Before steam, digital sales of games wasn’t really a thing outside of a few niche examples. The 30% cut was the same percentage that retail stores were taking.
The difference is physical retail had a lot of overhead. Steam just creates a new key and adds it to your account. Yeah, they also have to store the game data and distribution up to the ISP, but that’s really cheap compared to storing physical games at physical locations that only have access to their local buyers. Valve’s profit margins are significantly higher. They could probably take 5% and this would still be true.
Storage and bandwidth definitely weren’t cheap in 2003. Additionally Steam provides features that a brick and mortar store could never even think of providing, including updates, DRM, instant access to global consumers, community features, in-depth data analytics, and the ability to adjust pricing in real time.
While a lot of the work Valve has put in Steam seems both obvious and ubiquitous today, these were features they pioneered for both developers and consumers.
I’d also like to point out that the only digital marketplace I’m aware of that charges less than 30% by default (Epic) is famous for losing billions of dollars in the endeavor.
Storage and bandwidth definitely weren’t cheap in 2003.
To access the same number of people, all around the world, compared to physical stores it’s essentially a rounding error. Rent alone for all the stores would be far more than Valve had to spend, then you need employees to operate the stores and all the other ongoing costs. Storage was not as cheap, and from a consumer point of view it wasn’t cheap, it it’s far cheaper than physical stores around the world.
Additionally Steam provides features that a brick and mortar store could never even think of providing, including updates, DRM, instant access to global consumers, community features, in-depth data analytics, and the ability to adjust pricing in real time.
Not sure how that’s relevant, but yes. I didn’t say they didn’t.
While a lot of the work Valve has put in Steam seems both obvious and ubiquitous today, these were features they pioneered for both developers and consumers.
Again, sure. It doesn’t contradict anything I said so I don’t know why you said it.
I’d also like to point out that the only digital marketplace I’m aware of that charges less than 30% by default (Epic) is famous for losing billions of dollars in the endeavor.
Once again, sure. It doesn’t change anything in my comment.
I don’t know why if anyone says anything that is not just gobbling Valve’s cock with enthusiasm they get people showing up talking about how great they are. Sure, I like them too. It doesn’t mean there aren’t reasons to complain. That’s how you end up with companies enshitifying.
It almost feels like bots how frequent it is, but I just think you people have a compulsion to defend them from what isn’t even criticism, like they’re going to praise you for it. Well guess what? They don’t even know you exist.
Steam offers a lot more to developers than a storefront to sell your games. The App Store is an extremely minimal offering to developers for the amount of money they demand in exchange.
What do you mean? It’s not like the App Store is all that devs get from Apple. Apple has an app dev kit and loads of APIs into the phone that they maintain.
I also use Steam, but they were one of the OGs at taking a 30% cut from digital software sales. Apple always gets shit for this, but not Valve.
30% was undercutting the market when Steam did it. Y’all always forget that too
Because they got monopoly for controlling the OS too. No one will give a crap about the 30% if the app store and iOS are made by different entities.
Before steam, digital sales of games wasn’t really a thing outside of a few niche examples. The 30% cut was the same percentage that retail stores were taking.
The difference is physical retail had a lot of overhead. Steam just creates a new key and adds it to your account. Yeah, they also have to store the game data and distribution up to the ISP, but that’s really cheap compared to storing physical games at physical locations that only have access to their local buyers. Valve’s profit margins are significantly higher. They could probably take 5% and this would still be true.
Storage and bandwidth definitely weren’t cheap in 2003. Additionally Steam provides features that a brick and mortar store could never even think of providing, including updates, DRM, instant access to global consumers, community features, in-depth data analytics, and the ability to adjust pricing in real time.
While a lot of the work Valve has put in Steam seems both obvious and ubiquitous today, these were features they pioneered for both developers and consumers.
I’d also like to point out that the only digital marketplace I’m aware of that charges less than 30% by default (Epic) is famous for losing billions of dollars in the endeavor.
To access the same number of people, all around the world, compared to physical stores it’s essentially a rounding error. Rent alone for all the stores would be far more than Valve had to spend, then you need employees to operate the stores and all the other ongoing costs. Storage was not as cheap, and from a consumer point of view it wasn’t cheap, it it’s far cheaper than physical stores around the world.
Not sure how that’s relevant, but yes. I didn’t say they didn’t.
Again, sure. It doesn’t contradict anything I said so I don’t know why you said it.
Once again, sure. It doesn’t change anything in my comment.
I don’t know why if anyone says anything that is not just gobbling Valve’s cock with enthusiasm they get people showing up talking about how great they are. Sure, I like them too. It doesn’t mean there aren’t reasons to complain. That’s how you end up with companies enshitifying.
It almost feels like bots how frequent it is, but I just think you people have a compulsion to defend them from what isn’t even criticism, like they’re going to praise you for it. Well guess what? They don’t even know you exist.
Steam offers a lot more to developers than a storefront to sell your games. The App Store is an extremely minimal offering to developers for the amount of money they demand in exchange.
What do you mean? It’s not like the App Store is all that devs get from Apple. Apple has an app dev kit and loads of APIs into the phone that they maintain.
Sure, I’m aware. But nothing on the level of what Valve offers.
What do they offer?
Steamworks
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