Valve faces a £656 million lawsuit in the UK for 'overcharging 14 million PC gamers'

What the hell are these points?

Steam forces developers to ask for higher prices? Ah, yes, because Activision is so eager to sell Call of Duty for just $20 but big bad Steam is just forcing their hand and they have to sell it for $70. See if you look at their own store where they can set their own prices its… also $70… hmm, that’s weird. Maybe others… nope same prices across all platforms. Almost like publishers can actually freely decide on their prices.

Steam also forces customers to buy DLCs for games on their platform. Well, how else is this going to work? I buy a game on Steam and then call up the devs to venmo them $2 and they send me a DVD in the mail? Or should I make a new account on some other website and get my DLCs seperatly from there? Most games don’t even sell you DLCs, they sell you credits so you can unlock content that’s already in the game. Often times you have to buy those credits trough the devs website and link your account to Steam. That’s already a pain it the ass.

Steam takes 30% of the cut. True, that sound like a lot. Imagine you’re a solo Dev and you’ve been working 9 years on a game. 3 of those years you’ve essentially been working just to pay off Steam. But look at what you get for those 3 years. You get a seperate store page for your product that you can essentially design however you want. You get access to high speed distribution servers all over the world, that also allow you to effortlessly push updates out, the option for regional pricing, the industries most reliable user review system, an integrated discussion and fan art forum, third party controller support (important for people with disabilities), and a refund system. Sure 30% still sounds like a lot, but would you be able to provide all this if you would’ve self publish the game, probably not.

Steam is consistently the cheapest option to buy games on sale. And even if it isn’t the cheapest, at no point in time have I thought, man Steam has this game for $7.49 but EGS has it for $6.99, I better get it on EGS. Maybe on GoG but no where else.

It’s mind boggling to think that through inflation and some shortages almost all groceries have nearly doubled in price over the last 20 years, but a AAA game is still $60, even though the cost of making a game has skyrocketed. Imagine gas prices would’ve stayed the same over the last 20 years and people would complian that gas station sandwiches would tast like shit.

I copied my own comment from a cross post on another instance, so don't @ me.

The uk and ubisoft government should be sued for not preserving games like the crew

Monopoly, noun: the exclusive possession or control of the supply of or trade in a commodity or service.

Imo this does not apply to Steam. They do not have an exclusive possession or control of the PC gaming market. As is proven in the rest of this thread by just about everyone, there are other online game stores/launchers besides Steam. Literally no one is forcing you to use Steam (because then it would be considered a monopoly), when Epic, GoG, Uplay, Origin, and Rockstar Launchers all exist.

Again, like it was said elsewhere in this thread, they've just crushed the competition so completely that it feels like they have a monopoly.

TL;DR: Entitled parent is angry that Valve makes a profit. Claims they’re a monopoly. They aren’t.

As a consumer, I don't care about this. Even if Valve's cut were lower, the prices would remain the same. I don't get a cheaper game, the publisher just gets a higher cut, so it doesn't directly benefit me.

Lot of people misunderstanding just how fuckin strict anti-monopoly laws are in parts of Europe

You know how we all laugh at American internet prices? That's only one example of how much more Freedom©®™ we actually have

A company that makes a billionaire out of its owner is overcharging you, no matter how much you like the company or the owner.

It's funny because if it was any other companies I'm sure a bunch of you would be happy about it, but it being against Valve you can't help but defend them.

Should I dig in everyone's comment history to show who are the hypocrites that otherwise act like they're left wing?

It's true that Steam is in a dominant market position so I do agree they should be kept in check. At the same time, their value-add is quite reasonable, so I wonder what the "correct" charge is for the service they provide. Or perhaps some system they need to make more open to competition like Steamworks or the Workshop?

It's amazing how folks support valves monopoly while screaming bloody murder at every other tech company.

Going to love witnessing the gymnastics G*mers will do to try and justify Steams Monopoly.