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[jshackles]

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/detail/1697191267930157838

Basically boils down to this:

• Companies with larger game sales get more of the revenue - up to 10% more, meaning Valve will make 1/3rd less from these publishers.
• Sales data is no longer considered confidential, and can be shared freely if the game company desires
• Legal terminology updates for GDPR compliance
• Some new VR safety features are now mandatory

Seems like an interesting approach to their problem of larger publishers fleeing their ecosystem and making their own launchers (Bethesda, EA, etc) rather than selling on Steam. Also looking forward to maybe(?) getting some direct sales figures from some of the smaller publishers.

 

[EviLore]

Interesting. Kind of brazen realpolitik, in a way, to announce that they're improving revshare with big publishers rather than changing it across the board. Some reason for salt if you're a smaller fish in the ecosystem.

 

[FearlessBelgian]

Good news, is maybe because of the old rules than Activision and Bethesda leave them...

 

[JimboJones]

Interesting. Kind of brazen realpolitik, in a way, to announce that they're improving revshare with big publishers rather than changing it across the board. Some reason for salt if you're a smaller fish in the ecosystem.

Kind of makes sense in a way, the bigger the publisher gets the less it's going to need or rely on Steams services where small independent studios would find it more difficult/expensive to provide the services themselves.

 

[Kadayi]

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/detail/1697191267930157838

Basically boils down to this:

• Companies with larger game sales get more of the revenue - up to 10% more, meaning Valve will make 1/3rd less from these publishers.
• Sales data is no longer considered confidential, and can be shared freely if the game company desires
• Legal terminology updates for GDPR compliance
• Some new VR safety features are now mandatory

Seems like an interesting approach to their problem of larger publishers fleeing their ecosystem and making their own launchers (Bethesda, EA, etc) rather than selling on Steam. Also looking forward to maybe(?) getting some direct sales figures from some of the smaller publishers.

A positive move, but in truth something they should have implemented way back when EA was planning to bail due to Valve's insistence that they get 30% of everything, including DLC. I get that there are overheads to the running of Steam, but it never made much sense to take anywhere near a street retail cut even from the off. Should also have rolled Steam off as its own company as well versus keeping it under Valve. If they'd done that then perhaps Steam might have evolved into a complete digital media platform versus staying pigeonholed in game sales. because with the whole account based aspect they were ahead of the curve even with the likes of Apple and Itunes by a few years.

 

[WaterAstro]

The stupid thing is, why not the smaller or indie devs too? Why only give the big companies a break?
I could imagine if Origin or whatever giving everyone more cut, and then all the indies go on it lol.

 

[Kadayi]

The stupid thing is, why not the smaller or indie devs too? Why only give the big companies a break?
I could imagine if Origin or whatever giving everyone more cut, and then all the indies go on it lol.

I agree its kind of a kick in the teeth for games that might not garner that many sales, but on the flip side, they do gain access to a massive user base their projects would not ordinarily reach. With the big publishers, we are talking about development studios with 100s if not 1000s of people working on projects. So a 10% gain on sales income is probably a good incentive to assess whether it's truly worth going it alone and running your own global digital distribution service as far as ongoing overheads go. With their recent fall in share prices, it might be interesting to see if EA might be tempted to roll Origin into the umbrella of Steam. I don't know about anyone else, but when I compare my friend's on Origin versus Steam it's pretty much night and day in terms of activity. Origin is pure tumbleweeds most of the time.

 

[FranXico]

Do the same for all publishers and devs, or don't even bother. What an obnoxious thing to do, handing out priviledged treatment to the wealthiest.

 

[kraspkibble]

too little too late i think. at least for those who have created their own launchers. they aren't about to ditch them just for 10% more. they have launchers set up and they receive 100% of the sales. unless Valve pays them to put their games on Steam then it's not gonna work.

you fucked up and got too greedy Valve. eventually Steam will consist of just f2p, shovelware and indie games.

 

[Fuz]

Good, let's hope devs and users start abandoning steam.

 

[Kadayi]

too little too late i think. at least for those who have created their own launchers. they aren't about to ditch them just for 10% more. they have launchers set up and they receive 100% of the sales. unless Valve pays them to put their games on Steam then it's not gonna work

Not really. You're not 100%. Maintaining a global Digital distribution system is a costly venture. You're having to deal with customers from all over the planet. That requires a lot of investment in foreign language staff. Why burden yourself with that alone, when you can outsource it to someone else who has that covered already? I agree (as stated earlier) that in my view Valve were too greedy with the 30% cut, but 20% for AAAs is a more attractive option given the savings on support staff.

 

[wipeout364]

Valve is losing market share, it’s an extremely slow process but I suspect they are really starting to feel it now. The loss of EA, Activision and now Bethesda is devastating.
Valve has done something else as well though which makes it worse. Gamers no longer think of them as the good guys, this I would argue is equally as bad for their business. I used to love Valve but after abandoning single player games and throwing microtransactions into everything I just think they are almost as bad as EA. As a result I honestly don’t really care if I buy from Steam anymore, I buy GOG, I use Blizzards Laucher, Origin, and I had no problem installing Bethesda’s Laucher.

 

[nephilimdj]

Lol Valve paid Jim Sterling to visit Valve and took his recommendations to remove trading cards from new studios.
Now this to try to hold on to AAA studios.

 

[michaelius]

Interesting. Kind of brazen realpolitik, in a way, to announce that they're improving revshare with big publishers rather than changing it across the board. Some reason for salt if you're a smaller fish in the ecosystem.

It might look bad at first sight but people come to steam for big games first and that indirectly benefits lower guys also as they start looking around.

So it's extremely important for Valve to keep those bigger developers on steam.

 

[petran79]

I'd prefer if they forbade external DRM like Denuvo instead and Ubisoft's launcher for the Steam version.

 

[Woo-Fu]

Interesting. Kind of brazen realpolitik, in a way, to announce that they're improving revshare with big publishers rather than changing it across the board. Some reason for salt if you're a smaller fish in the ecosystem.

The way it is worded makes it sounds like number of sales, not size of publisher. Certainly it is larger publishers with the blockbusters, but not always.

 

[WaterAstro]

I agree its kind of a kick in the teeth for games that might not garner that many sales, but on the flip side, they do gain access to a massive user base their projects would not ordinarily reach. With the big publishers, we are talking about development studios with 100s if not 1000s of people working on projects. So a 10% gain on sales income is probably a good incentive to assess whether it's truly worth going it alone and running your own global digital distribution service as far as ongoing overheads go. With their recent fall in share prices, it might be interesting to see if EA might be tempted to roll Origin into the umbrella of Steam. I don't know about anyone else, but when I compare my friend's on Origin versus Steam it's pretty much night and day in terms of activity. Origin is pure tumbleweeds most of the time.

I don't care about a big company's pockets. Screw them and screw Valve for giving them more profits. I want more money going to the starving artists. I hope GOG responds.

Origin may be void of active friends because they just play it and shut it off, but it's making EA a ton of money.

 

[Kadayi]

I don't care about a big company's pockets. Screw them and screw Valve for giving them more profits. I want more money going to the starving artists. I hope GOG responds.

You make it sound like Valve is holding people in bondage Astro. Games live and die on their merits. No ones owed a living if a game doesn't sell, or fails to grab peoples attention. If you've smarts enough to make a game, then you've smarts enough to do other things also. The idea that anyone is starving in a garret is a romantic notion, but it ignores the issue of choice.

 

[Dice]

Big publishers have big sales not just by making big games but by investing in big advertising. Steam is not making people aware the big games exist, but rather the opposite. This is why they are able to jump onto their own launchers and be just as successful as before and only Steam suffers from it. The situation is reversed for small devs. Not only does just existing within Steam function as a massive advertisement increase for them, the big games on Steam allow for a draw of customers to even be there to possibly see the small dev games on the platform. These kind of dynamics are why these days you often see small devs doing better on Nintendo eshop than on the overcrowded Steam marketplace. I've seen plenty of small game devs say one day as a Steam daily deal made them more money than an entire year on their own.

 

[Denton]

Giving devs more money is always good, so this is good news and not bad news, but yeah I understand why some smaller indies feel pissed off.

And I do think this is still too little concession...if Valve wants to keep Bethesda and bring back EA and others, they would likely have to do 90/10 split or some such. I doubt this will convince any of the top dogs anyway.

I do wish Valve would go for it and convince everyone to come back, since I would prefer to have all games on steam rather than split among many services.

 

[Alexios]

The bigger indies can break the 10m revenue milestone easily, that will take them down to 25% fee instead of 30% for only like 333k sales at $30 with a worldwide audience. The 2nd stage might be harder needing like 1m666k sales at $30 to go down to a 20% fee. Pretty much every popular game should break it though. Sorry if someone's game sells like shit, good games often fall through the cracks given how spoiled for choice us gamers are, but Steam offers a lot for the cut it takes. If it didn't offer enough in return then people wouldn't wanna put their game on it. But most do for obvious reasons and as I understand it it's pretty much the industry standard.

 

[okiemok]

Valve is losing market share, it’s an extremely slow process but I suspect they are really starting to feel it now.

Beside the big guys self publishing, where do you see the loss in market share coming from?

 

[Futaleufu]

Valve is losing market share, it’s an extremely slow process but I suspect they are really starting to feel it now. The loss of EA, Activision and now Bethesda is devastating.

How is valve losing market share when their userbase has been steadily increasing?
Steam doesn't rely on one or two games/seasonal launches to keep the userbase growing.

I expect the Bethesda launcher to lose market share after F76.

 

[Solarstrike]

Hopefully Bethesda will see the light as soon as possible and come back to Steam with a RAGEing vengeance.

 

[LittleBusters]

This could give Microsoft's Store a big boost if they decided to give publishers 50% cut.

 

[Alexios]

This could give Microsoft's Store a big boost if they decided to give publishers 50% cut.

Um, why would taking more money give them a boost? 50% is insane, not even indies would accept that.

 

[Omega Supreme Holopsicon]

They should lower it to 15% and give additional discounts for big sellers.

 

[wipeout364]

How is valve losing market share when their userbase has been steadily increasing?
Steam doesn't rely on one or two games/seasonal launches to keep the userbase growing.

I expect the Bethesda launcher to lose market share after F76.

You are confusing revenue with market share. Gaming revenue is rising across the Board. I believe Valve’s percentage of the pie is dropping and they are noticing it yet but it’s coming hence the aggressive moves lately.

Fortnite, League, Blizzard’s entire catalog now COD and destiny, all of EA’s stuff, Microsoft’s new PC initiative, Minecraft, Now likely all of Bethesda’s stuff going forward, Yes I am sure Valave Market share is growing.

 

[HoodWinked]

EA origin's long con worked.

but the revenue share makes sense for top publishers. Valve wants the big games on steam, indie games aren't going anywhere so there's no reason for valve to incentivize indies. Steam is still the kingmaker for indie games so they will continue to get all indie games by default.

 

[Raitoningu]

Someone should start a Japanese games only store with 90% to the developers, steam can fuck off with that 30% theft crap

 

[Raitoningu]

Actually the same for indies only store where they pay a tiny amount depending on their sales instead of losing a massive 30% revenue on steam no matter what

 

[Spukc]

EA origin's long con worked.

but the revenue share makes sense for top publishers. Valve wants the big games on steam, indie games aren't going anywhere so there's no reason for valve to incentivize indies. Steam is still the kingmaker for indie games so they will continue to get all indie games by default.

What about switch ?
Saw a lot of thread how x indie game sold way better on switch then steam