Steam is pretty much the de facto standard for PC gaming these days. Even the most retail-loyal PC gamers likely have used it in some way, shape or form. Valve's Steam-powered empire also dominates the digital distribution landscape. Brad Wardell of Stardock (which owns the Impulse digital platform) estimates that Steam has roughly 70% of market share.
But it's one thing to be the big kid in the playground. It's another to start locking the other kids out. PC gamers may recall a brief dustup over the sale of Modern Warfare 2, wherein Direct2Drive, Impulse and other digital vendors refused to stock the title due to its native use of Steamworks, which would require the installation of the Steam client, and thus the Steam storefront.
I can see things from their point of view, certainly. Why sell a game that, once installed, provides a back door for the competition? Valve has also been lobbying hard for third-party publishers (like Activision and EA) to start including Steam's native DRM solution, which again could shut out competing services (like Impulse's Goo DRM).
Then again, the ever-outspoken Derek Smart published a very detailed counterargument on Gamasutra as to why the boycott itself was rather foolish, essentially making Modern Warfare 2 a Steam-exclusive title. The "problem," Smart claimed, was that Steamworks, as a unified suite of services for multiplayer, auto-patching, storefronts, and authentication, offers much more value to the publisher and developer. Essentially, Steam rules because it's simply better. Steam boss Jason Holtman showed the same sentiment on Gamesindustry.biz:
To our minds, we think that if you're making a good game and it's got the services a customer wants it should get out in as many channels as possible. If you have a good portal and you're good at collecting money from folks, and attracting them, there's no reason why you shouldn't be.
And I think he's right, in that sense. I choose Steam because it's awesome, and the closest PC gaming has ever come to a platform like PSN or Xbox Live, with the added advantage of there actually being competition. While the potential for abuse is there (as Randy Pitchford complains), there's always an alternative. Should Valve start to throw its weight around too much, I might just choose Impulse, since it has Sins of a Solar Empire on it. Just, for God's sake, don't sell it on Games for Windows Live. Please.
Contest:
7:00 PM on 11.28.2009
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And is this the same Derek Smart who
made the game Battlecruiser way back in the day? That was the only game I ever saw PC Games magazine give a flat F.
P.S. Magesx I really hope your being sarcastic.
Maybe the other platforms should work on offering more to the user and to the developers instead of complain about how Steam is doing better than them.
And the player, don't leave out the player.
Steam might be a monopoly at some point and we may all regret suppporting it on some level someday, but for right now it offers the best store, DRM, community features and multiplayer network in all of PC gaming. That is certainly worth supporting.
Besides, just like PSN to Xbox Live there will always be a competitor on the same platform ready to jump if Steam screws up. If one day they betray their customers or make some serious mistakes, some new DD service will say "we don't do those things!" and take a large percentage of people away. That's the better part of capitalism, and is even easier on an open platform like the PC.
I don't use Steam because I support Valve, I use it because no one offers an all-around better digital distribution system for PC.
L4d2 for 38 dollars and Borderlands for 34 when retail stores are selling them for 60?
Those fiends have gone too far this time.
Things like SteamWorks, VAC, Steam Cloud, A built in DLC marketplace, an excellent community, the Overlay, mod hosting and support for practically ANY game (bought from Steam or not) is it any wonder that Steam has the highest market share?
What Valve is doing is offering an outstanding service, and it's not their fault that developers see this, and want their games sold on Steam.
What do you suggest? Valve just to say "Sorry guys, people think we're just trying to take over the digital distribution business because we have the best platform... Guess we can't host your games"?
Steam is the biggest, because it's the best. Period.
Yeah same guy and he's still an arrogant prick. To be fair though, it got a flat F mainly for game breaking bugs. After 2.5 years(!?!) if patches, the game was actually pretty good, despite no-one caring by that point.
they deserve all the success (and money) they have
on steam you're buying games at prices unheard off.
I can see Impule's issue, but then again, Valve has games on sale that use GFWL. Not that it's much of a competition, but that's besides the point.
I see it as the others are scared. If Impulse had any confidence in thier DD service, they wouldn't have been all that concerned.
Which in turn is something i need to ask steam support about... i mean, anytime i install a steam game it installs on primary drive and i want to put my games on the secondary...
I do think it should probably become its own entity though... instead of staying a part of Valve. I think that's where most of these peoples issues arise from in the first place.
Or Unreal Tournament 3 Black for 10$... Or Empire Total War for 20$... Or Steam only games (aka L4D) for half price...
Yeah steam just rocks.
Anyway, judging from what I know so far, they don´t really have a serious competiton going on. no wonder they are 70% of the cake.
(Which is a lie).
Big Download did a much better article a few days ago breaking down the differences between all the "services" PC gamers can use now. You owe it to yourself to give it a look and next time, leave the fanboy journalism at home and stick to the facts please.
Let's make something clear here - GFWL is an INGAME client. The only thing it sells is DLC for whatever game you are running for at that time. You can buy DLC with the stand alone client, but GFWL DOES. NOT. SELL. GAMES.
As for Steam's "features", two of them were introduced by GFWL first (achievements and DLC). GFWL had them before Steam did, and GFWL also integrates into your 360 Gamercard, which is something Steam can never do. GFWL also is the only service that has done cross platform games.
You want to know why some people do not like Steam? Reread your article and I think the answer is pretty clear. Again, you like Steam? Good for you, but please be considerate of the other services other people may use.
Microsoft was cited as anti-compete because of the packaging of IE with the OS, preventing Firefox and others from being able to compete. If the product (OS) comes with a browser, people have little need to download one of their choice, since the choice is made for them. Firefox can't reach people because they were frozen out from the beginning.
This is basically what these brands would argue, that games packaging Steam are effectively removing choice from customers, and possible preventing customers from even knowing there are other choices. While some may say this is ridiculous, there are still some people who do not know what Firefox is, they surf, chat, etc, but have no clue there is something other then IE they can use. The fear is that Steam will effectively accomplish this by being the only ones packaged on discs, preventing others from reaching the same markets, freezing out competition.
Technology or innovation could be held back, or instead of reaching the market through other venues, possibly free services, instead they get tied up in "premium memberships" that add on cost, and since they are the only ones offering, or they are the ones offering it, and you are already tied to their services for many games, you are being pushed into getting it with them.
There even could be revelations that Steam/Valve is helping inflate prices, freeze out other customers from getting their software onto discs as well, etc. There is much the customer doesn't see, just because we are happy as customers, doesn't mean the market could be even better if there was more competition.
Every single time I've had to use GFWL it's been slow as hell and takes up a stupid amount of system resources. Generally there are also a ridiculous number of hoops to jump through as well compared to Steam. You are the first person I have heard proclaim a preference for GWFL over Steam, it truly boggles the mind.
Unless I'm forced to, I do not buy games on Steam anymore. Give me Impulse, Gamersgate or GOG: don't give me another DRM.
http://www.outlookseries.com/N3/Financial/3019_CUMO_Intel_Anti_trust_Suit_Bribed_Coerced_DELL_HP_IBM.htm
Not exactly like the above case but similar.
These exclusive deals would in any decade but the last be a monopoly.
But monopoly laws have been drastically been destroyed. Yes of course it's a monopoly - but republicans have basically made monopolies under Clinton and Bush legal.
To draw a better parallel this case is like monopoly behavior from Microsoft. Bundling the Internet Explorer browser INTO the XP and VISTA OS's to obscure the fact that is in no way part of the OS.
Europe found them guilty, because Europe still enforces anti-monopoly laws - the US seldom does.
We even allow a monopoly exception for insurance companies- which of course is why all health insurance is a legal ponzi scheme.
The second you go to collect (become ill)-
you are dumped - and can never get coverage again (preexisting condition).
Steam has probably paid a fee/bribe to get themselves included in the game code.
These strategic partnerships are legal because companies are allowed to make campaign contributions - and thus own and manage government like an investment.
In a democracy of course - government is supposed to manage corporations, which only exist, because govt. originally said they could exist.
Basically.
And like Hel pointed out I'd assume the day Steam becomes the bad guys will probably be the day they're bought by whatever publisher we've decided to villify when the day comes.
Actually, you can play single player games offline with steam. Just look here,
https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=3160-AGCB-2555
Just need to go into the settings menu in steam and check a few boxes. Also, I loves me some steam deals/sales.
And hell then there's GFWL, while I don't have a major problem with it.. the only way I can play my DLC is if I'm logged into my GFWL account online.. when my internet was down a couple of months ago for about 2 days the only way I could play fallout 3 was without the DLC and on a new character since my current one was on one of the DLC maps, thankfully I had my steam offline mode so I just played some other games on there.
The fact of the matter is, steam got on board with its platform before everyone else, and has fine tuned it in a way to where it works perfectly. They offer a great amount of support to both triple A and indie developers. The system works, and works well. It has a lot of features put with it, and it keeps getting more and more added to it, hell if anyone was on steam when it first came around, its almost like a completely different program.
Alot of these other programs have come late into the game that valve started.. valve has about 2 years ahead of these guys in their platform.. and im sure impulse, gfwl, d2d will have features just like valve.. or maybe not. Steam has community features now, group communities which have, over the past few days especially been very helpful for many of us dtoiders in getting PC FNF's started to a much larger level than they were before. There just is so much stuff being pushed into this program, every year this program evolves, and no matter how subtle or bold that evolution is.. it makes a difference and is, for the most part, better than before.
I personally don't like having all my games tied with 4 different applications, steam has unified my gaming library, and has made it extremely simple for me to back up these games to my external hard drive so I never have to use a cd or download them in full again. Its quicker, its easier, and its just plain better.
What makes steam a monopoly is they have a strong, solid xbox live style community interface. There are similar interfaces in the gaming world but they are merely chat clients (like Xfire for instant). Steam is the standard, even more so than Windows LIVE.
1. What other company gives such a reliable platform. I downloaded L4D @ like 1.7+MB/s.
2. I can just log into Steam on another PC, download and play games I already purchased. I tested this so I could play with the Map Editor, what a supreme win.
As mentioned in the 1st reply, the sales are phenomenal. This isn't Games for Windows. XD
everyone uses it because is the best we got.
That being said, I wholeheartedly agree with everything positive that has already been said about it so far in this thread. I want to bear Steam's manbabies.
Things like SteamWorks, VAC, Steam Cloud, A built in DLC marketplace, an excellent community, the Overlay, mod hosting and support for practically ANY game (bought from Steam or not) is it any wonder that Steam has the highest market share?[/i]
THIS
Only thing about steam that pisses me off is when games come coupled with additional drm such as securerom or games4windowslive as well as steam. Or when they don't work properly in offline mode (looking at you company of heroes). But this is more a fault of the publisher/developer and not steam.