Larian isn’t wrong, Steam mostly works. Stable client, refunds, workshop, Proton, massive userbase and tools that actually help developers and players. A lot of other stores still feel half-baked next to that.
But deserved != harmless. Valve has way too much power, discovery is a dumpster fire, and their communication and policy decisions can be arbitrary. Dominance like that rewards sloppiness and makes it harder for better alternatives to gain traction.
So yeah, Steam earned its place, but I do not want any one company owning PC gaming. Competition keeps them honest, and right now we need more real contenders, not just storefronts throwing money at exclusives.
Looking at how other tech areas have all consolidated into monopolies or oligopolies, valve is the best case scenario for PC gaming.
Imagine anyone else being in control. Activision? EA? Ubisoft? The gaming industry is not immune from disgusting money hungry corporations stepping on the users to squeeze out every little penny they can. Valve has never done this and has kept others in check for the longest time. The day we lose the current version of Valve will be disastrous for the industry, I’m pretty sure.
Is discovery a dumpster fire? I mean sure it could be better but I dont think its a dumpster fire. It seems there are constantly new small team indie games doing wild numbers on the platform. If discovery was truely bad we would be seeing the charts dominated by big studios.
As a player, I feel like discovery is great. I found literally dozens of interesting games just by scrolling down the main page.
I don’t know how it’s for devs, but it’s probably all but impossible to get traction if you’re just throwing your game in there, Fests being a compromised solution to an impossible problem
The regular Next Fests have probably been the single best thing for game discovery I’ve found in s long time. Nothing beats an actual hands-on demo for deciding if I’ll wishlist a game.
You can’t filter using more than one tag as an “and” filter, only “or”. That’s pretty basic for a filter feature, isn’t it?
It’s just surprising given how well implemented other Steam features had been in my experience.
He wasnt talking about search it was about algorithmic recommendation.
But you can filter by multiple tags. When you click search select the advanced search at the bottom of the dropdown. It does all the things you mention and far more
Mr biggest problem with tags is that it’s user curated and you can recommend an unlimited number of them.
Just because a game has a few funny moments, doesn’t mean it gets the comedy tag. Just because it has a brief driving sequence doesn’t mean it gets the racing tag. Just because there’s some reading involved doesn’t mean you get the visual novel tag.
It’s getting to the point I feel like there’s a conspiracy where there’s teams of people intentionally sabotaging the tag system and teams trying to counter it, all so they can control views and sales. It’s really noticeable when a publisher stops marketing and moves to another release.
That’s hard to do when Steam has all but cornered the market. Say what you will about Epic’s ineptitude, but even investing billions, the publisher of the biggest game ever can’t break into the market. Now imagine how hard it’d be for a smaller player.
I sincerely doubt that even if another launcher did everything Steam does, it would rival it without huge amounts of money being thrown around. People already use Steam.
And that’s assuming they get to this point, ignoring that Steam had decades to get there. It used to be ass.
I sincerely doubt that even if another launcher did everything Steam does, it would rival it. People already use Steam.
At that point, you can start grabbing business from steam via promotions and such. You don’t need to rival or outgrow Steam to break into the market, you just need a bit of the market.
And that’s assuming they get to this point, ignoring that Steam had decades to get there. It used to be ass.
It’s not even that other launchers have less features than Steam. It’s just that other than GoG, which has a very limited catalog and no regional pricing, there is not a single store that is not actively anti-consumer to a hilarious extent.
Not every company can pull it off, but I’m certain if Epic had invested in their launchers it could have worked.
A few years in and their launcher has stagnated completely
Larian isn’t wrong, Steam mostly works. Stable client, refunds, workshop, Proton, massive userbase and tools that actually help developers and players. A lot of other stores still feel half-baked next to that.
But deserved != harmless. Valve has way too much power, discovery is a dumpster fire, and their communication and policy decisions can be arbitrary. Dominance like that rewards sloppiness and makes it harder for better alternatives to gain traction.
So yeah, Steam earned its place, but I do not want any one company owning PC gaming. Competition keeps them honest, and right now we need more real contenders, not just storefronts throwing money at exclusives.
Looking at how other tech areas have all consolidated into monopolies or oligopolies, valve is the best case scenario for PC gaming.
Imagine anyone else being in control. Activision? EA? Ubisoft? The gaming industry is not immune from disgusting money hungry corporations stepping on the users to squeeze out every little penny they can. Valve has never done this and has kept others in check for the longest time. The day we lose the current version of Valve will be disastrous for the industry, I’m pretty sure.
Is discovery a dumpster fire? I mean sure it could be better but I dont think its a dumpster fire. It seems there are constantly new small team indie games doing wild numbers on the platform. If discovery was truely bad we would be seeing the charts dominated by big studios.
As a player, I feel like discovery is great. I found literally dozens of interesting games just by scrolling down the main page.
I don’t know how it’s for devs, but it’s probably all but impossible to get traction if you’re just throwing your game in there, Fests being a compromised solution to an impossible problem
The regular Next Fests have probably been the single best thing for game discovery I’ve found in s long time. Nothing beats an actual hands-on demo for deciding if I’ll wishlist a game.
I guess he talking about the search system, which is a dumpster fire relative to other Steam features.
Are we using the same product? There’s a vast array of quality tags that seem to genuinely work to find stuff?
You can’t filter using more than one tag as an “and” filter, only “or”. That’s pretty basic for a filter feature, isn’t it? It’s just surprising given how well implemented other Steam features had been in my experience.
He wasnt talking about search it was about algorithmic recommendation.
But you can filter by multiple tags. When you click search select the advanced search at the bottom of the dropdown. It does all the things you mention and far more
Did I really missed such a feature? I’ll try it out later.
Mr biggest problem with tags is that it’s user curated and you can recommend an unlimited number of them.
Just because a game has a few funny moments, doesn’t mean it gets the comedy tag. Just because it has a brief driving sequence doesn’t mean it gets the racing tag. Just because there’s some reading involved doesn’t mean you get the visual novel tag.
It’s getting to the point I feel like there’s a conspiracy where there’s teams of people intentionally sabotaging the tag system and teams trying to counter it, all so they can control views and sales. It’s really noticeable when a publisher stops marketing and moves to another release.
I don’t think you can create new tags can you ? At least I have not seen a place to do that.
But I do also think that there could be more specific tags.
And yeah, being able to AND / OR would be hella good.
However, I would not describe it as a dumpster fire, it’s pretty good all things considered.
Then the competition should put in the work.
That’s hard to do when Steam has all but cornered the market. Say what you will about Epic’s ineptitude, but even investing billions, the publisher of the biggest game ever can’t break into the market. Now imagine how hard it’d be for a smaller player.
Epic can’t break into the market because of their own shitty launcher, not because of anything Steam has done to lock down the competition.
Not very hard, if they were willing to create a decent launcher and engage in sustainable business practices (and regional pricing).
I sincerely doubt that even if another launcher did everything Steam does, it would rival it without huge amounts of money being thrown around. People already use Steam.
And that’s assuming they get to this point, ignoring that Steam had decades to get there. It used to be ass.
At that point, you can start grabbing business from steam via promotions and such. You don’t need to rival or outgrow Steam to break into the market, you just need a bit of the market.
It’s not even that other launchers have less features than Steam. It’s just that other than GoG, which has a very limited catalog and no regional pricing, there is not a single store that is not actively anti-consumer to a hilarious extent.
Not every company can pull it off, but I’m certain if Epic had invested in their launchers it could have worked.
A few years in and their launcher has stagnated completely
That’s kinda his point.
The competition is at work, but too many fanboys blindly bashing on anything that isn’t Steam is making it very hard for them.
The only competition is GOG and they will never succeed with DRM free for the big AAA. Epic succeeding is the worst case scenario
Which competition are you referring to?
Agreed. I’d add the predatory lootbox/gambling in stuff like counterstrike.
You’re saying a lot of words as fact for what is an opinion.
Watch your determinism.