The reason why Valve does all this cool shit is because it’s a private company and not publicly traded. It owes nothing to no one.
As soon as a company goes public, it owes its shareholders its profits and has an obligation to make as much as possible and use whatever means it can to do so.
Gabe doesn’t care. He does what he wants and he knows what his customers want.
Private companies have a fiduciary duty to their shareholders just the same as public ones. The big difference is that they tend to have far fewer shareholders and they usually all have some personal relationship. So it’s less likely to result in a lawsuit.
Gabe apparently owns 50.1% of Valve. I don’t know who owns the rest (I’m reading some places that he got divorced, so possibly his ex-wife?), but if they’re not happy with how it’s being run they could certainly sue. That being said it seems like a money making machine at the moment, so why would you.
I put an admittedly low amount of effort into searching (skimmed a couple dozen links or so) for evidence of crimes and came up empty. I’d be curious to see trustworthy sources about this as well.
Re: HL3. It’s a particularly infamous example of a game cancelation, and it does suck but studios canceling games happens.
Edit: Excepting antitrust lawsuits. I wasn’t surprised to see that and glossed over it, but it does qualify as a crime and I would say is a reasonable accusation. I didn’t read more in to it than that, yet.
Edit 2: The TL;DR: of the antitrust lawsuit if you weren’t aware (I wasn’t) is that Steam is taking a cut of up to 30% which they’re arguing is excessive. Game makers don’t really have a choice given that Steam is the market leader. Here’s a random newer article, more about Gabe having to appear in court, but it covers the basics. https://www.techspot.com/news/100969-gabe-newell-ordered-testify-person-valve-antitrust-lawsuit.html
30% has been the industry standard rate for decades and unlike consoles or mobile, PC game developers have more choices than any other even down to self-selling. It’s such a nothing lawsuit.
This is one dev upset because their game they spent what felt like 50 years developing one of the first “big” Indie titles didn’t make them enough money.
I read that! About it being the industry standard. The background on the developer is news to me.
I guess the question is, is 30% too much? Just because it’s the standard doesn’t mean it isn’t too high. But I’m not knowledgeable in the financial side of the gaming industry nor do I know what valve’s overhead is like so I truly don’t know the answer.
While I won’t comment as to the validity of the lawsuit (that is for the courts):
The “standard” for selling video games involved needing a publisher who could coordinate with manufacturers and distributors to fight to get your big box onto a Best Buy shelf. Steam is one of the biggest “disruptors” in history. They don’t get to make the “that is just how it always was” argument*
PC Game developers very much do not have more choices. Because, with very few exceptions, the response to “we are selling this on our own store” or “we are selling this as a gog/humble/epic exclusive” is “Fuck you, wake me up when you are on steam”.
I don’t know enough of the math behind the Steam CDNs and services to know if it is worth the cut. But, much like I am always going to whinge at DLC prices even as I acknowledge that it is “a good deal”, I am also going to generally side with “devs deserve more money”.
*: Take this with a grain of salt since it is a large claim and there are obviously no citations. But Steam did not invent digital distribution and companies like Strategy First (?) existed. And their cut for the massively inflated game prices (80 USD in the early 2000s…) was a LOT higher than 30%. Ironically, Valve used the same “you get more money if you sell with us” argument.
Hl3 will come out if and when valve comes up with interesting new engine tech. The story of hl1 was the pitch the gravity gun and physics of source was the reason for hl2. If vr had seen mass adoption hl alyx would have been a Main line game or maybe include more post hl2 content.
People don’t even know what people want. Gabe knows people expect HL3 to be some godly game and he knows what they make will in all likelihood not live up to that image. Why bother if it will just bring disappointment to everyone? Just save the effort and enjoy the memes.
The reason why Valve does all this cool shit is because it’s a private company and not publicly traded. It owes nothing to no one.
As soon as a company goes public, it owes its shareholders its profits and has an obligation to make as much as possible and use whatever means it can to do so.
Gabe doesn’t care. He does what he wants and he knows what his customers want.
Private companies have a fiduciary duty to their shareholders just the same as public ones. The big difference is that they tend to have far fewer shareholders and they usually all have some personal relationship. So it’s less likely to result in a lawsuit.
Gabe apparently owns 50.1% of Valve. I don’t know who owns the rest (I’m reading some places that he got divorced, so possibly his ex-wife?), but if they’re not happy with how it’s being run they could certainly sue. That being said it seems like a money making machine at the moment, so why would you.
Valve is not a publicly traded company though. They don’t really care if investors aren’t making the expected profits.
I mean, they care, but it’s all Gabe who decides in the end. If he doesn’t care as much then that’s the way it is.
“HE kNoWnS whAT CuStoMeRs WaNT”
No he doesn’t, people kept saying HL3 and there’s no HL3. The company committed crimes and illegal activities in many countries.
Stop the propaganda nonsense.
Those are quite the claims. Got any sources to back them up?
I put an admittedly low amount of effort into searching (skimmed a couple dozen links or so) for evidence of crimes and came up empty. I’d be curious to see trustworthy sources about this as well.
Re: HL3. It’s a particularly infamous example of a game cancelation, and it does suck but studios canceling games happens.
Edit: Excepting antitrust lawsuits. I wasn’t surprised to see that and glossed over it, but it does qualify as a crime and I would say is a reasonable accusation. I didn’t read more in to it than that, yet.
Edit 2: The TL;DR: of the antitrust lawsuit if you weren’t aware (I wasn’t) is that Steam is taking a cut of up to 30% which they’re arguing is excessive. Game makers don’t really have a choice given that Steam is the market leader. Here’s a random newer article, more about Gabe having to appear in court, but it covers the basics. https://www.techspot.com/news/100969-gabe-newell-ordered-testify-person-valve-antitrust-lawsuit.html
30% has been the industry standard rate for decades and unlike consoles or mobile, PC game developers have more choices than any other even down to self-selling. It’s such a nothing lawsuit.
This is one dev upset because their game they spent what felt like 50 years developing one of the first “big” Indie titles didn’t make them enough money.
I read that! About it being the industry standard. The background on the developer is news to me.
I guess the question is, is 30% too much? Just because it’s the standard doesn’t mean it isn’t too high. But I’m not knowledgeable in the financial side of the gaming industry nor do I know what valve’s overhead is like so I truly don’t know the answer.
While I won’t comment as to the validity of the lawsuit (that is for the courts):
I don’t know enough of the math behind the Steam CDNs and services to know if it is worth the cut. But, much like I am always going to whinge at DLC prices even as I acknowledge that it is “a good deal”, I am also going to generally side with “devs deserve more money”.
*: Take this with a grain of salt since it is a large claim and there are obviously no citations. But Steam did not invent digital distribution and companies like Strategy First (?) existed. And their cut for the massively inflated game prices (80 USD in the early 2000s…) was a LOT higher than 30%. Ironically, Valve used the same “you get more money if you sell with us” argument.
Hl3 will come out if and when valve comes up with interesting new engine tech. The story of hl1 was the pitch the gravity gun and physics of source was the reason for hl2. If vr had seen mass adoption hl alyx would have been a Main line game or maybe include more post hl2 content.
Thanks! I’ll give it a read.
People don’t even know what people want. Gabe knows people expect HL3 to be some godly game and he knows what they make will in all likelihood not live up to that image. Why bother if it will just bring disappointment to everyone? Just save the effort and enjoy the memes.
*and free publicity
Half-Life Alyx wasn’t good enough for you? Sheesh, go play ANY of the HL mods or many other new games released. Bad hill to die on…