• Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    They account for about 75% of game sales on PC from what I’m finding, it’s a “virtual monopoly”, i.e. they have enough reach to control the market even if they have competitors.

    • woelkchen@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      75% of the units sold or 75% of the overall revemue. Given that the most successful PC games aren’t even on Steam, the latter seems unlikely to me. Roblox alone is a sustained revenue stream in insanely high numbers.

      Do they block the competition in any way? They aren’t the stewards of Windows. Epic buys exclusive rights to games. Does Valve do the same? On Steam Deck, there’s even an entire independent app store (Discover with Flathub) enabled right out of the box. That’s how the community made Minecraft and Heroic Game Launcher available. Official EGS, GamePass, and GOG launchers could be made available via Flathub but MS etc. choose not to.

      • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        They have their own unethical business practice they’re getting sued for (preventing sales at a lower price on competing platforms) and just because you agree with what they do now doesn’t mean it’s not a risk to have such a behemoth in the market, Gaben is nice now, it just needs him changing his mind or retiring/dying and shit could hit the fan real quick.

        • woelkchen@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          It’s not about Valve or Newell being nice or not, it’s about whether Valve has a monopoly and the EU just recently looked at digital markets closely and determined that Valve is not a gatekeeper.

          • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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            1 year ago

            Because of the way they act at the moment, it doesn’t mean that they’re not in a monopoly position.

            Turns out it’s simply because the EU didn’t even study their case because the PC gaming market is too small to bother 🤡

            • woelkchen@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Well, the EU made a list of monopolists in digital markets and decided that Valve is not one of them and that has nothing to do with current behavior.

              • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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                1 year ago

                Find me a source confirming that they actually studied Steam’s position in their market. They have specific criterias, including financial and user ones, and Steam doesn’t meet them… oopsy!

                • woelkchen@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Find me a source confirming that they actually studied Steam’s position in their market.

                  I found a super recent source that does not list Valve as a monopolist. Maybe you should go and find a credible source other than “Trust me, bro” that Steam is a monopoly.

                  They have specific criterias, including financial and user ones, and Steam doesn’t meet them… oopsy!

                  So Steam does not rake in so much money to hog the market and also does not have enough users to hog the customer base. If anything is an oopsy, it’s you accidentally admitting that Steam is not a monopoly. Good we cleared that up!

                  • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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                    1 year ago

                    No, what I’m saying is that they didn’t check the PC gaming platform market at all because it doesn’t fit the criterias necessary for them to pay attention to it, which means that Steam not being on the list doesn’t mean they’re not a monopoly. You try to use that as proof, yet the European Union just didn’t check what’s happening in that market at all!

                    There’s tons of monopolies they don’t list because the market they’re in is too small to bother, it doesn’t mean they’re not monopolies.

    • DLSchichtl@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Nintendo accounts for 100% of games on the Switch. Microsoft with the Xbox. Heck, even Sony. And people making games for PC don’t have to ask Valve’s permission.

      Shit. Bestselling PC game of all time. Minecraft. Not available on Steam.

      • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Nintendo is compared to other console manufacturers.

        Microsoft is considered to be in a position of monopoly in the OS market, yet they’re not the ones building the PC itself.

        Holy fuck did I just enter a freaking asylum or something?