Humble Bundle creator brings antitrust lawsuit against Valve over Steam

CyberTech · May 2, 2021

Indie developer (and Humble Indie Bundle originator) Wolfire Games has filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against Steam creator Valve, saying that the company is wielding Steam's monopoly power over the PC gaming market to extract "an extraordinarily high cut from nearly every sale that passes through its store—30%."

An unbreakable monopoly

The lawsuit, filed in a Washington state federal court, centers on what it considers an illegal tying of the Steam gaming platform (which provides game library management, social networking, achievement tracking, Steam Workshop mods, etc.) and the Steam game store (which processes online payments and delivers a copy of the game). After years of growth, the vast majority of PC gamers are locked into the Steam platform thanks to "immense network effects" and the high switching costs to move to a new PC platform, the suit argues.

Full article

Humble Bundle creator brings antitrust lawsuit against Valve over Steam

"At bottom, Valve’s scheme imposes a massive tax on the PC Desktop Gaming industry."

arstechnica.com

TairikuOkami · May 2, 2021

LoL, devs can move to any platform they want, but quality costs and Steam provides more than a digital library.
I have many games on GOG or EPIC, but I still buy them on steam, because it gives me more than just a game.
Metro Exodus being a star example. Many decided not to buy it on Epic, but they claim, that it did not hurt sales.

There’s a lot we don’t know about the sales numbers – including any actual numbers. Back at GDC, Epic said during its keynote that Metro Exodus had sold more than 2.5 times as many copies on the Epic Games store than Last Light did on Steam back in 2013, but the PC market has gotten a lot larger since then.

jackuars · May 2, 2021

If it wasn't for Steam, most games (especially the indie ones) might be get the visibility that they deserve. However am mad at Valve for concentrating on Steam and not on games as much. Half-Life Alyx came after nearly 13 years since it's last instalment. But am forgiving them because they might just have created the best AAA game of this decade, even though there are 8 more years still left to go.

rndmblk · May 2, 2021

With Microsoft planning to drop their cut from 30% to 12% I wonder if Steam may consider reducing their commission? Might not match MS as they're not a big player in Windows gaming space. But might still influence them.

The_King · May 2, 2021

I am a big fan of Steam and its my preferred gaming platform.

I also agree that steam is indeed taking an extraordinarily high cut at 30%, we saw similar issues with Apple and Google app stores recently.

Both dropped their cut from 30% to 15% so hopefully Steam will follow soon.