this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2025
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Despite facing increased competition in the space, not least from the Epic Games Store, Valve's platform is synonymous with PC gaming. The service is estimated to have made $10.8 billion in revenue during 2024, a new record for the Half-Life giant. Since it entered the PC distribution space back in 2018, the rival Epic Games Store has been making headway – and $1.09 billion last year – but Steam is still undeniably dominant within the space.

Valve earns a large part of its money from taking a 20-30% cut of sales revenue from developers and publishers. Despite other storefronts opening with lower overheads, Steam has stuck with taking this slice of sales revenue, and in doing so, it has been argued that Valve is unfairly taking a decent chunk of the profits of developers and publishers.

This might change, depending on how an ongoing class-action lawsuit initiated by Wolfire Games goes, but for the time being, Valve is making money hand over fist selling games on Steam. The platform boasts over 132 million users, so it's perfectly reasonable that developers and publishers feel they have to use Steam – and give away a slice of their revenue – in order to reach the largest audience possible.

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[–] [email protected] 59 points 3 days ago (144 children)

The wolfire games lawsuit is so damn cringe.

No company is your friend, but there's a reason Steam is number 1. The reinvestment in the platform and breadth of features steam has is unrivaled.

Epic has been trying for nearly a decade now and their store doesn't even have 1/4 the features of steam.

I love GoG though. For me they offer something steam can't, installers for my games.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 3 days ago (36 children)

My view is if you don't like a distribution platform taking 20-30% of the sale then don't use that distribution platform. It's a free market and a free internet. Use Epic, GOG, or host it yourself

If I don't like what Comcast charges I don't do a class action lawsuit.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

If you lose access to a vast majority of the market if you don‘t use a service, it’s a monopoly. Don’t defend monopolists.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

Steam does nothing to prevent running non-steam games on any platform. Charge 20-30% extra on Steam and call it done.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Charge 20-30% extra on Steam and call it done.

Steam doesn't let you do that. This is literally what the lawsuit is about.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Sure. Not being able to sell literal Steam keys on other platforms for less on other platforms for less according to the terms is the same as being prevented from selling on other platforms for less at all, nevermind that Valve gets a 0% cut on Steam Key Sales made like so.

Also, there is no mention of said policy in either the OP article, nor the separate article about the lawsuit it links to.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

Nobody said anything about Steam keys. They don't let you sell games at lower prices, period.

Also, there is no mention of said policy in either the OP article, nor the separate article about the lawsuit it links to.

Are you being serious, right now? The source isn't 2 clicks away so therefore it doesn't exist? Lawsuits are literally public knowledge. You should inform yourself about a topic before you get into a conversation about it.

Here. Perhaps you can stop defending the billion dollar company now.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

As far as I can tell, the lawsuit alleges that steam threatened pulling their (wolfire games) steam sales if they sold elsewhere for cheaper. Which would be bad if true. However, this does not appear to be anywhere in steam's actual seller agreement. The only clause in that agreement is about steam keys being sold for cheaper, which is why the other poster was focusing on that.

That allegation seems to be that steam in practice is threatening things that are outside of the contract itself.

Edit: I read the emails from the lawsuit discovery (page 160–) and it seems like most of them are about steam keys and their policy on that, which seems more reasonable. But there are definitely a few emails that explicitly go beyond that

"You can definitely participate in sales off- steam, and we don’t want to discourage or prevent that. But in terms of promo visibility, regardless of Steam keys, we do try to think really hard about customers and put ourselves in their shoes. If the game is discounted down to $15 on Steam, and then it goes into a bundle or subscription with ten other games for $6 a few days or weeks later.., that really sucks for the people who bought at the way higher price! Why did you market me a $15 price if the game is actually selling for more like $1 somewhere else? For instance, we’d probably want to avoid running a 50% discount on a game if it was going to be a free giveaway on another store a week later, even if the giveaway had nothing to do with Steam Keys."

Which seems pretty straightforward. Some of the other emails also imply that they might choose not to sell the game at all on steam if you do that.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

The allegations of the plaintiff are not necessarilly the written or enforced policies of the defendant. Please consider linking something of substance when accusing others of being un-serious/insincere.

You made a claim without linking to it in the first place. Its not my job to substantiate your arguments.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Ah, the classic spoon-feed me the answer or it doesn't count as a source. Learn to use the internet, you're not a child.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

You honestly think I didn't do a google search before reading the two relavent articles reachable from the OP? Nothing I found, nor the fact that I regularly buy games/steam!keys cheaper than via steam, meshes with the plaintiff's claims.

Telling others to act like grown-ups while accepting un-founded claims that happen to reflect your argument at face-value, how very mature of you.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

I know you didn't google anything or you would have said "nothing I found substantiates your point" instead of "these specific two articles don't say what you said".

But let's assume you're not lying and you did look up the situation. What's your claim then? That Steam has no price veto policy or that they don't abuse it? Because one is wrong and the other is incredibly naive. Talk about taking unfounded claims at face value.

Also, why do you keep bringing up Steam Keys? That has nothing to do with anything. Focus.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

You don't know shit. My search turned up nothing more concrete than your own apeing of the plaintiff's claims as though those were evidence, so I didn't bother.

Meanwhile, the subject at hand quite literally revolves around Steam and Steam-Keys. We don't even have to get into third-party distribution without Steam-Keys to disprove your argument, although that market also remains alive and well as ever.

The rest was just me matching your energy, but I'm not exaggerating when I say I should have just blocked your belligerent ass a while ago. You can't be bothered to prove your own points, yet keep pretending to be the most "mature" and "focused" person here. It's painful to watch the trolling this far off the rails.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Your search turned up nothing because you searched for nothing. Steam Keys are irrelevant here, you only keep bringing them up to derail the discussion to a greyer area where you can better defend your beloved corporate overlord. This was always about the price veto policy. Very telling how you flat out refuse to even address anything regarding that topic. Grow up.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

It‘s not about platform compatibility or difference in fees. It‘s about the necessity to go through Steam (at competitive prices) and bow to whatever they may come up with in the future. The generic danger of a monopoly.

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