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[verek_22]

This is an post I found on a blog called Gamesbrief. They make some interesting points about Steam, pointing out things maybe we should be worried about. I'm not saying I agree with what this post says, but I just thought I'd post it, and see what you thought of this.

Angry Steam lovers, please, keep the language clean, for the ladies*.

Reason 1: Monopolies stifle distribution innovation

In a free market, innovation and improvements are encouraged by competition. The problem occurs when one company is so far-and-away ahead that no-one else can catch up. Think of Google. Think of Facebook. And now we should be thinking of Steam in the same way.

Reason 2: Monopolies stifle creative innovation

I keep hearing that is getting harder and harder to get onto Steam, and if you dont, then your game wont sell. The PC has always been an open platform on which it is easy to distribute games. If Steam becomes a de facto monopoly, Valve decides which games we see. A bit too competitive to Half-Life? No distribution. We dont like Match-3 games? No distribution. Were not sure that anyone will want a game based on farming? No distribution.

Reason 3: The little guys dont get a look in

Helping the little guys is hard. When youre big, and profitable, and important, its easy to prioritise the big publishers over the little guys. The little guys are already struggling on the console (although PSN provides one route to market), but the PC has been their lifeblood. A megalithic monopoly could rationally decide that it is no longer cost-effective to support the little guys.

Reason 4: Steam has all the pricing power

Retailers wont work with indies: its not worth their while and, more importantly, indies dont give them marketing support.

What if that becomes true of Steam? Valve is in a position to say “your game wont sell without us. We want a bigger cut, or upfront marketing commitment, or some form of guarantee.”

Reason 5: Valve doesnt need to promote the platform

For all their weaknesses, Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo spend a lot of money promoting and improving their platforms. Steam doesnt improve the PC as a gaming device. I am a lot more comfortable about oligopolies when there is something in it for the consumer (like subsidised home consoles, for example).

I checked this with the search box, but if a thread about this has been made already, then sorry.

Link to the original post.

* If you are, in fact, female and a Steam lover, then . . . uhhh . . . swear all you like, I guess.

[_r.u.s.s.]

i don't think steam is gonna be a monopoly, too many people hate it

[Maxor127]

I agree Steam will hurt the PC industry, but not for the reasons listed above.

[Himmler]

what are you guys talking about? steam is only good for hacking into your sister's mail.

[arete]

Or talking over a headset to someone who won't install skype.

EDIT: I thought I'd discovered all your fetishes, you disgusting furry ^^

[TheChosen]

As long as I can play Orange Box with it, Im cool with using Steam. In fact, I've always been cool with it. Never seen the problem.

The article is essentially just doing the basic "Steam bashing", while trying to sound like a professional journalist.

Also, there's still the immediate patching for games, tech support, catalog of good games, some old games (Not GOG variety, but hey, they got Lucasarts and X-Com) and the weekly offers. And just recently they started supporting Mac's.

If Steam becomes a de facto monopoly, Valve decides which games we see. A bit too competitive to Half-Life? No distribution. We don’t like Match-3 games? No distribution. We’re not sure that anyone will want a game based on farming? No distribution.

Gaming industry doesnt work that way! If there's potential sale, they'll sure as hell put it up for sale, and with selling it online, there's not much of distribution costs that you'd have to worry about.

And how the hell can online sales hurt the PC gaming? Havent this been said hundred times already, that its people not paying for games thats doing it?

[Tomekk]

Well, I haven't used Steam on my laptop, but the main reason I hated is well... that little f*cking app called Steampowered.exe ate a TON of resources and it was needed to run any games.

[_r.u.s.s.]

chosen by `sales hurting pc gaming` he meant people majorly using steam which chooses the games that are good for people. other games that don't get picked by steam would die. a lot of good games. games that maybe wouldn't want to pay the big milk cow called steam, or can't afford it

[Himmler]

i had steam installed till about two weeks ago. the only thing that annoyed me was platform updating. updating it constantly and adding more graphic scheise to it really sucked. they should of let people choose if they wanna have soft margins and all that kind of crap, cause I was only playing cs on my pc. but now, I'm back to fallout and Alter Ego online

[Professor Oak]

I don't really see why people hate Steam, if they don't like it, they can always go out there and buy games which do not require Steam. There are plenty of quality titles which do not require the mechanics of Steam to run.