Notch on Steam "I worry about the PC as a gaming platform becoming owned by a single entity that tak
303 replies, posted
oh well as long as it's not a [i]total[/i] monopoly
Digital game distribution is where I'm ok with steam having most of the market. I'd really hate to have 50 games on steam, 20 on origin and 10 on whatever else platform. Very hard to manage. Just like with CDs, 3 at my house, 5 at friend's place, however more at parents' place.
If you think 30% commission is a lot, you haven't been to real life yet. Most brokered shit is more than that and can even go over 50%. Now THAT is a lot. 30 percent is nothing. Sure you might not want to give away 30% when your game hits a goldmine, but most games do not, thus giving 30% in exchange for much more sales is what any smart developer would do. Steam doesn't even force you to be exclusive so you could publish on all platforms possible.
[QUOTE=weedfart;36973311]Nice to see so many bright and up coming economists, Steam is for all intents and purposes a monopoly on the service of the digital distribution of games - physical copies in another market don't really come into play apart from defining a price ceiling on cross platform games, everything else is fair game.
Notch is right to be worried in this case, Valve are a business and despite the fact they don't answer to shareholders like a company their size usually would - they still are a business and trust me they act like one. (euros -> usd conversion?? any takers no? what about AUD?)
A 30% commission on what is essentially bandwidth for one time purchases from customers is terrible depending on your game size and price, let's take an example for the cheapest game I can find with a moderate size, Orcs must Die! which from what I gather is roughly 2GB in size, it's on sale now which means that at £2.24 - steam have a) enough profit from 30% of that to cover the costs of bandwidth and their fair share of actually distributing the game and b) enough to pay the developer.
Let's do some math and it turns out that it's ~ 34 pence per gigabyte (being generous and not taking out distribution costs) that it costs steam to provide. Now with those prices on bandwidth, it's not exactly hard to figure out why BIG developers are hesitant to distribute their games with steam - with it being on average these days about £40 for a game that's 10gb in size that's £8+ of distribution costs per sale.
At $25 per minecraft sale, that's roughly $8.50 per sale taken off notch for a game that has a tiny file size. Ask yourself why should he put it on steam if a) it's already selling $300,000 units a day and b) the cut steam are asking is ridiculous.
tl:dr; valve arent god and youre all fuckin idiots if you think third party developers arent right in being skeptical about placing their games on steam, the only reason you think their service is personal and oh so amazing is because of a fucking clever business model.[/QUOTE]
If you seriously think digital distribution doesn't have to compete with retail console games, you're an idiot. In the digital distribution world, yes, Steam is the biggest kid on the block, but in the larger realm of game sales, they only account for a fraction of the whole. If their service didn't provide as much or more value than the Xbox 360 or PS3, nobody would bother with it.
As I said previously, it's not uncommon for sales commission to take as much as 50%. In the music industry, a publisher might take as much as 90% of a sale IF YOU'RE LUCKY. It isn't rare for "signed" bands to declare bankruptcy a few years in.
I never said and I never would say Valve was perfect. However, implying that Steam is something to regard with contempt or suspicion is fucking stupid.
[QUOTE=Matt-;36979634]Valve don't have a total monopoly, you're free to buy your games from Origin or GOG or anywhere else. It's just the service Valve provide is what the users want.[/QUOTE]
I'm not saying they have a total monopoly, I'm asking why you'd want them to.
Valve was kind enough to make a nod of him to include a paper mâché version of his head, in tf2, and now he goes and bad mouths steam... LOGIC! When someone's nice to you, you go and bad mouth their entire business, because you think yours is better and make a faulty excuse saying they will get all the money
Since we are still talking bad about notch I would like to say I remember when minecraft was really small. When notch actually went to /v/ to market his game and how for a while /v/ and other small internet communities were his only source of income. He was actually liked and would actually give out content. Then as soon as he started making money he said fuck you /v/ (and work) and even makes fun of them now even though they are the reason he got off of the ground in the first place. Because of this I think Notch isn't just lazy but a bad person. But since his game is as mainstream as COD now he will be swimming in money for the rest of his life no matter what he does.
[QUOTE=Ybbats;36953371]I never said he wasn't a lazy fuck, in fact I love him more because he is a lazy fuck.[/QUOTE]
Holy shit are you the worst notch fanboy I have ever seen.
[QUOTE=imasillypiggy;36982191]Since we are still talking bad about notch I would like to say I remember when minecraft was really small. When notch actually went to /v/ to market his game and how for a while /v/ and other small internet communities were his only source of income. He was actually liked and would actually give out content. Then as soon as he started making money he said fuck you /v/ (and work) and even makes fun of them now even though they are the reason he got off of the ground in the first place. Because of this I think Notch isn't just lazy but a bad person. But since his game is as mainstream as COD now he will be swimming in money for the rest of his life no matter what he does.[/QUOTE]
Will he be happy though?
He is pretty rotund..
Irony in the ratings.
Minecraft: Virtual Boxes
Notch on Steam: Death by Boxes
did anybody in this entire thread even read the article or did you just dismiss it and rate dumb after reading the title because "durr notch is dumb"
[editline]29th July 2012[/editline]
he never even said anyting negative about valve
[editline]29th July 2012[/editline]
[QUOTE=Jack Trades;36944775]Notch says that Steam sucks[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=what Notch actually;36943768]I love Steam[/QUOTE]
this thread in a nutshell
[QUOTE=Melonious Monk;36980369]If you seriously think digital distribution doesn't have to compete with retail console games, you're an idiot. In the digital distribution world, yes, Steam is the biggest kid on the block, but in the larger realm of game sales, they only account for a fraction of the whole[/QUOTE]
and in the even larger realm of general software sales, steam is an even smaller fraction. why, if you set the bar low enough, steam is barely successful at all
So why wont he release it on steam AND on other game stores at the same time?
Most probably because he wants full control on his game's distribution - which is fair enough, but is mildly inconvenient for us peons
[QUOTE=superstepa;36991123]So why wont he release it on steam AND on other game stores at the same time?[/QUOTE]
I think it could be because for example updating(not like he ever does) the game would be much more cumbersome. I've heard steam does not allow external patching from the game. Not sure how true that is though. If that's true, the updates are delivered late since Valve first has to approve them before they go live.
The real reason I assume is because notch could be feeling insecure for one reason or another. Right now he has an awfully popular product that he has full control over. Publishing on other distribution platforms could "take" some control away which notch doesn't like.
Or he simply doesn't want to give up 30% from sales which makes a lot of sense.
[QUOTE=itisjuly;36992531]I think it could be because for example updating(not like he ever does) the game would be much more cumbersome.[B] I've heard steam does not allow external patching from the game[/B]. Not sure how true that is though. If that's true, the updates are delivered late since Valve first has to approve them before they go live.
The real reason I assume is because notch could be feeling insecure for one reason or another. Right now he has an awfully popular product that he has full control over. Publishing on other distribution platforms could "take" some control away which notch doesn't like.
Or he simply doesn't want to give up 30% from sales which makes a lot of sense.[/QUOTE]
Every MMO uses their own launcher
My take on Notch:
2008-2010: Notch is a pretty cool guy, he's been making a lot of progress for an indie dev.
2011: Okay, get your shit together Notch.
2012: What the fuck are you doing?
[QUOTE=superstepa;36991123]So why wont he release it on steam AND on other game stores at the same time?[/QUOTE]
Minecraft is now mainstream enough that something like steam would only hurt his sales since steam would have to take a percentage of each sell.
So we're all hating on Notch now? okay then, whatever Facepunch.
[QUOTE=nehkz;36994753]So we're all hating on Notch now? okay then, whatever Facepunch.[/QUOTE]
I like how people act like this is a random decision we made.
[QUOTE=legolover122;36994958]I like how people act like this is a random decision we made.[/QUOTE]
"Alright Facepunch, how do we feel about Notch today?"
"Roll a D20!"
*1*
"THE DICE HAVE SPOKEN!"
I guess the lasting lesson is money corrupts.
He speaks of worrying about steam eventually turning into an evil empire, when he himself has been corrupted by his millions.
:iron-e:
[QUOTE=nehkz;36994753]So we're all hating on Notch now? okay then, whatever Facepunch.[/QUOTE]
This isn't new. Ever since Notch decided to start taking vacations totalling half a year rather than fix the game and add the mod support he promised literally years ago, FP has been unhappy with him. Yes, there are a great many Minecraft fans here; doesn't mean they're Notch fans.
what's with fat people not being able to keep their opinions to themselves as of late
fat people giving out their unthought opinions, but it's fine since everyone here is a Valve fanboy. If a thread has the word "notch" in it it should be blocked since most of the time it because a 10+ page thread with spammed posts about valve > mojang to just be locked later on.
[QUOTE=Elspin;36978835]It was kinda shitty from the start, I mean the first 40 posts or so were the most rabid of valve fanboys doing a total 180 on their opinion of Notch and raging hard that anyone would insult their beloved steam :v:
Don't get me wrong here, I use steam all the time and for the most part it's great, but there's certainly tonnes of criticisms and Notch's criticism here is 100% valid, why would you ever want a single company to have a complete and total monopoly, even if a company is perfect at the moment it could turn for the worse later.[/QUOTE]
He's got a point. This thread's contents (in a table):
[table]
[tr]
[td][b]Content[/b][/td]
[td][b]Rating[/b][/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]The article, posted in OP[/td]
[td]Not rated[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Rabid Valve famboyism/defense, the usual shit that happens when Valve's mentioned[/td]
[td]Like I said, shit.[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Discussion on whether or not a 30% cut is OK[/td]
[td]As most of the posts ignore the fact that the 30% figure is pretty much pulled out of someone's ass, it's useless[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Loadsamoney on page 1[/td]
[td]As much as I love Loadsamoney, it doesn't really contribute[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Discussion on whether or not anything can compete with Steam[/td]
[td]Occasionally reasonable, but generally gets a flat "no", which is both wrong and unconstructive[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Argument on definition of "monopoly"[/td]
[td]Automatically shit because it's an argument not a discussion[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Constantly bringing in brick and mortar stores[/td]
[td]Not rated - I'm having a hard time determining when it's good and when it's not, so I'm not touching it[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Big thing on how much people really should care about what Notch says about this sort of thing[/td]
[td]Not rated, as this is entirely opinion based (whereas other things aren't quite so much so)[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]
In conclusion, mostly shit with a few good points. But just because you find a diamond in a pile of shit doesn't stop it from being a pile of shit.
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