I’m not defending them. I’m saying that a service has to be financially successful…
No, the comment above brought up the stupid argument to defend them. You implying they need to to remain solvent is defending them too. How many yachts does Gaben have? How generously are the employees paid? Clearly they’re making more than enough money with 30%. Where that number would need to be to not make a profit is unknown, but it’s certainly far lower. You can understand this, right?
But the value they are providing is just worth a great deal to devs and I just don’t think that giving up 30% of your sales is a bad deal for handling the entire distribution.
I said this already, but this is assuming the sales wouldn’t happen if Steam didn’t exist. I doubt it. The sales numbers would be approximately the same, provided by someone else. They just have almost full market domination, so you don’t have a choice but to sell on Steam. It isn’t because it’s so great for the developers. It’s because they don’t have a choice.
I’ve worked in E-Commerce for over 10 years now and 30% is like the standard fee for this kind of stuff - in many industries, the fees are way higher.
“Thats just the way things are” isn’t an argument. “Slavery is just the way we do things! You can’t say it’s bad! We wouldn’t make a profit otherwise!” Not a good argument, right?
So, COULD they charge less? Very likely. But I don’t really see why.
To help developers. It seems like you’re purely capitalism brained. My argument was that it’d be better for developers. I didn’t say they’d make more profit. There’s a lot of bad things you can do to make more money. It doesn’t mean you should. It’d be good for the industry if they charged less. It’d allow smaller studios to make a profit for more niche games.
The service they provide is just worth that much.
Again, there isn’t a choice (for developers). It makes it worth it in the same way it’s worth it to hand over my wallet when someone points a gun to my head. It doesn’t mean it’s the best outcome for the developer if other options were equally viable.
Afaik, theyl aid off people across the entire company. The reason was a reduction in fortnite money, but the layoffs were even across the UE development teams.
IIRC, no. It was Fortnite specific.
And yes, you can also criticize the 30% cut. That’s your right. However, I’m just not agreeing with that stance. That isn’t defending a company, even tho you’re trying to frame it as such.
What do you define “defending” as? You’re making arguments supporting the behavior. Who in the world wouldn’t define that as defence? I’m not framing it as defence. It just is.
Where that number would need to be to not make a profit is unknown, but it’s certainly far lower. You can understand this, right?
Yes. But nobody knows. It certainly is lower. But again, and this is the last time I say this: A service needs to be finanically successful. This business is more than just it’s operating cost. On top of that, I’ll say this one again: The service is just worth it. Nobody in the world offers such an easy handling of the entire distribution chain combined with such a massive audience.
“Thats just the way things are” isn’t an argument.
While that’s true, that wasn’t my argument. My argument is that 30% is usually a fairly decent sweet spot for a platform when it comes to running a distribution system. I’ve build quite a few marketplaces in my time, and the standard fees were between 20% and 40%, all depending on how much work the platform had to do.
Again, there isn’t a choice (for developers).
There’s plenty of choice. You can choose not to sell your game on steam, put it on the EGS exclusively and accept that you’re never going to reach the audience you’d do with steam. Now you just gotta figure out if the lesser sales at 12% are more profitable than the more sales at 30%.
What do you define “defending” as?
You make defending sound like I’m a company white-knight that’ll defend a company from any wrongdoing ever, which simply isn’t the case. Valve does some shitty things and I have called them out for it. I just don’t think the 30% cut is bad in any capacity.
There’s plenty of choice. You can choose not to sell your game on steam, put it on the EGS exclusively and accept that you’re never going to reach the audience you’d do with steam. Now you just gotta figure out if the lesser sales at 12% are more profitable than the more sales at 30%.
Yeah, it won’t be more profitable. It isn’t a choice. There is a small choice for some games of distributing it yourself. This is incredibly cheap (which proves Valve’s profit margin is insane), but 99% of players won’t leave Steam. This means it isn’t a choice for all but a few niche games. Starsector, for example, distributes it on their own, so they get a 100% cut. The players who want to play that are generally more intelligent and can get it off of Steam. For something like CoD, that’s marketed towards mass appeal go the absolute minimum of technological literacy, you have to be on Steam. There isn’t a choice.
You make defending sound like I’m a company white-knight that’ll defend a company from any wrongdoing ever, which simply isn’t the case. Valve does some shitty things and I have called them out for it. I just don’t think the 30% cut is bad in any capacity.
You’ve already agreed it’s worse than it being lower. You don’t think it’s bad enough to be upset over, but you agree it’s worse than it could be. That’s the difference. I won’t stop at “better than it could be.” I’ll always argue for more from a company, and you should too.
No, the comment above brought up the stupid argument to defend them. You implying they need to to remain solvent is defending them too. How many yachts does Gaben have? How generously are the employees paid? Clearly they’re making more than enough money with 30%. Where that number would need to be to not make a profit is unknown, but it’s certainly far lower. You can understand this, right?
I said this already, but this is assuming the sales wouldn’t happen if Steam didn’t exist. I doubt it. The sales numbers would be approximately the same, provided by someone else. They just have almost full market domination, so you don’t have a choice but to sell on Steam. It isn’t because it’s so great for the developers. It’s because they don’t have a choice.
“Thats just the way things are” isn’t an argument. “Slavery is just the way we do things! You can’t say it’s bad! We wouldn’t make a profit otherwise!” Not a good argument, right?
To help developers. It seems like you’re purely capitalism brained. My argument was that it’d be better for developers. I didn’t say they’d make more profit. There’s a lot of bad things you can do to make more money. It doesn’t mean you should. It’d be good for the industry if they charged less. It’d allow smaller studios to make a profit for more niche games.
Again, there isn’t a choice (for developers). It makes it worth it in the same way it’s worth it to hand over my wallet when someone points a gun to my head. It doesn’t mean it’s the best outcome for the developer if other options were equally viable.
IIRC, no. It was Fortnite specific.
What do you define “defending” as? You’re making arguments supporting the behavior. Who in the world wouldn’t define that as defence? I’m not framing it as defence. It just is.
Yes. But nobody knows. It certainly is lower. But again, and this is the last time I say this: A service needs to be finanically successful. This business is more than just it’s operating cost. On top of that, I’ll say this one again: The service is just worth it. Nobody in the world offers such an easy handling of the entire distribution chain combined with such a massive audience.
While that’s true, that wasn’t my argument. My argument is that 30% is usually a fairly decent sweet spot for a platform when it comes to running a distribution system. I’ve build quite a few marketplaces in my time, and the standard fees were between 20% and 40%, all depending on how much work the platform had to do.
There’s plenty of choice. You can choose not to sell your game on steam, put it on the EGS exclusively and accept that you’re never going to reach the audience you’d do with steam. Now you just gotta figure out if the lesser sales at 12% are more profitable than the more sales at 30%.
You make defending sound like I’m a company white-knight that’ll defend a company from any wrongdoing ever, which simply isn’t the case. Valve does some shitty things and I have called them out for it. I just don’t think the 30% cut is bad in any capacity.
Yeah, it won’t be more profitable. It isn’t a choice. There is a small choice for some games of distributing it yourself. This is incredibly cheap (which proves Valve’s profit margin is insane), but 99% of players won’t leave Steam. This means it isn’t a choice for all but a few niche games. Starsector, for example, distributes it on their own, so they get a 100% cut. The players who want to play that are generally more intelligent and can get it off of Steam. For something like CoD, that’s marketed towards mass appeal go the absolute minimum of technological literacy, you have to be on Steam. There isn’t a choice.
You’ve already agreed it’s worse than it being lower. You don’t think it’s bad enough to be upset over, but you agree it’s worse than it could be. That’s the difference. I won’t stop at “better than it could be.” I’ll always argue for more from a company, and you should too.