A comprehensive guide to help Steam remain competitive in the modern gaming landscape.

[FOXDUDE69]

Hello, everyone!

Like many of you, I love Steam and I want to see it remain successful in the future.
There are many wonderful guides on Steam but they are typically meant to help players, so I think it's about time someone makes a guide to help Valve.

Let's Start!



𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐎𝐖 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 𝐎𝐅 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐓-𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐋𝐃 𝐀𝐂𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐒

You can't technically make an account for a child under 13 on Steam.

Meanwhile all of Steam's biggest competitors allow you to create a parent-supervised child account for your offspring.

This includes the Epic Games Store, where my offspring are already building a significantly large library of free games and enjoying matches of FORTNITE with their dad, while at the same time not being allowed to play RAFT on Steam with their dad because they haven't reached the arbitrary age of 13 despite the fact that they've been gaming since they were toddlers.

Since they aren't allowed to have an account, the only games they can play with me on Steam are shared screen or split screen games, both types of games that, let's be frank here, are more comfortably enjoyed though Playstation/Xbox on our 75" TV (Steam link introduces lag and visual artifacts so that's not a real solution).

What all of this is guaranteeing is that the vast majority of their childhood gaming memories will be dominated by consoles and the Epic Games Store.

The Epic Games Store already has the future advantage here, due to the fact that they've captured the attention of the next generation of gamers with the insane popularity of FORTNITE, a generation of gamers without an ounce of loyalty towards Valve like the Counter Strike generation had, and this backwards policy of only allowing children over 13 to create accounts is further increasing the advantage they'll have in the future.

When a child can have an Epic account stacked with hundreds of good free games and making countless, priceless childhood memories on their platform long before they are even allowed to make a Steam account (6 more years until my oldest is allowed to have an account), Valve is just letting Epic race by them while they are stuck in reverse.

Lastly, developers that lock their games to Steam are leaving money on the table because of this nonsense, too. The aforementioned RAFT has no ESRB or PEGI rating, but Subnautica is very similar in the type of content it features and it has a ESRB of 10+ and PEGi 7.

So if RAFT was on Epic or Playstation these developers would have made additional sales from parents of children 7 and up. Instead, and because RAFT is locked to Steam, these children are not technically allowed to own a game that's appropriate for their age. It's an absurd situation.



𝐑𝐄𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐊 𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐀𝐌 𝐏𝐎𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐒 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐎𝐅𝐅𝐄𝐑 𝐀 𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐏𝐄𝐓𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐕𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐘𝐀𝐋𝐓𝐘 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐌

Another thing that Valve is sorely lagging behind is with their laughably inferior loyalty program.

Yes, it's fun to customize your profile with some silly stuff but it doesn't hold a candle to using points to redeem actual games like you can on Playstation, Nintendo and even the Epic Games Store now.

The Steam points system should be reworked to give users the ability to redeem their steam points for full games or partially pay for the purchase.

This would also naturally make Steam points far more valuable, meaning Steam Awards would become more meaningful, which is a good thing in my opinion, and the "Jester problem" would basically take care of itself.

The items currently on the Points Shop would then also have to be greatly reduced in cost as their value relative to the value of a partial or full purchase of a new game is remarkably inferior.

But what we would be left with would be a loyalty program that actually encourages users to spend directly on Steam instead of third party key selling sites like Humble Bundle.

Additionally, every purchase on the Steam store should heavily contribute towards your Steam level. It just makes perfect sense.



𝐅𝐈𝐗 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐀𝐁𝐘𝐒𝐌𝐀𝐋 𝐂𝐔𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐏𝐎𝐑𝐓 𝐄𝐗𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄

Steam customer support is infamous for how terrible it is.

From personal experience and from what I've read online through the years, the average customer support experience on Steam seems to go a lil' something like this:

You write in your problem and wait multiple days for a generic answer from someone who didn't even bother reading your ticket.

Sounds familiar?

Compare this to other videogame services which allow you to livechat or even call... Services where you communicate to people who are actually trying to solve your issue instead of stonewalling you in hopes you give up and close the ticket.

This behavior reduces trust in the platform.

Valve's customer service is one of the worst I've experienced in my life and it's the main reason I've started significantly reducing the amount of money I spend of Steam and no longer recommend the service to friends and co-workers like I used to.

Trust is very important, and in the age of digital gaming, where you don't physically own the product you are purchasing, trust is paramount. So if you can't trust the entity selling it to you... Money will go elsewhere.



𝐃𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐋𝐎𝐏 𝐆𝐎𝐎𝐃 𝐆𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐒 𝐀𝐆𝐀𝐈𝐍

Let's face it, the Valve we fondly remember does not exist anymore, that's why you don't have a Half-Life 3 or a Left 4 Dead 3 or a Portal 3.

Yeah, yeah, Valve can't count to 3, very funny, I know.

But the underlying issue causing this "inability to count to 3" is not funny at all, it's ugly and downright disgusting.

Instead of continuing to work on their beloved franchises and innovate and develop new ones, Valve elected the way of easy greasy money.

They elected to focus on esports and played a significant and pivotal role in the normalization of lootboxes and gambling. Vast amounts of money for relatively little work.

And I do mean little work because even by esports/live service standards, CSGO and DOTA2 are quite pathetic. Fresh content is extremely rare... But lootboxes for young teens to gamble with... That's always rolling out.

Valve should turn back and try to live up to the reputation of being "the good guy", a reputation they've long stopped deserving but could deserve once again through hard work and a decision to start once again contributing to videogame history in a much more positive way.

Valve should apologize to their fans for abandoning their beloved franchises for lootbox money and promise to do better in the future. They should cut off API access to all the gambling websites that they like to pretend they can do nothing about. Make a clean break from the sleazy stuff, and then they should take the vast amounts of money they have and make good single player and co-op experiences.

Take a page out of Sony's Playbook and buy up smaller but promising studios with talented and passionate developers and with time and money, turn them into your own Insomniac, your own Santa Monica, your own Naughty Dog.



𝐈𝐌𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐕𝐄 𝐐𝐔𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐘 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐑𝐎𝐋

Quality control on Steam or the lack-there-of is an ever-present issue that we've just "learned" to accept. The Steam Store is filled with trash that couldn't even be described as shovelware and we've gotten used to seeing it so much that we "trained" ourselves to ignore it.

At least that's what we think, until we start browsing other stores and immediately notice that, while there some junk titles here and there, it's a much more pleasant experience to browse through content.

In my experience, the significantly reduced amount of trash on a store greatly helps in discoverability of smaller, low profile but legit indie titles which would otherwise be swimming at the bottom of a pool of trash. It's remarkably refreshing browsing through other stores compared to browsing on Steam.

Yes, we know those games sell because of Steam Cards, but is this worth your reputation, user experience and discoverability for smaller legit devs? The only sane answer is no.

If you care about your reputation and user experience, you have to curate your store.
You got away with ignoring this issue throughout the years, but as competition stiffens and other platforms offer a more curated experience, continuing to ignore this issue is foolish.


Thank you for reading!

[Babi Gendut]

Valve also needs to reduce their cut to match with EGS and windows store. Or at least let indie developers enjoy the 20% cut without the need to sell a gazillion copies of $10 games.

The tiered revenue share that valve use, only shows that valve only care about big AAA publishers who can earn $50 millions easily.

[FOXDUDE69]

Originally posted by Babi Gendut:

Valve also needs to reduce their cut to match with EGS and windows store. Or at least let indie developers enjoy the 20% cut without the need to sell a gazillion copies of $10 games.

The tiered revenue share that valve use, only shows that valve only care about big AAA publishers who can earn $50 millions easily.

Very good point. I was aware of this but forgot to include it. Thanks for the reminder!

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

:BigBullet: 𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐎𝐖 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 𝐎𝐅 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐓-𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐋𝐃 𝐀𝐂𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐒

You can't technically make an account for a child under 13 on Steam.

Completely false, in fact steam even tells you to create the account with your child. Children under 13 are allowed to have an account and steam tells you this. Children under 13 just can't CREATE the account.

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

:BigBullet: 𝐈𝐌𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐕𝐄 𝐐𝐔𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐘 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐑𝐎𝐋

Quality control aka censorship, is a double edged sword. Steam dictating what is or isn't good enough to be released limits options people have and people will complain. Better to not block games based on what someone at steam arbitrarily decides is good enough, and let users decide for themselves what is good enough

The others like loyalty rewards, game development, etc have already been addressed repeatedly so i'd advise you to use the search function.

[The Commendatore]

Oh, right. I completely forgot you said you were going to Epic.

Didn't last long.

[FOXDUDE69]

Originally posted by brian9824:

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐎𝐖 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 𝐎𝐅 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐓-𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐋𝐃 𝐀𝐂𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐒

You can't technically make an account for a child under 13 on Steam.

Completely false, in fact steam even tells you to create the account with your child. Children under 13 are allowed to have an account and steam tells you this. Children under 13 just can't CREATE the account.

1. REGISTRATION AS A SUBSCRIBER; APPLICATION OF TERMS TO YOU; YOUR ACCOUNT, ACCEPTANCE OF AGREEMENTS ⏶

Steam is an online service offered by Valve.

You become a subscriber of Steam ("Subscriber") by completing the registration of a Steam user account. This Agreement takes effect as soon as you indicate your acceptance of these terms. You may not become a Subscriber if you are under the age of 13. Steam is not intended for children under 13 and Valve will not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 13. Additional age restrictions may apply in your country.

[FOXDUDE69]

Originally posted by The Commendatore:

Oh, right. I completely forgot you said you were going to Epic.

Didn't last long.

Epic AND Playstation!

I also spend a lot of money on Nintendo!

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

Originally posted by brian9824:

Completely false, in fact steam even tells you to create the account with your child. Children under 13 are allowed to have an account and steam tells you this. Children under 13 just can't CREATE the account.

1. REGISTRATION AS A SUBSCRIBER; APPLICATION OF TERMS TO YOU; YOUR ACCOUNT, ACCEPTANCE OF AGREEMENTS ⏶

Steam is an online service offered by Valve.

You become a subscriber of Steam ("Subscriber") by completing the registration of a Steam user account. This Agreement takes effect as soon as you indicate your acceptance of these terms. You may not become a Subscriber if you are under the age of 13. Steam is not intended for children under 13 and Valve will not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 13. Additional age restrictions may apply in your country.

Yep, a child under 13 cannot MAKE an account as they cannot legally agree to the terms. Steam has repeatedly confirmed that a child can have an account and use one, they just can't make it as per law they cannot agree to the terms before they are 13. Hence why the adult is supposed to make it for them.

In case you weren't aware EPIC works the same way, when you make the account if you indicate you are under 13 years of age it requires your guardian to authorize the account on your behalf before you can make it. That is because of COPPA which has strict rules for those under 13 and websites.

https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6B1A-66BE-E911-3D98

We encourage you to create a Steam account with your child.

If your still unsure feel free to contact support which will confirm it for you.

[Nx Machina]

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

1. REGISTRATION AS A SUBSCRIBER; APPLICATION OF TERMS TO YOU; YOUR ACCOUNT, ACCEPTANCE OF AGREEMENTS ⏶

Steam is an online service offered by Valve.

You become a subscriber of Steam ("Subscriber") by completing the registration of a Steam user account. This Agreement takes effect as soon as you indicate your acceptance of these terms. You may not become a Subscriber if you are under the age of 13. Steam is not intended for children under 13 and Valve will not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 13. Additional age restrictions may apply in your country.

Except you missed: Family View

https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6B1A-66BE-E911-3D98

Setting up Family View

We encourage you to create a Steam account with your child. If there are features of Steam that you would like to exclude from the experience, you can restrict access using Family View. You may also choose to enable Family View on your own Steam account if you would rather they share your Steam Account.

[cinedine]

Originally posted by brian9824:

In case you weren't aware EPIC works the same way, when you make the account if you indicate you are under 13 years of age it requires your guardian to authorize the account on your behalf before you can make it. That is because of COPPA which has strict rules for those under 13 and websites.

It really doesn't. Because yes, on Epic you have to give parental consent and are informed about what it means. Also <13 accounts are heavily restricted.
https://www.epicgames.com/site/en-US/parental-consent

Steam? Not so much. And therefore they are technically in breach of COPPA when they treat accounts used primarily by <13yo the same.
There is a reason Meta is going hard after such accounts. Steam, despite being one of the biggest gaming platforms, is still so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ minuscule that it flies under the radar. Which doesn't mean Foxdude is in the wrong for suggesting to actually give a rat's arse.

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

Take a page out of Sony's Playbook and buy up smaller but promising studios with talented and passionate developers and with time and money, turn them into your own Insomniac, your own Santa Monica, your own Naughty Dog.

Well, they did buy Campo Santos.
Wonder what happened to them ...

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by Nx Machina:

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

1. REGISTRATION AS A SUBSCRIBER; APPLICATION OF TERMS TO YOU; YOUR ACCOUNT, ACCEPTANCE OF AGREEMENTS ⏶

Steam is an online service offered by Valve.

You become a subscriber of Steam ("Subscriber") by completing the registration of a Steam user account. This Agreement takes effect as soon as you indicate your acceptance of these terms. You may not become a Subscriber if you are under the age of 13. Steam is not intended for children under 13 and Valve will not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 13. Additional age restrictions may apply in your country.

Except you missed: Family View

https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6B1A-66BE-E911-3D98

Setting up Family View

We encourage you to create a Steam account with your child. If there are features of Steam that you would like to exclude from the experience, you can restrict access using Family View. You may also choose to enable Family View on your own Steam account if you would rather they share your Steam Account.

Yep, COPPA prevents anyone under 13 from agreeing to the terms on a website without parental consent. EPIC and everyone else all have identical methods to do so and require parental consent to create the account.

https://www.epicgames.com/site/en-US/parental-consent#:~:text=If%20a%20player%20indicates%20they%20are%20under%2013%20(or%20their,certain%20features%20in%20Epic's%20products.

So OP's kids aren't playing Raft unless he made the account for them, or his kids under 13 lied about their age..... Which is why its important to monitor what your kids do online

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by cinedine:

Originally posted by brian9824:

In case you weren't aware EPIC works the same way, when you make the account if you indicate you are under 13 years of age it requires your guardian to authorize the account on your behalf before you can make it. That is because of COPPA which has strict rules for those under 13 and websites.

It really doesn't. Because yes, on Epic you have to give parental consent and are informed about what it means. Also <13 accounts are heavily restricted.
https://www.epicgames.com/site/en-US/parental-consent

Steam? Not so much. And therefore they are technically in breach of COPPA when they treat accounts used primarily by <13yo the same.
There is a reason Meta is going hard after such accounts. Steam, despite being one of the biggest gaming platforms, is still so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ minuscule that it flies under the radar. Which doesn't mean Foxdude is in the wrong for suggesting to actually give a rat's arse.

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

Take a page out of Sony's Playbook and buy up smaller but promising studios with talented and passionate developers and with time and money, turn them into your own Insomniac, your own Santa Monica, your own Naughty Dog.

Well, they did buy Campo Santos.
Wonder what happened to them ...

You seem to have things backwards, EPIC is the one who breached COPPA, not steam and they had to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in fines - https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/12/fortnite-video-game-maker-epic-games-pay-more-half-billion-dollars-over-ftc-allegations

Steam is not in violation and fully complies with COPPA.

[Nx Machina]

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

:BigBullet: 𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐎𝐖 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 𝐎𝐅 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐓-𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐋𝐃 𝐀𝐂𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐒

You can't technically make an account for a child under 13 on Steam.

Meanwhile all of Steam's biggest competitors allow you to create a parent-supervised child account for your offspring.

Already exists - Family View:

https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/6B1A-66BE-E911-3D98

Setting up Family View

We encourage you to create a Steam account with your child. If there are features of Steam that you would like to exclude from the experience, you can restrict access using Family View. You may also choose to enable Family View on your own Steam account if you would rather they share your Steam Account.

Family View is a feature for parents and families to establish their own rules for what components of Steam are accessible.

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

:BigBullet: 𝐑𝐄𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐊 𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐀𝐌 𝐏𝐎𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐒 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐎𝐅𝐅𝐄𝐑 𝐀 𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐏𝐄𝐓𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐕𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐘𝐀𝐋𝐓𝐘 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐌

Valve already have the system they require.

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

:BigBullet: 𝐅𝐈𝐗 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐀𝐁𝐘𝐒𝐌𝐀𝐋 𝐂𝐔𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐏𝐎𝐑𝐓 𝐄𝐗𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄

It is only abysmal if YOU keep crossing the line and breaking the rules.

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

:BigBullet: 𝐃𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐋𝐎𝐏 𝐆𝐎𝐎𝐃 𝐆𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐒 𝐀𝐆𝐀𝐈𝐍

Let's face it, the Valve we fondly remember does not exist anymore, that's why you don't have a Half-Life 3 or a Left 4 Dead 3 or a Portal 3.

We? Are you speaking for everyone. Nope you are expressing a personal opinion for games ending with 3.

Originally posted by FOXDUDE69:

:BigBullet: 𝐈𝐌𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐕𝐄 𝐐𝐔𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐘 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐑𝐎𝐋

You have zero issue with the quality of Adult Only Sexual Content games, hence why you add those low quality games to your library.

[cinedine]

Originally posted by brian9824:

You seem to have things backwards, EPIC is the one who breached COPPA, not steam and they had to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in fines - https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/12/fortnite-video-game-maker-epic-games-pay-more-half-billion-dollars-over-ftc-allegations

Steam is not in violation and fully complies with COPPA.

The causality of
"We got sued over how we handle underage accounts and now offer better parental consent and supervision while making sure we do not get sued again by excluding known underge accounts from certain services"
seems to be just as lost to you as
"We encourage you do make an account for your <13yo child and therefore know we collect data and feed targeted advertising to <13yo which is actually against the law."

[FOXDUDE69]

Originally posted by cinedine:

Originally posted by brian9824:

In case you weren't aware EPIC works the same way, when you make the account if you indicate you are under 13 years of age it requires your guardian to authorize the account on your behalf before you can make it. That is because of COPPA which has strict rules for those under 13 and websites.

It really doesn't. Because yes, on Epic you have to give parental consent and are informed about what it means. Also <13 accounts are heavily restricted.
https://www.epicgames.com/site/en-US/parental-consent

Steam? Not so much. And therefore they are technically in breach of COPPA when they treat accounts used primarily by <13yo the same.
There is a reason Meta is going hard after such accounts. Steam, despite being one of the biggest gaming platforms, is still so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ minuscule that it flies under the radar. Which doesn't mean Foxdude is in the wrong for suggesting to actually give a rat's arse.

Yep. Epic not only gives you a way to legally create an account for your child but also makes it very easy for you to manage it. Steam's stance: "You can't have an account till you 13 years old because we love collecting data and can't stop even for a child."

Nintendo, Playstation and Xbox all allow you to create an account for your child, and will play by the rules to allow for that account, Valve are the only big fish in gaming who'd rather forbid child accounts if that means they can't collect data.

But hey, "something something Lord Gaben", "something something the good guys".

[Boblin the Goblin]

I forgot how much Steam is struggling in the gaming landscape but not having the features suggested.

And then I woke up.