That’s all nice, but you’re dreaming if you think any of that adds up to 30% of the value of a video game.
I don’t think that’s exactly how it works… It isn’t just the value of the game, it’s the exposure and distribution that it gets just for being on Steam. I imagine that’s well worth the 30% to most, which is why most devs seem OK with it.
It does seem slightly high to this non-expert, but I don’t really know enough to say for sure that it’s anti-competitive or anything.
It’s a monopoly on exposure.
The infrastructure and services they provide (outside of an advertising monopoly), do not cost, and are not worth anywhere near 30%.
Think about how much effort and time goes into developing a game, and then think about how much time and effort go into hosting the download files for that game and providing a forum. It’s not 30%.
They should get more than credit card transaction fees, but nowhere near 30%. I expect Epic would be quite profitable at 12% if they hadn’t invested in a terrible exclusive strategy that people hated.
You clearly have no clue what running a robust, globally distributed file delivery system takes, even if that’s all they did (and it’s nowhere near all they do)… It’s hardly “[no] cost”.
You think all Steam does is distribute files?
They distribute files, automate one click installs on Windows/Linux/Mac, they automate compatibly for non-Windows installs, they offer cloud saves, and they offer unlimited downloads and installs of games.
That’s a massive amount of infrastructure that makes sure games sold through Steam are playable for decades.
If you remember before distribution platforms you would see a game for sale at full price on disk for 6mo to a year, then IF there were any disks left they would slowly decrease in price until they eventually hit the $5 bin. After that the game was just unavailable to you and not generating any revenue for the developer.
On top of all of that, 30% is the cut that Physical stores take while offering NOTHING to the devs.
It’s not slightly high when you realize that someone has to pay for bandwidth, advertising, licensing fees etc. IGN (please take that with a grain of salt) has an infographic about this from an article awhile back. I feel like it explains fairly well that the industry standard is 30% and that only a handful of stores actually provide anything below that. And Nintendo particularly is reported to take 30-40% depending. I can appreciate that people are naturally distrustful of any large company. I can appreciate that steam doesn’t get it right 100% of the time and there are valid criticisms of it’s business practices and decisions over time. But on the other hand, this has always seemed like a nothing burger to me.
When you buy a digital key at Walmart or Best Buy or Game Stop, they get a 30% cut too.
It’s not even 30% of all sales: “Valve even adjusted Steam’s rates late last year in what seemed to be a response to the pressure from Epic, but this change is likely only impactful to major developers. After $10 million in sales through Steam, Valve’s cut drops to 25% on all new sales, and drops again to 20% on sales after $50 million. For reference, earning $10 million would mean selling just under 170k copies of a $60 game, and far more for independent games that are rarely that expensive.”
That explanation makes a lot more sense for AAA who are very likely using significantly more bandwidth (due to data bloat in their games, day-1 updates), and are much more likely to be making millions.
For indie not so much, and it seems odd that there isn’t even some general incentive for games with lower requirements. Then again, using a platform like itch instead (possibly geared more towards bundles) or even going with some other payment method (donations) might just make more sense in that case.
