Comment on Steam is basically a PC gaming monopoly, so why isn’t anyone mad?
hzl@piefed.blahaj.zone 10 hours ago
Are they a monopoly? They’re definitely huge, but a lot of the games on Steam are non-exclusive, and they don’t actually control the rights to the games. Like, they don’t own the IP, they don’t restrict content to their platform, and they have some pretty functional if smaller competitors like GOG and Epic. They also make their platform compatible with game keys that weren’t actually sold on their platform.
They’re definitely something with substantial market dominance as a platform, not I’m not sure monopoly is really the word.
DaleGribble88@programming.dev 8 hours ago
Monopoly is definitely the word, but they also don’t appear to be overly abusive about their market position.
JillyB@beehaw.org 6 hours ago
They take 30% of all PC game sales. If that isn’t abusing their position, idk what is.
JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyz 58 minutes ago
They allow devs to sell on other platforms and provide them steam keys for free, bypassing that commission.
TehPers@beehaw.org 2 hours ago
I see this point come up all the time when it comes to Steam, but I have yet to see anyone really propose an alternative. How much should it cost to host your game on Steam? It obviously can’t be free because of hosting costs, and you’re also paying for marketing and discoverability, so what’s a good price for it?
Until recently, 30% was the industry standard for large software stores. Google is apparently lowering its cut after losing their recent battle with Epic, so it’s possible that the industry standard changes. I’d hope that Valve adjusts with it.
Newsteinleo@infosec.pub 5 hours ago
You lost 60% when selling physical media in stores, 30% was an amazing deal when steal launched
Kissaki@beehaw.org 3 hours ago
what a funny and in this context ironic typo