Steam Sux! andor Rox!

[alanschu]

 

It's not really speculation to conclude that massive profits from its huge market share is what allows Steam to have its sales.

 

Are you of the impression that, when a game goes on sale for on Steam, that it's Valve deciding to put that game on sale?

[Dream]

Are you of the impression that, when a game goes on sale for on Steam, that it's Valve deciding to put that game on sale?

I always assumed it was the publisher (or devs if it's self published), but to justify those 75% price cuts they need a fairly large audience to market to(which is guaranteed to them by Steam). Ocelot's right about you most likely not needing as much market share as Steam has to do it, but at the same time it would probably more of a gamble if they had to rely solely on Amazon's DD user base (at the very least it wouldn't be nearly as profitable).

[alanschu]

A large reason for a 75% price cut in a digital avenue is that you don't have the fixed costs that physical distribution has.  If Steam only had 1000 people using it, there's still advantages to doing a 75% off sale on it.  It's more an application of price elasticity in economics rather than anything to do with Steam's distribution.  The costs of setting up a sale on a digital platform are very minimal.

 

 

A single day 75% off sale can spur interest because it can become a no brainer impulse buy.  These types of sales exist on other DD platforms as well.  For a product that isn't selling very much (often because it's an older title), it's simply a case of price elasticity resulting in a big enough increase volume in sales to bring in more revenue.  Steam takes a percentage of the sale, regardless of the price, so the cost to the developer/publisher to change the price isn't there.  If they bring in $1000 in revenue per day at regular price, or $1000 in revenue with the sale, they still make the same amount of money.  As the fixed cost is pretty much close to $0, you can still make money off a game with a discount to 90% off.  It's just whether or not it's the best price point for your sale to maximize revenue.

 

Assessing how elastic your price is determines how much of a sale you should give.  As a result, newer (still popular) games like Skyrim don't get the 75% off sales.  They wouldn't see the spike in revenue to make up for the lower price point.

 

 

I'd argue that the install base of Steam has very little impact over whether or not a sale is worth while.  If Steam only had 1000 customers, and doing a 75% off sale gets all 1000 of those customers to buy your game, it's a good idea to do that sale on that platform.

Edited February 27, 2013 by alanschu

[Tigranes]

And we're not talking about Steam being wildly successful writ large. We're talking about Steamworks exclusives deals that Steam has been brokering. So we'd have to assume that without those deals Steam would be significantly less successful, to the point that its reputation as a good digital platform decreases, to the point that devs/pubs are less inclined to agree to good sales prices, etc., etc. So I'd call that speculative.

[Dream]

A large reason for a 75% price cut in a digital avenue is that you don't have the fixed costs that physical distribution has.  If Steam only had 1000 people using it, there's still advantages to doing a 75% off sale on it.  It's more an application of price elasticity in economics rather than anything to do with Steam's distribution.  The costs of setting up a sale on a digital platform are very minimal.

 

 

A single day 75% off sale can spur interest because it can become a no brainer impulse buy.  These types of sales exist on other DD platforms as well.  For a product that isn't selling very much (often because it's an older title), it's simply a case of price elasticity resulting in a big enough increase volume in sales to bring in more revenue.  Steam takes a percentage of the sale, regardless of the price, so the cost to the developer/publisher to change the price isn't there.  If they bring in $1000 in revenue per day at regular price, or $1000 in revenue with the sale, they still make the same amount of money.  As the fixed cost is pretty much close to $0, you can still make money off a game with a discount to 90% off.  It's just whether or not it's the best price point for your sale to maximize revenue.

 

Assessing how elastic your price is determines how much of a sale you should give.  As a result, newer (still popular) games like Skyrim don't get the 75% off sales.  They wouldn't see the spike in revenue to make up for the lower price point.

 

 

I'd argue that the install base of Steam has very little impact over whether or not a sale is worth while.  If Steam only had 1000 customers, and doing a 75% off sale gets all 1000 of those customers to buy your game, it's a good idea to do that sale on that platform.

But that assumes there are other digital distributors available as well since with only 1000 customers even if they all bought your game at full price you'd be hard pressed to recoup the cost of production. However, the issue with that is that Steam didn't exactly steal market share from other companies; they pretty much created the market (I can't speak for others but I, as well as almost everyone I know, never bought any games digitally before Steam).

 

Is it possible that if Valve never created Steam the DD market would be just as large as it is now with the only difference being that we get all our games from Amazon or Direct2Drive? Maybe, but to me that seems unlikely (if I had to guess it would have taken many more years to get to where we are now).

[Zoraptor]

I'd bought games DD prior to steam. The switch was inevitable as it is a far better way to supply products from the point of view of those making the product.

 

The main reason why 'everyone' switched via steam was its bundling strategy, I'd put every cent I have in the bank that the vast majority of steam adapters did so via its bundling with games rather than choosing to download the client. If that hadn't happened you'd probably just have a situation (far better for the companies involved as they'd get ~100% of revenue rather than ~70%) where publishers sold their own games online and no centralised gatekeeper existed.

[AwesomeOcelot]

The main reason why 'everyone' switched via steam was its bundling strategy, I'd put every cent I have in the bank that the vast majority of steam adapters did so via its bundling with games rather than choosing to download the client. If that hadn't happened you'd probably just have a situation (far better for the companies involved as they'd get ~100% of revenue rather than ~70%) where publishers sold their own games online and no centralised gatekeeper existed.

If that's true, and I doubt it, then what you're saying is a) if Steam hadn't existed we would have been dominated by Battle.net, Uplay, Games for Windows Live, and Origin years ago, and b) that Steam bundling with games was a necessary component. Doesn't that leave us with what has happened as the much better scenario? Look how they are now, imagine what they would have been like without competition from Steam, left to their own devices.

 

You can't really say that people who already had Steam from Counter-Strike or Half-Life 2 wouldn't have chosen Steam over Direct2Drive, it's nowhere near as sure as you're making out.

Edited February 28, 2013 by AwesomeOcelot

[Dream]

If that hadn't happened you'd probably just have a situation (far better for the companies involved as they'd get ~100% of revenue rather than ~70%) where publishers sold their own games online and no centralised gatekeeper existed.

Because a publisher/dev's own personal website has just as large an audience as Steam, right?

[Nordicus]

a) if Steam hadn't existed we would have been dominated by Battle.net, Uplay, Games for Windows Live, and Origin years ago

GFWL being a major player in PC game distribution is both a hilarious and terrifying thought

[Tigranes]

Yeah, if it was a straight toss-up between GFWL and Steam, it's Steam any day.

 

Thankfully Ubisoft hasn't been publishing anything good, so I've never touched Uplay.

[greylord]

Yeah, if it was a straight toss-up between GFWL and Steam, it's Steam any day.

 

Thankfully Ubisoft hasn't been publishing anything good, so I've never touched Uplay.

 

I'm not a big fan of Steam...BUT...on this I have to agree with you on Steam over GFWL.

 

ubi has published some stellar games...but they all have had even worse DRM until recently than anyone else out there...which is why I play their games on console.

[Zoraptor]

If that's true, and I doubt it, then what you're saying is a) if Steam hadn't existed we would have been dominated by Battle.net, Uplay, Games for Windows Live, and Origin years ago, and b) that Steam bundling with games was a necessary component. Doesn't that leave us with what has happened as the much better scenario? Look how they are now, imagine what they would have been like without competition from Steam, left to their own devices.

 

You can't really say that people who already had Steam from Counter-Strike or Half-Life 2 wouldn't have chosen Steam over Direct2Drive, it's nowhere near as sure as you're making out.

I can say exactly that- it's the same reason Origin and Uplay can claim eleventy billion subscribers when their offerings have a poor reputation. If you've bundled it and made it compulsory then you have a captive audience, those who want to play the games that require it. If HL2 sells 8 million copies then you have at bare minimum 8 million customers. And if you're the first to do it- and the only one to do it with 3rd party titles- then you've gone a long way to capturing the market.

 

And no, we would not be dominated by anyone under my scenario. Don't like Origin? Don't buy EA games. Don't like 'ActiBattle.net'? Don't buy Actiblizz games. Don't like Matrix? Don't buy Matrix games. That's a far preferable situation to: Don't like Steam? Don't buy [long list of 3rd party publisher + Valve] games as the situation is now, as it is based on choice rather than restriction. You'd still have the actual independent stores like 'D2D'/ GG/ 'Impulse' and they would not be beholden to one competing behemoth either. EA could pull their games, certainly, but that would only be ~20%, rather than the ~70% that Steam enjoys if they ever wanted to get nasty with a competitor.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Is there a "meh" option for this thread? I think that having a large chunk of games require steamworks is awful, but do appreciate some aspects of Steam(like not having to wade through the nexus).

[alanschu]

 

But that assumes there are other digital distributors available as well since with only 1000 customers even if they all bought your game at full price  you'd be hard pressed to recoup the cost of production. However, the issue with that is that Steam didn't exactly steal market share from other companies; they pretty much created the market (I can't speak for others but I, as well as almost everyone I know, never bought any games digitally before Steam).

Is it possible that if Valve never created Steam the DD market would be just as large as it is now with the only difference being that we get all our games from Amazon or Direct2Drive? Maybe, but to me that seems unlikely (if I had to guess it would have taken many more years to get to where we are now).

 

By the time the game hits steam, production is a sunk cost.  A sale is purely about maximizing the revenue for a product.  That a game cost $1 to make or a billion dollars to make, the rationale behind what motivates the decision is still exactly the same.

 

Your point about Steam being a pioneer regarding digital distribution is also not really relevant to the discussion.  It just means that Steam was first (which is certainly important, and helps contribute to their market share).  When discussing whether or not Steamworks is truly useful to the consumer, it's irrelevant.

[Dream]

By the time the game hits steam, production is a sunk cost.  A sale is purely about maximizing the revenue for a product.  That a game cost $1 to make or a billion dollars to make, the rationale behind what motivates the decision is still exactly the same.

It may be a sunk cost but how much is made impacts whether the studio makes another game or folds. Also you certainly must admit that the modern renaissance of indie games can be largely attributed to DD and the easy marketing provided by Steam (and XBLA/PSN), and if the DD market was compromised of 1000 customers then indies wouldn't be able to do what they do.

Your point about Steam being a pioneer regarding digital distribution is also not really relevant to the discussion.  It just means that Steam was first (which is certainly important, and helps contribute to their market share).  When discussing whether or not Steamworks is truly useful to the consumer, it's irrelevant.

It is relevant though. I'd argue that Steamworks has more to do with Steam's (and DD in general) pervasiveness than the fact that it was first. Yes, in this instance the company that was first was the one that captured the market, but that's not always the case (also I think Direct2Drive predated Steam, but that's beside the point). After all the iPad wasn't exactly the first tablet computer by a long shot, but it's certainly the one that created the market for them.

[alanschu]

It may be a sunk cost but how much is made impacts whether the studio makes another game or folds. Also you certainly must admit that the modern renaissance of indie games can be largely attributed to DD and the easy marketing provided by Steam (and XBLA/PSN), and if the DD market was compromised of 1000 customers then indies wouldn't be able to

do what they do

 

You're taking my example of 1000 customers way too literally.  I used small numbers just to be easy.  You're right, if the DD market was only comprised of 1000 customers it wouldn't be very viable.  My point was that the install base doesn't affect whether or not a game goes on sale.  All that affects a sale is whether or not you'll get improved revenues with a sale.  At this point, the only thing keeping a consumer from using Steam over Good Old Games for the same game at the same price is brand loyalty.

 

My point is that the assumption that Steam's large market dominance is what allows Steam to do its sales is incorrect.  Steam (and every other digital distributor) does its sales because developers can easily exploit the convenience and low cost of putting on a sale, in order to take advantage of price elasticity in order to generate more revenue.  Since Digital Distributors take a percentage of revenue it will always mean that more revenue means more profits.

 

A retail store cannot do this since there's a fixed cost of production.  so if I sell a billion copies at $2 but it costs me $3 to package it, it doesn't matter that I made $2 billion in revenues.  I lost money.  With digital distribution, it doesn't matter if I make $2 billion in revenues because I sold one copy for $2 billion, or sold a billion copies for $2.  I make the same amount of profit.  This example also glosses over the cost of changing prices (menu costs), which a digital distributor can do for much, much cheaper

 

 

Since this was a discussion about whether or not Steamworks benefits you, the poster named "Dream," Steamworks doesn't make it easier for a developer to do a sale, since it's just as easy for them to do a sale on any other digital distributor.  Yes, Steam will probably be the most successful (in raw numbers), but that's simply because Steam is common and has nothing to do with whether or not a game uses Steamworks.  If Steamworks disappeared today, Steam would still have the largest raw numbers just do to how common it is.

 

 

 

It is relevant though. I'd argue that Steamworks has more to do with Steam's (and DD in general) pervasiveness than the fact that it was first. Yes, in this instance the company that was first was the one that captured the market, but that's not always the case (also I think Direct2Drive predated Steam, but that's beside the point). After all the iPad wasn't exactly the first tablet computer by a long shot, but it's certainly the one that created the market for them.

 

No.  It's not relevant to whether or not Steamworks benefits you, the consumer.  You really seem to be taking all sorts of tangents that aren't relevant to the thesis of the current discussion: "How does Steamworks benefit the customer?"

 

That Steam was first, second, one billionth, whatever, is irrelevant.  What is relevant is that Steam is the biggest at the moment, and leverages Steamworks to help ensure that Steam stays that way.  Given that the current discussion is whether or not Steamworks benefits the customer is the discussion.  You said that you felt Steamworks helps you out because the market dominance lets Valve (and developers) do sales.  I dispute this claim, especially now that Digital Distribution has become so much more common.  It may have been great for creating exposure for digital distribution, but at this point digital distribution is now bigger than brick and mortar retail for PC gaming.  If Steam up and disappeared today, the PC gaming world isn't going to suddenly transition back to brick and mortar retail stores as their primary outlet.

 

 

You're right that Steamworks helps Steam's market dominance because it helps ensure Steam's relevancy.  How this helps you, the consumer, is the question.

Edited February 28, 2013 by alanschu

[Dream]

My point is that the assumption that Steam's large market dominance is what allows Steam to do its sales is incorrect.  Steam (and every other digital distributor) does its sales because developers can easily exploit the convenience and low cost of putting on a sale, in order to take advantage of price elasticity in order to generate more revenue.  Since Digital Distributors take a percentage of revenue it will always mean that more revenue means more profits.

And my point is that without a large user base those sales would be irrelevant, and the large DD user base we have now was created by Steam.

Since this was a discussion about whether or not Steamworks benefits you, the poster named "Dream," Steamworks doesn't make it easier for a developer to do a sale, since it's just as easy for them to do a sale on any other digital distributor. Yes, Steam will probably be the most successful (in raw numbers), but that's simply because Steam is common and has nothing to do with whether or not a game uses Steamworks. If Steamworks disappeared today, Steam would still have the largest raw numbers just do to how common it is.

But one of the reasons Steam has those raw numbers in the first place is Steamworks.

 

How this helps you, the consumer, is the question.

The DD landscape created by Steam allows me to have access to a great deal of games I otherwise would not have, and Steam was able to create the landscape thanks, in large part, to Steamworks. Direct example: without Steam I may never have played Sanctum, Dungeon Defenders, Killing Floor, Trine, etc. because they may never have been made.

[alanschu]

EDIT: blah I have to go, I'll post my response in more detail later.

Edited February 28, 2013 by alanschu

[JFSOCC]

I'm on the fence. My biggest problem is that there is no honest competition for steam. Their censorship of some steam greenlight apps because of some questionable reasons (sensibilities of the audience... yeah) has me worried.

There insistence that you don't own your games, only a license to play them, and you HAVE to agree to this contract if you wish to play your games, saying no shuts you out of your own library. that's suspicious, it also would not hold up in (european) court.

The service itself also leaves a lot to be desired. you can add games to steam which you've bought outside it, but it won't add them to your account, except on the computer where you've added it. Their update process is lacking transparency, their program is slow and heavy. search is crappy, they haven't improved their chat service in YEARS, despite many requesting a log-in invisible option. I don't like to always broadcast to the world what I am doing on steam, but steam logs in for you and does so, without your permission.

 

And while valve makes great games, and while it is very convenient to be able to go on any computer, log in, and download my games, and I currently have 116 games in my library several of which I've never played, I'm still very dubious about valve's ethics. I don't trust them to handle my privacy well, and it's clear to me that they're there for themselves, not me.

[AwesomeOcelot]

The service itself also leaves a lot to be desired. you can add games to steam which you've bought outside it, but it won't add them to your account, except on the computer where you've added it.

That's only adding a shortcut in Steam, and they can't verify you own it unless they make a deal with the publisher so they're not going to add it to your account, that would be exploited to all hell.

[NOK222]

Steam can't be all that bad if I can get KOTOR II again and re experience it with all the new mods. 

[Zoraptor]

K2's never been out of print retail, there was another pressing not that long ago as well. In any case [game] being available after a hiatus is a feature of DD in general- GOG is probably responsible for more old games being available again than steam, especially since a lot of the old games steam does sell are rebranded GOG releases.

[Gizmo]

If I had the option, I'd never have installed it ~but the FO:NV CE was wrapped in that crap and refused to install without phoning home; then trying to download the game instead of use the DVD.
 
There are a multitude of reasons to hate this app, but the one that really bugs me is not the fault of the application at all ~it's Valve.
 
Valve maintains a client application on all subscriber machines... Valve actively accepts payment for games that they know will not run on the machine used to make the purchase ~and they say nothing.  I "bought" Troika's Vampire:Bloodlines for instance and it would not load. Valve tech support said to me (after two weeks wait) that I should remove one half of my computer's RAM (permanently) if I wanted to play the game I'd paid them for. This is their scripted reply... They couldn't mention it before accepting payment? "Are you sure that you want to purchase this title? Your PC has too much RAM and [insert game name] is known to not function on systems with that configuration."  Or even "You would have to change your configuration or play it on another machine."
 
Steam could poll the hardware and flag titles that would have known issues. They don't. I had to search for a user patch (possibly viral) ~but hey the game played just fine after that ~now why [the hell!] does Steam not offer a similar [but trusted] patch for a game they are all too happy to take money for?
 
The other day my entire Steam library listed as uninstalled (meh... 15 games, but big ones). To try to play any of them started the re-download of the title ~when I could read all of the data as present on the disk; Valve had me do their script and nothing worked.  Steam started downloading the games ~~and eventually it started acknowledging the installed files and the downloads were mainly Steam skipping files because they were already there... This was still a hassle and I regret every Steam purchase I've made; [or will make. Some titles just don't come without being stink-wrapped in Steam DRM].
 

No benefit? What about an easy overlay to chat with and keep track of your friends, a simple way to track all your games and provide access to them at any time, cloud storage of your saves, and a *load of other quality of life features.

This is the first thing I disable when I install Steam; I don't want the overlay, I don't need (or want) cloud storage ~hell I disable Steam Achievements in the games when I can.
My other computer ~the only other place I'd login to Steam from~ is out in the sticks with no broadband... Steams' useless to me there ; and it means that I cannot access anything that I purch... subscribed to.

Valve must consider any who live outside of broadband access to be insignificant and not worth speaking of, else they would allow Installs from Flash drives and/or have a dial-up connection mode for pure low-bandwidth authentication that doesn't slam you with gigabyte update patches; (or even small 50MB ones).

Edited March 10, 2013 by Gizmo

[alanschu]

 

Valve must consider any who live outside of broadband access to be insignificant and not worth speaking of, else they would allow Installs from Flash drives and/or have a dial-up connection mode for pure low-bandwidth authentication that doesn't slam you with gigabyte update patches; (or even small 50MB ones).

 

My friend keeps backups of Steam "installs" on a hard drive to do just what you describe is impossible.  His sister also uses steam, and typically copies the data files from her brother's computer onto her own to skip downloading the game from Steam.

 

In fact, when I was having issues installing Saints Row 3 (was short about a GB, though Steam was telling me I was "finished"), I just uninstalled the game from my computer, he copied it onto a flash drive, and I copied it to the correct path.  Ran it on Steam and it "downloaded" at gigabytes per second and I was good to go.

[Gizmo]

It's not impossible, it's that you would have to install it on another computer to copy it... You cannot go to an access point and download your game to a flash drive to bring home and install.

 

For some people that's a 40 mile drive into town ~perhaps even to the library.  Steam games (like from Walmart) ship on DVD with an installer... Why can't Valve let you download that if you need to?

 

** More importantly ~It's the Updates!  You get home (with your copied install after burning a favor from a friend or acquaintance), and Steam won't run the game without a massive patch... They should let you download local patch installers. That would at least allow people to grab their patches while in town and install them later when they get home.

Edited March 10, 2013 by Gizmo