They're a private company and thus have resisted many of the enshittification trends that run rampant through the industry.
And also their competitors are absolutely atrocious and are completely tone-deaf to what customers actually want.
This is exactly right. As soon as a company becomes public, it's all over. Profits at X%, every quarter, no matter the cost. It's the death of a company.
It doesn't have to go public to do that. It can get sold to private equity. The original owner can pass the business to their kid who has grown up privileged and huffs their own farts. Going public is a guarantee of enshittification but it isn't the only way.
Because they are one of the few mega companies that hasn’t shrinkflated, enshittified, or otherwise crumbled the quality of their offering. Haven’t sold out the privacy of their customer base to advertising companies, and are generally good to deal with for customers and developers.
It’s not a secret formula that no other company can learn from. It’s as simple as not being dicks IMO.
For some reason, most companies seem to grow too a certain threshold at which they sell their souls to profit and will self destruct to get more of it. Steam thankfully isn’t one of them….. yet.
They're not beholden to public investors. If they go public or sell to a public company it will change.
If Gaben leaves or dies, Valve is probably fucked.
That will be like a whale-fall event for all the skittering bottom feeders of the finance abyss.
He has a son who will supposedly take over, but we'll have to see how that goes when it happens.
All these concern trolling articles about Valve's "monopoly". We never get this shit about Youtube, Windows, local ISPs and other utilities, etc. Super subtle, guys.
The entire AAA video game industry right now is basically freaking out, panicking and financially imploding right now, after at least a solid decade of mainly figuring out how to waste an enormous amount of money...
While all trying to be the next big live service game.
A live service game isn't so much a game as it is a platform itself, a cash shop for in game content, a social media platform in itself.
(See Roblox for an extremely problematic but successful version of pulling this off)
These people all failed miserably at this, such that Ubisoft imploded, EA got bought out by Saudi Blood Money, Unity itself is imploding as an organization, MSFT switched its gaming division into pure wealth extraction mode before they shut it down in ~5 years and just act as IP liscensing overlords... etc.
They all tried to establish vertically integrated businesses, and despise that they can't come close to matching Valve, the most competent horizontally built business in the entire industry.
And yes, the 'video game industry' includes nearly all 'video game journalists'.
These people are with few exceptions, allergic to doing any actual investigative journalism, they're mostly just paid to manipulate the flow of discourse around video games, as a form of marketing.
Every other company could challenge Steam, but instead is enshittified within an inch of its life from the get-go. It's as much that Steam is doing so much right as it is that competitors are doing so much wrong.
Not you, GOG.
GoG was my second digital store, I resisted Steam for so long, but over the years, Steam has become my #1 source for games. It's just so easy, plus they are relatively consumer friendly. With the revamp of Steam Families, it's just so so much easier to have everyone playing on Steam. Plus I have a Steam Deck.
I try and buy games on GoG, set them up with Heroic, and it works great, better than EA, Epic and other storefronts, but just not quite as slick as Steam.
One day St. Gabe will be martyred, and Steam will undergo the unavoidable descent into enshittification, as to will GoG. I do not pledge undying loyalty to any platform, but Steam and GoG have been awesome for so long.
Besides, other than Itch and Humble Bundle, who even comes close in being good to use?
Gog is good, itch.io is good. They have different niches, and each do beautifully.
Because they aren't a true monopoly. They are only a functional monopoly because their competitors refuse to be competitive. Nothing except corporate greed is preventing other storefronts like Epic from being utterly ass.
I'm not mad because they go above and beyond to support Linux, which I prefer to use.
None of the other stores do even the bare minimum for Linux users, while Valve has helped make it easier to play almost every game.
Valve literally released hardware and said "hey, competitors, feel free to add your own stores and even OS". None of their competitors even bothered to try.
Valve doesn't need to resort to underhanded tactics to secure their monopoly like other monopolies. They just know that they provide a good service.
Bad take. The competition is literally constantly shooting themselves in the foot by offering a worse service and doing nothing to make gaming better.
It's not steams fault that companies like EA, Epic MS etc. are rotten to the core with their business practices and no one wants to use their storefronts.
GOG is the only one i might consider an alternative that isnt completely rotten.
Are they a monopoly? They're definitely huge, but a lot of the games on Steam are non-exclusive, and they don't actually control the rights to the games. Like, they don't own the IP, they don't restrict content to their platform, and they have some pretty functional if smaller competitors like GOG and Epic. They also make their platform compatible with game keys that weren't actually sold on their platform.
They're definitely something with substantial market dominance as a platform, not I'm not sure monopoly is really the word.
I skimmed most of this thread and didn't see anyone mention that Steam actually supports third party stores. They let developers sell game keys on other storefronts for free (with limits, granted—the number of keys they can generate depends on sales on Steam, I think.)
Fanatical and Humble only exist because Steam handles all of the games delivery infrastructure for them. That's, like, the opposite of monopolistic behaviour. Name another tech monopoly giving their services away for free so other directly competing businesses can profit.
This is why bro. Other game launchers feel predatory and rushed. There is no reason for anyone to install the EA App or Ubisoft Connect other than playing that two games from those studios. The only alternative is the Epic Games Store which has the fucking worst UI in existence and has only got a microfraction of the minimum functionality useful to build a community around a videogame. It also lacks native Linux support, forcing users to use alternatives like Heroic Games Launcher
Steam wins because it does nothing to increase "shareholder value" and it just cares to be a good platform for the users, it is respectful of consumers and actively fights corporate greed and publisher dishonesty
Used to prefer GOG over Steam. GOG did nothing for Linux gamers though, they didn't even release their Galaxy client for Linux. Will prefer GOG over Steam again when this changes (they said recently they want to change this, but only after Valve has already invested a lot into making Linux gaming a real thing with almost zero friction). That's also basically the best thing that Valve has done - they really did help to make Linux gaming a reality, and Linux gaming is an important step towards toppling Windows' dominance. They deserve a lot of credit for that. But there are also plenty of other things that you can criticize about Steam.
If you're on Windows though, you should definitely always prefer GOG over Steam because it's DRM-free (you buy it, you own it). Of course, there are many more games only available on Steam, so it might not be possible all the time, but at least you should prioritize your choices.
We also have plenty of other monopoly problems, one of the biggest is YouTube.
Because of all the other companies in that picture (except GOG, they're cool).
Tepid take: The only people calling Steam a monopoly are the loser competitors who can't find a more extortive business model that will actually compete in their quest to syphon wealth out of the gaming ecosystem. Also 'news' outlets that are being paid to assert this narrative, and dumbshit reactionaries who believe those narratives. Sorry Epic CEO, you can't cry and shit your pants into forcing a successful company to make room and give you a cut. The market will ony respond to a better product here, and Epic ain't it. EA learned this lesson with their shit-ass Origin product years ago, brand loyalty takes a long time to build and is a powerful variable, and steam is good at not fucking with the gamers, or at least only within parameters of acceptability, it appears.
Tim Sweeney's on record saying he doesn't see any point in making EGS any better since it's "good enough" lol.
Out of anyone, they had the best chance to make it, with the budget they had, and the fact that so many people have their launcher installed for Unreal Engine or Fortnite reasons. Yet they put so much money into exclusives, and none into having a compelling UX.
Steam is not a fucking monopoly. Take my downvote
Other game launchers: "fuck Linux it's so small"
Valve: "everyone deserves to play games :)"
Other game launchers: "Steam is fucking monopoly!!!"
Valve doesn't abuse the monopoly.
Because it's one of the only functional monopolies that got there by attracting users rather than M&As to quash competitors and regulatory capture. Monopolies shouldn't just intrinsically make you angry, they just are usually bad because they will have done anticompetitive things in order to become a monopoly.
As the article concludes:
Valve Corporation didn’t win by locking people in. It won by making sure they never really wanted to leave.
Really simple: because they are running it like tax funded infrastructure and not like an extortion racket.
Pretty much because the others are worse, and will continue to be until Gabe dies and they start to really squeeze all the value out of it they could.
I feel like this is something that could easily shift with one misstep by Valve. It's good now because for the most part they have made consumer friendly choices.
I am really worried about what happens when Gabe kicks the bucket.
The other contenders mostly are bad.
Drm-free still exists.
They provide a lot of value without charging the end user very much.
Microsoft could have done this except they're run by idiots and assholes. Nothing technical stopped them from launching a good store platform. They just didn't want to.
what difference not having shareholders has
Other Launchers don't feel like tools. The other stores feel like a fucking nuisance.
The only other usable options are itch.io and GoG.com, who allow downloading the games directly on their websites, without the need for any launcher.
It works, and since this is PC, we can very quickly pivot to something else if we need to.
Valve treats me like they actually want to earn ky business and they use their vast wealth to make cool shit. Valve is also the reason I no longer have to deal with Window's bullshit to keep playing my favorite video games.
Yes, I would love to see more altruism, but Valve is, at the bare minimum, the epitome of moral neutrality as a business. So there's nothing to really be mad at them about, and rather I have some gratitude for how they've used their money.
On the flipside, as others have pointed out, everyone else keeps shooting themselves in the foot. The only one thar hasn't (to my knowledge) is GoG, but they're never going to reach Steam status in a Capitalist society. And their social features are unavailable on Linux.
The next closest after that is Epic, who's shitty, buggy ass launcher and storefront is so horrendous that when they give games out for free, people buy said games on Steam instead.
So... Why would we be mad at Valve for their competition being shit?
I mean what, am I supposed to be 'preemptively mad' because they might become worse one day?
Like I don't understand why I'm supposed to be mad, it's a service that's useful and good, maybe it won't be one day but what am I going to do about that?
"preemptively mad" got a chuckle out of me, yeah it's premature to say that we should get big angy at Steam.
The word we should be looking for is "Critical." Valve is a huge company, they are not saints, and we should treat them with skepticism as a matter of course. But that doesn't mean they don't do positive, thankless work for consumers too (in the form of Proton, Linux support, etc).
If Steam is a monopoly, then explain how alternatives or competitors still exist. This entire "Steam is a monopoly" is bullshit because competition did and still does exist.
What is up with Valve and internet attacking them for their supposed monopoly?
Yeah, they are monopoly. The rare breed of one that is not predatory to it's customers, and actively improves the experience. They are also the one that wont shoot their own leg to incapacitate themselves for no particular reason. Also "also", they do not use predatory strategies to extort players off other platforms. Also^3^, they are the company that wont accumulate other companies just to destroy them in the end which also destroys competition.
They are not perfect. Lootboxes, gambling, and strong polices. But just try to compare them to second best online gaming store - they are fucking angels. Saints. Divine being. Compared TO THE NEXT BEST THING. That is saying something.
A monopoly (from Greek μόνος, mónos, 'single, alone' and πωλεῖν, pōleîn, 'to sell') is a market in which one person or company is the only supplier of a particular good or service. - AND STEAM IS NOT IT! They have competition and that competition, while having resources and ability to improve or match Steam, does little to nothing in order to compete.
Steam is so big because the others are shit!
For me the difference is there is nothing stopping competitors, Valve is not locking them out of the market in any way. If they don't want to spend the time to build a good competing product, that's on them. And additionally, PC gaming is just one platform for gaming
even the article itself touches on the fact that devs are mad, multiple times. the 30% cut is outrageous and discoverability is awful and easily sabotaged by review trolls. one of steam's biggest draws are it's sales, which have led to an extreme devaluation of indie games- anyone charging more than 20 bucks is considered to be overcharging while AAA games climb higher and higher in price. those same AAA games are often only available on steam
to their credit, the work they put into proton and them making that publically available was excellent of them. it's also good that they never tried to latch themselves onto the NFT and AI bandwagons. other than that, though? even if there was such a thing as a good monopoly, valve certainly ain't it
I dislike that a lot of the games are tied to needing to have the steam client open, also the steam client is a non-controllable aspect on my computer that I own. I can modify (with extensions and browsers) any experience I have online...except steam. I also don't like "leasing" games as that's all they do.
Last note is just I dislike putting any faith into a company to "do good" or to remain with their status quo. Companies are not "good", they are a service provider and shouldn't be anthropomorphized as such for being "good guys" or a company that "Cares"^tm^. The very fact that people are defending it by being sticklers of true definitions of a "monopoly" but hand-wave away the affects it has on the industry makes me concerned it will only become a bigger problem later on.
So how's much did Sweeney at Epic pay for this?
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