245: Steam: A Monopoly In the Making
- Thread starter M.S. Smith
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I hope Gaikai and Onlive are competitive enough to be considered competition. I don?t really use steam if I can help it (as long as we?re paying for it, I prefer getting physical media: if steam were cheaper than retail as it should be, I would use it more) but I know a lot of other gamers who do use it a lot.
However, I think it would be better if it had some honest to goodness competition rather than relying on loopholes like most industries use.
However, I think it would be better if it had some honest to goodness competition rather than relying on loopholes like most industries use.
What going to say something similar. This post is Win. There are lots of PS/360 only games, why should we be surprised that there are... Steam only games? I enjoy the steam platform a lot and they are a lot LESS restrictive than PS3/360. Such as I can edit files, saved games, make backups, and redownload on ANY* logged in PC I'm not.Dizko said:
*Note I have yet to find a cap on number of activations for my steam account. Except only 1 active login at a time.
Well, as a user, I am very satisfied with Steam. I have heard they are also very good to indie developers, though I have no actual facts to back that statement. So any competitors obviously have to offer much better service, which I as a steam user, don't really care that much about.
I thought video games were classified as a luxury. I know that hand-in-hand monopoly laws do not apply to luxury products, and as far as I can tell this would classify as a hand-in-hand monopoly. A person can be competitive in the job market without video games, unlike computers or internet. I fail to see a legitimate comparison between Microsoft and Valve.
GamersGate is based out of Norway, and has a pretty respectable library. GoG.com is available, and I'm pretty sure GameTap is as well. GG is my personal favorite, because it doesn't require a client of any kind, and has newer games, unlike GoG. Plus, they carry a ton of Russian games that have excellent gameplay, if somewhat shoddy writing and voice-acting.destroyer2k said:
My point is, Steam, Impulse and D2D are not the only options available to us Europeans. Hell, you could even go for the Xfire store, or the online stores of individual publishers (EA and Atari come to mind).
The only reason Steam is gaining a monopoly anywhere is because most people who claim that they dislike it but use it out of necessity don't actively try to seek out alternatives.
Honestly, I dislike Steam because of my former experiences back when it destabilized the Source engine, but mostly because, when I game, I don't want a stupid client hogging memory/cpu power, I want max performance. Achievements be damned.
I strongly agree. Even if there were 50 different game purchase and management options, it would make no real difference unless there were meaningful advantages of some over others. Regardless of how much you hate DRM, with Steam coming onto Mac, Valve are helping improve gaming.RetroVortex said:
Well lets see. Since this would move some of the DRM responsiblity from Valve to the publisher (who could, after all try selling through a similar distro channel that doesn't use DRM) this would remove a lot of Steam/DRM resentment...capacollo said:
More choice for customers and publishers, less flak for Valve... this sounds like an excellent idea to me.
This part is a lie... I had to travel on business and loaded Steam onto my laptop, and loaded up Torchlight (a game which uses the cloud for your settings and savefiles, I might add) and I was able to play the game on the plane when I had absolutely no internet connection at all. When it started, it said "play in offline mode?" and that was the end of it.Sjakie said:
Sometimes I wonder if the Escapist Editors/Writers read my posts, turn them from rambling rants into more professional pieces, and then post them. Not a serious accusation, but I've been saying similar things for quite a while.
Strictly speaking though I do accuse Valve of "evil empire" type behavior. I compare them to Wal*Mart rather than Microsoft however, though you can draw analogies to both. Basically there is a desire for game companies to go digital so they can remove costs like packaging, shipping, and distribution and take the money they would use for that as pure profit. The Escapist ran an article interviewing the guys from 1C which spelled out exactly the differance in how much money they make digitally rather than with packaged products.
The thing is that Valve is smarter than a lot of it's competition, or seems to be. Where most companies and digital services are putting their products up for the same price as retail (and pocketing the savings as cash, contrary to what gamers were promised) Valve reduces their prices on games frequently. The holiday sale last year being a key example, but they also rotate sales twice a week (midweek and weekend usually) and those sales can range from 10% to 80%. Showing how much of a discount digital distribution could technically stomach if it wanted to (but doesn't).
The thing is though that these sales make Valve seem like the "good guys" and undercut the competition, what happens when Valve has effectively destroyed all the competition? Everyone is using it because of ease of development, and because it WAS cheaper. Now they can raise their prices and there is no one left to face them. Even if called "sell outs" and all kinds of bad things will it matter? Remember Wal*Mart dominated to begin with as a group of good guys where every employee was given stock in the company (to begin with) and had prices lower than anyone else because of what later were labeled predatory pricing practices.
Today I'd like to believe in Valve, but while I take advantage of it, I can't help but feel that I've seen this all before. Truthfully I'm one of those that sort of feels it's best for us as the users/consumers to stick with the Brick and Mortar "disc in hand" way of doing business. Albeit I can't see the gaming community rallying in any meaningful fashion around those lines.
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To play Devil's Advocate however, I will also say that another Escapist article (Seamus Young I believe) made a point about how too many digital services being a liability. With everyone jumping on the bandwagon you can require 3 or more passwords and login credentials just to take advantage of all the features of a game (including communities and such). The alternative to having a "Monopoly" like Steam is of course everyone and their brother running their own service, which is going to result in chaos.
Arguably I feel that the ideal way for things to turn out would be for there to be 2 or 3 digital platforms which compete with each other, as opposed to engaging in cartel behavior which is similar to a monopoly (ie when groups that are supposed to compete coordinate so they won't have to compete). Cartel behavior being the biggest problem with the gaming industry as it stands now.
The bottom line is that a lot can be said for standardization.
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Finally I will point out that a lot of the suits in other countries are basically attempts to nail American businesses. Understand that we have been involved in numerous trade wars with Japan (remember whent he price of RAM exploded through the roof?) and since the advent of the EU a lot of our staunchest allies have become our biggest competitors. Needless to say anything they can do to gimp American juggernauts like Microsoft is something they are going to do. It's hard to really use them as reinforcing examples of anything when they target by and large American interests using any excuse they can usually. That's just how things work with international economic competition, and we've been ridiculous ourselves with some things for similar reasons.
This is not to say that Intel or Microsoft were not monopolies, and didn't need regulation, but really you can't point to things done by rivals (note I do not say enemies) of the US as part of cutthroat international trade.
Strictly speaking though I do accuse Valve of "evil empire" type behavior. I compare them to Wal*Mart rather than Microsoft however, though you can draw analogies to both. Basically there is a desire for game companies to go digital so they can remove costs like packaging, shipping, and distribution and take the money they would use for that as pure profit. The Escapist ran an article interviewing the guys from 1C which spelled out exactly the differance in how much money they make digitally rather than with packaged products.
The thing is that Valve is smarter than a lot of it's competition, or seems to be. Where most companies and digital services are putting their products up for the same price as retail (and pocketing the savings as cash, contrary to what gamers were promised) Valve reduces their prices on games frequently. The holiday sale last year being a key example, but they also rotate sales twice a week (midweek and weekend usually) and those sales can range from 10% to 80%. Showing how much of a discount digital distribution could technically stomach if it wanted to (but doesn't).
The thing is though that these sales make Valve seem like the "good guys" and undercut the competition, what happens when Valve has effectively destroyed all the competition? Everyone is using it because of ease of development, and because it WAS cheaper. Now they can raise their prices and there is no one left to face them. Even if called "sell outs" and all kinds of bad things will it matter? Remember Wal*Mart dominated to begin with as a group of good guys where every employee was given stock in the company (to begin with) and had prices lower than anyone else because of what later were labeled predatory pricing practices.
Today I'd like to believe in Valve, but while I take advantage of it, I can't help but feel that I've seen this all before. Truthfully I'm one of those that sort of feels it's best for us as the users/consumers to stick with the Brick and Mortar "disc in hand" way of doing business. Albeit I can't see the gaming community rallying in any meaningful fashion around those lines.
-
To play Devil's Advocate however, I will also say that another Escapist article (Seamus Young I believe) made a point about how too many digital services being a liability. With everyone jumping on the bandwagon you can require 3 or more passwords and login credentials just to take advantage of all the features of a game (including communities and such). The alternative to having a "Monopoly" like Steam is of course everyone and their brother running their own service, which is going to result in chaos.
Arguably I feel that the ideal way for things to turn out would be for there to be 2 or 3 digital platforms which compete with each other, as opposed to engaging in cartel behavior which is similar to a monopoly (ie when groups that are supposed to compete coordinate so they won't have to compete). Cartel behavior being the biggest problem with the gaming industry as it stands now.
The bottom line is that a lot can be said for standardization.
-
Finally I will point out that a lot of the suits in other countries are basically attempts to nail American businesses. Understand that we have been involved in numerous trade wars with Japan (remember whent he price of RAM exploded through the roof?) and since the advent of the EU a lot of our staunchest allies have become our biggest competitors. Needless to say anything they can do to gimp American juggernauts like Microsoft is something they are going to do. It's hard to really use them as reinforcing examples of anything when they target by and large American interests using any excuse they can usually. That's just how things work with international economic competition, and we've been ridiculous ourselves with some things for similar reasons.
This is not to say that Intel or Microsoft were not monopolies, and didn't need regulation, but really you can't point to things done by rivals (note I do not say enemies) of the US as part of cutthroat international trade.
Sorry but that's just plain wrong. Valve did sales even before Impulse was brought up. They do sales because they know people will buy things.zakski said:
People will go "Hmm it's only $5 so it's ok" and do this for several games.
It has nothing to do with Impulse joining the market or GoG.
As for this whole Steam becoming a monopoly. Honestly? I don't really care.
Valve actually cares about their community. They have released great games. Supported them for a long time and given support for Dedicated server and all that stuff.
So even if they control the entire online market I will not give a damn. Steam has worked wonders for me. Offline mode works when it should, you can just try it out. Pull out the cable and see if you can login in offline mode.
It's also fun to see people claim that MS are "EVIL" because they "FORCE" their media player onto the OS users.
Really? So they are evil when they make it easier for people who want to quickly listen to music or watch a video? You also have a choice. Find another program on the net and install that one. But would most people know about this? Nope.
No one is forcing you to use the basic ones too and it's only really the ones who know how to change it that whine.
Thanks to the Europe court or whoever it was, I'm now forced to pay the FULL price for the Windows 7 version. Unlike the $45 version upgrade that exist out there for USA. This version would be available for us too but Europe court put up some bullshit about that.
I like to buy my game the old fashioned way, and when I do I am not happy when it absolutely wants me to have internet, not to mention installing a f*cking gaz engine, before letting me play, even if that's just the first time.loremazd said:
I also like it when the copy I buy is mine forever, that is, NO risk of all my games being taken away for any or even no reason.
Really, somehere look like thei've been brainwashed, "valve cares about us" "their services are the best"; I wish your accounts bite the dust and see how valve really care !
What if I want a game on steam and not the services ?
heh, I can't, that's the difference between a "service" and a noose.
Actually you are right, it is not steam who is evil, it's all the fault of the legions of undicerning easily manipulated idiots and their uncanny will to delude themselves to the very end...Zefar said:
Even if I am proud owner of a lot of titles on Steam I am very afraid of the fact that they can ban my account and ALL games if they want to.. even if I bought them with REAL money.
While steam did have christmass sales back in '07, as far as I can tell they did NOT do any weekly or weekend sales before march '09. However Impulse had its first weekend sale on the 12th of dec '08, the year that it came out. http://www.neowin.net/news/first-impulse-weekend-sale-is-on. If ya have any evidence that proves otherwise I would like to see it XD.Zefar said:
Edit: Not because I am provoking flames, but because I can't find anything that says otherwise
How does GameTap convert $ to ?? There is no price point in ? so does it take in account $=/=? ?Zephirius said:
And don't mention xfire this is one of the worst digital online store (maybe even more that d2d). I don't mind $=? (got use to this bullshit), but I do mind that xfire had some games cheaper in $ that in ? (one game was 30$ for US, but for EU the same game was 40?). Since then I don't even look at there game store.
I am from Slovenia witch is part of EU. And I can't buy games from impulse it doesn't support my country (only about 5-10% games I can buy from them). The funny thing is that this started only a few months ago before that I could buy all games.zakski said: