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6% of devs think Valve justifies its 30% Steam cut, according to GDC poll
- Thread starter BeI
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What did you expect, this is the standard in a Steam thread.
We're approaching "make Steam a loss leader or it will become a monopoly!" type territory and it's baffling
Honestly a mod should flag the post that breaks down how Valve allowing unlimited key generation means we were never really talking about a flat 30% in the first place, so the discussion can at least hinge on that premise
It is true that for Valve it is a strategic hedge. But they're also sponsoring a lot of free (and not as in beer) software that helps Linux infrastructure develop. I certainly appreciate those results.
I'm definitely not the one stretching, this is what someone literally said a couple of posts above. Ridiculous.
That's because they provide the same services to any game sold on their storefront, regardless of the actual sales numbers. Games can be sold elsewhere using Steam keys but only if they are also available for sale on Steam. They are still seeing a cut of those games sold on their storefront, which usually accounts for the majority of sales.
I mean they don't have to do the Steam key thing at all, but any game that has those features has to be sold on Steam, meaning Valve is still making some money on that game.
So would anyone care to comment on my previous post? It's not clear to me that we can have an adequate discussion of "valves cut" unless we acknowledge that 30% is not the true cut at all.
Nah, it's pretty much spot on.
People want more money? check
Valve being needlessly tight lipped about what they do with their cut? check
Ah sorry, thought that was aimed at me. I'm just arguing semantics in the grand scheme of things
Twitch Prime is still a thing. But they don't sell games anymore.
....I was going to ask "why?" but the fact that I didn't even notice probably answers my own question.
Is there a chance that Valve will have a Steam Dev Days 2019 where they will talk to devs more about what plans they have for Steam and new tools for devs and what not, there has not been one in the last 2 years and since Valve does not really seem to mention that much about what they do? I would imagine that since they don't have investor meeting like every other video game company where they reveal sales data and plans for the future and what not that it feels like Valve keeps everyone in the dark. Maybe then they will talk about some more big changes coming to Steam, like them hiring a big group of people to do Customer Support stuff for Devs/pubs.
Also in regards to what some people have mentioned about people not wanting to have another launcher I am sort of like that. I am not 100% against downloading another launcher but since I am a human being that does mean that I can be lazy and as such I myself am to lazy to download anything off the internet and on top of that having to remember yet another password and if I have not logged in for a long time it tells me to reloggin and most of the time I do not know the password and have to do the email thing and by that time I don't even want to bother any more.
The whole no Steam no buy thing, may seem stupid and it kind of is but in the case with the EGS, I mean those games were going to be on Steam and then all of a sudden they were not, so something clearly happened there. Now had the dev made it where they were going to release on EGS, Steam and Windows 10 then I and a lot of other would have had no issues with that, but no the dev instead choose to make it a EGS timed exclusive for a year??
Maybe I am part of the issue for not being 100% on the side of the devs on this, since I am also the type of person that got RE2 from GMG since it was 25% off and did not want to pay full price and thus giving the dev as much money as I possible could.
I myself use to use Linux when I built my gaming PC back in 2014 and then changed to Windows since I like to use a controller and well a lot of games that I wanted to play did not have Linux support. I have noticed that some one on here mentioned how if anything that Linux support has actually gone down on Steam? But isn't that because of China? I think China alone has like 30 million Steam users and I would imagine that a majority of them would be playing on Windows and not Linux.
Also Valve was not the only one that had issues with MS and Windows, even Epic Games themselves were calling out MS on what they planned to do with Windows and Valve wanting to make an alternative is not a bad idea, it make not gain a lot of traction now but it might in the future. Talking more about Windows in general have we not been seeing an increase in PC gaming? From across the world and when ever I see a PC building video they always show Windows instead of Linux. Linux to me is still something that I have not had much experience with and it feels overwhelming to me, I might try it out more in the future but I do feel that some of this plays a factor as to why not a bigger amount of Steam users are using Linux. Just like how more people regularly use an Xbox One controller on Steam instead of a PS4 controller and why is that? Most likely because of button UI not supporting DS4, yes there is Steam input but you do just see Xbox UI instead and while you could mod it not everyone wants to do that. People just want plug and play which at first glance Linux does not seem to be like that??
At the end of the day I just want to buy games and not feel let down by devs (getting a Steam refund), I also want to be able to get a game day one and not pay much money for it (GMG). So if devs decided not to use Steam at all and just put their games on their own webstore, provided support and sold the game to me for cheap then I guess I would just buy directly through them?
Valve just be more clear about what it is that you are doing.
Also in regards to what some people have mentioned about people not wanting to have another launcher I am sort of like that. I am not 100% against downloading another launcher but since I am a human being that does mean that I can be lazy and as such I myself am to lazy to download anything off the internet and on top of that having to remember yet another password and if I have not logged in for a long time it tells me to reloggin and most of the time I do not know the password and have to do the email thing and by that time I don't even want to bother any more.
The whole no Steam no buy thing, may seem stupid and it kind of is but in the case with the EGS, I mean those games were going to be on Steam and then all of a sudden they were not, so something clearly happened there. Now had the dev made it where they were going to release on EGS, Steam and Windows 10 then I and a lot of other would have had no issues with that, but no the dev instead choose to make it a EGS timed exclusive for a year??
Maybe I am part of the issue for not being 100% on the side of the devs on this, since I am also the type of person that got RE2 from GMG since it was 25% off and did not want to pay full price and thus giving the dev as much money as I possible could.
I myself use to use Linux when I built my gaming PC back in 2014 and then changed to Windows since I like to use a controller and well a lot of games that I wanted to play did not have Linux support. I have noticed that some one on here mentioned how if anything that Linux support has actually gone down on Steam? But isn't that because of China? I think China alone has like 30 million Steam users and I would imagine that a majority of them would be playing on Windows and not Linux.
Also Valve was not the only one that had issues with MS and Windows, even Epic Games themselves were calling out MS on what they planned to do with Windows and Valve wanting to make an alternative is not a bad idea, it make not gain a lot of traction now but it might in the future. Talking more about Windows in general have we not been seeing an increase in PC gaming? From across the world and when ever I see a PC building video they always show Windows instead of Linux. Linux to me is still something that I have not had much experience with and it feels overwhelming to me, I might try it out more in the future but I do feel that some of this plays a factor as to why not a bigger amount of Steam users are using Linux. Just like how more people regularly use an Xbox One controller on Steam instead of a PS4 controller and why is that? Most likely because of button UI not supporting DS4, yes there is Steam input but you do just see Xbox UI instead and while you could mod it not everyone wants to do that. People just want plug and play which at first glance Linux does not seem to be like that??
At the end of the day I just want to buy games and not feel let down by devs (getting a Steam refund), I also want to be able to get a game day one and not pay much money for it (GMG). So if devs decided not to use Steam at all and just put their games on their own webstore, provided support and sold the game to me for cheap then I guess I would just buy directly through them?
Valve just be more clear about what it is that you are doing.
Valve may not subsidize the cost of hardware but they unofficially seem to subsidize the cost of games, for buyers at least by allowing stuff like GMG and also by having regional pricing, so the hardware by be expensive but at least the software hopefully is affordable and thus leads to less piracy
I don't see how the content of what I said makes me either of those things. Anyway, feel free not to respond to me. I thought I would approach you with a little respect instead of talking down to you or calling you names, thinking you might reciprocate the charity.
I agree, your little strawman above is quite dramatic. :) Kind of hilarious to build that and then criticise someone else's argument's soundness. :D
(unless you replied to the wrong post and there was someone in the thread who actually said that Valve was doing anything to mess with others stores, in which case carry on).
I like how you only replied to one of my three points because the only way your reply stands was by not addressing the others, i.e. your ridiculous false dilemma between 10% and 30%.
So, yeah, asspull. There is zero grounds for you to assert that Valve cannot make any single concession to devs without breaking the viability of every other store. Fin.
I mean, let's look at them taking away visibility rounds, trading cards, and now showcase visibility and refusing to even tell their developers what they need to do in order to get those features back.
If they would just talk to their developers, it wouldn't be as big as an issue. But they don't. They even respond to emails with "we can't reveal that information".
It's not even about trading cards or "look at this cool achievement/badge that I got". It's about Valve treating everyone like a Bad Actor.
Could you remind me? I figured it was 30% for any game through the store, and 0% outside. I believe your other post said they lower the percentage at times?
You could argue 30% is partially to make up for the lower percentage sales they allow, I suppose.
As a dev over the last 10 years we've had this convo at every company I've been at, indie or AAA. Its always "Can we avoid using Steam and paying that 30% or is there something on there we absolutely need".
For the indies they're basically stuck and a lot of the times it comes down to losing your 30% for even just having the ability to sell your game internationally.
It does beg the question though should someone who just uses Steam for distribution really be paying the same 30% as someone who is using all the bells and whistles like Trading Cards, Achievements, Leaderboards, Friends, Matchmaking, etc.
Their attempts at lowering it based on sales are pathetic and are basically their way of saying "Yeah we're happy to take a slightly smaller cut cause your game is printing a ton of money for us".... Its usually the guys not selling that need the breaks.
For the indies they're basically stuck and a lot of the times it comes down to losing your 30% for even just having the ability to sell your game internationally.
It does beg the question though should someone who just uses Steam for distribution really be paying the same 30% as someone who is using all the bells and whistles like Trading Cards, Achievements, Leaderboards, Friends, Matchmaking, etc.
Their attempts at lowering it based on sales are pathetic and are basically their way of saying "Yeah we're happy to take a slightly smaller cut cause your game is printing a ton of money for us".... Its usually the guys not selling that need the breaks.
I'm surprised that this question of yours hasn't been the focal point of this entire Steam cut debate from the beginning, the fact that this 30% applies to a gamut of games that may or may not even integrate or otherwise benefit from the functionality that some of us would imagine helps justify Steam's own cut.
As a reaction to the Epic shop's lower cut (yes, I know they announced it before the Epic reveal, but let's be real here, they had to have known in advance) Steam's cut now changes depending it on sales. I think it can get as low as 20%. depending on the volume.
And it's pretty much an open secret that bigger publishers always had access to better cuts.
Me too, I actually think the rate being based on the services used is fairly reasonable....
Sure. All I'm saying is they are not getting steam services in exchange of giving Valve that cut ( so the idea of a different rate depending on how much bandwidth is used or whatever doesn't make much sense ), you get those services in exchange of being part of steam ecosystem, which obviously benefit Valve.
The 30% cut us entirely about sales on steam storefront.
You don't see how pretending to know better than devs where they should put their games is condescending?
I don't find a lot of respect in condescension and passive-agressiveness like the above, but whatever; I'm not interested in tone policing. To use a common argument in this thread, "you're free not to read or reply to my posts if you don't see the value in them". :)
They already made concessions. Sell well enough and your cut will increase.
I mean any dev who sells a game on Steam is paying a 30% cut to Valve on a significant portion of their sales at the very least. I can understand why devs might think Valve doesn't justify that, especially with how closed off they seem to be.
It still confuses me that there was no Dev Days this year, a year where tons of change happened.
No, that proves that Steam is so big, they have no choice but to accept the 30% cost or lose significant amount of sales.
They would have to partner with multiple storefronts and still get less sales because most PC gamers are on and buy from Steam.
Vast majority of people are not going to see just being so big, you have no choice as justification for something like this.
Of course they're not. Are you playing dumb? Why in the hell do you think Valve allows these storefronts to sell Steam games, if not because they're a vector for more consumers into their ecosystem?
I'm kind of tempted to return your question of "do you not understand basic fucking economy?".
So far nobody is willing/able to match steam. That's why steam is on top. You agree that steam is not impeding anyone from trying. So they don't seem to be doing anything wrong there.
I don't see why valve should be compelled to make sone kind of concession on their cut? Beyond the huge unique benefit allowing generation of free steam keys? Completely unfounded.
Since somewhere in the region of 15-40% (closer to the latter figure for most major games, closer to the former for indie games) of the individual game sales that they support (through their CDN infrastructure, achievements system, friends lists, matchmaking and so on) are in the 0% cut category (i.e. free games, bundled games, retail sales, third party store sales), it's not true that Valve takes close to 30% of the revenue of a developer. The actual figure is not possible to pin down but conservatively it would be ~25%, and closer to the ~20% mark (or less) for major games that have significant retail presence or are being sold in large quantities through third party websites or on the developer's own website. When you factor in the recent change to high selling games whereby games sold above certain threshold lower even the valve storefront direct-cut, this figure will also go down for new major games and breakout indie hits. People say that they know that there's the 0% cut for generated keys sold elsewhere but I don't think many people realize how large of a chunk that is.
Thirty percent of the direct steam-sale is a misleading figure when presented without context because of this. The difference between say Epic and Valve is not the difference between 30% and 12%, because both figures are naive up front values that have different contexts around them.
Steam isn't going to incentivize developers to not use their networking features. It makes zero business sense. Opting out of these functionalities to get a better cut for devs isn't going to happen. So yeah, you are free to ask that question, but it's kind of an academic / pointless debate.
That change only applies to an extremely small percentage of devs though, which would have no effect on a survey like this.
This is kind of rude, I mean I know they started being dismissive to you first but still. GMG and Humble are competition still, they are all PC storefronts competing for dollars from the same audience, and any dollar spent at Humble is a dollar Valve isn't seeing a cut from. That said, these devs selling Steam keys DOES feed them directly into Valve's ecosystem...so it's a mutually beneficial relationship in that way. Still I'm sure Valve would much rather the entire PC audience spend all of their money directly through Steam instead of using key resellers.
I think a lot of the dissatisfaction isn't directly the Valve take, but the idea that right now they don't have personalized developer responses. Like for example, if I personally have an issue or suggestion I want to contact PlayStation about, I talk to Shane Bettenhausen since he's our Sony rep and he's always been great about getting problems resolved quickly. However, if I have an issue with Steam, I just have to send an email to their general developer support group & hope for the best. And sometimes I get good help from them, but it feels a lot more precarious than having a set person to talk to. And in fact, when I first released games on Steam back in 2011, we did have a handful of set Steam developer support people we could contact for issues or when we wanted to try a special promotion.
No one is saying they are getting a 30% cut from all sales total, just all sales sold on Steam. Which they do.
Steam is a mutually beneficial arrangement. The cut Steam takes isn't necessarily so unless they're told what that money is going towards. If Steam treats it as pure profit, then I'm not sure that's the case.
Technically, if you wanna take the anti-capitalist route, you would argue that the statement of "competition is always a good thing" is an asinine, pro-capitalist statement.
Also, one-liners only don't make sense in bad movies."That's the secret: I'm always angry."
And then taking it out of context. The question that developer was asking was about the complications of developers supporting Linux, and you used it as part of your argument about a program that does not require developers to support it.
Then when that was pointed out you switched from talking about monetary cost to damaging the image of the game. Sure, but the problem with that argument is that you've introduced a threshold (news of a defect [or set of defects] that spread so wide that it could eliminate a 100% profit margin) without definitively demonstrating how likely it is to be crossed given at most a 0.8% userbase that could be affected.
I'm not even saying devs don't know their own industry or whether 30% is too high or not; I'm saying the arguments you're using need more weight.
The last one they had was in 2016, and from what I recall in 2017 they also said that they would very likely not have one in 2018 either, it's possible that this will change since they might now be seeing the need to open up more
Man this so much too. Again having worked for big and small the difference in white glove experience on Steam you get when you get a Valve Rep assigned to you cause "You matter" arbitrarily is amazing.
Unfortunately not many studios or publishers get a dedicated rep on Steam.
Ah of course, that does make a lotta sense. Like corporate tax vs how much a corporation pays in actuality. 20% - 25% sounds fairly reasonable (though I never personally had issue with 30% because I just don't know enough about it) especially considering Epic's own issues with 12% already.
Correct.
You and me (or rather, you and the devs in this poll) are arguing entirely different things. This may be a bit of a detour but I think it's important to split this hair.
- Your argument is that from a capitalist perspective, it makes sense for Steam to keep things as they are. This is true.
- Their argument is that Steam is not providing enough value for the money they're asking for. This is an argument entirely orthogonal to the above unless you adscribe to the capitalist notion that value is entirely subjective except as the point where offer and demand meet.
If you're a laissez-faire capitalist, then indeed the two arguments move along the exact same axis and the first invalidates the second. However, if you're not, you may be able to simultaneously believe that a product may have the best value / quality in the market while also being overpriced (e.g. video cards during the cryptocurrency boom). Of course, this requires a different metric for "overpriced", and that's where things get hairy, but also the entire reason there's a conversation about it. If someone said "man, video card prices are insane, I had to pay 500$ for [card model here]" and someone else told them "that's a great price, you won't find it cheaper anywhere else", are they really making opposing arguments?
Makes sense?
Right, this is the issue. Devs see Steam bringing in all this money, taking a cut of all their sales on Steam, and feel as though they have nothing to show for it. I can understand the frustration, Steam has a lot of nice features for the consumer but as a dev it seems laking, and they are notoriously tight-lipped and hard to get in contact with.
They said that curation would only be at the start and they would gradually open up their store. Seems more like managing an application launch than a permanent policy on curation
You realize the post I was replying to was aimed (and in this case, "aimed" in a very literal sense) at me? They've been nothing but exceedingly rude all the thread, which is perfectly fine by me, but they don't really need you jumping in to defend them.
There is no such thing as "competition" that exists because you allow it.
There is no such thing as "competition" that is, on the whole, a "mutually beneficial relationship".
Not if that means shrinking the audience. And believe me, if Valve didn't think that'd be the case, they wouldn't have allowed to sell keys off-Steam. "Mutually beneficial relationship" is exactly right.
It would be really nice if people stopped believing in companies as some sort of angels or charities. When all is said and done, Valve really is an amazing company, but it's still a company, an entity whose ultimate goal is to generate profit. They do not make business choices with the expectation that they will harm them.
The good thing about appeal to ridicule is that you don't need to make any actual argument, innit? :)
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