total biscuit has his point, in the long term this steam is bad for consumer as well.

and Valve is a cancer among all developers, no developer likes to share their cut to valve. Never.

And only way to stop this shit is to

have mega publisher+ all developers should just gang up on valve and develope an open source digital client,that is equally powerful.With 1 thing, the client are only responsible for grouping the all ur games together/storing Cd-keys etc in 1 client for consumer. But the game download/patch server are link all the way back to the developer ftp server themselves. So in other words,the page for the game, the Download bandwidth/ ftp server, patching server, are all maintained by developer itselfs just like how facebook work now. With everything maintain by developer, there is not need for developerto share the cut to 3rd party, games will be cheap this way also.

then Consumer also get 1 client only = Everybody win

I mean how expensive can manage just login and CD-keys? every developer share the cost can make this common server run flawlessly with ftp/patch server running on their own.

it is not good deal to some developer who is capable to do everything themselves. And u are not developer, u are not valve, u do not know how much these developer pays valve. Valve do not offer steam as charity by charging the upkeep cost without profit.

There is a reason why some developer choose to avoid using steam, they is the reason why EA move all their future games within their server. Maintaining server urself sometimes is cheaper, it also allows u to choose ur best provider to maintain the servers. EA do not have to pay valve's cut of profit.

Server upkeep cost alone is cheaper than paying someone pocket(valve) + server upkeep cost.

With these big guys like EA/Ubisoft moving out, u'll see the reason why they hate to share their cut to valve.

I dont think develop a simple login/DRM tracking software like steam is expensive. It is just an authentication client that group all the games they a player own, and link the ftp server back to the developer. Just like torrent websites, they host nothing, just a link.

I mean these big game developer is capable of develop a game that are easily far more complex & expensive to develop and giving out free sometimes. So this kind of Open-source client should cost peanut to them.

the real problem is everyone EA/UBI/blizzard trying to complete on their own with their own version of client, instead of sitting on the same table to give consumer a better open fair platform.

It is not cheap but definately NOT super expensive than the total cut that these developer pays valves every game they sold/release. EA/Ubi/Blizzard have their own clients, so are many MMOs including the free ones have their clients. It is not hard to make a client. I dont see how this can be hard if at least the "big 5" developers sit on the same table start their own common client put their AAA titles there, EA went risky Origin with BF3, and it pays off handsomely. Now they are half-way off the grid from Steam. It just that they(big developers) arent willing to talk the same tone to ditch valve.

I think quazacolt meant that adding up the advertising fees valve is charging further worsten the revenue. U will need to pay Valves cut/profit as well. Not is not just the server upkeep and advertising. I mentioned that in previous post already, valve are not here providing all these service @ cost doing charity, the developer are paying server upkeep + valve profit + adversting + valve profit. Valve are earning nice profit out from just providing service from it. Thats the biggest problem with developers hating steam because they DO NOT want to share their profit to valve.

In general the Steam ecosystem are only benefitial to small developers who couldnt afford to distribute their game across the world in global scale.

This post has been edited by Boldnut: Jul 22 2012, 12:41 AM

people are supporting Steam because they are the lesser evil than the rest we have today. And they have no other choices because they want that huge -75% discount.

it is quite hard to say if EA were to release their version of "steam" back then, and the result would be diff. But one thing is very real in common among some of the developers who couldnt agree with steam -> Valve are taking their cut of profit, and they do not want to share their profit.

Steam are only benefiting small indie developers, not the big boys. The big boys can certainly do all these digital distribution without steam, because they have spent money on marketing their game already. Their titles are popular enough, they just do not want share profit to valve and talk on valve's terms.

Valve is obviously playing the the consumer card with its own interest for now just to gain market share and kill off everyone else. As TB said everything will be fine until Valve gone full retard if they ever go full monopoly, which is my concern also.

I got my Assassin Creed 2 for just 5 bucks(USD), and now Ubisoft have customer support me, release game patch, maintaining Uplay Upkeep. All that are within 5bucks. That 5 bucks are included with valve's Download server upkeep, advertising + valve cut of profit.

I couldnt even imaging how much money are left for Ubisoft alone. I couldnt even imaging if they ever earn some money off me. Probably a dollar? or 2-3 bucks? for an AAA game that is 2yrs old? Thats absurd from a developer point of view.

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Added on July 22, 2012, 10:39 amI am more toward them arent willing to band together. This is the biggest problem among them.

if the ftp server run by the developer themselves & are linked from the "open client". That means the upkeep for the Login server should be significant lower than the download server upkeep. Thats shouldnt be much of a problem as the amount are small enough. Heck u might even enough sponsorship by the big boys run the server.

a same example could have been say for like HDMI(not really open), RJ45, OpenGL/OpenCL.

Another good example for software are metatrader in the forex stock, or the Linux as a whole.

This post has been edited by Boldnut: Jul 22 2012, 10:43 AM

quite true at least for me I wouldnt even bother at all if it is isnt cheap enough. Free games are high quality these days for casual gamer like me. it is quite pitty that Ubisoft now have to spent their resources supporting me as legitimate customer as I almost pay nothing to them for a multi-million AAA game

as for the gate, u can also make the authentication independent among the developer as well. for ex. I have to login Uplay acc using "open client" as well as Origin acc using "open client"

At least from here, customer dont have to run multiple clients just to launch 1 game or having multiple client installed.

right now for Uplay it sucks, I have to launch steam, click play launch Uplay click play again just to play game. It is pretty redundant.

This post has been edited by Boldnut: Jul 22 2012, 10:55 AM

well it is a dog eat dog world out there.

Lets not forget.
if u buy a game from retailer, u pay the retailer, logistics, record company, paper printing so on. All these cost money.

With Steam/digital distribution only, the developer and the content distributor(steam) are the only ones earn ur money.

that means selling @ $50 in steam actually give more money to the developer than selling $60 physical copy across the world. This is part of the reason why Steam/developer can give -75% discount to digital copies, because they basically bypass all these retailer.

now to ask me, do I need my money goes to retailer? no, why? cos I prefer my money goes more to the developer to support the developer for future sequels.

I do not see how selling cheap, cheapens IP. Diablo 3 are selling at high price, it still sucky.

Selling cheap does not affect creativity and innovation, it is the total revenue u earn that affect u, Selling 10 digital copies @ $60 does not get u more money than selling $100 copies @ 10bucks. It is about maximize the revenue so the developer is capable to hire talent people to innovate good things for the next release.

thats the reason why EA origin is a good thing happen to us. I actually welcome this to happen, It stop Valve from total monopoly. At least u will never see the huge amount of new EA games on valve anymore.

The only thing EA need is to do is to keep improving their Origin client, man up develop a game that DOES NOT suck. (been a while they didnt do it already)

This post has been edited by Boldnut: Jul 23 2012, 11:04 PM

it takes time, this is not an instant sucesss, I hope Origin is as successful as steam so Steam and origin fight each other to give more sales to us.

This thread Amazing.... first time I ever heard people say Monopoly is a good thing. looks like Totalbiscuit has his point after all.

exactly! I still think having an alternative to complete each other is better than just having steam now.

Just imagine how much pain the developer gonna go trough just to get their game on steam.

Valve can say: here, my cut is 30% of ur sales, take it or u wont end up in our system. While this should not be a problem, but wait... if it isnt on steam, it will not sell well. That mean in order to sell well u are force to accept Valve's terms. There is no alternative to scare valve.

see the problem here? the developer has no bargaining ground.

To make it more absurd some people in this thread are even go as far as to say monopoly is a good thing lol...

the real problem TB mention here is that u have retard fanboy that defending them with absurd reason things such as these...

1. If it aint on steam I will pirate it. <-- lol?
2. Monopoly is a good thing? <--sure valve is doing a good job so far, but one should not go blindly make claims like that. Intel does a good job too, yet many outcry about it, so why should valve get this "special monopoly" treatment over other companies.

This post has been edited by Boldnut: Jul 26 2012, 04:05 PM

I kinda wondered that as well, he bought many windows OS only game, but doesnt spent on $M OS, it doesnt seems to make any sense.

the thing is if valve went retard on u, u cannot jump ship b4 it sink, because all the years the money u spent on valve cannot be move away from them.

right now for example if suddenly GoG or Gamersgate become awesome, u want to move ur library there, u cant.

This post has been edited by Boldnut: Jul 26 2012, 04:34 PM

they do not want to share the profit with valve, but they dont have a choice, games arent in steam dont sell, thanks to bunch of idiots say = "If it is not in steam, I wont buy"

It is not in good business to share profit, unless they have no choice(which they dont have).

the issue is there is no way to get away from Steam with ur games, if valve sweet talk u with -75% game then one day valve piss u off, u wanna get rid of it, u cant, cause ur game stuck there.

problem is hor, when suddenly auntie chap fan become gooding better than unker ones and price also better come with special dimsum, u as a long term unker chap fan customer, u cannot go tapao the chap fan u bought from unker take it to auntie store to add dimsum to eat.

in steam u cannot leave with ur games if steam piss u off -.-

aw man ini macam mana boleh?