Why all the Steam hate?

[MaddSkillz]

So I get the angst of players that perhaps came recent to Steam (or have been here a bit) and now compare it to Epic, but frankly if not for Steam there would not be any online PC market places at all. Uplay, Origin, Battlenet, Epic - now maybe Verizon and Google - they are all riding off Steam.

Sure Steam could improve, it does all the time. But no way im going to run 6+ more? game platforms to run my games (165 on Steam alone). Simply having all my games in one location, that get updated all the time for various OS, driver or other content update, is a massive benefit. Beats the BS of having to search for updates once a upon a time.

Yes not perfect. But so much better than it used to be (piss off i know im likely older than most) but still has a lot of upside.

Peace

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

İlk olarak drewbstar tarafından gönderildi:

İlk olarak Dr.Shadowds 🐉 tarafından gönderildi:

Pretty much, some people are trying to blow things up than it should be, or trying to make people believe something that may not even true to begin with, or just a lie, in this case, the sale cut was never an issue to begin with, which is the kicker, and all the people that bad mouthing are aiming solely at Steam only, no one else, even those they're doing the same thing, which is a joke, and soon you confirm them, they change their tune right on the spot hilarious.

If it isn't an issue, why are devs going to platforms which explicitly state they're lowering the cut?

Like I said before above, if you cared to read it.

[Mikasa Ackerman]

İlk olarak Dr.Shadowds 🐉 tarafından gönderildi:

İlk olarak Sakura Haruno tarafından gönderildi:

so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ true until epic mentioned the revenue , no one complained , rather the oposite , people complained how steam sales arent what they used to be , which is the complete oposite of caring about the devs

with consoles there always were used games too , i can still get snes games at 2nd hand stores , nintendo stopped making money in 2000 or even earlier, meanwhile some other stores or people on a fleemarket make money with them

on steam the devs get to keep making money for years , another thing if money was such a big deal to companies , wouldnt they tell microsoft and sony to immediantly stop supporting used games ? after all they lose devs so much money , if used games arent a problem and never were during the ps3 / 360 era and the current ps4 / xbone era surely steam taking a cut isnt either

Pretty much, some people are trying to blow things up than it should be, or trying to make people believe something that may not even true to begin with, or just a lie, in this case, the sale cut was never an issue to begin with, which is the kicker, and all the people that bad mouthing are aiming solely at Steam only, no one else, even those they're doing the same thing, which is a joke, and soon you confirm them, they change their tune right on the spot hilarious.

yeah , in my 17 years as a gamer ( i played before but i would say when i was 4-5 years old i started to actually game alot myself and not just watch others play and ocasionally play an easy level ) i never once , wondered "do the publishers get much money when i buy a game used , or do they get alot if i buy it new but at a lower price , like 30€

i legit never did , i did wonder how some franchises i never played were like ( pikmin or metroid prime for example ) but never the other tihng , just as i never felt bad for buying a game used , the only snes and n64 game i bought new was paper mario , everything else was already used or i borrowed it from my aunt and cousin who also had a n64 ( i even still have my aunts old snes which she gifted me when i was very young )

the gamecube was the first console where i started to buy new games but even there i bought alot at 2nd hand stores , i dont have numbers but i am sure 2nd hand stores got more money from me than nintendo did

i never cared about any things really when i was really young i even didnt know how my mother got the games , i didnt even realize she paid money for them ( i never did much with money when i was young besides buying pokemon trading cards for 5-10 cents from others with pocket money )

honestly , sales cuts need to happen , i probably said this somewhere before but whatever i sometimes go shopping at a very special store we have in our town called metro , its basically a store for stores , they sell 0.5l softdrinks in packs of 50 and 100 for really low prices , there a single plastic bottle costs like 40-60% of what they cost normally ( but you cant buy there without a member card you dont just get easily , i can go there because my uncle leads a restaurant and obviously he has a card and he got an extra one for us

they have so many things that cost far less than they would cost in a super market , their fish and meat also are so much higher quality than the average store because these things mainly get bought by restaurants , often the price difference for a real company and someone making "a purchase for the private use" is 5-10€ for some things and only a few cents for others

when i see the same product at another store its always more , its just clear the store puts a percentage on the price they paid at metro (or for really big stores , directly paid to coke and co) so they make some profit

its the most normal thing ever , just like theres taxes the state takes for each purcahse ( 20% of the price for austria ) you can go anywhere, there will always be multiple parties taking a cut from a price so the core price probably is 40-60% of what you end up paying , if you buy meat directly from a farmer who has some cows , you wont pay as much either , we had a farmer on a mountain , who had chicken , she sold us eggs for so low prices because she mainly had them for private use and that way she could make some money , and her chicken always layed enough eggs anyway


everything you buy , except for prepaid cards , the store takes a cut , the producer takes a cut the developer takes a cut

prepaid cards probably are different because i pay 20€ for a steam card , and get exactly 20€ on steam , i asume valve just pays the store some money for selling a certain amount per month but idk

but for everything thats not just virtual currency on a platform ? everyone takes some money

i sadly couldnt find it in english but look at this

https://www.jtg1995.de/wie-setzt-sich-der-milchpreis-zusammen/

its a chart how the price of milk is made , in this example the milk costs 55 cents for consumers

3.5 cent are for VAT , 23.1 cents are for the actual milk and so on , the same goes for every product , thinking valve is evil for taking cuts , is just silly , just look at the chart ( would be great if someone found one like this in english so more could read it )


its the same with games , for physical , they have to pay for a disk , they have to pay for shiping and storing them , they have to pay the store a percentage for selling iit , and so on , on steam its just paying steam a percentage and thats it nothing more , no making copies , no having to make sure many stores have your game , and so many other things that arent a problem on steam

[Γαῖα]

OP

How may apps does your mobile phone have, more than one right. Well your basically the pot calling the kettle black as a great many things in your life are from more than one source yet todate i bet you havent moaned about that.

In time some bright spark will introduce a bit of software that will combine them all. Worry over, lets move on.

[drewbstar]

İlk olarak Dr.Shadowds 🐉 tarafından gönderildi:

İlk olarak drewbstar tarafından gönderildi:

If it isn't an issue, why are devs going to platforms which explicitly state they're lowering the cut?

Like I said before above, if you cared to read it.

I did. Yet those reasons are a fraction of what the sheer % of each copy is worth. A very small amount of people refund their games, given the option. Most people that buy the game are willing to invest money into it.
You mention publishers starting their own platforms (e.g. Origin), I'm talking about developers going to not-Steam platforms. (Metro -> Epic).

What do you mean by "control"? The ability to set the price of the game? Release date? Stuff like that? Steam already lets developers have a great deal of control on that sort of thing. Developers can push back launch dates, do betas, Early Access, and more. And they can even leave the platform to go to Epic

If it's a refund policy issue, my guess is that once they get big enough, they'll get sued to like Valve did in Australia.

Also, consoles are a league of their own. I won't turn this into a PC vs Console debate, but the market share for consoles is still huge. They're willing to put up with whatever cut because it's worth their time and money. The context of a single company doing the entire process (hardware, software, updates, logistics, marketing) for their product isn't the same as the PC market. Steam isn't out here marketing OEM builds or Intel chips.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not here to shill out for the other launchers. I think Bethesda and Epic forcing exclusives is dumb. They should have let them co-launch, and let the platforms compete amongst themselves. (i.e. Keep Metro on Steam for $60 and use the magic power of 12% for a $50 on Epic). But a "Valve can do no wrong" approach ignores how the market works. We aren't in the 90s any more. Amazon exists. Their ability to ship games and provide bandwidth makes the 90s look like the stone age alone. It's far more possible to host your own servers now. Setting up 2FA isn't as hard now that most people have a phone (about 95% ownership in the US).

Now that lawmakers are FINALLY acting against lootboxes/skins, odds are Valve's going to get a huge hit to their income. With that, cuts may come in some form. But that speculation is for another thread.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

İlk olarak drewbstar tarafından gönderildi:

İlk olarak Dr.Shadowds 🐉 tarafından gönderildi:

Like I said before above, if you cared to read it.

I did. Yet those reasons are a fraction of what the sheer % of each copy is worth. A very small amount of people refund their games, given the option. Most people that buy the game are willing to invest money into it.
You mention publishers starting their own platforms (e.g. Origin), I'm talking about developers going to not-Steam platforms. (Metro -> Epic).

What do you mean by "control"? The ability to set the price of the game? Release date? Stuff like that? Steam already lets developers have a great deal of control on that sort of thing. Developers can push back launch dates, do betas, Early Access, and more. And they can even leave the platform to go to Epic

If it's a refund policy issue, my guess is that once they get big enough, they'll get sued to like Valve did in Australia.

Also, consoles are a league of their own. I won't turn this into a PC vs Console debate, but the market share for consoles is still huge. They're willing to put up with whatever cut because it's worth their time and money. The context of a single company doing the entire process (hardware, software, updates, logistics, marketing) for their product isn't the same as the PC market. Steam isn't out here marketing OEM builds or Intel chips.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not here to shill out for the other launchers. I think Bethesda and Epic forcing exclusives is dumb. They should have let them co-launch, and let the platforms compete amongst themselves. (i.e. Keep Metro on Steam for $60 and use the magic power of 12% for a $50 on Epic). But a "Valve can do no wrong" approach ignores how the market works. We aren't in the 90s any more. Amazon exists. Their ability to ship games and provide bandwidth makes the 90s look like the stone age alone. It's far more possible to host your own servers now. Setting up 2FA isn't as hard now that most people have a phone (about 95% ownership in the US).

Now that lawmakers are FINALLY acting against lootboxes/skins, odds are Valve's going to get a huge hit to their income. With that, cuts may come in some form. But that speculation is for another thread.

If you're talking about Metro game, then that was a deal between Koch Media, and Epic games. DS had to pull then relist on Epic, they even stated themselves they relist the game on Steam in 2020 exactly one year later in their post. What got people upset is that those that didn't pre order, or was going to get it later on, will need another client, just for one game that should've been on Steam as they been doing pre order for over a year, and out of the blue, pull the rug on the community with the switch, expecting people to just buy it from Epic, or wait it out for the next year if you want it on the platform you wanted it on for the convenience, and not juggle multiple game clients. But here something didn't take into account, why is it a problem to list it on Steam, and Epic at the same time? why not do that?

By control, for Pub starting their own platform, exactly as that, total control, they get final say in anything, they have control over your account, your say, and etc as long you're on their service, hence their house, their rules.

The refunds right now for most platforms have their own rules tied to it, may not be the same.
Epic changed their refunds policy 2 times within a month, as they quickly realize people were going to abuse them for free games, and have to be expected to honor their refund policy. Which 1st it was two refunds within two weeks, 2nd it was change to refund within 14days, 3rd it was change to exactly same as Steam 14days, and less than 2 hours of game play. That aside some platforms offer other memes of choices when it comes to refunds, and they may change it, or do things how they wanted, example Sony which I'm sure you know about, in AU you can ask for a refund, but outside AU if you download a single byte of data you forfeit your refund, as that how I last remember it back in early 2018.

Also this wouldn't be about console vs PC, it's mainly about the sales cut, which we're talking about just between us two ATM, which is sales cut was a problem they should be talking about it, making demands, and etc across every platform despite being on console, or PC. And yes you be right console market has a higher sale than PC market, for games, but for users on PC overall wise it's the other way around, or equivalent, mainly because how far spread out everyone is doing whatever on all kinds of platforms, and etc, which why numbers looks small in comparison when any platforms list their numbers for how many people active, and etc...

Also again you be right exclusives are dumb on PC, it doesn't make any sense at all to force exclusivity on the PC market, which we can only hope it doesn't turn out into who going to pay more to get the devs to list on what platform, which that should never be the case, I rather they choose to list their games on platforms they want their games on, without being influence into doing so by waving money in their face. I know Epic can be another good store, if they didn't bother doing what they're trying to push for, instead they should be doing what everyone else done, they can even reach out and ask them to list on their platform as well, this way they can grow, instead of trying to force for a growth.

I believe those lawmakers will do whatever in their power to get their pockets deep as they can which is no doubt at all. I do believe Value will have to either get rid of loot boxes, or not allow those in certain countries to have loot boxes.

[TorMazila]

İlk olarak ᛋᚺᚨᚾᛞᛟᚱ tarafından gönderildi:

So is the hardware and infastructure for creating games. Game devs are no longer the few hundred ultra-nerds of the 80s that spend their entire time on PCs to make a game for their few peers. The amount of people working on games has increased, with a much, much larger audience. That means that they can hire cheaper workers and sell more copies, leading to a reduced price.

People say

A thousand monkeys given a thousand typewriters can't write "War and Peace" 

(it's a huge 4-volume book by Lev Tolstoy). I mean the "cheaper workers" often results in sub-par glitchy product or the costs grow in other ways - testing, process management and such.

And the amount of glitchy trashware deserving 0 attention is what we actually get instead of masterpieces due to the changes you've described.

[TorMazila]

İlk olarak drewbstar tarafından gönderildi:

Don't get me wrong, I'm not here to shill out for the other launchers. I think Bethesda and Epic forcing exclusives is dumb.

It'll be a competition like "distant flea market vs your nearby Super-Duper-Mart "

[Andi]

I dont hate but i love steam

[grody_antagonic]

There is steam hate? I mean, sure, there always was in some dirty corners of the internet, but seriously? Nah. Just Epic Fail spreading bad mood among PC gamers.^^

[Ganger]

İlk olarak weirdopuss tarafından gönderildi:

There is steam hate? I mean, sure, there always was in some dirty corners of the internet, but seriously? Nah. Just Epic Fail spreading bad mood among PC gamers.^^

There is more steam hate than epic hate on these forums. Go take a look at the VAT forums to see that LOL.

[Stonedog]

That is a good question, and I would like to clarify something I have no hate towards valve whatsoever, but the people that used to moderate and some of their business practices lately have become quite heavy handed. There would be another market I'm sure someone would've filled the gap by now valve was just simply first really at least as far as applying to proper technology to do it and they had the money at the time also. I think a lot of it has to do with their lack of direct communication, and quite simply the third parties they employed to do some of their work because they do not directly moderate or employed most of their customer service base. Yet those indirect employees have taken a lot of what valve has allowed them and turned it into just all most abuse on their part and they're in towards users who disagree with them. Now valve does have something to do with this and it's a simple fact that any company that has a very out of proportion marketshare or No Real competition in the market tend to become aggressive and forget who it is that really put them where they are. The customers. You can see this slowly and surely becoming a reality and I wish that someone at valve would recognize this and stop it because they offer an excellent service for the most part that is fairly done and reasonably done. Nowhere else before of the online market did you find any body outside of Babbage's, and it almost bankrupt them, that offered any kind of returns on PC games even at two hours. But it is simply fair to allow your customers to disagree with you and your policies and not lock every topic that you think is doing so.do

İlk olarak MaddSkillz tarafından gönderildi:

So I get the angst of players that perhaps came recent to Steam (or have been here a bit) and now compare it to Epic, but frankly if not for Steam there would not be any online PC market places at all. Uplay, Origin, Battlenet, Epic - now maybe Verizon and Google - they are all riding off Steam.

Sure Steam could improve, it does all the time. But no way im going to run 6+ more? game platforms to run my games (165 on Steam alone). Simply having all my games in one location, that get updated all the time for various OS, driver or other content update, is a massive benefit. Beats the BS of having to search for updates once a upon a time.

Yes not perfect. But so much better than it used to be ♥♥♥♥♥♥off i know im likely older than most) but still has a lot of upside.

Peace

[drewbstar]

İlk olarak Ganger tarafından gönderildi:

İlk olarak weirdopuss tarafından gönderildi:

There is steam hate? I mean, sure, there always was in some dirty corners of the internet, but seriously? Nah. Just Epic Fail spreading bad mood among PC gamers.^^

There is more steam hate than epic hate on these forums. Go take a look at the VAT forums to see that LOL.

That's because we're on Valve's site. If(?)/when Epic gets a forum, odds are people will list their issues there.

[Stonedog]

The decision to discontinue XP and below support was a major factor in the current " Rage against the Machine" mentality we have. Whether morally right or wrong it is controversial to many. Simply put the biggest factor to me was the security factors. Valve simply did what it had to do to protect itself and the MAJORITY of its users. I am not pro or con on it in this post. Just laying out my version of the truth.

What I would like to know is why, after knowing they were going to do so a year or more back, did they continue to sell games that ran on Win XP and down till just very very very recently. Like you can find some still on the store recent. These games will not run on win 7-8-10 or the like , some even in emulate mode of Windows. Seems thats the real question people should be asking and have every right to be angry about.

MS doesnt support these anymore so Valve HAD to follow them because it becomes a HUGE security risk for them if they do continue. Not sure they needed to sell Games that functioned only on them though, misleading (a kind term to use for this) customers till the very last day.

[Brian9824]

İlk olarak Stonedog tarafından gönderildi:

The decision to discontinue XP and below support was a major factor in the current " Rage against the Machine" mentality we have. Whether morally right or wrong it is controversial to many. Simply put the biggest factor to me was the security factors. Valve simply did what it had to do to protect itself and the MAJORITY of its users. I am not pro or con on it in this post. Just laying out my version of the truth.

What I would like to know is why, after knowing they were going to do so a year or more back, did they continue to sell games that ran on Win XP and down till just very very very recently. Like you can find some still on the store recent. These games will not run on win 7-8-10 or the like , some even in emulate mode of Windows. Seems thats the real question people should be asking and have every right to be angry about.

MS doesnt support these anymore so Valve HAD to follow them because it becomes a HUGE security risk for them if they do continue. Not sure they needed to sell Games that functioned only on them though, misleading (a kind term to use for this) customers till the very last day.

Show 1 game that doesn't run on Windows 7,10, etc and only runs on xp.

That being said steam is a just a website for other people to sell their products just like amazon. People still sell 8 track tapes on amazon, its up to the person buying it to know whats required to play it.

Even if a game only ran on a windows xp machine you could always download it and copy it over and play it in offiline mode.

[Diamond Falcon]

Since my first post in the early days of this discussion page, I've been keeping watch on things being discussed here and i will admit many of the users here have brought up very good and in some cases quite interesting points.

As another user or more has pointed out here, It does seem many users have forgotten the times before steam and other digital storefronts.

During the early 2000's PC gaming as a whole was effectively on life support with many developers shunning the PC in favour of the consoles of the time and other factors such as poor PC ports and 3rd party DRM like SecuROM, Starforce and the like.

When steam first appeared many people thought it would never catch on or work and like all things new many hated it however fast forward from then till now and look where we are many of us have grown to accept steam and the concepts of a digital storefront.

I do know that there are users who are concerned that in this day and age you don't physically own a game, more of a digital license to play it and the dangers of should the servers die the games are suddenly rendered dead. This is of particular concern if the games are tied to 3rd party DRM which Denuvo, being this era's SecuROM is always a possibility unless the devs of the games manage to fix/remove before the shutdown as we saw with games such as Dark Souls during the death of Game for Windows Live.

I feel we are entering a dark age for PC gaming one based on Digital storefront exclusives and Enforced 3rd party DRM similair to how the early 2000's were. My biggest fear in this is if Epic do actively push for store exclusives then it might start a trend with other storefronts further dividing the PC community.

The Old Phrase "United we stand , Divided we fall." comes to mind, as the console players have had to suffer for years exclusives do nothing but fragment us as a community, As gamers we need to stand together.