Why Everyone LOVES Valve and HATES Epic

As long as STEAM and ultimately GabeN, won't change into some kind of villain, we will stick with Valve. Then we will just move on... Things change as everything in life and neither Steam nor Epic will change that

I mainly play on gog

Epic: we want to fight monopoly of Vable by forcing developers to release games on Epic only and nowhere else

epic is trash cuz of its ui and support, the rest idc

Valve just has the best platform. That's it that's all. I only use other platforms when I'm forced to because they mostly suck. EA is one of the worst.

steam was the one and only platform i tried to convince my family with
ever since 2018

here's an idea, why don't developers enforce a "30% steam tax" upon games they upload to steam? While on epic games a game is $10, on steam it would be $13

Considering I have multiple Games on Origin/Ea launcher that just won't work because EA doesn't care to fix known bugs. I'd take a steam "Monopoly" any day at least all my games regardless of how old will still launch.

Well EGS is now arround for 5 Years and Launcher is still as crappy since than

*nerdy normies like valve

I have my 19 years of service badge on steam, with 153 games purchased. As far as I know all 153 games still work, and I could play them now if I just installed them. Some of those games are re-releases of childhood favouirites, like commander keen, doom or unreal tournament, and they're still playable. My most played game on the steam deck is final fantasy 9 lol. The only time I remember ever being annoyed with valve is when they've overhauled the steam UI, which they've done about twice, but I got over it. Interesting vid btw.

People also forgot that STeam has a lot of facilities for developers and players. Epic has a friend system, that's it. Servers for these are not free.

i think a cool form of protest would be if gamedevs release their game on both steam and eepic but they adjust the pricinng in a way that they earn the exact same from both sales.
Then it will be easily visualized for all the steam elitists how much more steam takes from the devs to publish a fully fisnished game.
I think even gamers would understand the numbers of a steam game costs 80$ while an epic game can still be 60$.
Steam is unfair to indie devs and gamers don't care

As someone working in the lancenter scene i love Valve/Steam!

Easy to create accounts, no unique number/mail required, easy to pass login information to start steam, easy to validate game files and update the games, easy to copy games to new harddrives/computers, light client that doesnt use to many resources, easy to use website/store.

The problem is valve has been growing for 20 years now and been innovating it even grown itself a economy within. It's so user friendly that buy just playing a theres a chance you can buy a game without even putting money into steam. Valve have been pushing pc gaming even without competition they never just stop because they were like a monopoly. I always think there where 4 major game stores msoft,sony,valve,gog and 2 minor the android and ios one. Only pc had multiple choice earlier (now Android has another one). And in all digital store only valve gives us poor users in 3rd world country a way to enjoy and earn games without even spending irl money. Currently we have multiple choice in pc store if you're a publisher why not just put your game in all of them reap the 70% you get from valve and its high foot traffic and also get that 88%you get on epic but with low foot traffic.

holy Gabe!

Imo valve doesn't deserve a cult following. However, they are the frontrunner in quality and "quantity" of game libraries. The ideal product us customers want is a centralised page where ALL our games are accessible from, and the easiest way is to tie that to a storefront as well. None of the other storefronts can compete because steam had a 10 year headstart. I believe only if a centralised library page surfaces outside of steam, can the other storefronts compete - eventually.

The epic platform is so laggy and slow , I do not have nothing against them but just doesn't look good for me

At least Valve has awesome titles like Gmod, the Half Life series and the goat of fps shooters Team Fortress 2, while most of the games on the Epic Games store could be bought on Steam itself so really there’s no competition even though Valve is not the best when taking care of their og titles(they can’t count over the number of 2) they still have bangers that could be played for thousands of hours

valve has done steam the right way at the right time. theres a lot of features that are hard to find but have you used epic? its so annoying to use and it always seems to be selling me some shitty game that epic paid too much money for.

steam have a game market, a player to player item market, a player made community where players can vote on what they want in their games, and discussion boards. then steam has the largest game library in all of gaming not just what valve thinks might make them some money.

the one thing i think steam could do better with is showing players new indie and small dev games.

Wouldn't really say people love valve with their absurdly high cut they take fron each game sold

It's worth considering that Valve's 30% figure didn't come from thin air. That's about how much it costs to get a physical game copy into a store.

That 30% from a physical copy is already spent - manufacturing and shipping, mostly.

The 30% from a digital copy more than covers the costs of hosting the game. That lets Valve invest a lot more into gaming, as you pointed out.

I think Valve does qualify as a monopoly, but it's not because they're exploiting their market share or performing bad business practices like pushing out competition. They just genuiely provide a product that's so much better than anything anyone else offers, and really haven't changed that business model in ages. The thing is, they've done it for so long that for any other company to come in they'd HAVE to operate at a serious loss. And even then, they'd only be able to gain a following if Valve pulled some serious scumbag moves in changing their business model and actively pushed their users to other platforms. Unlike many monopolistic companies today Valve knows this, and rather than squeeze their customers for what they can, they just continue to provide their services.

Spoiler: They're stupid and done gone and bonked their collective heads. Neither should be loved. People also have terrible memories and don't do their due diligence. Source: Reality and the comments here.

Valve does not have monopoly. They are a market leader. Why the fuck would anyone open their mouth to even say that they’re a monopoly.

All bow to our overlord Gabe!

🙇🙇‍♂🙇‍♀🙇🙇‍♂🙇‍♀🙇🙇‍♂🙇‍♀🙇🙇‍♂🙇‍♀🙇🙇‍♂🙇‍♀🙇🙇‍♂🙇‍♀

When Gabe does I truly believe steam will become just another corporate garbage bin that Nickles and dimes its customers to death

If Steam is a monopoly...............bring on the monopoly!! Hope they never go public, it will be the death of them. P.S.: Epic is trash.

Games aren't really cheaper in other platforms for the most part, but the other platforms are generally lacking compared to steam, epic games to this day still not having a text chat so you can ask friends for a game is just... and they really want to compete with steam? it is embarrassing. Reality is most people want to arrive home after work and have fun with their hobby, not get into activism or all this stuff. When new releases are in fact cheaper in other platforms and players see the lower platform cut reflected on themselves in the form of discounts, then Steams golden age will end.

Should look into the Epic vs Apple case. You missed some real gems.

"...In the context of gaming, Dr. Evan's observation has vivid illustrations in the PC market. The incumbent Steam store charged a 30% commission for decades before Epic Games' store entered with a 12% commission. Immediately before that time, Steam lowered its commission to 20%, and its average commission rate declined to 10.7%. Microsoft followed suit shortly after..."

Basically, the developers hurt by the '30% steam tax' are just crap at using the system and marketing their game. Using Steam keys can lessen their financial burden substantially, but it can't, however, get customers to buy their crappy game.

So long as steam stays private and never goes public, I don't mind whatever you want to call them. The 30% is only on full price games, when you join a sale they take significantly less because they want you to sell the game.

The biggest problem with streaming and console "competition" is that instead of actually trying to improve their platform all they do is fight over exclusives. exclusive titles should no longer be a thing

Visualize, for a moment, a middle eastern bazaar. A central marketplace where vendors have been selling their goods for many years. The two primary vendors are steam (large selection) and gog (antiquities). Unless you really want something antique, it's more convenient to just pick up all your goods from the same place, ergo steam. Friendly staff, good prices, easy return policies etc.
One day, a new stall opens up on the bazaar, unknown vendor to all the locals, right across the steam stall. The new merchant is not familiar with the close and friendly relationship the locals have with their vendors. He is sleazy, rude and greedy - only in it for the money. He goes as far as to send out goons to incoming supply caravans to intercept shipments meant for all the other vendors, then creates a monopoly by being the only seller of some goods - he establishes himself quickly, by force, as the one vendor you HAVE to go to, if there's some goods you want that only he carries. You don't really like him, but if you want that product, you either steal it while he's not looking or buy it off him.
But as time goes on you grow to dislike him more and more. Initial impressions were bad, but as you walk past his stall, you notice just how horrible it is. Foods are moldy, utensils are half broken, he routinely chews out random customers and has goons kick people out and ironically enough, slanders the steam merchant across from him constantly, every time you walk past. Spreading misinformation, claiming superiority and moral high ground, all the while intercepting more and more shipments and further cementing his monopoly on certain goods.
Until one day, he runs out of money to fund his goons. He's running out of options. So he goes running to the local town gathering at every opportunity to complain about his lack of customers, all while either willfully ignorant or blissfully unaware of his own faults.
That's Epic in a nutshell. Bad store, spyware, trying by force to establish itself as a viable competitor with shady and dumb business practices. Then when it doesn't work out, cry and throw a tantrum and blame valve for your own ineptitude and lack of customers, make up random stuff about monopolies and hope that eventually something sticks.
Epic can gargle on my sweaty balls. I will never install their spyware or give them a dime. Praise Gaben.

One thing is that Epic launcher is #%¤&¤ and it's missing bunch of features. Can't even log off from chat. It also feels very unresponsive to use when after minimizing it I have to wait several seconds for it to open again. It receives updates now and then but I don't understand what they are doing to it because there's no changes anywhere ever and launcher has been the same as long as I can remember.

Nice

A free market against the Chinese spyware from free gam's to deplete the air. EA the same, and Ubisoft doesn't even have enough original games to keep its own platform together

the customer support of steam is just better than anything i have ever experienced. They are incredibaly helpful and friendly

I don’t love Valve.
I don’t hate Epic.

I use them.

Period.

Valve make good games, and are faidly open with community engagement
Epic buy good games, then excessively monetize them with no interest in the community

The issue with epic for me was how bad their Platform worked and how bad customer service was. And in the end you pay the same price for the game. The game devs were at fault not the customer. If they would sell the game for a better price on a different Platform, this will let some people switch platforms

“Monopoly” is an explicit act to have exclusive possession of a trade and such. Valve hasn’t really made an explicit act to create a monopoly, they are just doing everything right. Steam is a great software, not surprised people pick that over others.

for store who supposed to get better , its been 5 years , noting on EGS improved , no roadmap with any improvement , 5 years and they still not made any money , any game who signed explusive deal mostly regret it as they lost more sales , then they would save from that 35% cut on steam , less features , not able to track bugs or talk to community for feedback (who also frutstrates players meaning they often criticize game more) , what steam had when it was 5 years old? , steam when it was 4-5 years old added forums , entire community tab , every steam game got its own forum , screenshot section (basicly most steam community we got today) , what steam added next year? workshop support for entire platform

what EGS added in 5 years? NFT store , shoping basket , thats about it as far as i am aware , you cant still even buy game as gift on EGS despite that feature was added early to steam (i could not find its year sadly so could be there from start)

i cant wait for EGS to die so i can sue them for 1 game i purchased there (borderlands 3)

i find profitibly especialy crazy as EGS has like 35% 40%? of steam users , but noone at EGS buys games , people ether use it to play fortnite , or claim free games

once fortnite well starts drying up , entire EGS store going to fold like house of cards.

I love how PC players makes fun of console users for arguing about different boxes but PC gamers are arguing about a single box

Yeah, Epic is a joke. They've managed to survive off of fortnite whales & income from UE....but they have been in a decline for a while now. They won't last for another 5-10 years. Can't wait to see who eventually acquires UE & fortnite when they have to close their doors.

If people wanna develop a game for Linux or even guarantee that it consistently works in wine with no tinkering, I will buy from the developer directly. Being able to run MOST games out-of-the-box with no tinkering makes it worth it to buy from Steam.

I'm not sure where the idea of 30 percent flat comes when people talk about revenue share, because it is not true and it never was. In fact you need to be a very unknown, obscure developer with a very limited user base in the past to end up with this split. Most bigger AAA titles have 20% revenue shares contractually on average, sometimes less when you are called Bobby.

Regarding the 30 percent itself and inflation; in the old days a 20% cut excluding all the physical and distribution costs was actually super good and when digital distribution came around, suddenly you got 70% and not distribution hassles at all - that's what made self publishing possible in the first place. And I don't include all the productivity improvements, way bigger markets and way cheaper ways of marketing that made making games dirty cheap compared to the 90s. So realistically for the experience you get today, games should be around $45 - in reality a skin gets sold on those in-game transaction store for $15 that cost less than $5 to produce. And yes, $15 per person and the total cost of production is $5. So those micro transactions are an additional insane money grab, and I didn't even start with all those gambling mechanics like loot boxes which are illegal or heavily age restricted by now in a few civilized states.

So yeah, to get back to it, if you are an Indie and you have troubles to get your finances together with a zero-friction provider only taking a flat 30% or better if you put in the time to negotiate after your first successful release there, I highly recommend talking to the old folk that made games before and around the century. Just to get some perspective. And if you want to get really fancy, perhaps you can dig up someone from the first video game crash ;-)

I don't know if you mentioned it, but I wonder how Epic's strategy of giving games away to users for free plays into their attempt to become a monopoly. Do they think they are just going to let people build a library they didn't pay for on their store and that will incentivize them to favour them over Steam?