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Gabe Newell on Steam monopoly accusations: Gamers have 'enormous choice' about where to buy games (www.pcgamer.com)
submitted 3 months ago by to c/pcgaming@lemmy.ca
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[–] 3 points 3 months ago* (5 children)

I was just curious whether technically Steam is a monopol for Linux, as in being the only store where you can run games without using 3rd party tools.

Not that I mind, running games on Linux is super easy nowadays (My favorite is Faugus launcher), but technically it can be another hurdle for some people.

But when I need to play some Epic free game, Heroic is awesome.

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  • [–] 8 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    I mean, they develop and maintain Proton yet they don't even prohibit you from using it on other things. If literally any company did that, their shareholders would riot...

    ...so I don't think it technically qualifies as a monopoly, but they probably could have had a legal monopoly using an exclusivity patent on the tech (although they technically can't patent the whole thing because it's based on Wine, but they could have done this in a way that they could have).

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  • [–] 4 points 3 months ago

    That is a fair point. I'm also not trying to discredit Steam, I don't really think there's any kind of a problem as of now (well, apart from the fact that it could go downhill very fast once Steam changes hands), and the services they provide are reasonable and for me worth the 30% cut, especially their Proton work.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 months ago* (1 child)

    Well, things like Lutris do the same automated configuring of the underlying tools to run Windows games under Linux and putting it all under a "press button to play" interface as Steam as well as letting you manage your collection.

    Lutris (and I believe Heroic too) even integrated with game stores and will list your games there and download them directly from there to install them.

    What they don't have is the store part - you can't actually BUY games from those tools.

    People using for example Lutris to play GOG games in Linux, have pretty much the same experience as using Steam from a browser to buy the games and then Steam app to manage your games collection and launch the games.

    Having both Steam and Lutris, I personally prefer the latter because it seamlessly integrates with multiple stores and even works fine with games from other sources (such as games I bought in physical format way back in the day or games I bought directly from the developer).

    Sure, the open source apps doesn't include a store, but as I see it that's actually a good thing since I'm not interested in getting the sales push to buy more games everytime I want to play a game, same as I'm not interested in seeing ads when I'm browsing the web.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 months ago

    What they don’t have is the store part - you can’t actually BUY games from those tools.

    Heroic does let you buy games through the app, but it seems like it's just a browser that gives heroic an affiliate link when you make the purchase.

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