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That's shitty. I hope Valve goes down in this law suit but Gabe specifically asked for a remote deposition because he's old and obese. Two serious factors for COVID or really any illness. Apparently that wasn't enough to get them to allow remote deposition. What a really shit situation to put a person in.
I don't really understand the antitrust argument here. There are a literal ton of other market places to sell PC games on, such as Humble Bundle which apparently Wolfire started. You could also sell directly to consumers if you wanted without going through a marketplace at all.
Also the main point is valve does not do anything to prevent you from selling the game directly or through other stores.
Just move to a shitty store like EGS.
Their store is to shitty? Pay the 30%.
Either way, never heard of this publisher. I'll just know not to buy their games anymore.
They kind of had their store. Wolfire games created Humble Bundle, then it became its own company and now belongs to IGN.
If they kept going for the initial spirit of HB instead of letting it become just another way to buy on Steam, maybe they'd be that competition.
If I remember correctly, at the time Valve justified the 30% by pointing out that Apple was charging the same for music and video content. And Valve immediately started building value-added services like forums, updaters, multiplayer support, achievements, etc. to justify the price.
If you compare what Valve was doing to the physical media distribution methods of the period, it was a MASSIVE improvement. Back then, you could sell 10000 units to Ingram Micro or PC Mall, or whatever, and you only got paid if they sold. And any unsold inventory would be destroyed and the reseller would never pay for it. And if you actually wanted anything other than a single-line entry in their catalogs, you paid a promotional fee. Those video games featured with a standup display or a poster in the window at the computer store? None of that was free; the developer was nickeled and dimed for every moment their game was featured in any premium store space.
They are very indie. I had only heard of one of their games, Lugaru, before today.
They seem to be getting better at making games, but they still look to be visually lacking.
Huh. So, I actually own Lugaru, which I purchased through Humble Bundle in May 2010.
It... was not a good game. Basically anthropomorphic rabbits beating the crap out of each other, which SOUNDS good, but was not executed well.
Fuck this company, I'm glad they've made their name known so I won't buy any games they have anything to do with.
What is wrong with wolfire here?
We'll have to see what evidence they submit. I'm skeptical given that this lawsuit is funded by Epic. I have other skepticisms, but learning that Epic is the root of the lawsuit is what makes me doubt any legitimacy the claimants have. I posted a very long series of thoughts just elsewhere in the thread that goes into more detail. It's mostly nothing though since it's just my thoughts and we can't truly know until the case is settled or releases details.
My opinion, it comes down to Steam's ToS is regarding Steam Keys. Steam Keys sold not on Steam do not get 30% taken by Valve, but Valve still provides its services - cloud saves, forums, per game notes, complete controller remapping support and more. So, for example: A developer sells a game on Epic and generates 1,000 Steam keys - has 500 on Steam and 500 on a 3rd party site. The developer can sell the game on Epic for whatever price they want. $5. $20. $50. Whatever. Steam asks that whatever Steam Key is being sold is priced the same on every store front. No matter what they sell for though, none of that 30% is taken by Valve from the 3rd party sale. The Epic storefront in unaffiliated to the developer since they are not Steam Keys.
500 of those keys are now utilizing Steam's services without any of that sale revenue going to Valve. I have 20gb of Cloud Storage, if every user has that much and there are how many users on Steam... (120 million active users turns into 2 billion 400 million gigabytes, or far over two hundred thousand Terabytes. I think I mathed it right). They must have some serious cloud storage.
With that in mind, it seems reasonable to me that Valve not want developers to advertise other storefronts, nor does it seem unreasonable that they ask to have equitable pricing between store fronts i.e. if it's $5 on Itch then at some point it should go on sale for $5 on Steam.
Out of curiosity, what do you think Wolfire is in the right about? From my understanding, Humble Bundle can do whatever they want within the developers wishes regarding sales, and if they want to continue to sell games then they don't have to sell Steam keys to do it? It seems to me that Humble Bundle is trying to sell games for even cheaper on their storefront, while providing Steam keys which would be actively be putting strain on Valve, while Humble Bundle gets to benefit from the services being provided. What exactly is the issue here? Is it just that Valve is so large? So then at what point have they used their size to prevent games from being sold? I didn't see them during Control, Metro Exodus, Chiv 2, or Kenna or Mechwarriors 5 or really any of the other ~100+ games this has happened to. Or what about when Epic bought Rocket League or Fall Guys and removed it from Steam's storefront? Hm. I guess the video game giant that literally makes the Unreal engines doing far more egregious business is exempt from the same critiques.
I see a lot of instances of $$$ gating games, specifically away from Steam, but I feel like I've yet to see an example where Valve actively restricted the sale of a game from itch.io or Fanatical or quite literally any kind of exclusive whatsoever? So I'm just really curious what merit someone thinks that this suit actually has? It's just that none of what I've seen anywhere puts Valve in a bad light. Funny, the only actual bad court case I can think of was against AUS and resulted in worldwide refunds across the entire platform. Looking at Apple in the EU, I doubt U.S. will have any of those changes come our way. The other lawsuit I'm familiar with Valve is how Corsair is suing them for the bumpers on the Steam Controller. Patent trolls.
Basically, I see nothing to suggest that Steam is using their size to inhibit the sales of games on other platforms, only that they ask that it be equal. I saved the closest I ever came to seeing "some merit" and of course the info is from a now deleted user, so I can't even say what that was anymore. Though I'm sure it will be the evidence provided in court. For posterity, here is what Wolffire has to say about it.
Anyway, like I said I am curious if there is any legitimacy surrounding it, or if there's an aspect that I've been missing. However, I am very skeptical simply because it's being spearheaded by Epic. He straight up is saying in the blog post that "no cheaper game anywhere, not even if they're not Steam keys!" Overgrowth is not some hugely popular game, he was literally doing this move to try and sell more copies of the game. I highly doubt that Valve as a company threw their weight against this guy over this. Especially to the extent of which he claims "it's why all other storefronts have failed*.
I will say, I could understand more an employee mis-speaking or a miscommunication, but then to take what a random employee person allegedly said to court... Furthermore it goes onto say that developers are afraid if they don't sell on Steam then they will lose a majority of revenue... It has no acknowledgement of why that may be, like say the value of services that are provided by Steam? That whole cabal of devs could happily go to Epic or Itch or the Nintendo Switch. Only a fear of losing revenue for not supporting a platform because of the immense value it provides.
Literally, if it were any other series of storefronts - like if Fanatical, GMG, Itch.io all came together with a civil suit then I'd hear the fuck out of that antitrust case.
But... Humble Bundle complaining and Epic funding it? Hard pass, pass so hard I didn't even hit it pass. If Humble Bundle has an issue they are in a fine position to no longer sell Steam keys and that solves their problem. I don't think there is much merit in "I lose revenue because I chose not to sell my game on Steam.". About as much merit as making that argument for any console.
I mean, seriously! Just think of how many sales were lost by Wolffire just because they chose not to port the game to Switch PS4 and XBOX!
I don't really see a difference between the two, and I definitely do not see a monopoly or antitrust where Valve meddling in store sale pricing affects the success of competing stores. For one, price parity is standard everywhere - whether that's wrong or not is irrelevant, it's the reality that the case is ignoring. For two, as I said it completely ignores the services Steam provides which in my opinion are far more likely reasons for why people continue to use Steam. Steam gets us with the extreme sales and keeps us with the stellar services. Other store fronts are free to have those sales, but if they do not succeed I doubt it's due to price meddling and has far more to do with the services that are missing.
sigh sorry, I didn't mean for it to get this long. Especially since I just posted another comment about this length. However, I do feel this one does a better job explaining my understanding of the situation so... lol
From my understanding of the now deleted price parity clause was that any storefront selling your game, regardless of Steam keys being sold, had to have price parity with Steam's price. This was how it was back in 2015-2016 when I signed the agreement and had discord messages stating that to my team. That said, I recently pulled up the same steam agreement and there is no longer any price parity on the agreement. It seems like Steam is quietly trying to remove it.
Does that change your stance? If price parity doesn't depend on steam keys?
If it’s $5 on Itch then at some point it should go on sale for $5 on Steam.
Also afaik, no, the wording said price parity to the exact price and time of each platform. So if it was 5 dollars on Itch, then it needed to be 5 dollars on Steam, at that same moment. Regardless of sale times between platforms being different. This is something they loosely enforced because the enforcement of this sort of thing would be insanely difficult.
Just from a quick search about the case, it seems to hold very little water.
Hell, it's already been dismissed once.
steam is one of the good guys. maybe instead of suing they should just make better games
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Ah yes, because rich == bad
It's possible to be successful and have a good influence on the industry. Valve is the perfect example of that.
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It's a private company. They don't have shareholders to report to, so they're not remotely as scummy. Fuck the rich, but choose your battles and go after the ones who are really the problem.
Uhm, I'm Not against your argument, but have you informed yourself in any manner before making this Statement.
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I don't get wolfire's point here. Yes steam takes a hefty 30% cut but game developers are free to sell directly if they want to. Unlike apple who have completely locked down the iOS app ecosystem or Google who allow sideloading but scares and warns people against downloading apps from non Play Store sources, steam does nothing to hinder games not sold through it. If there was a competitor who was as good as steam but took a smaller cut, then that competitor would have been the market leader in place of steam.
What's that about price parity? I've often bought games from 3rd party sellers like Fanatical, to name one, specifically because their prices were lower than Steam's. What am I missing?
They used to have a price parity clause in their steam distribution agreement. They loosely enforced it, depending on what game and what service. I think they quietly removed it because I read through the agreement recently and didn't see it but I remember it influencing choices I made for pricing my games on itch.io.
I see, thanks for the clarification. That does sound a bit shitty on their part, especially because when most people are asked "gaming on PC?" they answer "Steam". Lower prices elsewhere might have given a better chance to other storefronts, although I don't think that would have made a huge difference, since Steam is THE storefront
Steam wants to keep it that way. Any references to other storefronts in your demo or game aren't allowed either. So if you're demo has a list of every place to buy the game, it's rejected, can only contain steam. Steam is deathly afraid of losing the advantage.
What role do you think the Steam workshop plays in this?
Obviously the people playing the AAA franchises don't care, but when you see the sheer quantity of workshop content for some games (Cities:Skylines and Space Engineers come to mind for me, no doubt there's other examples in genres I'm less familiar with), you see how much the modding community has contributed to the commercial success of these games. I'm wondering how this factors in to steam as a whole.
Remember, if Valve actually lost this suit, which they almost certainly won't, it won't improve the videogame ecosystem. It will possibly make it worse.
I see a lot of covid misinformation going on around this story which is extremely worrying. Just because the human race not currently at risk of imminent extinction from it doesn't mean it's not still a serious illness. Some people get long term complications from it. Some people are extra vulnerable to it. Some people are still dying from it.
"Just get the vaccine" is the worst kind of uninformed handwaving response to the concerns and worries of other humans, it's upsetting it is becoming the norm.
These are some heavy accusations for Gabe
Wait that lawsuit is still going on???
Judge: I further order you to complete Half Life 3