They'll never release HL3. They are not a developer anymore. They are just a game store/directory. HL3 has been overhyped so much that anything released would be a disappointment. The gaming market has changed too much from when they made a game engine and released half life to showcase that game engine.
I can probably list a million more reasons why they'll never release, but those are the big points.
Half-life Alyx was HL3, just it was better to name it not HL3, because fans would lose their minds.
I don't know whether valve has violated anti-trust law or not, and I certainly don't think gaben deserves any more protection from covid than the general public but;
this is a stupid ruling. Why on earth can't he appear remotely, as he requested? They can't "adequately assess his credibility"? Are they gonna have an FBI body language expert on hand? Check his forehead for sweat droplets? There's nothing they can ask him in person that they can't ask him over a camera.
Feels like the plaintiffs are doing some kind of lowkey spite thing here, and I'm surprised the judge played along.
You're going to need a lot more than just I'm afraid of covid to get out of being in person for a trial. People with actual fears of being killed for testimony, still appear in person. At this point with vaccines making any serious complications nearly impossible for covid, it's a really desperate attempt to avoid attending.
I was a juror last year for a civil case, half the witnesses were cross examined over zoom before the days of the trial and played back for us. The judge made it explicitly clear that we were to take remote testimony the same as any others done in person
This isn't a criminal trial with Gabe Newell as the defendant, it's a civil trial against the company Valve.
I appreciate requiring everyone wearing a good mask while he's in the courtroom, but I don't understand how having him in the room to testify would be substantially different from an online appearance.
Gaben will then slowly drop his head and whisper into the microphone with a wry chuckle - "You fool. You have just activated my trap card."
Immediately, the Half Life 3 release will drop. Gaben has been holding it back, continuously updating for decades, awaiting exactly this moment. The judge, completely flabbergasted at the proceedings will immediately declare a mistrial. Legal scholars will then study the "Gaben defense" for decades.
If this happened I think Gabe would just say "it's not happening, not at least the way you all want" and then we get some half life cyberchip augmented reality game in another 15 years (it is good though)
Legit, I've never heard of anti-competetive practices from Valve. Anti-consumer? Sometimes, yeah, though they do a lot more right than most
The argument seems to be that "30% cut is too high" but it's not like there aren't other options if you think that's too high. Epic loves to pay for games to be exclusive there, humble and gog exist, one could even go the retro route and set up their own website (though that's prolly the dumb idea), itch.io comes to mind...
If Valve HAS done some shady shit to ensure their major market share I'd be down to hear it, but to me as a PC gamer since '10ish (and had PC gamer friends since 06) it seems they got there through being a not complete garbage heap of a company that actually improved over the years on user feedback, which is supposed to be the good example of capitalism innit?
If 30% we're too high, surely just by offering a competitor that takes a lot less if a cut (say, 12,%), developers would flock to thst competitor because it saves them so much money, right?
Hah if 30% is deemed too much the apple app store and pretty much any retail is going to be next. Steam is popular because they don't pull this nonsense. At 70% growth p/a why bother too
I'm also curious what the allegations are. The only ones I ever heard were from Epic, which was basically making a big fuss to promote their own competitive platform (which was so shit it didn't gain any traction apart from the free games).
I've tried all the online stores ever since the cloudification (remember Impulse?) but none have ever been able to compete with Steam in terms of features and value to the customer. Steam didn't get to the top by being anti competitive, it got there by being competitive and offering a better product to all stakeholders, not just to shareholders.
And as you mentioned, there is plenty of competition for Steam. Don't like the monoply? Get it on GOG or Itch instead.
Escape from Tarkov has been very successful with their own site and launcher. I don’t see it ever going to steam and it’s regularly in the top 10 of twitch
Valve hasn't done anything shady, but monopolies are still bad and unhealthy. Both things are true. And there are no other options for less of a cut if you want to actually make sales, pc gamers won't purchase from other platforms.
Yes. They sued Valve with allegation that they are too successful by providing good service. Sure 30% is too much for some developers, but solution is quite simple... don't sell on Steam. Problem solved. Go to Epic, GoG, bunch of others. Hell every company now has its own launcher and store.
Or even just make it more expensive on steam, if you really want 100% of the revenue for every sale. Pass the cost of using steam on to the user and offer the game on other (worse) markets at a markdown.
Pretty much. Meanwhile other stores engage in actual behaviour that deserves an anti-trust lawsuit like buying up developer studio's and making their games exclusive to their own platforms. Or paying devs to make games exclusive to their store temporarily. You know, things that actually screw the consumer over.
Lmao Valve made a service so good at what it does, it's fucking over all these other business ghouls like Tim Sweemey who are actively trying to dominate the market without actually competing; just look at Epic's store, it's d o g s h i t. They give out free games and still no one I know wants to use it. It's the same across the board, these companies do not want to make good services, they want to legally strongarm the consumer.
I'll tell you a secret) nowadays ALMOST all corporations regardless of what they make business into wanna strongarm the consumer, for quick example look up denuvo and baldurs gate, if product is good then people will buy and denuvo won't be needed
GOG has shown that drms are never needed. More often than not, denuvo causes issues to the player, and gets bypassed by a pirate easily. It is simply there because gamedev companies think they get something out of it, when in reality they don't.
I recently got Alan wake 2 on EGS because I'm a huge Remedy head and huge fan of the first game and couldn't contain my excitement to wait for a steam release and potentially see spoilers, and damn dude that store really is the most bare bones half assed thing ever. Even EAs store on their launcher is nicer.
this is very true, its not like they saying no to other stores like apple for example, they just cant compete so they sue instead, really show how pathetic they are.
So there is an anti-trust lawsuit against steam, but not apple, Google, Amazon, Microsoft.... Etc of those giant companies who literally destroy everything in their way? Please tell me they're next?
There are anti trust lawsuits going on with most the companies you listed though? Microsoft had one in the early tech days that they won, but there’s probably going to be another one soon…
EDIT: If it's true that Valve is also refusing to sell games that are sold for a lower price in other stores where steam keys are not being sold then I think there's definitely a case here. I didn't understand that was their policy but if so it sucks and I take back anything good I said about them being permissive. Thanks to this comment for finding the exact language in the lawsuit that alleges this.
I'd be interested to see what Wolfire's case is, if there's more to it that I don't know about I'd love to understand, but if the article is characterising their case accurately...
claiming that Valve suppresses competition in the PC gaming market through the dominance of Steam, while using it to extract "an extraordinarily high cut from nearly every sale that passes through its store."
...then I don't think this will work out because Valve hasn't engaged in monopolistic behaviour.
This is mainly because of their extremely permissive approach to game keys. The way it works is, a developer can generate as many keys as they want, give them out for free, sell them on other stores or their own site, for any discount, whatever, and Steam will honour those keys and serve up the data to all customers no questions asked. The only real stipulation for all of this is that the game must also be available for sale on the Steam storefront where a 30% cut is taken for any sale. That's it.
Whilst they might theoretically have a monopoly based on market share, as long as they continue to allow other parties to trade in their keys, they aren't suppressing competition. I think this policy is largely responsible for the existence of storefronts like Humble, Fanatical, Green Man Gaming and quite a number of others. If they changed this policy or started to enshittify things, the game distribution landscape would change overnight. The reason they haven't enshittified for so long is probably because they don't have public shareholders.
To be clear I'm against capitalism and capitalists, even the non-publicly-traded non-corporate type like Valve. I am in fact a bit embarrassed of my take on reddit about 7 or 8 years ago that they were special because they were "private and not public". Ew, I mean even if Gabe is some special perfect unicorn billionaire that would never do any wrong, when he's gone Valve will go to someone who might cave to the temptation to go public. I honestly think copyright in general should be abolished. As long as copyright exists I'd love to see better laws around digital copies that allow people to truly own and trade their copies for instance, and not just perpetually rent them. I just don't see this case achieving much.
I'm so worried about what will happen to Steam when Gabe dies. I really hope he has a successor picked out who is as ideologically stringent. Otherwise I'm going to lose a huge library.
I was under the impression that the policy required a game's price to be the same on all marketplaces, even if it's not a steam key being purchased. I.e. a $60 game on steam must sell for $60 off-platform, including on the publisher's own launcher.
I just went to double check my interpretation, but the case brief by Mason LLP's site doesn't really specify.
If it only applies to steam keys, as you say, then I agree they don't really have a case since it's Steam that must supply distribution and other services.
But, if the policy applies to independent marketplaces, then it should be obvious that it is anticompetitive. The price on every platform is driven up to compensate for Steam's 30% fees, even if that particular platform doesn't attempt to provide services equivalent to Steam.
According to a Valve quote from the complaint (p. 55), it applies to everything:
In response to one inquiry from a game publisher, in another example, Valve
explained: “We basically see any selling of the game on PC, Steam key or not, as a part of the
same shared PC market- so even if you weren’t using Steam keys, we’d just choose to stop
selling a game if it was always running discounts of 75% off on one store but 50% off on
ours. . . .”
This is kind of necessary. You could open a store just selling Steam keys. You get Steam's software distribution, installed user base, networking for free and pay nothing to them. Steam is selling all of those services for a 30% cut. Since your overhead is $0, you can take just a 1% fee and still turn a profit because Valve is covering 99% of your costs.
Steam could disable keys or start charging fees for them. As long as they're being this ridiculously generous and permitting publishers to have them for free, some limitation makes sense.
I'm dubious, though. There must be a provision for promotional pricing. I've definitely bought keys for less than Steam prices.
David said in a blog post that the suit is specifically alleging price fixing tactics for other platforms that aren't key sellers, but sell the whole game. Whether that holds up in court - we will see.
For those being happy that valve is in this position, don't. Any company that gets into a monopoly position, accidentally or not, will turn. Google too had "do no evil" in their manifest, until they didn't
While I agree, it is important to note that Valve is a private company. When you don't have to please shareholders and do absolutely everything to increase revenue, there is possibility for a level-headed leader that keeps the company customer friendly.
But if anything changes (greed takes over or leadership changes), it could still turn.
Valve is a private company right now. But Gaben is 61 and it goes without saying that Valve is at the top of every predatory tech capitalist's wishlist. Can you even imagine what Microsoft or Google or Meta would pay for Valve? Steam is great, but that probably won't last forever. GOG is waiting in the wings if Steam ever becomes enshittified, but most of your library cannot be transferred over.
Where did this rumor come from? Private companies have shareholders, too, and they have as much say in the profit direction of the company as the shareholders of any public company.
Valve has been the market leader for years and still hasn't let the consumer down. Their business strategy comes down to offering us the best possible service. Meanwhile crappy stores like Epic Games try to lure you in with free games and timed exclusives and I still gave up on their featureless mess of a platform.
David Rosen of Wolfire Games (Receiver, Overgrowth, Lugaru) is alleging that steam reps have threatened to de-list his game if he lists it as less expensive on other platforms. Specifically not just steam keys but other distribution platforms.
Which is hard to believe, considering how many times I've bought steam games on other (legitimate) platforms that were cheaper than on steam, that are still on steam today and werent removed for being cheaper on another platform.
Valve is trying to escape Microsoft's monopolistic practices with Linux while out performing their competition in a fair market. I like competition but I don't get what advantage steam has that their competition doesn't. Even with the steam deck they're using standardized hardware and open source software to make a competitive product leaving room for competition to create their own versions.
Steam has a large userbase, which offers a lot of consumer inertia to prefer games on Steam. They also have a policy where game pricing on other platforms cannot undercut Steam.
The main complaint is that this pricing policy coupled with the consumer inertia makes it difficult for other gaming marketplaces to enter the market. You cannot undercut steam unless a publisher wants to not put their game on Steam at all (which would be suicide for anything but the largest titles), so you have to sell at Steam's price point. Few platforms could match Steams' established workshop, multiplayer, streaming, and social services; all of which benefit from costs at scale and the established user content.
Imagine trying to convince a user: "Buy your game here instead. It will cost the same as on Steam. No, you won't have access to the existing Workshop. No, you won't have in-platform multiplayer with your Steam friends." Even if you had feature parity, people would prefer Steam since that's where their existing games and friends are.
Note that the main argument Wolfire is making is that game marketplaces (buy/download the game) and game platforms (online features, mod distribution, social pages) need to be decoupled. By integrating the two, Steam is vertically integrating, amortizing the cost, and then forcing every other marketplace to bear the cost of a platform in their pricing.
If you bought a game and paid for platform services separately, then competition can better exist for both of those roles. Which is good for consumers.
I typically try to buy games from gog if available and on epic if not and steam if it's on sale. The only harm I see is how janky the other storefronts are and how frequently they break or refuse to load and that's not steams fault. I don't play a lot of online games but epic and gog are my primary platforms to play on.
I'm not defending steam but I also don't see how the advantage a platform like steam has is a direct result of any anti consumer practices. Honestly I prefer a storefront over rootkits and heavy handed drm any day not to mention downloading gamepatches directly from the publishers website.
One can appreciate Valve's contributions to Linux gaming without idealizing them. The likely reason they went for Linux is that they would have to pay Microsoft to use Windows.
This is true that it is a likely reason. It is also possible that Gabe Newell runs his company in a very deliberate way because he thinks it's a net benefit to both his company and gaming in general. From what I have heard, which of course may be a flawed understanding of the man, it seems like he has certain principles. I guess the question is whether or not a person believes intent matters or only the end result.
I don't idealize them, I use the other storefronts (gog epic) potentially more because they often don't sell games with any form of drm. I just don't get it because as far as my experience goes they're all about the same minus more jank on the other two.
I've actually spent the most time with Rockstar games launcher thanks to GTA V and RDR2 and that one is a real piece of work tbh.
Is this why they were giving away all free steam keys on 4chan yesterday? I thought it was just Black Friday deals, shoulda known those anons don't do anything for the sake of being nice.
Wolfire originally operated Humble Bundle, and they have a very legitimate case. Steam uses anticompetitive pricing policies that makes it difficult for other marketplaces to compete.
If anticompetitive means "it's your choice to enter into an agreement in which we host your game for 30%, and distribute it on our platform, with unlimited patch updates, and unlimited user downloads, and a fuckton of features like community forums, guides, groups etc., also if your game is good we will promote it free of charge"
Then I suppose companies like Epic who choose to run at a loss, as opposed to providing a good service, have no chance, and Steam is anticompetitive.
The counter narrative exists though, Steam is just a good service, and if you want to compete with them, you need to provide a good service, like GOG.
I love this new narrative that undercutting the competition's pricing is anti-competitive and not just winning at the competition because the other teams don't want to improve.
I can't believe that a company that puts out a device running Linux that gives you access to the OS in a few clicks and provides guides for how to install competing distribution platforms is more anticompetitive than Sony, Apple, Nintendo, Microsoft, Google. Valve and Steam aren't perfect. It's difficult to accept that having a store and charging for it is worse than, for example, Sony buying studios and paying millions of dollars for some games to be exclusive on their platform.
ITT: a lot of people worried that one of the few examples of corporate-provided services that isn't a flaming pile of anti-consumer profit-before-everything garbage is going to be punished for not being that via political ratfucking.
How would they even break up Steam? Separate their software and hardware development from the store? Can't imagine that making any real impact on their practices.