• Tim Sweeney- If Valve commits to permanent 88/12 cut, we will stop exclusivity
    281 replies, posted
Steam: *does it* EGS: Oh right, our features aren't done yet, we are going to continue do it for a while more ok? Also, why he insists so much on this when he isn't a dev of an indie / small / middle company, but one of the big AAA ones that also have their own Store? How about stop treating your workers like slaves? Has Valve ever released info on how much cost running Steam BTW? I don't think they really need that 30% when they already gets cuts on other parts like the market. Still, if people really wants to get more profit there are already two places: GOG and Itch.io, they just need more visibility.
Well that's one way to put it. We'd need an official statement from Gabe to address this question.
Having Valve take an unfair share of developers' revenues on top of the publishers makes the issue worse not better. Also I don't care about any Steam features that don't have to do with buying games.
Also, the 12% cut is just marketing bullshit. Epic will increase it as soon as they have established their monopoly or when the Fortnite money is gone.
Why is 30% unreasonable? For that cut you don't have to worry about file hosting and content distrubution, payment processing, account security and privacy regulations, creating a storefront from scratch, social features and mod distrubution, and that's barely scratching everything else Steamworks provides (matchmaking, etc.).
Think of it as what Uber did. Offered great, attractive prices for costumers and drivers, with small taxes, then once they've established their market they increased their cut and the prices. They had loss after loss for 5 years or so and once they had a good market base they started to maximize their profits to make up for the money lost. Same thing with Epic.
Do you have a source on that? Because almost every other distribution platform (not just for games) does it for less.
Every other distribution platform doesn't have 1/4 of the features Steam has. No mod support, achievements, community forums, user reviews, workshop, matchmaking services. I think the problem here is not the revenue sharing as we once discussed a while ago. If the 88% revenue for publishers is better than Steam's 70%/65% (Epic), then they'd think which platform was best. Should they give up features and the comfort we have on Steam for more money or should they just release the game in it where they'll have good sales and a solid player base? It's a reasonable decision, but oferring $2mi for, e.g., a crowdfunded game so they can release their game on X store first is bad. If it was Steam soing that we'd all come down and complain to Gabe and Valve. And they'd listen. They wouldn't ignore it like Sweeney. Also let's not forget that no one is saying Steam is perfect. Valve has their flaws but right now they're the only store that actually listens to community feedback.
tbh if I was developer and was releasing game - I would go with steam even if it means getting less cut. It feels like it has more coverage and more daily users, I only use uplay and origin when launching game via steam. That is unless of course I was offered 2 million by Epic
Why is it bad if it means the developers make their budget back faster, and the amount of extra effort the potential player needs to go through is minimal? Haven't consoles, TV networks and music distribution platforms been doing this for years?
Tim is slowly reaching Randy and Cliffy levels of dickheadness Imagine using the "Steam had 15 years so give us some time"excuse at literally anything else. Imagine a car or a house that has no features everyone expects, and when you ask about it the answer you get from the guy making it is "Our competitors had all the good stuff from 15 years ago, give us time and we will add them later"
Worth mentioning for the point of these discussions that 30% drops to 25% past $10 million, and 20% beyond $50.
because people paid for it to be released on Steam and not on Epic.
itch.io don't appear to have a cart, and I don't see many complaints over it
People are pissed because selling the game off to a publisher is a gigantic shit in the face of all those people who funded the game out of their pockets in the first place.
At this point, as much as Valve has annoyed me in the past, I almost wish they responded to this blatant dick-waving game Epic is trying to play, and just responded by showing what you get with Steam that you don't get with Epic. And more importantly, how it affects consumers, and developers in an equal way. It seems pretty clear to me Epic cares about neither.
No, but they'd still have a nigh-on stranglehold on the PC games market, on top of the tons of other ways they have to monetize Steam users and no public shareholders to appease, so I don't exactly see what the problem would be. And this is on top of the prodigious cash reserve I'm sure they've stockpiled since they stopped caring back in 2013. It's not like everyone at Valve isn't already set for life even if they don't make another dime ever again. They already live in an auteur wonderland where cash is no object (except other auteurs have the tendency to actually do things). What do they care?
Imagine having $2 million to bribe a company to put their game on your store for time-limited exclusivity but not having a shopping cart feature in that online store. Epic deserves praise for their bold experiment: EGS is breaking new ground by being a store in early access.
The thing is: We don't know if 12% is actually feasible. But we can't assume that it is. Of course it would be great if it is. But Epic themselves admitted that 12% isn't that sustainable in developing countries. gog takes 30% and they were barely making any money last year. for example...? You said "almost every other" so you better come up with a huge list.
I'm going to second the request for some actual evidence to back up the claim that Valve couldn't operate on a 12% margin in most regions. Valve has been wildly profitable at the current pricing scheme, which on their biggest sellers is only a 20% cut, and that's in spite of not only infrastructure costs and paying their employees, but also a variety of dead-end projects that they've poured money into over the years. Payment fees are one thing, but Valve is not hurting for cash by any means. I'm not defending Epic, but don't say a 12% rate is completely unsustainable if you don't actually know one way or the other.
Has Valve ever lowered themselves to the level that Sweeney is at?
30% cut is the industry standard for years, whether it is reasonable or not is up for debate but considering all the feature Steam have offered to developers and customers we can see the 30% actually goes toward providing a better service. The cost isn't just maintaining the service, but also improve it. On the other hand EGS's 12% is built upon Fortnite money and a barebone storefront that couldn't even provide a lot of the basic features. Plus the way Epic is covering all sales up to a certain point so that developer could profit even if literally no one buys their game is definitely not sustainable. Digital storefronts might be able to operate on a 12% cut, but believing Epic to be doing it "for the developer" is delusional, and the way they're going with it does not help customers a bit. Reminder Steam is not stopping developer to sell games on their own or other services even when they are putting their games on Steam, unlike EGS.
itch.io is also doing it's own thing, and is not trying to undercut the biggest store on the market using dodgy bushiness tactics because of a personal vendetta. Are you seriously saying that they should just stop turning a profit because "They already have money why does they care?" What the fuck are you on about? The sole reason that a business exist is to provide a service, and earn a profit. Steam exist to make a profit, Epic Store exist to make a profit. Except one is make a profit by being a consumer friendly store, and the other is using shitty tactics to make a profit in the false pretense of being a good boy helping developers. Guess why peoples are mad? Also, as a side note : I'm pretty sure i saw someone saying that 4a games self-published Metro, and it probably got edited out cause i can't find it anymore sadly. Metro Exodus is published by Deep-Silver. 4a Games will not see the money from that "better cut", Deep-Silver will. Epic is only buying out games that will be successful, not games from a no-name indie developer that will barely recoup it's cost. Wanna support small developers? Buy their game on the Humble Bundle store, or on their own site. Don't expect Epic to help actual small developers. Steam give anyone a chance to be seen, but sadly, this has a cost. Don't forget that an indie game like Factorio has both Steam Key, and Website key. You can either buy it on steam and give them a cut, or buy it directly on their website to give them 100% of your money. neither stores is your friend, but at least Steam let ALL the small developers a chance to get seen, even if the game itself is not a moneymaker for them.
holy shit. saving this forever
I do. Because I don't think they can really top Valve at that point.
No but they don't allow you to resell your product on another storefront for a lower cost. I'm pretty sure DLC also has to go through them. Now I know Valve won't do this but I'd actually really like to see them call the bluff. Fortnite on Steam would be novel
With less operating costs than Steam, the Epic Games Store is barely profitable. Steam has much higher operational costs than the Epic Games Store, meaning a 12% cut would be a net loss on every sale. This is Sweeney saying he wants Valve to drain themselves to keep up with his companies dirty, shitty practices. Operating with the same 30% share, GoG barely turned a profit. While they have less consumers they also have less overhead costs. Physical game retailers couldn't keep operating at the 30% share they operate at, hence why many, like GameStop, supplemented with used games sales with absurd trade in values because that was entirely profit for them. And even that wasn't working for GameStop so they again supplemented it with collectibles and extortionist credit card deals. And even then they're not really cutting it. And they have been having these problems since before digital distribution became a major method for console game sales which was the big thing for them. Epic can only pull off what they're doing because of Fortnite. I strongly, strongly doubt the Epic Games Store is even close to turning a profit on the investment in to the project at all. Between the unsustainable revenue share and the sales guarantee and the payouts for developer exclusivity, there is no possibility that Epic is going to be in the black on this for a long time. They are basically just hoping for Valve to break before they do.
That 30%, as mentioned countless times, is industry standard and has been. It was before Steam and still is. It was the standard when the indie game scene became the thing it is today. If that 30% were unreasonable the indie game scene never would have existed.
30% Is industry standards across tons of fields im so tired of reading people’s post says where they fail to get that
I mean if Valve does it, then that basically kills any reason to use any other storefronts. Not only will Steam have more consumer facing features, but it will be more pro developer, which is really the only angle that Epic and Discord have right now. It would also stop publishers from jumping ship to Epic, because there would be no reason to take Epic's money if they're guaranteed more sales on Steam with the same cut. Honestly, I don't see why Valve just doesn't do it. They have the capital and the large user base to keep a cut like this sustainable. This isn't like GOG's situation where such a cut would be detrimental to their operations due to having a niche audience. I really don't get why people would be against Valve doing such a move.
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