I rewatch the YouTube movie every so often, been waiting for this game since I saw the announcement quite a long way back. Glad it's still going ahead!

View this comment - View article - View full comments

I don't see how any of these points are exclusive to Steam, nor how they are as damaging as this suit claims.

We say that Valve Corporation imposes price parity clauses that restrict and prevent game developers from offering better prices on PC-games on rival platforms, limiting consumer choice and harming competition.

I would be interested to see if anything comes from this claim. I highly doubt it happens to the extent this suit claims given that you can find find games at varying prices on and off Steam.

It is also worth mentioning that in some countries, games with exclusivity deals on the Epic Games Store (meaning they got paid up-front, from a storefront which takes a lower cut) can cost more than on Steam, who take a higher cut. I don't think the price goes down once the exclusivity deal ends, either.

Tying: We say that the restrictions Valve Corporation imposes, that mean the add-on content for games must also be purchased from Steam, restricts competition in the market.

I don't fault Valve for this, personally. I think this falls under the umbrella of DRM. But if a developer wanted to give this sort of freedom I'm not sure all of the responsibility here is up to Valve. How would Epic feel if people could buy DLC on Steam on a hefty sale? Likewise, I'm not sure Valve would like people buying some potentially paid-exclusive DLC on the Epic Games Store. And to top it all off, I think publishers are happy to let people buy a game's DLC twice.

I think this is a wider-industry thing. At worst, Valve is being passive here. But there is nothing stopping developers from offering keys on other stores for DLC or even the full game. Anyone who has bought an indie game on itch.io knows it is not uncommon to get a Steam key in addition to the content you bought, so that you don't have to buy it again.

I also think this is distinctly different from cross-console DLC for example, since on PC you have direct access to files (albeit usually marred with DRM).

Excessive pricing: We argue that Valve Corporation has imposed an excessive commission, of up to 30%, charged to publishers, that resulted in inflated prices on its Steam platform.

I don't think Valve do this to inflate the price of games on Steam. If they did, they wouldn't negotiate with developers and publishers.

The 30% tax is an industry standard, but that that makes it okay by default. It does have various benefits however. Compare the quality of the Steam Client to that of even competitors that take 30%, not to mention competitors that take less.

It has also been mentioned that charging 30% makes offering physical Steam Wallet gift cards far more financially viable. This may be exaggerated on Valve's part, true, but I recall Epic had trouble offering gift cards because their cut was too low.

Epic tried the lower-cut model and demonstrated that it didn't pay off. Whether that was due to incompetence, greed, or because the cut was simply too low to reinvest properly, I can't say. But Valve have shown, in my opinion, that they invest the approx 30% cut they take very wisely. Free online gameplay, free Cloud Saves, Remote Play Anywhere/Together, investments in open-source (Proton, DXVK, vkd3d-proton, funding KDE's Wayland work, throwing weight behind standardizing Wayland protocols instead of only making private ones (GameScope has some private protocols for now)), investments in hardware (previously the Steam Controller and Steam Link, currently the Valve Index and Steam Deck).

What I am getting at is, it is much easier to see where the 30% cut is going with Valve compared to other platforms. How much of that 30% is pure profit and how much do they actually need to invest in Steam is anyone's guess.

I believe Microsoft take a lower cut on the Microsoft Store as well, but it's easier for Microsoft to take that loss than it is for Epic.

---------

We believe Valve Corporation has been unfairly shutting out competition for PC games and in-game content, which has meant that UK customers have paid too much for these products.

I believe that Valve hold a dominant position simply because they offer a better service than their competitors. I like supporting charity bundles on itch.io, I like buying games for preservation on GOG, but I buy games on Steam because I prefer the platform.

Even if Valve lowered their cut and allowed cross-store DLC, I would still go to Steam. Even though it's not unusual for a game to be cheaper on GOG, I still buy on Steam. I like my Cloud Saves, all-in-one co-op, ease of use on Steam Deck (GOG and Itch could do this too if they had better native Linux clients).

I don't feel like I've ever overpaid for a game on Steam or gotten a bad deal. Even though it is noted that they're going after Sony too, if they really think people in the UK have paid too much because of these practices, they'd need to go after a lot more than just Valve and Sony. If this is as much of a problem as they pose, then every major digital distribution platform has this problem.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: PenglingJust throwing this out there, but have you tried a different HDMI cable? I know that the Switch is super-picky about those, and it wouldn't especially surprise me if the Steam Deck also is.

I didn't know this, I have tried a few different ones but not with the intent of fixing the problem, I just happen to use different hubs and cables with my Steam Deck through general usage. But I'll keep that in mind, maybe that's why the Switch is so picky. Although I thought the Switch one was actually supplied by Nintendo, but it's been many years and I may be remembering wrong :grin:

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Currently waiting for SteamOS Preview to fix the issue where unplugging from an external display will not turn the internal display back on. The point of Preview is to find and expect bugs, but someone already reported the issue and Valve are aware of it, so just patiently waiting now.

CEC features on Preview are also hit and miss, currently with the latest Preview they aren't working for me at all (I reported this in a comment already on ValveSoftware/SteamOS) but to be fair, CEC rarely works with the Switch (the only other hardware I've tested with CEC support), and the Steam Deck Dock has so many other problems with my TV alone (even on Stable) that at this point I'm not sure if it's Valve's fault.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Native games should work via Steam with the Steam Linux Runtime (and UMU if it has any support for native games). I don't understand how you could make them not work via Steam. Through GOG or something, I guess they could limit what executables could run maybe?

Although if they really are spouting some No-Desktop Mode, they must be either running everything through Steam as a Steam Shortcut, or they have GOG (Galaxy 2.0? Lutris? Bottles? No idea) and so on running through their own custom skin. In that case, if GOG is running via Wine, I guess that would be why native titles wouldn't work - Also, why would you buy a PC gaming handheld without a Desktop Mode!? It's one of the killer features of the Steam Deck!

Maybe they're running the Steam Client via Wine, dear God...

I'm not impressed that they are advertising support for the Epic Games Store at all, let alone above Steam. This sounds like a thinly-veiled crypto device, but time will tell I suppose.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Quoting: toru9999just upgraded, the flatpak and kernel version remain unchanged...so much for "security".

Is the kernel entirely unchanged? Valve will keep the same kernel version but they will backport lots of patches, the Preview channel changes it reasonably regularly. EDIT: I should've clarified, the version string may be mostly the same, but there will be an updated hash.

I wonder if maybe some other Arch packages were changed?

On the other hand, maybe they're referring to Steam Client security changes. Since many SteamOS updates are actually just Steam Client updates, except when they specifically note changes to drivers, the Arch snapshot, etc.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

Here's hoping there's no Anti-Cheat nonsense, even if it's got Proton support enabled this just adds yet another lifespan to the game (not to mention more Epic Games junk).

I'll keep a cautious eye on this, but at worst, we can stick to the tried and true ARCADE GAME SERIES: PAC-MAN [External Link] (there are better ways to play Pac-Man, but this is convenient and legal.)

View this comment - View article - View full comments

It's nice to see, but Fallout 4? Yuck. I'd rather see further stability improvements (Steam Deck and otherwise) to the classic games, as well as Fallout 3 and, the best but most unlikely, New Vegas.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

This kind of Anti-Cheat is just another reason to avoid online multiplayer games. I didn't play games with them on Windows, and I'm certainly not going to play them on Linux.

View this comment - View article - View full comments

My library's already fully decked out, so nothing for me this time around. I think only two games from my wishlist are on sale from this sale, guess I'm not really into this category. :smile:

View this comment - View article - View full comments