Retail threatens Steam ban

[Jetsetlemming]

The monopoly is when Steam is integral part of a retail game.

That's not what monopoly means, though. Monopoly would be when Steam has all of a given market (the retailers are specifying PC gaming) cornered to the exclusion of competition. This isn't the case. Including the steam client in certain select titles sold outside Steam is no more of a monopoly than gamestop exclusive preorder bonuses. Yes, they favor a specific store. No, they do not suddenly remove all competition.

[Steppenwolf]

That's not what monopoly means, though. Monopoly would be when Steam has all of a given market

Umm but that's exactly what happens with the games that include Steam... If that's no monopoly then what is? There is no option in retail Civ 5 to detach the game from Steam and connect to a another digital distributor for my DLC.

Your semantics seem wrong. The word monopoly doesn't equal market dominance. What it means is that there is only one seller to choose from for a given product or service.

[Jetsetlemming]

You can't have a monopoly on Civ 5. That's like saying Walmart has a monopoly on Sam's Choice, except less so because Civ 5 is sold outside Steam. It just connects to Steam when you install it. I'm sticking with my analogy of a gamestop preorder bonus. It favors one source of the product but does not exclude other sources. You can buy Civ 5 at Gamestop, or Best Buy, or Amazon, or Direct2Drive. It'll just install Steam when you install the game.

[Zeta]

Steam's not a monopoly. Valve have not used monopolistic strategies in building Steam. Its market share does not create a lesser experience for consumers.

Including the steam software on retail games and requiring it's use are very similar tactics to those that got Microsoft in a lot of legal trouble.

[Jetsetlemming]

Steam's not a monopoly. Valve have not used monopolistic strategies in building Steam. Its market share does not create a lesser experience for consumers.

Including the steam software on retail games and requiring it's use are very similar tactics to those that got Microsoft in a lot of legal trouble.

On a vastly smaller scale. I've never been comfortable with the Internet Explorer anti-trust rulings in the EU anyway. How are you supposed to get an alternate browser in the first place without IE to go on the internet and get it?

[Sentura]

scale doesn't matter when we're talking about principle. the civ 5 direct connection to steam was a bad thing, and i'm hoping someone is looking out for this for the future.

[Steppenwolf]

Right now it's purely on principle but things change. There is no guarantee Valve remains a "nice" company and even today i don't consider Steam the best thing since powdered bread. It's actualy pretty shitty for us Euro guys. Competition would be a good thing in my eyes.

[Hourences]

Valve doesn't force anyone to use a direct USD > Euro conversion. You can get a seperate Euro and USD price if you ask for it.

That said I agree that more competition would be nice. A monopoly is in no ones interest.

[Serenius]

I love when subpar companies try to lobby against a superior product because they can't be bothered to make their own as good or better.

This would be the equivalent of trying to start a WoW boycott because the MMO you work on is utter crap instead of making your game better than WoW.

[twiz]

What it means is that there is only one seller to choose from for a given product or service.

How is this any different from XBox360 or PS3's online marketplaces?

I agree that monopoly's are bad, mmkay. But the way to break up a monopoly is with legitimate, innovative competitors offering a product with advantages over Steam - not government intervention to lessen the quality or value of a product until the competitor's product starts looking like a good value too. And certainly not with intentional, blatant collusion to try to bully some market share from Valve.

I do see an issue with requiring Steam to be installed just to handle DRM shit. If there were a Steamworks standalone that could handle the DRM and nothing else, that would be ideal.

[Bunglo]

So we should allow monopolies because a company innovates first?

My post wasn't addressing what we should or shouldn't allow. It was addressing this misconception of Valve doing something wrong because publishers freely choose it as DRM for some of their retail games.

You want something other than Steam for retail games? Fine, so do I, but crying monopoly (like the retailers in the OP) doesn't change a publishers mind. It's up to the consumers to complain to publishers on why they don't want it and suggest alternatives.

This is the reason some games use Steam as DRM instead of Securom+Steam+WindowsLive (bioshock 2.) People complained, a good number said Steam would be better, there you go.

As Twiz as said, I don't like monopolies either, competition is good for the consumer. However, those who have a problem with Steam cutting into their profits need to step it up a notch and come out with something worth while to attract new consumers and people already using Steam.

[Sentura]

the problem with doing something like creating a new steam is that it's a digital distribution. consumers do not want to switch between different platforms to play different games, and as such, steam will always have a near monopoly. there isn't a way to sway consumers who have already bought into steam, because just that: they have bought into steam. they have all their games there etc., and do not see a reason for getting an entirely new distribution system just so they can save a couple of bucks per month on whatever games offered on different platforms.

steam is starting to become a concern if they continue down the road of creating games that can only be activated over steam (see the civ5 problem). this could, however, be more or less solved by creating games that can be activated on any digital distribution platform.

[Bluestrike]

I have always been a fan of Steam, but now they are too big and I don't like how steamworks is done.

things like chat, achievements and server lists should not be tied to a store application.

So I try to support Stardock's impulse::Reactor instead as they offer a solution that gives you all the same stuff without ties to a store page.

(as steamworks should have been if Valve really were such nice guys)

What has that to do with anything? The industry and the economy don't stand still and that's a good thing. I wouldn't mind another digital distributer with a 40% market share because then Valve couldn't just translate Dollar prices 1:1 to Euro.

Thats not really Valve, but the publishers demanding it or you get the "not availeble in your region" stuff like it was in the past.

I can understand it a bit, as long as they are not going to charge more for EU users if the dollar value goes ever above the euro again

[Jetsetlemming]

Darryl Still, the international publishing director for 1C, the major Russian game publisher, has written an opinion piece on this topic.

http://www.mcvuk.com/features/808/OPINI ... l-vs-Steam

It's a pretty incredible slam dunk for digital distribution and an attack on retailers for how they already treat PC games in stores.

What is more surprising is the reaction of retail now. I have read it described as the reaction of a small child who threw his toy away because he no longer wanted it, but started screaming as soon as another child picked it up to play with. The metaphor works perfectly, especially in the light of the excuse I heard on numerous occasions.

‘There is no demand’ went the mantra. But is this really true? Not in our experience.

I remember fondly the meeting in my office with a red-faced publisher who was explaining why their initial order from a major retailer for one of our new releases was just 30 units. At the time I had my browser open on the Steam product data page, which updates sales numbers every few minutes.

“They have taken one unit for each of their top 30 stores” he told me. “There is just no demand from their customers”.

I glanced at my screen, hit refresh and advised him: “In the time it’s taken you to tell me that there is no demand, Steam has sold 45 units”.

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.