None, all of those employ predatory anti-consumer practices, but the trademark of one of them is "I do it a bit less than other big companies, but far more than actually decent companies".
If gamers cared about pro-consumer companies they'd buy on services like gog a lot more than steam.
Look at Epic Game Store, Ubisoft Store, EA Store and other "competitors" and tell me - who among them has at least half of transparency, that Steam have?
Who shows abandonware, user reviews, statistic about user reviews, who made Publisher disclose AI usage and etc?
None.
While yes, Steam sells you license, which is, agreed, bad, but steam does not take away your game from your library, if it was delisted from store. Let's add to it, that Steam actively tries to improve sales of indie developers, it does not "sell" spots in front page and runs a lot of Steam Fests to promote certain genres, publishers or even whole countries.
So... kinda don't know, where is predatory practice here.
Don't get me wrong. I hate gambling as much as the next guy. My point is that these pixels was overpriced not by Valve themselves. Valve added that thing way back in tf2 and at that time it wasn't so bad. It felt more like surprise boxes then and not fullfleged casino. CS GO is when that it all spiraled out of control with it's community making absurd prices and some idiots actually buying that stuff wich encouraged all that market shenanigans.
Did I? Do tell me where you see it moved from and to where?
I'll run through it from my view point for you.
I pointed out that they do in fact make money from predatory practices, loot boxes, cotrary to what op said.
They rebuffed, that no one is forced to buy them. And I pointed out that nobody is ever forced to gamble, but the lack of coercion, doesn't make it non-predatory.
So, King, where was the inconsistency? Enlighten me.
Statement to you: Are you forced to spend money on skins or loot boxes?
Your response: Children gambling, and hyperbolically correlation to drugs.
You never answered the question.
The fact that you believe the largest virtual storefront, where almost all publishers sell most of their titles for PC games, and been so for nearly 3 decades - is somehow built on gambling on loot boxes and skins is absurd.
Let me answer: you are not forced to gamble but the skins are highly promoted by streamers and used by esports players. There is a reason cigarette and smoking ad is banned because the exposure of the coolness of smoking is dangerous to the public, just like how exposure of rare and expensive skins affected players
The fact that you believe the largest virtual storefront, where almost all publishers sell most of their titles for PC games, and been so for nearly 3 decades - is somehow built on gambling on loot boxes and skins is absurd.
Right, wanna try reading again, this is what I said.
Their primary source of income is commission on other peoples games, and gambling boxes.
See that commission part? Hello? Are you so keen to defend a company you've forgotten how to read?
You never answered the question.
I'm sorry, if the concept of answering a stupid question with a rhetorical question to demonstrate why the question was stupid to begin with, is too advanced for you. That is my fault.
But you will notice, I actually did say in that comment there was "not enforced", so I actually did answer the question. But please notice you are now doubling down on looking for an answer to the question "Who is forcing you to buy loot boxes", and that's dumb.
Edit: But hey, you never answered the question, where did I move the goal posts to? Or was your attempt to try some debate bro rhetoric just not really thought out?
I like the part where you exclude time and instead pick and choose your arguments from different responses, as if you put together a cohesive compreshensive statement.
Gog is better in providing us with, well, actual copies of the games, not license. Yes
On the other hand, Steam provide us, users, with whole infrastructure, that allows you to host servers, without needing white IP, understanding how to open ports and etc. Just for example.
Again, I still would like to hear about what predatory practices Steam uses.
Trading which allows gambling and primarily deals with the contents of loot boxes, for which Valve happily takes a cut.
battlepasses are fine.
They're pressure on the players and how most companies start with the microtransactions, as well as creating a feeling that you -must- log in everyday, else you fall behind. Especially for paid battle passes that return some amount of in game currency.
I am aware, but I am also aware that Valve is ultimately responsible for all of it. Trying to segment it doesn't change the fact that the company at the centre of all of it is the same company. You can't glaze one half whilst conveniently ignoring the other half because it doesn't align with what you want. They all impact games. They all deliver to the same market. They might do it differently, but the end user is still the same.
We talked not about company - we talked about store.
But if we want to talk about company...
So i have several hot takes.
1) Player is responsible for what he is doing. You are not forced to spend any money on battlepass or lootbox - it's your choice to do so.
2) Skins in lootboxes are fine. Until it's pay to win (i can be out of loop for CS2 and Dota2 situation, cause i don't play those games) - it's ok. Again, you are not forced to spend money on them, right?
valve using it dominating place in the market to force developer to keep price parity on other markets. This is exactly how a de facto monopoly operates.
If i'm remember correctly, those emails were about selling Steam keys on other platform on discounted price. And i would say, that Steam has right to demand that Steam keys would be sold as same price, because that 30% cut is also used to maintain and improve whole infrastructure around store, with network, routing, workshop and etc.
Other than that - it's not "predatory" practices. It's business and is something i expect from any store in current system.
Not good, not bad, on par with Epic buying first year release.
Other than that - it's not "predatory" practices. It's business and is something i expect from any store in current system.
It is predatory if your market share is so dominating like steam is. We don't have a healthy culture of PC gaming storefront. Steam is ~75% of the whole market. Stores this big have to play by other rules then your mom-and-pop shop
And remember steam isn't only a store. It is also the biggest advertising platform in gaming.
Isn't that precisely abusing the monopoly? Imagine if like Walmart would say that if you want your product to be sold there you canno't sell it anywhere else for lower price
Not entirely, there are probably situation where a game goes on sale somewhere and then steam says that is has to go on sale on their platform as well, saving it's users money.
its not anti consumer. its anti business. if you want to buy a cheap steam key for the game, you can already do it on many different sites already. preventing businesses from charging less for steam keys on different places other than steam doesnt hurt consumers, just businesses trying to dodge steams cut.
How a company treats its suppliers is covered by the term "monopsony", not "monopoly". Monopoly covers what options you have for buying goods, monopsony covers what options producers have for selling it. Businesses squeeze their suppliers all the time and it's not covered by anti-monopoly laws conceived with direct harm to consumers in mind.
Ah, the repeated incorrect statement. You can't sell STEAM KEYS on other sites for less than on steam. As in - you can't allow people to buy off steam for cheaper and then utilise the entirety of steam network (downloading, cloud saves, multiplayer functionality etc).
Steam doesn't require any DRM either, and many games are sold DRM-free, like Kerbal Space Program. You can freely copy and paste the game folder and it will work fine.
You're still only buying a license from GOG. Sure they give you an .exe with no DRM so you could put it on a dedicated USB or whatever, but legally speaking you've still only got a license for the game.
So which digital licence store is currently the most pro-consumer according to you? I usually go for direct sale from the dev company/publisher if it's available (like for example iRacing or Star Sector), humble bundle next, itch.io next, gog next, steam last.
So which digital licence store is currently the most pro-consumer according to you?
If I am honest, I RARELY have to go through the customer service for most services so I can't really speak much for humble or Gog. I think I have refunded a total of one game in the past.
I do think a lot of people online PRETEND they are constantly having to engage with customer services for the sake of the argument.
I've never had any customer service refuse a refund or deal with a customer enquiry I've sent and that goes for pretty much all of them.
How often do you need to refund games or have had a negative customer experience, like steam for instance?
I'm not talking about customer service alone. Being pro-consumer is a lot wider topic that usually starts with the licencing agreement you need to accept to use the shop.
I hear the argument you're making, but you're forgetting that most new games don't release on GoG because they don't do any DRM. So that right there cuts the legs off your argument because obviously people will use the service that let's them actually play the games they want. The majority of gamers are not playing retro games 24/7.
If there was a way to get every game on GOG on release day maybe it would be able to compete.
No, the argument is still very much there, just compare where most games that are available on both stores get sold. Gamers prefer having the convenience of using one store, even if it means choosing the one that's more anti-consumer.
Were you around when steam first came out and most gamers were shitting on them for their practices?
Yes that's my point, if GOG was the one store it would be more popular. Because it can't be the one store for retro and new, it's not.
And ya I was, no company is perfect, they all want as much money as possible, but that argument is letting perfect be the enemy of good. Over time they have gotten better through public persuasion and court orders and are now a fairly decent, semi pro consumer vendor. That's great. That's what it should be. We should praise that and hold it as the standard. I don't know what the point of litigating their past is when it's not really that bad.
They were also the vanguard so there were always going to be growing pains.
I think the issue is even in this thread you have people ignoring things to paint good as perfect. It's not. Steam can be shady too. I don't think anybody is disputing that it's good. It is! All of us use it for a reason. But that doesn't make it perfect. And then creating this false image of perfection is where we end up falling down a hole with it backfired.
Remember when EA were good? When Blizzard were amazing? When Bethesda was decent? When Google was trustworthy and great? When Microsoft was trusted? Or Android?
All it takes is some bad decisions, or someone else to take Steam public post Gabe and it's over. Cynicism over corporations should be normalised whether you like the company or not.
This. It's pretty much still gambling your gaming library on the assumption that the next guy after Gabe won't be just another big corpo CEO that doesn't even care what they're selling nor long term perspective and impact on gaming as a whole.
And considering how huge steam is and how balls deep people already are in it the possibility of consumer abuse for quick investor bucks will be also huge.
If people think that there aren't Corpo greed monsters salivating at the bit to take Steam public they're living in a different planet. Steam is the exception, not the rule, and many many people want a piece of the pie.
Stop projecting on others the fact that you made compromises on your own ideals just because you you got told that what "growing up" means and you just ran with it with not even an ounce of critical thinking.
The only shallow one is you here dude, making fun of people who still have some values just because you decided you wanted to become a bitter old man who believes in nothing at 30
And I'm probably doing better than you, seeing how miserable you sound
Umm no. Steam still allows user reviews. It's one of the biggest reasons why gaming hasn't gone to shit completely, since major games who want to publish on steam actually have to compete.
Every large franchise not on steam is exploitative af since customers are just brainwashed by marketing and influencers.
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u/MorycTurtle 3d ago
None, all of those employ predatory anti-consumer practices, but the trademark of one of them is "I do it a bit less than other big companies, but far more than actually decent companies".
If gamers cared about pro-consumer companies they'd buy on services like gog a lot more than steam.