sixamp
Member
I remember the days of WONID and then the day steam came out, holy hell everyone hated steam but it grew into a great platform.
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Tim Sweeney: “If Valve commits to a permanent 88% revenue share, we’ll stop making new exclusive deals”
- Thread starter Bullet Club
- Start date
I remember the days of WONID and then the day steam came out, holy hell everyone hated steam but it grew into a great platform.
Mitsuda Maniac
Member
I'm not sure if I remember correctly, but it seemed like PC gaming was in a bad place before steam got popular. Devs/publishers seemed to not even want to release games on PC because of piracy and revenue concerns.
I'm not saying his sentiments about devs are wrong, but I perceive the statement as PR / damage control for the latest crunch time hit pieces, and people who are mad at Epic for taking games from Steam. Reason being --> How is Epic's bottom line adversely affected by Steam taking a larger cut?
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Tim Sweeney is a very frustrating individual.
DynamiteCop!
Banned
I still remember my WONID lol, 34001.
LordRaptor
Member
Epic should be committing to catering to the underserved markets that valve provide service to, while capped at their current revenue share, rather than trying to push an ultimatum to valve to match that revenue share and have to abandon markets as a result of that share not being enough to meet costs.
If that 12% is 'enough' of a share, Epic should be able to prove that.
If its not, then they have to admit that.
If that 12% is 'enough' of a share, Epic should be able to prove that.
If its not, then they have to admit that.
lukilladog
Member
Lol, wait for a rectification/spin tweet tomorrow after Tencent reads this.
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ethomaz
Banned
When that happened? Because more and more games were released every year.
When that DOOMED PC era happened?
Or maybe these claims happened even after Steam like 2013: https://www.gameskinny.com/yc2ux/pi...game-devs-predict-a-grim-future-for-pc-gaming
Denuvo exists do hold piracy for some days after launch and that is a recent thing.
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LittleBusters
Banned
He claims to represent gamers and says outlandish things about competitors(Microsoft, Valve). He seems to be doing well enough despite NeoGAF being 99% against him.
Goff2k
Member
Good ol' floppy disks. Fields of glory was my first rts game. Just pixel French army vs the Brits at the battle of Waterloo.
Don't think Gabe even cares about the tweets. Steams doing fine with what games are being released.
somerset
Member
One can trust this Tencent operation just as far as one can throw it.
People invested in computer gaming tend to be children when it comes to business, and how one business traditionally wages war on another. Comments on gaming forums re: Epic and Sweeney prove this.
Sweeney is not about lowering costs and raising quality for the gamer- quite the opposite. Steam, like many businesses that first rise in a new age, is a remartkably *democratic* operation- putting the customer first as a primary method to grow the business. Unfortunately, the way things work in the world of business is that after a time, when a new age has settled down, anti-customer sharks start to circle- determined to 'tame' this upstart- and correct this business to the form of the usual "never give a sucker an even break".
Sweeneu has attacked Steam for daring to allow customers to have a say about the products they sell. Of course, it is the tradition of business to *buy* their reviews, and never allow customers any say. Amazon, for instance, now allows sellers to fully game their book and product reviews. IMDB killed the forums for the same reason, and any studio that wishes can pay PR troll farms to fill the review section with positive reviews for their movie.
Certain statist game 'reviewers'- who make a very good living behind the scenes with their 'relationships' with the big publishers- have attacked user reviews on Steam remourselessly, knowing their spurious 'arguments' will find favour with the hard of thinking. Not once do these same 'critics' point out that the corporations have always gamed the system, and bought 99% of all reviews that ordinary people read. And that Steam's only 'offense' is to dare to break this corrupt understanding.
Then we have the 'in the pocket' game 'critics' excorate Steam for daring to allow ordinary folk to publish games that obviously tend to fall far below AAA values- despite the fact that Steam's review policies allow users to make very detailed posts examining the true state of these cheapo games. No-one buying on Steam is ill-informed unless that person is too lazy to do a little research first.
Sweeney- the guy behind one of the worst AAA franchises of all time- Gears of War (the Transformers of the gaming world)- has a pure Michael Bay attitude when it comes to gamers. To Sweeney, gamers game because they are 'dumb' 'illiterates' with an inability to do anything 'higher' with their time. Games should be AAA budget high-fashion, low intelligence, no skill button mashing fests aimed at the drunk/stoned sofa crowd.
Epic Store's 'invite' to devs includes the "how can we dumb down your game to broaden its mainstream appeal". Sweeney has stated very loudly in public that the broad church of Steam disgusts him.
So on to Sweeney's offer to Valve. I know, unlike most of you here, how this just emulates numerous shark businesses in the past in various other business areas. Sweeney is desperate for Steam to give up everything that makes it popular and unique. When Gabe crawled on his belly and did as Sweeney commanded, and censored comments for Borderlands 1 and 2, Epic's partner Gearbox did not thank him, but bashed Steam all the harder as he boasted that only the Epic Store could do a good job selling Borderlands 3.
If Steam were to reduce its 'cut' for all the games on the store (it already does this for the biggest selling AAA titles behind the scenes anyway), Sweeney knows this would force Steam to drop the myriad of services it provides for free, murdering the chances for whole swathes of smaller titles. And *no*, Sweeney would not keep any of his *non-contractual* 'promises'. He would simply laugh as Gabe cut his own throat, and watch as Steam sank and Epic Store rose.
*Anything* Sweeney attacks in the Steam Store, Valve should double-down and support all the more. When sweeney opens his mouth, it is to express concern about the fetures Epic fears most of all in the Steam Store. Most of all Sweeney hates the user comments and support of smaller devs.
The Chinese government is a fabian government, just as all three major political parties in the UK are fabian too. Tencent is a fabian operation. Read Orwell's 1984 if you want a true picture of the fabian model. Fabians believe in Darwinian evolution of control, where you give everyone an equal chance at the beginning, but those that rise to power in such a system prove themselves to be superior to the rest. Thus the fabian politicians and business people at the top (like Sweeney) have a right to tell the people at the bottom to shut their traps and do what their Darwinian 'betters' tell them to do.
Steam is socialist, and the fabians, who only pretend to be 'socialist', hate true socialist systems, for they give a voice to the people at the bottom. Britain and China are currently fighting to outdo one another in the censorship of ther internet. Fabians are always censors. So Sweeney's hatred of Steam's user forums comes as no surprise.
Americans are told socialism and capitalism are 'opposites', which is absolutely untrue. People like Sweeney exploit this often stated lie that all too many Americans believe. But ruthless capitalism unlike humane capitalism, has no conscience, and thus happily uses its funds to buy stooge propagandists that pass themselves of as 'voices of the people'.
In the early days of unions, for instance, big business paid agents amongst ordinary people to demoise unions and their leaders. A common trick was to call union leaders 'reds'. Today Epic Store mouthpieces use similar tactics to demonise gaming 'unions'- the forums of user voices on Steam, Metacritic, Rotten Tomatoes etc.
PS before the days of Steam, most game devs could expect to see <40% of the retail selling price of their game- and all the promtional work for that game would usually have to come out of that <40%. To get you game in the big stores, the vast majority of devs/publishers had to accept 'buy back' deals for unsold stock. Steam has increased per game profits by an unthinkable degree for a vastly smaller cut, and provides excellent PR services as part of that tiny cut.
Sweeney's siren 'appeal' of Epic's 'smaller' (in reality, and in gaming's long term future anything but a smaller cut) percentage is like that mad man Stiller picks up in the movie "Something about Mary", with his '7 minute abs' business plan. To the hard of thinking, Sweeney goes "my number is lower than their number so my business plan is better than their business plan". Everytime you hear Sweeney talk, remember that 7-minute abs scene.
People invested in computer gaming tend to be children when it comes to business, and how one business traditionally wages war on another. Comments on gaming forums re: Epic and Sweeney prove this.
Sweeney is not about lowering costs and raising quality for the gamer- quite the opposite. Steam, like many businesses that first rise in a new age, is a remartkably *democratic* operation- putting the customer first as a primary method to grow the business. Unfortunately, the way things work in the world of business is that after a time, when a new age has settled down, anti-customer sharks start to circle- determined to 'tame' this upstart- and correct this business to the form of the usual "never give a sucker an even break".
Sweeneu has attacked Steam for daring to allow customers to have a say about the products they sell. Of course, it is the tradition of business to *buy* their reviews, and never allow customers any say. Amazon, for instance, now allows sellers to fully game their book and product reviews. IMDB killed the forums for the same reason, and any studio that wishes can pay PR troll farms to fill the review section with positive reviews for their movie.
Certain statist game 'reviewers'- who make a very good living behind the scenes with their 'relationships' with the big publishers- have attacked user reviews on Steam remourselessly, knowing their spurious 'arguments' will find favour with the hard of thinking. Not once do these same 'critics' point out that the corporations have always gamed the system, and bought 99% of all reviews that ordinary people read. And that Steam's only 'offense' is to dare to break this corrupt understanding.
Then we have the 'in the pocket' game 'critics' excorate Steam for daring to allow ordinary folk to publish games that obviously tend to fall far below AAA values- despite the fact that Steam's review policies allow users to make very detailed posts examining the true state of these cheapo games. No-one buying on Steam is ill-informed unless that person is too lazy to do a little research first.
Sweeney- the guy behind one of the worst AAA franchises of all time- Gears of War (the Transformers of the gaming world)- has a pure Michael Bay attitude when it comes to gamers. To Sweeney, gamers game because they are 'dumb' 'illiterates' with an inability to do anything 'higher' with their time. Games should be AAA budget high-fashion, low intelligence, no skill button mashing fests aimed at the drunk/stoned sofa crowd.
Epic Store's 'invite' to devs includes the "how can we dumb down your game to broaden its mainstream appeal". Sweeney has stated very loudly in public that the broad church of Steam disgusts him.
So on to Sweeney's offer to Valve. I know, unlike most of you here, how this just emulates numerous shark businesses in the past in various other business areas. Sweeney is desperate for Steam to give up everything that makes it popular and unique. When Gabe crawled on his belly and did as Sweeney commanded, and censored comments for Borderlands 1 and 2, Epic's partner Gearbox did not thank him, but bashed Steam all the harder as he boasted that only the Epic Store could do a good job selling Borderlands 3.
If Steam were to reduce its 'cut' for all the games on the store (it already does this for the biggest selling AAA titles behind the scenes anyway), Sweeney knows this would force Steam to drop the myriad of services it provides for free, murdering the chances for whole swathes of smaller titles. And *no*, Sweeney would not keep any of his *non-contractual* 'promises'. He would simply laugh as Gabe cut his own throat, and watch as Steam sank and Epic Store rose.
*Anything* Sweeney attacks in the Steam Store, Valve should double-down and support all the more. When sweeney opens his mouth, it is to express concern about the fetures Epic fears most of all in the Steam Store. Most of all Sweeney hates the user comments and support of smaller devs.
The Chinese government is a fabian government, just as all three major political parties in the UK are fabian too. Tencent is a fabian operation. Read Orwell's 1984 if you want a true picture of the fabian model. Fabians believe in Darwinian evolution of control, where you give everyone an equal chance at the beginning, but those that rise to power in such a system prove themselves to be superior to the rest. Thus the fabian politicians and business people at the top (like Sweeney) have a right to tell the people at the bottom to shut their traps and do what their Darwinian 'betters' tell them to do.
Steam is socialist, and the fabians, who only pretend to be 'socialist', hate true socialist systems, for they give a voice to the people at the bottom. Britain and China are currently fighting to outdo one another in the censorship of ther internet. Fabians are always censors. So Sweeney's hatred of Steam's user forums comes as no surprise.
Americans are told socialism and capitalism are 'opposites', which is absolutely untrue. People like Sweeney exploit this often stated lie that all too many Americans believe. But ruthless capitalism unlike humane capitalism, has no conscience, and thus happily uses its funds to buy stooge propagandists that pass themselves of as 'voices of the people'.
In the early days of unions, for instance, big business paid agents amongst ordinary people to demoise unions and their leaders. A common trick was to call union leaders 'reds'. Today Epic Store mouthpieces use similar tactics to demonise gaming 'unions'- the forums of user voices on Steam, Metacritic, Rotten Tomatoes etc.
PS before the days of Steam, most game devs could expect to see <40% of the retail selling price of their game- and all the promtional work for that game would usually have to come out of that <40%. To get you game in the big stores, the vast majority of devs/publishers had to accept 'buy back' deals for unsold stock. Steam has increased per game profits by an unthinkable degree for a vastly smaller cut, and provides excellent PR services as part of that tiny cut.
Sweeney's siren 'appeal' of Epic's 'smaller' (in reality, and in gaming's long term future anything but a smaller cut) percentage is like that mad man Stiller picks up in the movie "Something about Mary", with his '7 minute abs' business plan. To the hard of thinking, Sweeney goes "my number is lower than their number so my business plan is better than their business plan". Everytime you hear Sweeney talk, remember that 7-minute abs scene.
Ban Puncher
Member
If Tim is so hard up for money he should stop letting Gabe live inside his head rent free.
I'm super curious to find out whether or not 12% would be enough for EPIC games to cover the cost of providing support for HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS of video game titles.
Maybe we'll never find out because EPIC is only committed to having "GOOD" titles on their platform. Way to gate-keep the developers you're supposedly fighting for, this dude and all the EPIC guys seem like complete jackasses trying to play good guy politics on twitter.
I'll speculate that If they were ever to get a library big enough to demand higher operating costs and those start cutting into their Fortnite profits we'll see a completely different less smug EPIC games, but that won't happen because this company isn't for the gamers first as they claim.
Maybe we'll never find out because EPIC is only committed to having "GOOD" titles on their platform. Way to gate-keep the developers you're supposedly fighting for, this dude and all the EPIC guys seem like complete jackasses trying to play good guy politics on twitter.
I'll speculate that If they were ever to get a library big enough to demand higher operating costs and those start cutting into their Fortnite profits we'll see a completely different less smug EPIC games, but that won't happen because this company isn't for the gamers first as they claim.
synchronicity
Member
What a self-serving comment.
Ixiah
Banned
They have the Magnum Opus of David Cage, the Sadness Trilogy, i think we can safely assume that the slogan "Only Good Games" is a Lie.
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Kadayi
Banned
Gotta love Sweeney still pushing that 30% angle. Valve already reviewed their pricing 30% on the first $10 Million, 25% on $10+ million and 20% on anything above $50 million. Most AAA are already heading into the 20% bracket day one. It's only the low-end games that Epic ironically isn't that interested in getting that are still caught paying 30%.
Also, any game on Steam using Unreal Engine has to pay Epic 5% of their profits regardless. Of course on EGS Epic is eating the unreal engine licence fee, so even if Valve did offer 12%, they wouldn't be matching EGS in that regard. In fact, they'd have to go lower.
This is just Sweeney trying to gaslight consumers and the industry talking heads into arguing the case that Valve is somehow the unreasonable one. When the reality is, EGS is a shambles as far as launchers go and isn't remotely comparable in terms of feature set to Steam.
Also, any game on Steam using Unreal Engine has to pay Epic 5% of their profits regardless. Of course on EGS Epic is eating the unreal engine licence fee, so even if Valve did offer 12%, they wouldn't be matching EGS in that regard. In fact, they'd have to go lower.
This is just Sweeney trying to gaslight consumers and the industry talking heads into arguing the case that Valve is somehow the unreasonable one. When the reality is, EGS is a shambles as far as launchers go and isn't remotely comparable in terms of feature set to Steam.
Celcius
°Temp. member
Sigh....
edit: I should have posted more than just a one word answer. I'll be glad when this fued between Epic and Steam is over. It would be great if Steam was able to lower the cut they take from devs, but I don't think Epic (at least alone) is going to get them to change that.
edit: I should have posted more than just a one word answer. I'll be glad when this fued between Epic and Steam is over. It would be great if Steam was able to lower the cut they take from devs, but I don't think Epic (at least alone) is going to get them to change that.
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infinitys_7th
Member
What state is he in? That can potentially be legally binding.
Gavin Stevens
Formerly 'o'dium'
Valve won’t give up 30%, they need funding to not make half life 3. That games not going to not make itself, you know.
Messerschmidt
Member
I got a bad taste in my mouth when Epic cut development on Unreal, the game that made them a household name, in favor of fortnite. Pretty much everything I've heard about Epic since then has emboldened it.
PhoenixTank
Member
I hadn't seen this icon for so so long I'd forgotten WON existed, but I could picture it before looking it up. Not exactly nostalgia but I appreciate the memory jog for ~17(?) years ago.
sol_bad
Member
Can Tim open a retail chain and offer a lower cut as well? He says he wants this 12% cut across the board, does that mean at retail as well?
Has he talked to GMG, Humble, Fanatical, Indiegala, GameBillet, Gamergate and WinGameStore and asked if they could all operate on a12% profit? Or is he hoping to put retail and other digital store fronts out of business?
*EDIT*
I guess one thing I can't understand from Valve. Why aren't they at least actively working on the Source engine and offering discounts for developers that use us? Are they doing this?
Has he talked to GMG, Humble, Fanatical, Indiegala, GameBillet, Gamergate and WinGameStore and asked if they could all operate on a12% profit? Or is he hoping to put retail and other digital store fronts out of business?
*EDIT*
I guess one thing I can't understand from Valve. Why aren't they at least actively working on the Source engine and offering discounts for developers that use us? Are they doing this?
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Whales in Fortnite. Getting free games are actually a huge discount.
Threeshotgamer
Banned
Pitchford
Stuart360
Member
I'd usually say yes, but Sweeney and EPIC really are frsutrating at the minue. I wish both would just go away.
The Pleasure
Member
Lord Gaben. Stop being bitch made and release the fire. HOT FIRE. Show this dumb mother fucker who made gears of shit the ultimate in gaming. Release Half Life 3. Malfunction. HOT FIRE. SPIT IT OUT. I once made love to a mountain dew can. It was exhilarating.
StreetsofBeige
Gold Member
Depends who has more pulling power, and what kind of deals they have in the back end.
It's like a frozen pizza going on sale at the grocery store from $8 to $5. It's $3 off. Store eats it, manufacturer eats it, or somewhere in between. Unless someone works at Steam or is a gaming insider who can provide details, I have no idea in the gaming industry how discounted pricing works. In your typical store with lots of products, most are sold by big corporations, which has lots of deals and process. But for gaming, there's so many small devs that don't have enough manpower to negotiate hardcore deals (like the big publishers surely do), I have no idea how they structure deals with Steam,
Either way, the consumer wins because they just got the pizza for cheaper.
Heimdall_Xtreme
Jim Ryan Fanclub's #1 Member
Thank you Fortnite.
Thank you for Nothing
Thank you for Nothing
?
We.... We are not talking about deals or discounts here. At all.
And we are talking about a specific scenario so pulling power is already over (we assume Steam lowers their cut) So, they can't lay it off back to the manufacturer.
Now on to the situation:
It's a specialized store that suddenly has to give a much higher cut back to the manufacturer.
As such (and as I stated) the store has three options.
- A long-term large impact on revenue (No-Go, unless they compensate that internally. Which means lost jobs, not automatically new games)
- Scaling down provided services, including customer services (Bad for customer)
- Less Deals/Higher Prices (Bad for customer, obviously)
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KonradLaw
Member
Because it makes no sense financially. And I doubt any more publishers will pull out for good. Look at how Bethesda came back whimpering. Epic manages to moneyhat some games, but they can't moneyhat entire publishers and those with enough clout to pull out of Steam will do it anyway, because even Epic's 12% fee is high compared to 0% of their own stores. You don't see Activision or EA putting their games on Epic Games Store, do you? Heck, even Ubisoft put just two moneyhatted games there. They didn't put Far Cry New Dawn or Odyssey.
Lowering to 12% would be catastrophical to Valve's revenues. To make it worthwhile the sales would have to completely crater on Steam.
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Paracelsus
Member
My thoughts exactly. It would be perfect for Valve to do it and Epic to lose billions for bailing out the deal.
Gamezone
Gold Member
Then why do Epic only take 12%? Did they create the store just for fun?
KonradLaw
Member
Because they're desperate and know they won't be able to fund exclusives forever. So they hope to grow it enough that 12% will entice devs to put games on their store out of their own volition. Because otherwise there's no point of putting games there at all when you're also on Steam.
JCK75
Member
You're talking about another new playing trying to entice developers to come on board.. to prove it's sustainable one has to actually carry this for 5-10 years. But the amount of servers/bandwidth/services Valve provides compared to the others means it costs more money to operate, in 5 years maybe Epic/Discord will offer half of what Valve does and when they do, their operating costs will rise rapidly.. and Epic can't make devs work around the clock forever.
Sentenza
Member
You mean that new store they already shut down because no one cared and was actively losing them money?
I did that as well.
I also distinctly remember it was far worse back then. Especially if you didn't want to rely on piracy.
And it kept getting worse and worse, in fact, until Steam reverted the trend.
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Silvawuff
Member
Thank you Fortnite.
Thank you for Nothing
Fortnite is the world's largest babysitter. It single-handedly took most of prepubescent online shitculture and stuck it in one place. This is god's work.