Again, just showing console gaming is one of the worst things to do if you are a gamer
Good. Make them open their platform to third party stores. Make them open their bootloader.
That’s the biggest problem I have with consoles. They’re essentially expensive boxes that are tied to a single service, in this case PSN.
You don’t like their store pricing, DRM or other policies? Yeah, well, unlucky. Sell your box and buy a different one (or don’t). Too expensive to play online on PSN? Well unlucky, because that’s the only way to play online. If it’s more expensive tomorrow, you better pay if you want online play or you’ll be locked out.
Xbox now locks out uncertified controllers, maybe PlayStation as well? Even their own previous controllers (DualShock 4) don’t support playing PS5 games on PS5, so if you want to play a 4 player couch coop game you better own 4 controllers specific to that one console. I get it, the new controller has some new features like “adaptive triggers” - but that’s entirely optional. Heck, you can play the PS5 games ported to PC with a DualShock 4 on a PC/Steam Deck.
Isn’t it effectively the same on PC but just voluntary? Nobody buys stuff outside Steam so they can do whatever they want. Long gone are deep discounts and you have to hunt for good deals on key shops.
You’re getting downvoted but you’re (almost) right. There are other platforms especially GOG which allows to download DRM free installers, but most of the people have no clue about this.
You can buy steam games on other sites that are not steam, theres a lot of them. Also, theres lots of stuff outside steam to play games as well
How popular is this other stuff compared to Steam? Existence of alternative doesn’t mean there’s no monopoly.
I buy more games outside of Steam than on Steam, but I probably spend more on Steam. I like bundles from Fanatical and sometimes Humble Bundle, and if a dev (usually indie) sells keys on their own site, I’ll try to buy direct (e.g. Paradox does this).
I’d buy more GOG games if GOG bothered to properly support Linux, but they don’t, Steam is easier, and prices are usually the same.
If the price is the same on Steam, I’ll get it there, outsid otherwise I’ll probably go somewhere else.
Same. Got BG3 in GOG in October, then a puppy in December. Was so happy when it worked on the Steam Deck. You can also add external games on Steam if they’re installed on the computer/Steam Deck!
And Valve gets a cut in all of those scenarios. It’s a convenient monopoly as long as you don’t look into how much Valve benefits from this.
They only get a cut from games sold through Steam IIRC. Devs can create their own keys for free and sell them outside of Steam, with the stupulation that they don’t undercut Steam. I don’t know how rival stores work (e.g. does Steam get a cut of Humble Bundles?).
Many people buy games outside of Steam. Sure, relatively speaking it’s a minority and if a game is available on Steam and elsewhere, most will pick it up on Steam.
But part of the reason why Steam is so good is because these other platforms exist and there’s nothing actually stopping anyone from buying their games from other stores. Cloud saves, game streaming/remote play, online play, family sharing and many more features are all free/included with the game purchase on Steam and they also pioneered many of these features. Steam Workshop adds great value as well, there isn’t anything remotely comparable on any proprietary console.
Steam is good because it has to be in order for people to choose to use it.
And “deep discounts” are the same as ever, I see some games 90% off on sales events. Sure, successful AAA titles usually don’t get a big discount 2 weeks after release, but in the end the publisher sets the pricing anyway. Generally, even when comparing full price, games are just cheaper on Steam compared to PSN (10 to sometimes 20 $/€ for big titles).
No, people don’t buy games outside of Steam, I was just speaking about the numbers - that’s why Alan Wake 2 didn’t break even for a year. It’s just a monopoly that you like because it’s still convenient and don’t mind downsides. Most digital storefronts work like this. At least console players still have an option that allows them to trade/resell their games, which PC players lost ages ago, thanks to Valve.
How many people actually trade/resell games? And what’s the actual value of that in terms of dollars? How does that compare with the generally lower price of digital games?
Digital games are often $5-20 if you wait a year or two after release, whereas console games are often $40+ even for older games. According to my Steam Replay, 37% of playtime is on old games (8+ years old) vs 15% for new releases (released in 2024). I don’t have sales numbers, but I imagine a lot of people are buying digital games on steep discounts. You can’t really do that on a console.
For me, not being able to resell a game is worth the massive discount I get from digital. Many of the games I buy are $1-2 (Fanatical, Humble Bundle, etc), and I rarely pay >$20. I also have a Switch, and I’m lucky if I can find a used game for <$40, and when I used to have a recent console, the floor was about $20.
If you prefer console, that’s cool. I prefer choice. I can:
- customize my PC, and I think the HW is actually cheaper long term - I upgrade CPU and GPU separately at about 3-5 year intervals to something mid range
- I have controllers from different brands (XBox, PS4, Steam), as well as a nice KB and mouse
- I use my PC for nongaming uses (software dev, messaging, photo/video editing, etc) - further reduces the gaming-specific costs
- buy from a variety of stores - Fanatical and Humble Bundle for cheap bundles of Steam games, GOG, EGS (I just claim the free games and play a/ Heroic, because EGS refuses to support my platform: Linux)
- create family account so we can all share games - possible with console, but only one person can play a given game at a time, whereas on Steam it’s one per library (we have three, me, wife, kids)
All of that more than makes up for a lack of physical games.
I sell games, sir, because I’m not made out of money. I buy digital too but it’s impossible with most AAA titles these days.
Anyway, I’d say it was your money to spend how you like, but Steam monopoly means games are more expensive than they need to be and you’re kidding yourself if you think otherwise.
Steam doesn’t have a monopoly, they have a massive market share that they don’t abuse. Even on their own platform (Steam Deck), they went out of their way to allow competition by giving access to desktop mode, and you can add non-Steam games to the Steam app, which means I get all the nice platform features from Steam in my EGS and GOG games (Steam Input, Proton, etc).
There’s nothing stopping anyone from switching to a competitor, like EGS, GOG, or any of the publisher-specific platforms. EGS even takes a smaller cut, so they can afford to sell games for less, yet they largely don’t. PlayStation and Xbox are completely separate platforms, yet prices are similar to Steam, and usually higher for older games.
Valve doesn’t set prices, publishers do. If you don’t like prices, complain to the publishers, not Valve.
You really need to qualify your argument here that Valve somehow caused higher prices. In fact, if you look at game prices before Steam and adjust for inflation, games are cheaper now.
Valve sets their cut at 30%. Would it be this high if Valve had competition? Would games cost the same if the cut was 10%? Why is it so high in the first place? What’s being offered in return?
I will preface this with : I have many games that are not in steam that I play regularly, I understand this isn’t the norm, I have zero paid games in EGS and outside of checking the platform I never use it.
Alan wake on EGS is a terrible example to support your claim.
It’s like being upset that a fancy new car hasn’t recouped costs when it’s only available in 4 custom made dealers that are only open half the time and the manufacturer refuses to allow it to be sold in all the places people normally buy cars.
Sure, that is certainly a choice but it’s a choice that would have been part of the risk assessment before the money was sunk.
Steam does have a monopoly, because it works and there isn’t anything better.
There is a bit of resistance to switching, most game libraries are in steam because it’s been the best option for a very long time.
If EGS worked well and epic (outside of unreal engine) wasn’t such a shitshow the platform would be fine.
It’s doesn’t and they aren’t so it’s not.
It can’t compete on features, support or stability so it tried exclusivity, that hasn’t worked out for them.
Steam has its own shit, sure, that percentage is some apple level monopolist bullshit.
Name a comparable, viable alternative?
Alan Wake 2 is a great example because it’s a game with both critical and popular acclaim that will be remembered years from now. Despite this, people decided to ignore it - they couldn’t be bothered with alternatives. Most of you claim those games on EGS so you don’t even have to make an account. This means that the platform now has such a high impact on what you consume that you’re going to skip on one of the best games of the year even though all that stops you is that it’s not in Steam. That’s a terrifying amount of power that people aren’t bothered by even though we’re talking about company that’s smug about selling gambling to children.
That’s exactly my point, you are taking the stance that people didn’t buy alan wake because it wasn’t on steam, to a degree that’s true, i’m saying that i think a larger proportion didn’t buy it specifically because it was on EGS.
If it were released as a game you could buy and play sans-platform, then i’d agree with you. It’d certainly see less sales than a steam release, because steam is where everyone is.
My stance is basically if you remove steam entirely, Standalone Sales > EGS. Add steam back in and you get Steam > Standalone > EGS
Think in terms of food, you’re basically saying the it’s the fault of the 3.5 star monopolistic countrywide chain fast food place that nobody want’s to eat at the recently health-inspection-failing 1 star food-poisoning cafe.
Is there a monopoly, sure, is the competition so bad people avoid it regardless of the monopoly, also yes.
If you were using something like GOG as an example, i’d fully agree with you, but EGS has seemingly infinite funds and they still managed to release something so bad nobody wants to use it, even for “free” games.
It’s not even just the platform, epic as a company have a reputation, so they have to also overcome that, which they have not.
That’s a terrifying amount of power that people aren’t bothered by
Historically there’s been no need to be worried, generally, i agree that’s not ideal, but again name a viable comparable alternative.
even though we’re talking about company that’s smug about selling gambling to children.
You mean as opposed to the company that actually lost a class action regarding loot boxes in their game targeted at children?
You aren’t even wrong about this but “People don’t buy games from this company who famously lost a lawsuit regarding gambling targeted at kids because this other company who also do sketchy kids gambling things are …better at PR?” isn’t a convincing argument.
Everyone should be better at this, but they aren’t.
I don’t know. Most of my games are on Steam but I have lots of games on EA, Ubisoft, Epic Games, GoG and Blizzard platforms, not to mention Battlepass. But yeah Steam is dominant but it’s third party and not controlled by Microsoft
EGS just published their sales numbers and it’s a fart compared to Steam which has the defacto PC gaming monopoly. It’d be fine if it was some open platform but it’s just another unaccountable company that prints money for being first to monopolise the market, no different from Microsoft.
That’s because Steam offers a better user experience than EGS. Here are some nice things about Steam that EGS lacks:
- Steam input - awesome controller mapping
- Linux support - esp Steam Deck
- huge back catalog
- user reviews - maybe this exists now for EGS?
- lots of features I don’t use, but others might
While EGS has:
- free games
- timed exclusives
Why should I use EGS? Steam is better.
Valve has an arguably better platform but is more expensive and doesn’t have some exclusives. That would be a great opportunity for a competitor yet nobody broke through despite pouring billions in. Weird, huh?
Valve didn’t figure out how to port Steam to ARM and dragged their feet on x86-64 so I’m not sure where that money goes, probably gambling research.
Valve has an arguably better platform but is more expensive
Yes, I think everyone would agree that Steam is the best PC games platform
doesn’t have some exclusives
Well yeah, that’s the definition of exclusive. Sony, Epic, and Microsoft pay to have games not available on other platforms. First parties don’t release their games on other platforms to increase the attractiveness of their platform. Valve does this with their first party titles as well (CS:GO, Half Life, etc), but they release very few games.
Exclusives are the definition of anti-competitive behavior. Valve only does this for their first party titles, and other than that is very competition friendly, since they allow devs to release on any other store, as well as make free keys to sell elsewhere.
As a platform, they behave much better than pretty much everyone else, with maybe only GOG beating them due to license transfers and DRM-free commitment. Steam arguably has the best customer service in the industry (or if not best, very close to it), so it’s less of a concern.
Valve didn’t figure out how to port Steam to ARM
Why would they? Windows on ARM is pretty much nonexistent, emulating x86 on ARM on Linux has severe performance issues, and the best platform support for ARM is from Apple, where there’s even less game selection.
Most games don’t work on ARM, so there’s little point in supporting it. But Steam does work on macOS on ARM (I think it uses Rosetta still?), where devs are actually going to port their games to ARM. Windows and Linux on ARM are incredibly niche and games just aren’t ported for those platforms. I guess they could do a compat layer like Rosetta, but it’ll be a terrible experience running a game through a compat layer.
AFAIK, EGS and GOG don’t support ARM on anything other than macOS (and phones for EGS), and why would they?
dragged their feet on x86-64
Why does that matter? The main reason to port to x86_64 is to access more memory. Even while Steam was x86, games could still absolutely be x86_64. During the transition, they still needed to support 32-bit, so why do extra work when the benefits don’t really apply?
I’ve helped update to 64-bit, and it can be a lot of work. Why prioritize that?
I’m not sure where that money goes
- Steam features like Steam Input (i.e. all that stuff that makes them stand out)
- Linux support - tons of investment into WINE/Proton, drivers, etc; this is huge for Steam Deck
- hardware development - Steam Deck, Valve Index, etc
- marketing - both their products and other devs’ games
- employee salaries - Valve employees are paid very well
- legal fights - e.g. patent lawsuits
- Gabe’s yachts - similar to how Unreal Engine profits are used by Tim Sweeney
They’re not public, but it’s not hard to estimate since they publish a lot of data about the platform.
Not being publicly traded makes this very different from Microsoft, actually.
Yes, it’s even less transparent and accountable.
In what world do you think publicly traded companies are more accountable? If anything it’s the opposite.
Private company is not a subject to many regulations and duties that a public company has to adhere to, mostly on external reporting. How much do you know about Valve? What’s their profit for 2023?
Hence why nobody should ever buy the digital-only edition of a console. You buy like one used game and make the money back. Then, you can sell that game once you’re done and turn a profit over digital-only.
I still remember when AAA games where $30 and that cost included the disk and case, sure inflation is a thing but with digital only these games still should be cheaper, not the same or more expensive than a physical copy.
For the longest time, they couldn’t undercut physical MSRP with digital MSRP because they didn’t want to upset Walmart and have them stop stocking their wares.
I started buying games after buying myself an OG play station. Even back then, I remember $40 and even $50 MSRP game prices. Their greatest hits line was discounted to $20. Final Fantasy 7, which remains an all time favorite of mine, was $50 at launch.
Their greatest hits line was generally priced at $20, which offered a way of discounting games after launch. IMO man games in Steam follow a similar pricing strategy these days - high launch prices with discounts later.
Note that I’m not advocating for the digital only model. Not being able to sell your games again is super lame.
Honestly? It’s been probably a decade-and-a-half since the last time I bought a physical game, and I don’t exactly miss it. I lived through the era of having cubic metres of space taken up by discs and boxes of games that you finished once but don’t really want to get rid of since you liked them and might want to revisit them. I lived through scratched discs and reading errors crashing the game mid session or preventing installation altogether. Having a digital games library is just magnitudes more convenient in practice, and I don’t mind paying for that. Especially since I buy 90% of my games on big GOG/Steam sales anyway.
Sure, but this is specifically about consoles. They don’t have the same open market that PC digital games have so the only way to not be price gouged is buying physical.
Bluray is extremely scratch resistant. I’m sure there are extreme cases, but scratched disks haven’t been a problem for 15+ years.
PC games don’t have an open market in the way you think.
The reason digital console games are more expensive than physical is precisely because physical console games are still a thing. Digital prices are kept high to not piss off the physical stores. If digital was cheaper then the brick and mortar stores would sell way less games. Shelf space in stores is limited and if they don’t sell enough games they rather use that space for something more profitable. As such, lowering digital prices would effectively end physical game sales.
Once you take physical sales out of the equation digital prices will drop. The fact digital PC games are so much cheaper proves this.
Once you take physical sales out of the equation digital prices will drop.
You don’t really believe that, do you? Why would a for-profit company would ever lower the prices if it wasn’t absolutely necessary?
You don’t have to believe me, just look at the price for PC games which are already digital-only.
I bought resident evil code in the box PC because it was cheaper that directly on steam.
Why would Sony care about GameStop’s share price? Physical stores already are using the shelf space for more profitable things. GameStop’s shelf space is like 90% not-games now, plus they’re closing down tons of physical locations to focus on online sales.
Physical games still exist because they’d lose too many sales if they exclusively sold digital games. Otherwise, they’d happily stop selling physical games since they make less money for every physical game sold. Money gained from digital-only sales is less than money lost from pissed off customers not buying your console or games at all, so they keep physical games.
PC is not cheaper because there are no physical games, lol. How would less options and less competition lower prices? PC is cheaper because nobody has a monopoly on digital games so stores need to run sales to attract customers. This article is literally about Sony restricting digital sales to their own store so they can have a monopoly and artificially raise prices.
PC is not cheaper because there are no physical games, lol. How would less options and less competition lower prices? PC is cheaper because nobody has a monopoly on digital games so stores need to run sales to attract customers.
Exactly. That’s why I personally don’t mind buying digital games on PC, because the PC is an open platform. If Valve decides to drop the ball and sell every game for double the price or something, I can still get and copy games via other means on my Steam Deck. If Sony decides they double the price, you’re out of luck.
Exactly. That’s why I personally don’t mind buying digital games on PC, because the PC is an open platform. If Valve decides to drop the ball and sell every game for double the price or something, I can still get and copy games via other means on my Steam Deck
That’s not how it works at all. Valve doesn’t set the prices in their store, the publishers do. Valve just takes a cut of whatever the publisher decides to charge. If a publisher for a game decides to double the price for a game, why would they do so only on Steam and not on every other store that game is sold?
It was just an example. If they only allow publishers to publish racing games from now on or whatever, you have a choice to run other software on your hardware. A console is locked down, it’s a brick if the manufacturer want it to be.
From the perspective of a PC owner you sound like you are stuck in the 90s or early 2000s, back when you needed extra shelf space for physical game boxes at home.
Lmao. I primarily game on PC. I own hundreds of digital games. Even with it’s superior sales and open market, PC struggles to beat buying a used game from marketplace or ebay.
Also, are you seriously dissing physical media? The benefits of actually owning something cannot be overstated. Even with Steam, you’re technically just buying a revokable license to play a game. Physical media can not be revoked, it can be resold/shared, and it works offline. See: the recent PSN outage where people were locked out of their digital games for a few days.
Plus, having a physical collection is just plain fuckin cool.
With physical media you are also just buying a license.
Blatantly incorrect
I bought a digital-only PS5 because I know I will never buy a physical game. I bought a handful of physical games for my PS4 and I still regret it.
I gladly trade time and convenience for a little extra money.
for a little extra money
Won’t be “little” for long.
Isn’t “little” even now unless you always buy day one.
