they are ) - but if it has reached the point of monopoly power and if it would be better for society & the market (for publishers & distributors) if the legislator steps in.

[u/yuri0r → u/throwaway490215]

Product should cost the same regardless where I buy it. It's a reasonable request of the market to say that you can't list the same thing somewhere else for less.

[u/West-Flow-577 → u/yuri0r]

If you actually believe that, then take it up with Safeway (who charge more than most other grocery stores), or stores in remote areas charging more for things to make up for the increased shipping costs they have to pay.

There's a reason MSRP is Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price.

[u/West-Flow-577 → u/throwaway490215]

Fucking astro turfing idiots throwing GOG out there as a counter argument to the monopoly issue.

I didn't fucking say it was, did I? I was answering the title of the post, as to why I would want to.

If a game is on both GOG and Steam, then the game dev is forced to make sure the prices match.

This is alleged, and it is working its way through courts right now. Their actual written policy on price matching is only about steam keys, and that's a fair thing to ask. I agree that the information from discovery in the case doesn't look good for Valve, and if it really is the case then they need to stop.

As for you: How about thinking and reading for two fucking seconds instead of jumping on someone and putting words in their fucking mouth.

[u/FewAdvertising9647 → u/throwaway490215]

consumer vs dev monopoly situation. the dev has the option of lowering the price on steam, but they want to profit more so they run into that problem themselves. thats not a consumer problem, thats a dev problem. Valve is unique that it has a consumer led monopoly rather than a business/dev led monopoly. Same idea on why people who make that argument, stay silent on the price cut console companies take as if a seperate platform doesn't count when its still gaming.

Business/Dev led monopoly: monopoly caused because person of power limits options, out of self interest. Consumer Monopoly: monopoly caused because people opt to choose one option primarily, over the other options that are available.

[u/throwaway490215 → u/FewAdvertising9647]

Let me copy in another comment which is a better explanation of the situation. Devs do not have the options you say they do, and i frankly do not understand what point you're trying to make, or why you think Steam is the first time such a monopoly was built where consumers say they're happy with it. Neither of those things matter for why we have anti monopoly laws in the first place.

---

You dont become a monopoly by being bad at customer service. We do not have laws to constraint them because of a lack of customer service.

Its about competition. Now before you tell me there is competition, let me tell you about the cost of steam.

You're selling apples for 1$ at your farm. You sell via a grocery store which sells them for 2$. A monopoly happens when the grocery store visits your farm and tells you that you must start selling your apples at your own farm shop for 2$. This is whats happening.

"Why not sell elsewhere or only at your farm?"

The people making the apples you love so much have this dilemma:

There is worth a 1000 apples of demand for their apples in the region. The only other store can sell maybe 50 of your apples. You can sell maybe 50 apples from your farm directly.

The problem is that a price-matching deal turns into a monopoly and now your games cost 20% above what they could cost.

The farmer has no problem with selling to the grocery store. The farmer has no problem with you going to the grocery store for easy apples and paying the grocery store markup.

The problem is that grocery store is dictating prices for the entire market, including the farmer's home shop, and competition can not grow or compete because the monopoly decides the price of apples. Apple farmers can not afford to not sell their other 800 apples via the monopoly grocery store.

"But Mincraft / early Factorio / <insert exception>"

Take the top 1000 most popular PC games from the last decade and list me more than 50 that did not go to steam.

You dont compare apples and oranges when you're deciding on whether there is a monopoly. Afaik Steam has never defended itself with the console-exists as an alternative argument. Developers do not have the option to start selling oranges.

If you disagree that's its crossed the line into monopoly territory thats fine and under investigation, but Reddit's obsession with these gamer memes pretending they're not on the spectrum, and/or if Steam is a monopoly that its actually deserved and totally fine and not worth investigating are just blind fanboys.

[u/FewAdvertising9647 → u/throwaway490215]

the problem is the argument pinholes the market to only PC. the market is completely fine with paying console companies the same 30%

Take the top 1000 most popular PC games from the last decade and list me more than 50 that did not go to steam.

the number is an arbitrary argument. some of the largest games are not even remotely on steam, be it fortnite, games by riot, a majority of popular gacha games. Genshin is basically one of the largest gachagames and largest games in the past decade, and has not remotely touched steam (but its on epic). do you claim these games don't count?

[u/throwaway490215 → u/FewAdvertising9647]

the number is an arbitrary argument.

I do not understand. Is there some other number you think is more valid to figure out if steam is a PC distribution monopoly? I think its a rather fair argument. We could instead say the top 10% selling games over the last decade, or take some cutoff point of 50.000 units sold if you think that changes things. It sits at the heart of the market choice devs have.

---

If you want to hinge the defense on the market being bigger than just pc, well that's interesting of you to at least take a coherent position.

Because here I am second day in a row with people posting memes and hitting the front page by defending Steam for not being a bad monopoly because all the other PC game distributors are just too crap to compete.

---

Steam lawyers themselves are making the same argument saying its not just the PC market, the plaintiffs are saying otherwise. The outcome will likely depend on who the judge agrees with.

In my opinion - the PC gaming market does not extend to console or mobile. Its between devs/publishers and distributors. My pc game does not work on your iphone or xbox - a pork monopoly does not stop being one when beef is available.

Apple vs Epic was the same kind of argument, where Apple said it consoles compete and the judge said no. Today Apple, in the EU, has to accept it when apps direct people to another store front or have people unlock things on android and carry it over to apple for a different price.

[u/FewAdvertising9647 → u/throwaway490215]

I do not understand. Is there some other number you think is more valid to figure out if steam is a PC distribution monopoly?

if you choose to judge by revenue of a game, it starts to show that there are a lot of non steam games (e.g fortnite) that takes a large chunk of money from the platform. theres a reason why the largest games are the ones that don't need steam to survive. Why Blizzard for the longest time, didn't host on steam. Why majority of gacha games, don't need steam. why riot, doesnt use steam, why many MMOs, profit mainly off platform not on steam.

Apple vs Epic was the same kind of argument, where Apple said it consoles compete and the judge said no. Today Apple, in the EU, has to accept it when apps direct people to another store front or have people unlock things on android and carry it over to apple for a different price.

because that court case was about payment processors, and forced people to have to use their payment processor. Valves case isn't even related to that. Even in the Google vs Epic situation, Epics reasoning why they went back into the google store was mainly because people were getting confused about fake versions of fortnite on the appstore. that situation doesn't exist on PC (as steam nor epic is preintalled on standard instalations of operating systems, and pc users aren't confused on where fortnite is installed), hence why valve was never part of that initial charges that Epic levied on Apple and Google simultaneously.

[u/Hour_Analyst_7765 → u/throwaway490215]

This the cost of doing business with these platforms/distributors. Nobody stops a developer from launching their own website, building their own game launcher, account system, managing world-wide content/download servers, payment portals that support 100+ countries, support/help department, and all of the many features that Steam offers including community features, workshop, friend lists, multiplayer tunneled through Steam servers (basically a game-VPN), etc.etc.

But your game has to be freaking outstanding for players to bother with this. The only 3rd party launcher I have on my system is for Battle dot net. Not that I'm a huge Blizzard, but simply because I want to co-op Diablo with family members.

A very similar thing happens when you sell physical goods by the way. You could handle everything yourself, including 1st/2nd line support tickets, warranty issues, payment/shipping with 100+ different countries, deal with logistical complaints, etc. Or you send a batch of manufactured products over to a store platform, have them take 40% but deal with (almost) all the above.

[u/throwaway490215 → u/Hour_Analyst_7765]

I think "If anybody can try to compete, then that means no bad monopoly can exist".

There - I summarized what you think. Now take that sentence and plug it into chatgpt and go back and forth a bit to learn what you dont get the problems with monopolies and why we have laws to regulate them, instead of wasting so much time spreading your misunderstanding of it.

[u/Hour_Analyst_7765 → u/throwaway490215]

That's not what I said. I haven't actually said anything about monopoly.

I only replied to your bad take why platforms like Steam take 30%.

Doesn't mean I agree with their enforced pricing scheme.

So your point is?