Quoting: TheRiddickYeah %30 is pretty high for a DIGITAL GOODs based store. Who knows if Valve will change this policy. It does hurt indie devs the most who can't achieve high sales numbers to get discounted 'valve tax rate'.

Why is it always "this is against Indies"? Valheim is a small indie title and sold bonkers numbers. Avengers is a AAA blockbuster with a HUGE name behind it (the biggest running movie franchise!) and it bombed hard.

Valve wants to sell games. Why should they make a difference between AAA and Indie? Money is money.

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Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: kuhpunktYou continue bringing up the 2018 incident and not what happened after. That seems disingenous.

What happened after? You mean the Covid-19 pandemic? Lots of things happened after, are any of them relevant?
Some "things that happened after" may even have been changes to the Steam store, but all in a sort of edge-tinkering sort of way as far as I can tell. I haven't seen any plausible argument or evidence that they would have nearly as big an impact as many people's documented experience of the algorithm change's impact.

He brings up the 2018 incident again and again, where some devs complained about the algorithm. I can't make a judgment how justified this was.

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-12-05-valve-offers-explanation-for-october-drop-in-steam-traffic [External Link]

In 2019 they made big changes again...

Valve also points out that it got feedback that the old algorithms felt too biased towards the store's most popular games, and really didn't feel very personalized as a result.

https://comicbook.com/gaming/news/steam-store-discover-update-features/ [External Link]

He doesn't bring that up and behaves like the 2018 thing is still the status quo. Why?

They made further changes down the line

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/593110/view/1714119088658959583 [External Link]

And they just released the latest store change a few weeks ago.

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Quoting: scaine

Quoting: kuhpunkt

Quoting: scaine

Quoting: omer666

Quoting: Liam Dawe

Quoting: toorI feel now that my money should rather go to Valve than to them for sure.

They haven't been a part of Humble Bundle for years.

Rosen and Graham have been CEO and COO of Humble Bundle up until 2019, and are still in the company today as "advisors" after stepping down. Source [External Link]

I think the confusion is that Wolfire sold Humble Bundle to IGN in 2017, even though the CEO's of Wolfire stayed on the Humble board as advisors, while also being CEO of Wolfire. A bizarre arrangement.

Quoting: scaineThese aren't popular games, but they're solid games that used to get exposure. Now they don't. So the 30% cut by Valve, for these devs, is particularly insulting, because Valve is adding precisely no value. Indeed, many of these indies saw (for the first time, ever, over years) greater sales via Itch, than on Steam.

The algorithm is a real problem indeed, but it doesn't mean the cut is unfair. People these days want to get everything for free and they realise later on why it was so cheap. Steam does take 30% but they inject it back in functionality, infrastructure and (sometimes open source) development.
Epic spend most of their money into buying exclusives, which are AAA games. In the end both consumers and indie developers get screwed but no one seems to care.

I'm tired of arguing this on behalf of the various indies I follow on Twitter, but I'll say it one more time - these Indies used to (past tense) get great value from Valve, by way of large customer base and a tiny bit of exposure to engage that customer base. As of the 2018 change, that is no longer the case.

There's simply no point in justifying a 30% cut by promoting services that will never be used... because no-one knows these games exist, since the algorithm doesn't give any exposure. It used to be a tiny sliver. Now it's not even that.

Personally, I suspect that Valve realised that a non-curated store was a terrible mistake - it led to uninteresting, fringe and plain "bad" titles being surfaced on its front page. Therefore this is simply a way to push those titles to the bottom of pile without actually taking the bad press that shutting them out would generate.

Just a shame it pole-axed the indies at the same time.

Andyou still speak in past terms, still referencing the 2018 stuff.

And now you talk abot the non-curated store that led to "uninteresting, fringe and plain "bad" titles being surfaced on its front page" - what? How many of those unsatisfied devs are actually the ones that people complain about?

What's your point. What are you asking me? I'll do my best to answer on behalf of the devs I'm now apparently defending.

You continue bringing up the 2018 incident and not what happened after. That seems disingenous.

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Quoting: Guest

Quoting: kuhpunkt

Quoting: Guest

Quoting: kuhpunkt

Quoting: GuestAre you trying to say that one company to rule them all is....good? If you honestly can't think of why that situation is harmful, then I suggest you do a bit of digging around on what happens when there isn't competition. From what I hear, Internet connectivity options in the USA is a good example to start with.

He said the situation at the moment is bad. No company at the moment is the one that rules everything.

Sidestepping the issue there. Valve have far too much control over gaming. Any one company with the amount of control that they have, is bad. It doesn't matter if Valve themselves aren't trying to abuse the situation (and they most certainly are not altruistic with their intentions either of course), the situation is not good.

--edit:
I think this is relevant, but do look up the requirements for PAX Online 2020. It was a requirement for indie games to be on Steam. As in you could not even put a submission to the event if the game wasn't on Steam. That's....not good.

I'm not sidestepping in the slightest. I don't see that issue at the moment. Gaming makes billions. Everybody can develop and publish games now without any hurdle. It's never been better.

Never been better doesn't mean it's as good as it should be.

What should it be like then? And if it's as terrible as he said, what was it like 20 or 30 years ago?

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Quoting: Guest

Quoting: kuhpunkt

Quoting: GuestAre you trying to say that one company to rule them all is....good? If you honestly can't think of why that situation is harmful, then I suggest you do a bit of digging around on what happens when there isn't competition. From what I hear, Internet connectivity options in the USA is a good example to start with.

He said the situation at the moment is bad. No company at the moment is the one that rules everything.

Sidestepping the issue there. Valve have far too much control over gaming. Any one company with the amount of control that they have, is bad. It doesn't matter if Valve themselves aren't trying to abuse the situation (and they most certainly are not altruistic with their intentions either of course), the situation is not good.

--edit:
I think this is relevant, but do look up the requirements for PAX Online 2020. It was a requirement for indie games to be on Steam. As in you could not even put a submission to the event if the game wasn't on Steam. That's....not good.

I'm not sidestepping in the slightest. I don't see that issue at the moment. Gaming makes billions. Everybody can develop and publish games now without any hurdle. It's never been better.

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Quoting: GuestAre you trying to say that one company to rule them all is....good? If you honestly can't think of why that situation is harmful, then I suggest you do a bit of digging around on what happens when there isn't competition. From what I hear, Internet connectivity options in the USA is a good example to start with.

He said the situation at the moment is bad. No company at the moment is the one that rules everything.

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Quoting: GuestValve need competition against Steam. The reality is that it's the main place to get most games, and it's the primary point of purchase for just about anything. I've seen a good many comments on this very site that if a game isn't on Steam, they won't buy it. If a developer wants a game to be successful, they've practically no choice but to put in on Steam (exceptions exist of course, but for the vast majority this is quite true).

Valve have far too much influence as a distribution platform. It's not healthy for the gaming ecosystem. They can pretty much do what they want with impunity, and that's really not good.

At about this point I'm sure several people will be foaming at the mouth and already typing out something furiously, but at no point above did I say Valve were bad or evil. They've reached this position by being good at the business. My point is that the situation is bad, and the situation is harmful to gaming, particularly on GNU/Linux.

On a parallel note, the flood of crap on Steam is really harmful to developers, and customers too. Part of the reason I continue to support GOL is for discovering nice games. Something like Vaporum I'd never have seen were it not covered on this site. Valve's so-called "algorithm" is basically just a way for them not to have a hand in any sort of store curation. While there are arguments for and against that, if Valve don't have a hand in it, they shouldn't take money for it. That 30% cut of theirs is, I believe, too much.

The real solution is some competition to force the market to be a little more friendly. The problem with that now is being really difficult to get into the market: Epic did it by spending an awful lot of money to get exclusives, and personally I think they botched it (to say nothing of completely ignoring GNU/Linux).

How is it unhealthy for the gaming ecosystem? How is the situation bad exactly? How is it harmful to gaming?

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Quoting: x_wingBTW, seems that GOG takes a similar cut from devs and had financial problems not long ago. Anyway, what a greedy bastards!

That's the thing. They take 30%. They broke it down in a documentary. Operating costs, servers, transfer fees, wages and all that crap... it was 20% from the sale. 10% of each sale was their actual profit.

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Quoting: scaine

Quoting: omer666

Quoting: Liam Dawe

Quoting: toorI feel now that my money should rather go to Valve than to them for sure.

They haven't been a part of Humble Bundle for years.

Rosen and Graham have been CEO and COO of Humble Bundle up until 2019, and are still in the company today as "advisors" after stepping down. Source [External Link]

I think the confusion is that Wolfire sold Humble Bundle to IGN in 2017, even though the CEO's of Wolfire stayed on the Humble board as advisors, while also being CEO of Wolfire. A bizarre arrangement.

Quoting: scaineThese aren't popular games, but they're solid games that used to get exposure. Now they don't. So the 30% cut by Valve, for these devs, is particularly insulting, because Valve is adding precisely no value. Indeed, many of these indies saw (for the first time, ever, over years) greater sales via Itch, than on Steam.

The algorithm is a real problem indeed, but it doesn't mean the cut is unfair. People these days want to get everything for free and they realise later on why it was so cheap. Steam does take 30% but they inject it back in functionality, infrastructure and (sometimes open source) development.
Epic spend most of their money into buying exclusives, which are AAA games. In the end both consumers and indie developers get screwed but no one seems to care.

I'm tired of arguing this on behalf of the various indies I follow on Twitter, but I'll say it one more time - these Indies used to (past tense) get great value from Valve, by way of large customer base and a tiny bit of exposure to engage that customer base. As of the 2018 change, that is no longer the case.

There's simply no point in justifying a 30% cut by promoting services that will never be used... because no-one knows these games exist, since the algorithm doesn't give any exposure. It used to be a tiny sliver. Now it's not even that.

Personally, I suspect that Valve realised that a non-curated store was a terrible mistake - it led to uninteresting, fringe and plain "bad" titles being surfaced on its front page. Therefore this is simply a way to push those titles to the bottom of pile without actually taking the bad press that shutting them out would generate.

Just a shame it pole-axed the indies at the same time.

Andyou still speak in past terms, still referencing the 2018 stuff.

And now you talk abot the non-curated store that led to "uninteresting, fringe and plain "bad" titles being surfaced on its front page" - what? How many of those unsatisfied devs are actually the ones that people complain about?

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Quoting: scaine

Quoting: kuhpunkt

Quoting: scaine

Quoting: kuhpunkt

Quoting: scaineThe same argument and frustration is often voiced around Play and Apple's store - they take their 30% cut but unless you magically put out the next minecraft, factorio or limbo, you're gonna languish with pitiful sales until you go out of business.

And the solution would be what? Everybody is always screaming for CoMPetItiOn... and when they have that and lose against other more popular titles, it sucks. Go figure.

The point is how they get popular. If the algorithm was fairer for new titles, then indies would have a better chance at leveraging Steam and becoming the next big thing. But since it doesn't, they never hit the front-page and the same tired (but popular) games are constantly regurgitated on the carousel and in the discovery queues.

There's also a huge amount of opacity around how that algorithm works. It used to be "okay" for indies, but a couple of years ago (maybe 2018?) it changed, and multiple indies saw their revenues destroyed. They weren't even being surfaced during sales. It put some studios out of business.

You can't force being popular. No algorithm in the world can change that. It used be be "okay" for indies, because there was less competition. Less games that would take away your attention.

Valve already tries what they can with Game Festivals and whatnot, where they highlight hundreds of games.

Do people complain about Bandcamp or iTunes or Amazon, because their unknown albums and movies aren't able to compete with Taylor Swift and Star Wars?

The algorithm did change that. It's nothing to do with competition. Sure, you can't force being popular, but even 1000 sales for an indie were important and they got those sales, year after year, sustainably. Then the algorithm changed (devs were informed by Valve that this was happening, but no details as to what it meant) and 1000+ sales turned into less than 100.

So, multiple indies reporting that their sales literally fell off a cliff, as a result of this one change.

These aren't popular games, but they're solid games that used to get exposure. Now they don't. So the 30% cut by Valve, for these devs, is particularly insulting, because Valve is adding precisely no value. Indeed, many of these indies saw (for the first time, ever, over years) greater sales via Itch, than on Steam.

Yeah, and they change the algorithm again and they constantly tune it and they have the Steam Labs (they just released the new store to hopefully improve visibility), but when you are one in 50000 games, how is Steam supposed to give everybody the same exposure?

And if they aren't happy on Steam, they can just leave and be successful elsewhere, like Itch. Free market.

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