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Gabe Newell ordered to make in-person deposition for Valve v. Wolfire Games lawsuit
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this post was submitted on 24 Nov 2023
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They have a monopoly but that's because they're just the best service. It's not just that they were the first, they're just consistently the best. Everybody who has spun up another ancillary launcher and DRM service has always made an inferior product to Valve's.
Epic games bribes you with free games, launched without a functioning cart, and hoovers your data.
EA has gone through Origin and the EA app, both of which are awful; Origin being the butt of jokes for years and the EA app being an unstable piece of garbage that logs you out every day with "a particularly annoying bug".
Ubisoft. Self explanatory.
I could keep going on, but Valve earned their position in the market. Could they reduce the cut and still exist with a good profit? Absolutely, but that's the only thing I'd really want them to change - treat the devs a bit more fairly.
I don't mind their market position. I do mind them taking an entire third of revenue, straight off the top. That's bullshit enough when console manufacturers do it - and they claim that's to subsidize the hardware platform that they built and control.
Do you believe it’s free to host downloads, support matchmaking services, and the near endless other services steam provides? Or did considering why other online gaming retail platforms (besides GOG we love GOG) suck major ass just skip your mind?
Free being the only other option.
An entire third, or zero. Other numbers don't exist. Valve obviously needs every cent they take, to do the bare minimum you smugly rub in my face, as though I've never even heard of their service. All that value just goes right back to the game-makers! Aaand all the hardware research and development they do for themselves but nevermind that.
And I guess GOG is a clear counterexample of your own point but uhhhhhh smokebomb!
So what is your actual point here? Because you've said fuck-all to make a point.
Valve's cut should be less than a third.
Do you need a diagram?
You know they're not hurting. They enjoy immense profit, at the expense of people who still make games. All excuses are tired nonsense. The cut isn't why Epic sucks. It's not why GOG has less market share. Steam barged its way into relevance on the back of Half-Life 2, and was the first digital game store anyone bothered to use.
They'll have a de-facto monopoly next year because they had a de-facto monopoly last year. That's all it takes. That's the entire fucking reason we have laws about monopolies. They can do whatever the hell they want to publishers, and there's fuck-all consumers can do about it.