Man, I don’t like the Steam monopoly on principle, but I have to admit I do struggle to pay attention to Epic exclusives. It’s simply the launcher I open the least after GOG and Steam. I’ve though “hey, wasn’t that Ubi Star Wars thing out” like two or three times and forgot about it between remembering that’s an Epic thing and deciding whether I wanted to buy it.
But hey, since we’re going multiplat again, I could use some newer Ubi games on GOG, too.
I choose to believe that Gabe’s will bequeaths Steam to a cohort of independent non-profits and co-ops which will each be charged with attempting to continue to elevate gamers and gaming according to Gabe’s 1,200 page manifesto.
At twelve disciples, that means he can give each pair one of his mega yatchs. I’m sure with a third of all gaming profit coming their way, the twelve of them will be able to afford the 100 million per year it costs to maintain the fleet worth around 1 billion.
He’s not Jesus, he is just a piece of shit billionaire like the rest.
There is no such thing as a good monopoly. He leverages a 30% tax on a huge chunk of the gaming industry. Steam, Microsoft, Epic, Sony and Nintendo all essentially participate in collusion and anti competitive behavior.
Think of all the indie studios that closed and sequels that got canceled and ask yourself if they could have made it if steam only took 5%.
They leveraged linux to save on development and maintenance costs. Capturing the handheld market at a tenth of the price while making the same profit isn’t altruisme.
It’s not like the value added for that 30% tax isn’t there. Steam has made so many things so easy that it’s easy to forget what things were like decades ago.
If you were an independent game publisher, you had to figure out how to set up a web storefront, a content delivery network hosted in perpetuity, take payments, do multiplayer, add in-game chat, map every weird joystick and gamepad in the universe to your control scheme, achievements, friend lists… And every game developer had to do that independently because there was no public solution, really. The friction to enter the indie dev space was so much higher.
Also, steam does not force you to use their store- you can generate steam keys and sell your game away from the steam platform. The only thing that they enforce is if you sell it for a lower price elsewhere, they’ll de-list your game. Which I think is reasonable.
You can use the same argument about Musk or Benzos as well. Clearly, they are over charging for the value or they wouldn’t be billionaires.
Steam could give the same value on 2% taken and Gaben would probably still be able to afford at least one of his 6 mega yatchs. But there’s indie companies that are struggling where just an extra 10% would go a long way.
In the end, Gaben and his friends greed is killing indie companies, affecting the quality and amount of games we get and is having a detrimental effect on the industry.
Yet because Gaben has a really good pr team and managed to convince everyone he’s “not your average billionaire”, we now have comments comparing him to Jesus and applauding his monopoly as being the only good one. Fucking hell.
Man, I don’t like the Steam monopoly on principle, but I have to admit I do struggle to pay attention to Epic exclusives. It’s simply the launcher I open the least after GOG and Steam. I’ve though “hey, wasn’t that Ubi Star Wars thing out” like two or three times and forgot about it between remembering that’s an Epic thing and deciding whether I wanted to buy it.
But hey, since we’re going multiplat again, I could use some newer Ubi games on GOG, too.
Valve is just one shite CEO away from going from PC’s blessing to its curse.
I choose to believe that Gabe’s will bequeaths Steam to a cohort of independent non-profits and co-ops which will each be charged with attempting to continue to elevate gamers and gaming according to Gabe’s 1,200 page manifesto.
GabeN will name twelve disciples who will spread His word and continue His work.
At twelve disciples, that means he can give each pair one of his mega yatchs. I’m sure with a third of all gaming profit coming their way, the twelve of them will be able to afford the 100 million per year it costs to maintain the fleet worth around 1 billion.
He’s not Jesus, he is just a piece of shit billionaire like the rest.
Whoa, you should preface your posts with a warning, lest anyone cut themselves on all that edge.
It’s a good monopoly, for now and hopefully for a long time.
The fact that Valve went out of their way to make gaming better in Linux, says a lot imho.
There is no such thing as a good monopoly. He leverages a 30% tax on a huge chunk of the gaming industry. Steam, Microsoft, Epic, Sony and Nintendo all essentially participate in collusion and anti competitive behavior.
Think of all the indie studios that closed and sequels that got canceled and ask yourself if they could have made it if steam only took 5%.
They leveraged linux to save on development and maintenance costs. Capturing the handheld market at a tenth of the price while making the same profit isn’t altruisme.
It’s not like the value added for that 30% tax isn’t there. Steam has made so many things so easy that it’s easy to forget what things were like decades ago.
If you were an independent game publisher, you had to figure out how to set up a web storefront, a content delivery network hosted in perpetuity, take payments, do multiplayer, add in-game chat, map every weird joystick and gamepad in the universe to your control scheme, achievements, friend lists… And every game developer had to do that independently because there was no public solution, really. The friction to enter the indie dev space was so much higher.
Also, steam does not force you to use their store- you can generate steam keys and sell your game away from the steam platform. The only thing that they enforce is if you sell it for a lower price elsewhere, they’ll de-list your game. Which I think is reasonable.
You can use the same argument about Musk or Benzos as well. Clearly, they are over charging for the value or they wouldn’t be billionaires.
Steam could give the same value on 2% taken and Gaben would probably still be able to afford at least one of his 6 mega yatchs. But there’s indie companies that are struggling where just an extra 10% would go a long way.
In the end, Gaben and his friends greed is killing indie companies, affecting the quality and amount of games we get and is having a detrimental effect on the industry.
Yet because Gaben has a really good pr team and managed to convince everyone he’s “not your average billionaire”, we now have comments comparing him to Jesus and applauding his monopoly as being the only good one. Fucking hell.
The only good monopoly is one where the profits goes back to the population or the customers.
It’s a private company, so you could argue that the profits go towards the employees and the customers in the form of improvements. Not shareholders.
Well, that and the several billion dollars in Gaben’s bank account.
Private companies are still corporations, guys.