Treating your customers decently can lead to profits in the long run. What an insight. They should teach that at business schools.
Best I can do is create shareholder value by making our product shittier and more expensive. Take it or leave it kid
Valve has fundamentally different goals from Microsoft and Sony
Microsoft and Sony want to increase profit a couple percentage for the next quarter
Valve wants to be profitable 10, 20, 30 years into the future
Thing is, they have been doing this for over a decade. Publicly traded companies can’t compete long-term, if there’s a well funded provate competitor
Publicly traded companies can’t compete long-term, if there’s a well funded private competitor
That’s why these companies love the idea of purchasing half the industry or using their resources to operate at a loss and squeeze out private competitors.
If they can’t compete, they can consolidate.
Then trust busting needs to happen
The gaming industry is fine. The “wall street gaming industry” is not.
It’s about time these corporate feral hogs start to feel the pain of the free market but they deserve much worse, bankruptcy. Xbox still exists, no leaders were laid off, their parent company still supports genocide, and this is all a problem.
Do you really want your games to pay for 8-10 figures a year for a hollow executive team’s risk free compensation? One where they have 0 liability, $0 of their own money on the line, literally not even gamers, to be the last word on what games make it into our hands and how they wring our wallets dry?
Who would have thought that eh?
Online subscription is a joke at this point
But I need a return on my investment now! Short term profits! Short term profits! SHORT TERM PROFITS!
In case anyone’s not clear as to why: Sony has announced that they’ll stop producing discs and that they can take your content at any time for any reason.
Historically, Steam has promised they will never do that and will offer DRM-free (clarification: they’ll remove the Steam DRM) downloads.
Also, all of them have jacked prices up. Xbox, PlayStation, and Steam have raised hardware prices around 35-40%. However, Steam runs on PCs they don’t sell, as well as Macs, and they have a Linux distribution they provide for free called Steam OS.
Steam has promised they will never do that
Can you give us a credible source? I want it to be true, but I don’t want my only source to be hearsay.
I have never seen anyone back that claim up, despite it being a very popular one to make. People like to pretend they own their steam games but until that gets enforced by law; you don’t.
I want to say I read it in an interview like 15-20 years ago
If you reach out to Steam support, you’ll get a response like this.
(Not my support ticket, this was stolen from Reddit)
But who knows what measures are in place and if that would include all games.
Edit: I’m dumb and misread the convo. My response is about if Steam went away, you would still be able to access your games but the convo is about would Steam remove games from your library.
Steam delists games, however, if you already bought it, you still have access to it.
Even if Valve promised DRM-free downloads if they go belly up there’s no chance in hell they’ll ever actually do that
Why do you think that? Turning off DRM would be trivial and they might even end up being legally obligated to do just that either because of laws or because of how whatever hypothetical bankruptcy they go through might be structured. Never mind Valve going belly up seems highly unlikely to begin with. If it does ever happen and it happens in the way you describe, piracy will absolutely skyrocket and people will stop buying games online after they’ve had their trust shaken.
I’ve heard it requires a DLL to disable steams basic drm, and it’s been that way for 20+ years.
You can do this right now with the Goldberg Emulator, but it doesn’t work well for games which are deeply integrated with Steam’s API (for example, to do things like Cloud Saves).
Valve has not jacked up prices: Their game prices have been consistently among the cheapest and the only reason their hardware is expensive now is because part manufacturers are mostly price gouging (lying about AI being the cause of ALL the increased costs, which isn’t true, just like it wasn’t entirely true with the bitcoin mining craze).
It’s also worth pointing out that Valve has made massive contributions to Linux gaming (and Linux in general), which enables people to game on potato-spec machines and compared to other gaming platforms, they are far better than almost all of them except for GOG.
Well, if the Steam Deck hasn’t gone up in price where you’re at, you might wanna buy a couple. Keep them sealed, you can sell them for a profit later. Most places, they’ve gone up quite a bit.
The cost of making the Steam Deck has gone up. Valve can’t sell them at a massive loss or they’ll go out of business. That’s not Valve jacking up the price, like I already pointed out:
Go re-read my post, because you clearly missed an important part
the only reason their hardware is expensive now is because part manufacturers are mostly price gouging (lying about AI being the cause of ALL the increased costs, which isn’t true, just like it wasn’t entirely true with the bitcoin mining craze).
Building a PC for yourself has skyrocketed in price too, blaming Valve is just ridiculous and anyone making that argument is just showing everyone that they are wildly ignorant.
Also, scalping is shitty.
Yeah, but if you give Valve a pass for jacking up hardware costs, you kinda have to give everyone else a pass. Otherwise it’s just bias.
I’m biased toward Valve over Microsoft and Sony, but I try to argue in good faith. Not saying you’re not, just that I try to hold myself to a standard. RAM, GPU, and storage costs are up so all game consoles are up. I don’t give Valve a pass here.
No, I don’t.
I can (and should) look at each one on a case by case basis, compare the parts, the actual costs of said parts, and make a determination from there. In the case of Steam devices, I do not lot believe they are price gouging - you can build a similar device that’s going to be on par with or less expensive than their machine, but not by all that much.
Being a scalper on the internet? It’s more likely than you think
DRM is up to publishers, not Steam. Valve doesn’t enforce or require it, and it’s unlikely publishers would lift DRM from their games because Valve asked.
Steam does have a DRM mechanism - it’s optional and easy to circumvent, but it’s there
Yes, and Steam doesn’t force it on a publisher. They can opt out.
Steam itself is DRM
There are many, many DRM free games on Steam.
Stop spreading this nonsense. There are arguments against Steam, but until they require DRM to be on their platform, this isn’t one of them.
None of them are DRM free. Every game requires the Steam client to download, launch, and play. Stop spreading this nonsense.
Incorrect. DRM free games on Steam do not require the Steam client to be running to run them.
Try it before commenting.
I have tried it. It doesn’t work.
Then you didn’t try it on a DRM free game.
Stardew valley is one example I know of. The developer didnt enable it so you can buy and install the game then copy the installed contents to other computers and run it without steam and play multiplayer all with the same copy. Steam can be closed or removed on all of them
Not by my definition. Not in the same way as denuvo or dvd movie drm is.
It is in the sense that you can’t play the games without it.
You can. Many of steam games you can just archive or copy over somewhere else and they’ll still work just fine.
And you can get a crack for most DRM out there (nowadays, even Denuvo).
Being weak and possible to work around for those with sufficient technical skill doesn’t make it any less a DRM.
Steam’s DRM is clearly only trying to stop the people with average and below technical skills from installing and running the games outside steam, not trying to stop the people with higher technical expertise from going around it (and in fact if you use something like the Goldberg Emulator there are even more games which can be made to run outside Steam than just the “many” you talk about).
By comparison the no-DRM posture you see in with GOG is not only “here are the offline installers to download” directly from the page for the game in your library but even “CONTRACTUALLY game publishers cannot sell games here with ANY DRM”.
“The rules are there but we don’t enforce them” is a very different posture from “we make sure there are no such rules”.
No, cracking the game vs just copying the downloaded file is not equivalent. How did you not see that? With copying the file it means the original file is already DRM free and does not require steam. So steam is just a glorified downloader and launcher in that sense
None of this affects the fact that, contrary to what the person above claimed, there are games on Steam without DRM.
and that they can take your content at any time for any reason.
Its less that they can and more that they definitely will. The fact that they can has been fear-mongered and pearl-clutched over since the dawn of online sales.
Until now its been handwaved away as obviously nobody would actually shoot themselves in the fucking face like that. But then they did.
Sony and StudioCanal isn’t the first time it’s happened, though. It’s just making a lot more waves.
Remember when PC gaming was dead according to every outlet for two solid years?
The key is being consistent and transparent. We got gut punched by the Steam Machine price, but it was an expected and transparent outcome. XBOX and Sony are so volatile that it’s making Steam look like a saint. From laying people off, to constant price increases, to the disc situation. Both these companies need to chill tf out.
Add to this MS buying up all of these game studios to do nothing with them and then kill them because they’re so inept.
Their actions look like a typical monopoly. Buy competition to destroy it later so you’re the only one in business.
That is the entire content of the Microsoft’s Guide to Business Practices.
One page, one sentence.
Embrace, Extended, Extinguish.
Microsoft, monday morning: “how the fuck do we buy Linux?”
One appears to actually like their customers and the other two are actively hostile towards them. I’m sure somebody at Microsoft/Sony are scratching their heads trying to figure out what’s wrong.
Sony’s disc move just screams of a corporate accountant trying to improve the financials and they pick one of the dumbest options to cut costs on. Retailers are obviously upset as digital download cards probably sell like crap compared to physical copies. Outside of gifts I have no idea why anybody would bother.
Also worth mentioning Sony’s CEO and CSO sold 56% and 18% of their shares 2 days after the disc announcement to the tune of millions.
Sony has a 457m lawsuit against them for antitrust issues which they’ve historically defended with…physical disc sales. So I’m happy to see that decision blowing up in their face and I’ll wait for the outcome on that.
That’s the point. It’s not about the disc. It’s about cutting out retailers.
Games sell at the same price or cheaper at the retailer as they do digitally, and the retailer takes a cut. Games sold through PSN or the Xbox store make Sony and Microsoft way more money.
And that’s before we get to used sales.
Don’t get me wrong - not to argue. Hate the fact that they’re doing this but asking this genuinely objective point of view.
Why should retailers’s business would be concern to Sony? Isn’t this similar if I was an iron supplier and decided to not sell my materials to one manufacturer that I’m not tied with an agreement, just because I’ve decided not to?
One could argue, with video games specifically, that they lose part of the market without the retailer.
A lot of games are played by kids, and parents, friends, and other family members still go into a store and buy a game to give as a gift.
Sony doesn’t want to come out and say “Best Buy can get fucked” because Best Buy still sells headphones, TVs, and other products Sony makes, including the Playstation itself. They need the retailers to sell their products.
But with digital goods, they can cut out the retailers retailers. The $10 bucks or whatever the retialer would get now goes to Sony.
Tell me again how many discs valve is selling? What happens to your steam account when you die?
I like valve, but don’t fool yourselves, Gabe N does not give a shit about the customers any more than Asha or Hideaki.
Well, that’s just objectively incorrect. Gabe at least recognizes that piracy is a service problem and being consumer friendly is more profitable in the long-term. People like Asha and Hideaki can’t seem to figure that one out no matter how much evidence is given to them.
i love steam but he does raise a good point. vavle explicitly said that steam acc is legally not transferable. there’s no second hand market and your library is legally gone for good when youre gone.
no matter how good valve is right now. the threat of enshittification is real, and will remain so until the discourse of the right of owning digital game is settled.
Oh yeah, Steam is not perfect by a long stretch. It mostly looks good by comparison with it’s competitors who appear to take being gently asked NOT to shit directly down their customers throats as basically a death threat. Was just pointing out that saying Gabe doesn’t give a shit is incorrect, as he does give a shit insofar as giving a shit has actually turned out to be the best long term strategy for Steam’s profits.
That said, Steam actually does have a history of honouring wills to transfer a dead persons library to someone else on death, despite that technically being disallowed by their ToS. So they aren’t bound to do it legally, but they do currently tend to. Which honestly might get them into some legal hot water if they ever try to enforce that term.
Valve is one of the few companies that has historically honored people’s bequests and allowed bequeathing their libraries to others after they die. Unlike say Apple who has outright said that your iTunes purchases disappear into the ether when you die.
Why would I want more plastic crap? I have zero issue with this.
My account is my entertainment, I see no reason to have it after I die. My kids don’t want it, they have their own.
The savings and convenience far outweighs any second hand retail. I am glad I don’t have to burden my kids and family with even more physical crap they would have to toss out.
Fuck yeah, love you Valve.
Love your contributions to Linux more though.
Gaben-kun will notice you
Maybe he’ll even send me a Steam Frame! Or a yacht! I heard he has a bunch of those.
Valve’s main advantage is they don’t have to make up heinous policies in the quarterly game of “tug off the shareholders”.
It’s all been fucked by AI RAM and SSD (and still GPU) prices. If anyone tries for a next gen £1000 console, they’ll be going the same way as Sega.
I mean…on one hand, it’s pretty easy for
SteamValve to be doing well. They’re the only major platform that’s released a new console this year (except for Nintendo), they’re the hardware manufacturer with the biggest recent success (except for Nintendo) in the Steam Deck, and they’re the only major platform without any well-publicized egg on their face (except for Nintendo). It also helps that they basically own the entire PC space outright, where the other platforms are fighting amongst themselves (except for Nintendo).But that brings up the Italian-plumber-with-a-powerup-that-turns-him-into-an-elephant in the room. Nintendo has been doing really well, too; and while, since the Wii, they’ve largely abandoned the power gamer space to the three players mentioned in this headline, the Switch 2 was a crazy release.
Obviously, Steam has made a lot of great bets that have paid off, they’ve managed to keep up customer goodwill by limiting anti-competitive behavior and focusing on good product and service over vendor lock-in, and they’re clearly the least anti-consumer player in the space right now. But Nintendo’s strategy of “make the games so compelling and polished that people won’t care about the lock-in” is basically the polar opposite, and it’s working too; so I don’t know how well we can draw conclusions about the industry from this.
Nintendo lost me when they declared they could remotely brick my switch 2 if they didn’t like what I did with it. Their wars against modders who make better versions of their games than Nintendo does is also lame. Most people won’t care but for me at least, I’m not interested in them anymore.
I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m not even saying I disagree, but I don’t think those move the needle on public sentiment like the Sony and Microsoft stuff. “Well, I don’t pirate Switch games, so my console won’t get bricked.” vs “Hey! But I buy physical copies of games!” and “Hey! They’re laying off a bunch of people, and I can imagine how that would feel.”
Honestly, what Sony is doing to capture platform lock-in isn’t substantially different from what Nintendo did. They were just quieter about it, or maybe they phrased the announcement better, or maybe they just get away with it because it’s not as visceral.
Sony is also not actively getting patents that are so broad the it stifles competition like Nintendo does, and did specifically to try and win the Palworld lawsuit.
No, they’re probably doing it too. They definitely did it in mobile phones, suing Apple for having phone call ringer silencing tech in their phones for instance; I would be surprised if they aren’t doing it in gaming too.
Nintendo got a lot of hate and took a big loss with the palworld lawsuit.
I don’t know how big a hit they actually took from that. If you ask the average gamer, I don’t know if they even are aware that it happened. I think the Sony physical media thing and the Microsoft layoffs have broken containment much more than the Palworld thing, though I don’t have any evidence of that.
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More importantly, the entire software (shops, operating system) and hardware are not a locked down platform and controlled by a single company. And the Steam prices (one word: sales) and rights (refund policy, games never get rewoked) are the best among the industry.
I would like to think people cared about that but I don’t think it’s true.
What exactly do you mean people don’t care about? I mean which part of my reply, as I brought up multiple points. I think people care about all points I brought up.
All of them
How do you come to this conclusion that nobody would care? About game prices and refund policy? I’m baffled.
I look at the choices that people overwhelmingly make.
What choices do you mean? Steam is the defacto standard on PC. Also just because most people use something (like Windows as operating system), does not mean they don’t care or get annoyed by Windows. Just for the analogy. Millions of people care about the points I listed. And you can see it in forums and social media or YouTube video creators too, if you don’t believe me.
You are not very specific about what you think. It is hard to understand about what exactly you talk. What choices, which people?
Mint is cool, but have you tried Bazzite? I just switched a while back and it’s been a pretty solid gaming experience.
Valve is the only only one supporting Linux!. The rest are greedy fucks.
I hear this every time: CEOs and Exec management of companies telling their employees that costs of production or whatever have gone up, there is need for layoffs in order for the company to stay afloat. At the end of the fiscal year: champagne bottles popping because record profits have been made… and we all play along in this circus show
Executives have obligation to the board of directors and shareholders to constantly bring record profits. Technically they are doing exactly what they are paid to do.
Until that changes, every large corporations will continue to enshittifiy everything for profits.
It is theft. Just plain theft. They don’t know jack about running they’re companies so they resort to just running it into the ground and then running away with the cash.
Post it. You know which meme.
I want an edit of the “he can’t keep getting away with this” to “he can’t keep winning” lol.
ANOTHER $200 BILLION DOLLARS TO STEAM &VAVLE!
Funny to see articles like this after the wave of steam machine bad press. If you visit console based subreddits there are so many bagging in Steam.
Meanwhile you’ll never own a PlayStation disc again after next year. Great contribution to the industry Sony!
The funny thing, is that if you check the people who bought the steam machine, they’re happy with their purchase too
That sure is a lot of people who would probably like to be able to purchase reasonably priced PC hardware.
