I wouldn't generalize like that. Kotaku has some solid pieces of investigative journalism still. It's not just Grayson that works there.
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Kotaku: 'It Wasn't Meant To Be This Lightning Rod': Valve Developer Looks Back At Company's Epic Store Exclusivity Comments
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Sweeny's hypocritical, tone deaf, and plain wrong tirades on twitter, which as another poster accurately pointed out are Trump level stupid, Don't fuel Grayson's agenda so you're not going to see any articles about it on Kotaku.
What? Paid mods are a terrible idea. I'm all for creators getting paid via donations (as Nexus does already) if that's your choice, but why are we rushing to create 'walled gardens' on PC. Keep that shit and exclusivity to consoles.
Right, it was an "unfair" treatment of some Steam customers (those who missed the pre-order window) relatively to other Steam customers (those who managed to pre-order before the game was removed).
However, I fail to see how it warranted a statement on the store page. There are many games which I, as a Steam customer, cannot purchase, due to region restrictions or because they were removed from the store without a notice, while other Steam customers can purchase these (in different regions) or could purchase these games (before they were removed). That is unfair, but nobody at Valve writes about it, only game collectors do, in a few forums.
Moreover, there is a possibility to make the treatment fairer, but that is a scenario which Valve never considered for any removed game: remove the game from the owner's account (base scenario), and refund the game (best case scenario). Actually, this happened when people took advantage of pricing errors on Humble Store. I remember at least one occurrence, it was a game about Cthulhu. If they can do it for pricing errors on other stores, then they could do it for removed games.
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I mean considering that even Jason Schreier is leaning more towards the EGS train due to his tweets about the EGS situation and his imo odd article about Valve giving their employees vacations, this seems to be more of a Kotaku thing in general. Same with PC Gamer.
Not saying that you shouldn't give them clicks at all because they make some sound articles about many things, but don't be surprised that Nathan seems very pro-EGS and anti-Steam.
Not saying that you shouldn't give them clicks at all because they make some sound articles about many things, but don't be surprised that Nathan seems very pro-EGS and anti-Steam.
A curious amount of posts trying to downplay Steam's comments and its effect on the millions of customers Steam has.
Steam is a juggernaut - like any Juggernaut, if they call out something, or someone (a competitor), its legion (millions) of fans will repeat it ad nauseam and use it as a war cry in this 'Epic is the problem' battlefield. The fervent vitriol in twitter comments alone is startling.
Steam is a juggernaut - like any Juggernaut, if they call out something, or someone (a competitor), its legion (millions) of fans will repeat it ad nauseam and use it as a war cry in this 'Epic is the problem' battlefield. The fervent vitriol in twitter comments alone is startling.
Imagine word lawyering Valve to this extend in order to twist one mild statement as bad.
While the entire game's industry ignores Epic's inflammatory rhetoric, including using right-wing libertarian talking points to attack their competitors.
seconding the thread warnings for nathan grayson stuff. Dude just has a hard-on for valve in general and i'd rather not inadvertently help that silliness monetarily. Or frankly even waste my time opening the thread lmao.
and of course, sweeney and certain devs are in no way trying to fan the flames themselves, no way what so ever right?
That's nice and all, but it didn't happen.
The comment wasn't a lightning rod for anything and all you're doing is making hypotheticals on something that never was. The unfair comment didn't become a banner for the anti-EGS sentiment. People talked about it for like a day and that's it. Wanna know which comments are used constantly to show EGS and the people in charge don't have the customer's best interest at heart? Tim Sweeny's.
The fans didn't repeat it ad nauseam, though. This statement had very little impact. The only person repeating this statement ad nauseam is one of Kotaku's writers, and that's the only reason we're even talking about it now.
You mean they posted another notice about Anno like a week later? Just without the word unfair?
IIRC at the time Beth attempted to introduce paid mods the infrastructure for supporting creators was not really there that much, so I can see why some people would, at that time, jump at the chance of being able to actually sell their mods (even if it meant giving a cut to Beth/Volvo).
The problem was that the modding scene was/is an incestual mess and most of the mods had dependencies on other mods and scripts and ownership was nearly impossible to determine. So when large part of creators gave Beth the finger the whole idea had to get scuttled because almost nobody was actually able to sell anything beyond horse armour tier shit without reverse engineering half of everything.
I don't understand why you quote my post. This whole thread is about an article which focuses on the use of the word "unfair" by Valve.
This is the title of the article:
This is the first sentence of the article:
You are mistaking me for someone that takes Nathan Grayson's opinion on the matter with a straight face. Funny how the only journalist's word lawyering Valve are the only ones that claim it did anything. The lightning rod is not about the attacks on EGS from social media, it was about the press's reaction to it.
Journalists at the time spent more time on that one word from Valve then the unprecedented even of Metro leaving the store while still being sold.
It doesn't suit the narrative of Steam being this big bad that needs taken down and save all indies that journalists desperately want to invoke.
Just look at how silent (or even downright hostile) some journalists have gotten when the DARQ developer turned down exclusivity and revealed Epic's exclusivity terms.
??!
You quote my post in this thread, call it "word lawyering", and assume my intent was to "twist one mild statement as bad".
If you were making a statement about Nathan Grayson, feel free to unquote my post, so that I don't take your comment personally.
The poster was referring to the interview in the article. I understand that you do not like the writer, but maybe try to skim through the article.
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I don't think an informative blurb is out of hand, and I do think that characterizing something as "unfair" does stoke the flames in a kind of irresponsible way.
See: any game that implements draconian DRM or rootkits.
I appreciate having some visibility on things of that nature.
Please. We're talking about five people at most.
This is a nothing comment by Valve that has inexplicably gotten more attention than a hundred indie games put together.
It's absurd that anyone would pay it any mind, and yet here we are.
As much as I want to chastise them for it, the few journalists that actually chase this bullshit know what they're doing. They know that gamers feed off of trash like this, just as they've done in the console wars of the past.
I see your point, but I don't even want to open that door. Many games benefit from the modding scene . . . I'm playing through modded Star Wars: Empire at War, a game from 2007 that modders turned from a pretty basic strategy game to something closer to a Total War game. It's a net positive for the community, and I don't want to cede that power directly to corporations. The Battlefield series used to have an amazing scene until EA took that away with BF3.
I agree, juggernauts should be careful about what they say, I'm kinda tired of listening about the ''Steam tax'' and ''it's all for competition'' stuff.
I don't play PC games and the last time I used Steam to play games was TF2 a long time ago, but I feel like they are within their right to throw EGS and the publisher under the bus for holding a Pre-Sale on their platform and then obtaining an exclusivity deal at the last minute.
Each party made a decision that was best for their business. Holding Valve responsible for harassment or internet anger over a last minute platform change seems ridiculous.
The reaction to this is up to EGS and the publisher's own PR teams. I'm sure they 100% anticipated push-back. It's part of running a business. And this isn't just some small company unequipped for this. This is Epic Games. It feels weird how often the gaming press protects huge companies from consumer push-back by portraying huge gaming companies as small interests without resources.
I don't think you would find this take anywhere but the gaming press. Where massive entertainment behemoths become a lot smaller when anti-consumer maneuvers are called out. It makes these company's jobs a lot easier when independent outlets volunteer their services to further the cause.
Each party made a decision that was best for their business. Holding Valve responsible for harassment or internet anger over a last minute platform change seems ridiculous.
The reaction to this is up to EGS and the publisher's own PR teams. I'm sure they 100% anticipated push-back. It's part of running a business. And this isn't just some small company unequipped for this. This is Epic Games. It feels weird how often the gaming press protects huge companies from consumer push-back by portraying huge gaming companies as small interests without resources.
I don't think you would find this take anywhere but the gaming press. Where massive entertainment behemoths become a lot smaller when anti-consumer maneuvers are called out. It makes these company's jobs a lot easier when independent outlets volunteer their services to further the cause.
If this were in any way at all, in any shape or form, true, more people would be reading (or just even be aware of) the official Steam blog lmao. Nice try though.
This is nonsense. People can criticize an article for being poor without being lowkey accused of being Gamergater. Come on now.
That's not at all a fair description of Kotaku in general, but you do you.
Now that you mention it, Kotaku is indeed in need of it. I think they should only allow the articles that I like on the site.
That's all it comes down to, really.
To fathom that a company of their size and market share 'didn't realize the impact it could have' or 'wasn't mean to be...' is absurd & any corporation of comparable size playing the 'we didn't think or intend' card are being disingenuous, especially in an age where everything you say can and will be scrutinized, shared, reposted, liked and commented on.
The pervasiveness of the sentiment has infiltrated practically every 'social ''gamer-hub'' that's out there from reddit to fuckin' youtube comments.
That being said, Tim S. says dumb shit fairly frequently.
Kotaku in general is fine but neither Schreier, nor Grayson should be trusted with any articles regarding Steam or Epic Games.
They've topped even random shitposters on Era.
Trying to paint Valve as the bad guys because they offer paid holidays instead of forcing crunch on their workers (Schreier) or trying to call them out because they have a pro-consumer view (Grayson) are incredibly stupid ideas for articles.
Well damn, that did go over my head. 2subtle4me
Yeah I didn't even know they made that statement. I don't like the EGS shit because of the actual act of whats happening (which i'd imagine is the reason for most people instead of this comment). Also, because it's supposed to be about devs getting their fair share but they constantly deny actual indie devs who need it the most if they turn down being exclusive. It's just bullshit lol. I'd respect it more if they were just honest about them wanting to be number 1 at any cost instead of pretending to be the hero of game developers.
There was absolutely nothing whatsoever wrong with Valve calling the Metro situation unfair, and trying to make it about them, as *if* they're the one's at fault here, just gives cover for EGS and Sweeney to continue to act horrible.