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[CyberPanda]

Kine is a new 3D puzzle game about music, machines, and dreams that will be coming exclusively on Epic Games Store. However, and similarly to all timed-exclusive EGS games, it already has a store page on Steam. The fact that there is already a Steam store page puzzled some gamers, and its developer has revealed why all EGS games have a Steam store page.

According to Gwen Frey, Valve wants developers that are releasing on other storefronts to have a Steam page.
“I was hesitant about this myself. Long before I put up my Epic store page I asked Valve to remove my WIP Steam page, and they did so for me. However, they strongly urged me to reconsider.” said Gwen Frey and continued.

“Valve wants developers that are releasing on other storefronts to have a Steam page. They want their customers to be able to wishlist the game on Steam as soon as they see a trailer elsewhere.
I still had Valve remove the page and left it removed for many, many months. Just before I released the last trailer I reached out to Valve and asked them if their opinion had changed. It had not, and they encouraged me to put the page back up.”

In the past few months we’ve seen gamers seeking advice for some EGS games on their Steam forums. A recent example is Metro Exodus. So yeah, it appears that Valve is encouraging developers to have Steam store pages for their games, despite these games releasing first on other digital stores.

Kine dev: "Valve wants developers that are releasing on other storefronts to have a Steam page"

According to Gwen Frey, Valve wants developers that are releasing on other storefronts to have a Steam page.

www.dsogaming.com

 

[NiiloPielinen]

" I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. "

 

[Rya.Reisender]

I thought Valve just introduced a rule that you need to release the game not later than on other stores?

 

[RyuCookingSomeRice]

I thought Valve just introduced a rule that you need to release the game not later than on other stores?

Nope that was an old clause they do not seem to enforce.

Good guy Valve I guess. They dont even wanna fuck with any negative shit. They wanna give out a store page where ppl can go to for questions I guess?

And fuck epic aint never buying shit there

 

[Lort]

Desperate times for valve.

 

[Rya.Reisender]

Nope that was an old clause they do not seem to enforce.

Good guy Valve I guess. They dont even wanna fuck with any negative shit. They wanna give out a store page where ppl can go to for questions I guess?

If true that would be good. I'm not using Steam, but often read the discussion page because there's more talk than on say GoG forums.

 

[Lort]

Nope that was an old clause they do not seem to enforce.

Good guy Valve I guess. They dont even wanna fuck with any negative shit. They wanna give out a store page where ppl can go to for questions I guess?

And fuck epic aint never buying shit there

That was not an “old clause” it was created to try counter Epic game store.

Valve wants this to try convince publishers why their games should be on steam.. its not a good will guesture its not a “help” page.. its a page to encourage steam fanboys to harass game developers to pay the steam tax. Its not about bringing non windows games to windows .. its about making sure windows games pay %30 to valve.

 

[The Cockatrice]

That was not an “old clause” it was created to try counter Epic game store.

Valve wants this to try convince publishers why their games should be on steam.. its not a good will guesture its not a “help” page.. its a page to encourage steam fanboys to harass game developers to pay the steam tax. Its not about bringing non windows games to windows .. its about making sure windows games pay %30 to valve.

Nice try Tim but no one believes you.

 

[Generic]

I wish Valve reduced their 30% share cut already.

 

[Lort]

Nice try Tim but no one believes you.

Oh i know fanboys are so deluded they close there eyes stick their heads in the sand and still yell lalalalal. Thats not in question theres plenty of people like that .. if you dont wish to be one let me google that for you...

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/steam-distribution-agreement-makes-release-185300076.html

Date september 19th 2019.

General royalty rate for steam 30% as per less than a year ago.

Redirect Notice

www.google.com.au

 

[RyuCookingSomeRice]

That was not an “old clause” it was created to try counter Epic game store.

Valve wants this to try convince publishers why their games should be on steam.. its not a good will guesture its not a “help” page.. its a page to encourage steam fanboys to harass game developers to pay the steam tax. Its not about bringing non windows games to windows .. its about making sure windows games pay %30 to valve.

Mate, fuck off with your disengenious bullshit.

If you have no desire to discuss the topic at hand, and instead come with wild accusations and wild theory's then this isnt the thread for you.

There are no Steam "fanboys". Nobody here is trying to suck Gabe's cock.

 

[Dontero]

I wish Valve reduced their 30% share cut already.

Yeah if they did that before steam users could play EA games, Blizzard games and many other games.
No sane publisher would want to run their own store if margins were small.

This is the same reason why almost every industry doesn't sell their stuff directly. Because cost of running shop when you only want to sell your own stuff makes it uncometetive with other shops. It is the high throughput that is allowed by selling all kind of things that allows you to operate at low margins.

For example food shops operate on about 1-2% margins and that margins are still going down. This is a reason why mom's and pops shops are closing because they have to charge more as they don't have high throughput of customers to live from 1-2% margins unless they rise price and lose even more customers.

I repeat, physical food shop stores operate on 1-2% margins. And they have to hire workers, physical spaces so on and so forth, nothing like Velve which hires few 100s of people for worldwide market and rents servers with bandwidth.

This is why Epic starting fire under Steam ass is good. Margins already went down and rest of the shops are now considering going down with them. If there would be 5 more big contenders it would be down even more. Steam itself tries to stop big publishers leaving by reducing for them cut to 20% but 20% is still more than those publishers will receive in their own shops.

With more competitors game developers would have to work on cross shop api rather than use exclusive shop apis which would be real stake at the heart of Steam and anyone who tries to marry social platform and shop.

I just hope there are more players that could create their own big shops and start to contend.

There are no Steam "fanboys". Nobody here is trying to suck Gabe's cock.

aside from you.

 

[RyuCookingSomeRice]

Oh i know fanboys are so deluded they close there eyes stick their heads in the sand and still yell lalalalal. Thats not in question theres plenty of people like that .. if you dont wish to be one let me google that for you...

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/steam-distribution-agreement-makes-release-185300076.html

Date september 19th 2019.

General royalty rate for steam 30% as per less than a year ago.

Redirect Notice

www.google.com.au

That 'article' may be new, but like a dumbass the writer didnt check his facts because that part of the disclosure contract has been there since 2017. No they dont enforce it.

Now go play fortnite

 

[The Cockatrice]

Oh i know fanboys are so deluded they close there eyes stick their heads in the sand and still yell lalalalal. Thats not in question theres plenty of people like that .. if you dont wish to be one let me google that for you...

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/steam-distribution-agreement-makes-release-185300076.html

Date september 19th 2019.

General royalty rate for steam 30% as per less than a year ago.

Redirect Notice

www.google.com.au

I do not think you grasp the meaning of the word fanboy but keep trying Timmy. You're still not making any sense and this Steam 30% has been debated and proven successful for a long time that I just can't bother to be serious anymore. Now go take Randy out and have yourselves some kool aid.

 

[Generic]

I do not think you grasp the meaning of the word fanboy but keep trying Timmy. You're still not making any sense and this Steam 30% has been debated and proven successful for a long time that I just can't bother to be serious anymore. Now go take Randy out and have yourselves some kool aid.

Successful for Valve's shareholders for sure.

 

[Hudo]

If anything, the EGS has caused that Valve actually communicates more than usual. Maybe they'll even establish a committed PR-team down the line...

What I don't get is why some developers and users are masturbating so much over Steam. It's the same crap as any other launcher that gates your access to your games.

 

[Murr]

That was not an “old clause” it was created to try counter Epic game store.

Valve wants this to try convince publishers why their games should be on steam.. its not a good will guesture its not a “help” page.. its a page to encourage steam fanboys to harass game developers to pay the steam tax. Its not about bringing non windows games to windows .. its about making sure windows games pay %30 to valve.

It is just a smart business move. Steam wants people to be on Steam and to use its features. If you buy a game and encounter some problem, you might find the steam page in your search results. If you then compare Steam, where actual people discuss and talk about he game in question, with the wasteland that are other stores, you might want to stick around. Valve built their business around the Steam community so why not use it as an advantage.
That's what i think anyway.
If people, who buy Metro on the EGS discuss the game on Steam, they are on Steam and participate in its community.

Steam

 

[Generic]

If anything, the EGS has caused that Valve actually communicates more than usual. Maybe they'll even establish a committed PR-team down the line...

What I don't get is why some developers and users are masturbating so much over Steam. It's the same crap as any other launcher that gates your access to your games.

Valve built Steam over consumer loyalism. Everyone hates DRM and buy-but-not-own-it, except when Valve does it.

It all started with the juicy Steam's discounts.

It is just a smart business move. Steam wants people to be on Steam and to use its features. If you buy a game and encounter some problem, you might find the steam page in your search results. If you then compare Steam, where actual people discuss and talk about he game in question, with the wasteland that are other stores, you might want to stick around. Valve built their business around the Steam community so why not use it as an advantage.
That's what i think anyway.
If people, who buy Metro on the EGS discuss the game on Steam, they are on Steam and participate in its community.

Steam

This is only true for Steam-only games. Usually I find the answers and discussions on Reddit or the game's official board.

 

[DeltaPolarBear]

Successful for Valve's shareholders for sure.

That fact that you don't even know that Valve has no shareholders, show your complete ignorance on the topic.
You are not even worth the time to discuss with.

 

[The Cockatrice]

That fact that you don't even know that Valve has no shareholders, show your complete ignorance on the topic.
You are not even worth the time to discuss with.

Careful, the doge avatar army is under Tim's thumb.

 

[sol_bad]

I wish Valve reduced their 30% share cut already.

Why?

 

[Sentenza]

I wish Valve reduced their 30% share cut already.

They already did.
It goes down to 25 and then 20 as sales grow, not to mention they are the only service around that allows devs and publishers to generate an unlimited number of free serial keys to sell elsewhere. That ALSO goes to erode from that "notorious" 30% in case people don't realize it.
And that's while offering the largest user base AND the best package of services and tools to both developers and customers.

I'm honestly not sure how some people fail to realize that has to count for something.

 

[Kadayi]

I'm honestly not sure how some people fail to realize that has to count for something.

It's because they're either ignorant, paid not to or they just console drivebys who don't even PC at a guess.

 

[lyan]

That fact that you don't even know that Valve has no shareholders, show your complete ignorance on the topic.
You are not even worth the time to discuss with.

wait what, Valve is not a limited company?

 

[Dontero]

It all started with the juicy Steam's discounts.

Which exist mostly because at the time Steam had to compete with physical stores.

 

[DeltaPolarBear]

wait what, Valve is not a limited company?

Do you think Gabe memes are just memes? Gabe literally own 100% of Valve. It is his and no one else's. No shareholders, no stock fluctuations.

 

[RyuCookingSomeRice]

Yeah if they did that before steam users could play EA games, Blizzard games and many other games.
No sane publisher would want to run their own store if margins were small.

This is the same reason why almost every industry doesn't sell their stuff directly. Because cost of running shop when you only want to sell your own stuff makes it uncometetive with other shops. It is the high throughput that is allowed by selling all kind of things that allows you to operate at low margins.

For example food shops operate on about 1-2% margins and that margins are still going down. This is a reason why mom's and pops shops are closing because they have to charge more as they don't have high throughput of customers to live from 1-2% margins unless they rise price and lose even more customers.

I repeat, physical food shop stores operate on 1-2% margins. And they have to hire workers, physical spaces so on and so forth, nothing like Velve which hires few 100s of people for worldwide market and rents servers with bandwidth.

This is why Epic starting fire under Steam ass is good. Margins already went down and rest of the shops are now considering going down with them. If there would be 5 more big contenders it would be down even more. Steam itself tries to stop big publishers leaving by reducing for them cut to 20% but 20% is still more than those publishers will receive in their own shops.

With more competitors game developers would have to work on cross shop api rather than use exclusive shop apis which would be real stake at the heart of Steam and anyone who tries to marry social platform and shop.

I just hope there are more players that could create their own big shops and start to contend.



aside from you.

Haha what do you mean aside from me? I buy games from all storefronts that dont operate in hostage tactics to get people to come into their shop ur fucking ridiculous m8

 

[lyan]

Do you think Gabe memes are just memes? Gabe literally own 100% of Valve. It is his and no one else's. No shareholders, no stock fluctuations.

I looked up it is incorporated and private like Epic (and Tim Sweeney doesn't own 100% of the shares).

I doubt Gabe owns literally all of it though, at the very least some current/former employees would likely have been awarded with share benefits after all these years, and given its size and lifespan possibly some funds/investment banks too for financial reasons. Well its private so we can't verify anything.

 

[RyuCookingSomeRice]

That fact that you don't even know that Valve has no shareholders, show your complete ignorance on the topic.
You are not even worth the time to discuss with.

Yea but steam fanboys hurrduurrrr

 

[DeltaPolarBear]

I looked up it is incorporated and private like Epic (and Tim Sweeney doesn't own 100% of the shares).

I doubt Gabe owns literally all of it though, at the very least some current/former employees would likely have been awarded with share benefits after all these years, and given its size and lifespan possibly some funds/investment banks too for financial reasons. Well its private so we can't verify anything.

Since the shares are not sold, and Gabe own 50% minimum, it is basically his company. Basically he got his fortune from working at Microsoft, so he never had to sell shares to keep Valve going.
Valve doesn't exist to make money, Gabe was already rich. Gabe is running Valve because he cares about PC gaming. He was the first person to port Doom into the Windows environment, so modern PC gaming, al that came after MS-DOS was basically built from what Gabe coded.

WinDoom (Microsoft)

For the port by Bruce Lewis, see WinDoom. WinDoom was a preliminary port of Doom v1.8 to Microsoft Windows 3.11 by Gabe Newell using the newly developed Win32s and WinG technologies. This port never made it past beta testing due to the impending release of Windows 95. Two beta versions were...

doom.fandom.com

 

[Lort]

They already did.
It goes down to 25 and then 20 as sales grow, not to mention they are the only service around that allows devs and publishers to generate an unlimited number of free serial keys to sell elsewhere. That ALSO goes to erode from that "notorious" 30% in case people don't realize it.
And that's while offering the largest user base AND the best package of services and tools to both developers and customers.

I'm honestly not sure how some people fail to realize that has to count for something.

LOL ... “ as sales grow” the “discount” starts at 10 million dollars .. which is why so many indie and large developers laughed at this token transparent tactic. Even offering discounts hasnt stopped developers leaving, its not worth while compared to what else is on offer.

The largest user base? Wrong by far thats the ios, android and window stores. Sales of course show that even the “smaller” userbase of playstation and xbox uaually actually sell more games than Steam.

Epics store at 85 million users compared to Steams 90 million means it will soon be third place ... on windows and 5 th place overall.

Best services? Pc games user Direct x and Windows calls for 99% of game services then a few quick dll calls for steam. Steam code is easily replaceable and never fundamental or important to the game. Microsoft Apple Sony all provide better and far far far far far more services to games.

 

[Lort]

Since the shares are not sold, and Gabe own 50% minimum, it is basically his company. Basically he got his fortune from working at Microsoft, so he never had to sell shares to keep Valve going.
Valve doesn't exist to make money, Gabe was already rich. Gabe is running Valve because he cares about PC gaming. He was the first person to port Doom into the Windows environment, so modern PC gaming, al that came after MS-DOS was basically built from what Gabe coded.

WinDoom (Microsoft)

For the port by Bruce Lewis, see WinDoom. WinDoom was a preliminary port of Doom v1.8 to Microsoft Windows 3.11 by Gabe Newell using the newly developed Win32s and WinG technologies. This port never made it past beta testing due to the impending release of Windows 95. Two beta versions were...

doom.fandom.com

He ported one came so he “invented” gaming on windows .. what are you smoking ??!

I love this thread ..... bring out your fanboys ... come one come all and prove your not a fanboy by claiming that steams 30% cut is because he dosent care about money and that all windows gaming up to now and forever more is because he ported one game he didnt even write.

Heres what wikipedia says about his whole career at Microsoft Newell then spent the next thirteen years working at the company, serving as a producer of the Windows 1.01, 1.02, and 1.03 operating systems.

A producer ( not a coder) of versions of windows only famous for being bad.. Windows 3.11 was the first “popular” windows.

 

[DeltaPolarBear]

He ported one came so he “invented” gaming on windows .. what are you smoking ??!

I love this thread ..... bring out your fanboys ... come one come all and prove your not a fanboy by claiming that steams 30% cut is because he dosent care about money and that all windows gaming up to now and forever more is because he ported one game he didnt even write.

Heres what wikipedia says about his whole career at Microsoft Newell then spent the next thirteen years working at the company, serving as a producer of the Windows 1.01, 1.02, and 1.03 operating systems.

A producer ( not a coder) of versions of windows only famous for being bad.. Windows 3.11 was the first “popular” windows.

It seems you really have no idea what PC gaming is, what Valve is , or anything else I am talking about. Gabe spending his money on his Knife collection, but otherwise the money is spent on research. You know, things like Virtual Reality. But I doubt you care about the truth.

 

[llien]

Whatever.

I never understood love for Steam or Valve for that matter.
Lazy ass software show with atrocious margins and no real competitors.

Remember just how pathetic the whole "Steam Machine" story went.

 

[Sentenza]

LOL ... “ as sales grow” the “discount” starts at 10 million dollars

Eh, so?
The deal becomes more convenient for the business partner as it becomes more convenient for them, as it's supposed to be.
Server bandwidth aside their cost to support a commercial flop that moves no copies is the same of supporting a successful title. Not sure why they should handle around "discounts" for commercial failures.
The fact that some indie devs complained just goes to show how out of touch with reality some of them are, not the other way around.

The largest user base? Wrong by far thats the ios, android and window stores.

Are you deliberately trying to come off from this thread as stupid as humanly possible or it's an unintended side effect?
iOS doesn't sell PC games, iOS takes the same percentage while doing a lot less for you in terms of support.
And the Windows Store sales are notoriously ABYSMAL, especially for games.

Sales of course show that even the “smaller” userbase of playstation and xbox uaually actually sell more games than Steam.

That's an ass-pull. It's definitely a case-by-case basis, but games selling more on Steam than on both the services you mentioned (especially the XBOX Live service) are not uncommon at all.
Sometime they are almost in balance with an edge for a platform or the other, sometimes the disparity is even HEAVILY in favor of the PC version.

Epics store at 85 million users compared to Steams 90 million means it will soon be third place ... on windows and 5 th place overall.

You are comparing entirely different numbers. Steam has an estimation of 90+ active monthly users, which is NOT the number of total active accounts by a long shot. Then again I don't think you have ANY grasp of this topic, despise your insistence to contribute to it.

Best services? Pc games user Direct x and Windows calls for 99% of game services then a few quick dll calls for steam. Steam code is easily replaceable and never fundamental or important to the game. Microsoft Apple Sony all provide better and far far far far far more services to games.

As I said, why are you even trying to argue about something you absolutely don't have the faintest clue about?
Since your first reply you are acting like the clown of this thread. At first I even thought it was done on purpose, as some form of trolling/parody.

 

[Lort]

Eh, so?
The deal becomes more convenient for the business partner as it becomes more convenient for them, as it's supposed to be.
Server bandwidth aside their cost to support a commercial flop that moves no copies is the same of supporting a successful title. Not sure why they should handle around "discounts" for commercial failures.
The fact that some indie devs complained just goes to show how out of touch with reality some of them are, not the other way around.



Are you deliberately trying to come off from this thread as stupid as humanly possible or it's an unintended side effect?
iOS doesn't sell PC games, iOS takes the same percentage while doing a lot less for you in terms of support.
And the Windows Store sales are notoriously ABYSMAL, especially for games.


That's an ass-pull. It's definitely a case-by-case basis, but games selling more on Steam than on both the services you mentioned (especially the XBOX Live service) are not uncommon at all.
Sometime they are almost in balance with an edge for a platform or the other, sometimes the disparity is even HEAVILY in favor of the PC version.


You are comparing entirely different numbers. Steam has an estimation of 90+ active monthly users, which is NOT the number of total active accounts by a long shot. Then again I don't think you have ANY grasp of this topic, despise your insistence to contribute to it.


As I said, why are you even trying to argue about something you absolutely don't have the faintest clue about?
Since your first reply you are acting like the clown of this thread. At first I even thought it was done on purpose, as some form of trolling/parody.

In summary you said ...
Who cares about developers and if they make any money on their games

That ios and the Apple ecosystem is smaller and has less services than steam.

That every platform other than Steam PC games is irrelevant in any comparison.

In all honesty i should have realized you wouldnt look up anything yourself.. the 85 million users in epic store are also active users ..

Im glad you did come to the party and accept that despite having more “active users” and discounts Steam still rarely outsells each of the consoles stores.. solidifying its destiny as an increasingly irrelevant player.

Do you even code bro? Because i literally jusy said true statements about how games work and it seemed to cause an odd reaction.

 

[Tako Ou]

Heres what wikipedia says about his whole career at Microsoft Newell then spent the next thirteen years working at the company, serving as a producer of the Windows 1.01, 1.02, and 1.03 operating systems.

A producer ( not a coder) of versions of windows only famous for being bad.. Windows 3.11 was the first “popular” windows.

Sure, building the foundations for what would become the leading OS is no achievement.

This is just disingenuous at best.
If you are so intent on calling others "fanboy", you might want to refer to yourself as a "hater".

 

[Sentenza]

In summary you said ...

No, I didn't.
But I don't see the point in keep having an argument with someone who's either being deliberately disingenuous or unintentionally too obtuse to follow the discussion at hand.

 

[Yoshi]

Since the shares are not sold, and Gabe own 50% minimum, it is basically his company. Basically he got his fortune from working at Microsoft, so he never had to sell shares to keep Valve going.
Valve doesn't exist to make money, Gabe was already rich. Gabe is running Valve because he cares about PC gaming. He was the first person to port Doom into the Windows environment, so modern PC gaming, al that came after MS-DOS was basically built from what Gabe coded.

WinDoom (Microsoft)

For the port by Bruce Lewis, see WinDoom. WinDoom was a preliminary port of Doom v1.8 to Microsoft Windows 3.11 by Gabe Newell using the newly developed Win32s and WinG technologies. This port never made it past beta testing due to the impending release of Windows 95. Two beta versions were...

doom.fandom.com

Because rich people rarely care about money, right? Considering the pretty large share Valve takes with Steam, it is pretty likely that yes, making money is a prime motivator for Gabe. Not that there is anything wrong with intending to make money off your business, but claiming he runs Valve just because of his love for games is just wrong.

 

[DeltaPolarBear]

Because rich people rarely care about money, right? Considering the pretty large share Valve takes with Steam, it is pretty likely that yes, making money is a prime motivator for Gabe. Not that there is anything wrong with intending to make money off your business, but claiming he runs Valve just because of his love for games is just wrong.

"Pretty large share"...
Except, that is the same share everyone takes. Except for Epic, who are litterally operating at a loss with their store by paying the entire expect profits of Indie games in advance, and thus not something that you can call a store.

You think 30% is Valve's invention? You think Valve decided on it? I guess you do think that.

 

[Murr]

This is only true for Steam-only games. Usually I find the answers and discussions on Reddit or the game's official board.

Don't really see why it would only be true for Steam only games. Just because there are other great/not so great (reddit) platforms to discuss games on, doesn't mean that steam forums can't be a place to discuss the games.
It has the potential to drive people to the store.

 

[Vawn]

Good guy Valve I guess. They dont even wanna fuck with any negative shit.

Right. Good guy Valve.... 30%

 

[Sentenza]

Right. Good guy Valve.... 30%

And?

 

[The Cockatrice]

Right. Good guy Valve.... 30%

Did you even bother reading the thread or are you people so far up your own ass your only defense is OMG BUT 30%!?!?!!?! Jesus you're all like a bunch of robots mind controlled by Tim.

 

[Yoshi]

"Pretty large share"...
Except, that is the same share everyone takes. Except for Epic, who are litterally operating at a loss with their store by paying the entire expect profits of Indie games in advance, and thus not something that you can call a store.

You think 30% is Valve's invention? You think Valve decided on it? I guess you do think that.

Valve did not invent the number 0.3, no. But they set the share as they did and used the very same share people of closed platforms, who offer specialised development software in a closed environment and definitely are in for the money, because, unsurprisingly, they want to make quite a good buck on Steam. In fact, half the share still seems to be sufficient to make good money off such store, as Epic demonstrates. Therefore it should be uncontrversial to say that Valve / GN are indeed in it to make a good profit.

 

[RyuCookingSomeRice]

Right. Good guy Valve.... 30%

Do you Epic mouthbreathers have any decent argument or do you just keep spouting the same bullshit over and over

 

[Sentenza]

Valve did not invent the number 0.3, no. But they set the share as they did and used the very same share people of closed platforms, who offer specialised development software in a closed environment and definitely are in for the money, because, unsurprisingly, they want to make quite a good buck on Steam. In fact, half the share still seems to be sufficient to make good money off such store, as Epic demonstrates. Therefore it should be uncontrversial to say that Valve / GN are indeed in it to make a good profit.

You are just saying things at this point, with absolutely no concern of them reflecting reality or not.
Valve did not "set" the standard for a 30% revenue split in the relationship between provider and third-part reseller. It existed for years across multiple types of market. And when Valve introduced it for digital stores it was also shockingly competitive compared to what preceded it in the retail market/distribution agreements with other publishers (which typically started from a 50% split going up).
Valve offers at least the same amount of dev tools and "specialized software" that other platform holders have, and invests just as much in research and development, both for the Steam infrastructure and on the open source front, at benefit of the entire PC market (i.e. Vulkan, Proton, Linux, and a lot more).
And yes, NO SHIT they are there for the money, I don't think anyone ever claimed for them to be a charity.

Not sure what Epic demonstrates, given that they are currently operating at heavy loss and their aggressive policies are literally a case of them trying to brute-force themselves into a market with a strategy that smaller distributors (i.e. CDP/GOG) can't hope to match.

I swear for people who understand so little about the entire topic some of you are incredibly efficient at repeating certain convenient (and disingenuous, if not outright misleading) talking points.

 

[Yoshi]

And yes, NO SHIT they are there for the money, I don't think anyone ever claimed for them to be a charity.

Valve doesn't exist to make money, Gabe was already rich. Gabe is running Valve because he cares about PC gaming.

You are just saying things at this point, with absolutely no concern of them reflecting reality or not.
Valve did not "set" the standard for a 30% revenue split in the relationship between provider and third-part reseller. It existed for years across multiple types of market. And when Valve introduced it for digital stores it was also shockingly competitive compared to what preceded it in the retail market/distribution agreements with other publishers (which typically started from a 50% split going up).

What kind of comparison is that? If you distribute physical media, you have production cost and a certain risk (due to inventory / guessing demand) to calculate. This is a non-issue with Steam.

 

[Sentenza]

What kind of comparison is that? If you distribute physical media, you have production cost and a certain risk (due to inventory / guessing demand) to calculate. This is a non-issue with Steam.

It's... Not a comparison at all, just stating a fact? When Steam came by, developers and publishers were ecstatic about how good of a deal it was compared to the previously available options.

Darryl Still of 1C (Russian publisher) in 2011, few years after Steam was beginning to establish its foothold in the industry, around the time retailers started to BITCH and whine about Steam stealing their thunder.

So, let’s say £10 per unit sale goes to the publisher, £3 to the developer/sub-licensor, and it’s in your bank five months after the customer has paid out £30.
Compare that to the digital model. On a £29.99 sale, the digital partner will pay the publisher – or in many cases direct to the developer – between 60 and 70 per cent, by the end of the month following the sale.
Wow. To recap: on a sale over the counter today, we can have our £3 by the end of March, or on a digital sale, we can have £20 by Christmas (note: article published in November 11th).
Remind me why we should choose to go with retail and decline to let Steam sell the game?

 

[Woo-Fu]

I thought Valve just introduced a rule that you need to release the game not later than on other stores?

It wasn't just introduced.
It doesn't apply to people who haven't already entered into an agreement to release on Steam.