this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2025
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Debunking the grey market beyond Steam (www.gamesindustry.biz)
submitted 1 day ago by misk@sopuli.xyz to c/games@sh.itjust.works
127 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Despite facing increased competition in the space, not least from the Epic Games Store, Valve's platform is synonymous with PC gaming. The service is estimated to have made $10.8 billion in revenue during 2024, a new record for the Half-Life giant. Since it entered the PC distribution space back in 2018, the rival Epic Games Store has been making headway – and $1.09 billion last year – but Steam is still undeniably dominant within the space.

Valve earns a large part of its money from taking a 20-30% cut of sales revenue from developers and publishers. Despite other storefronts opening with lower overheads, Steam has stuck with taking this slice of sales revenue, and in doing so, it has been argued that Valve is unfairly taking a decent chunk of the profits of developers and publishers.

This might change, depending on how an ongoing class-action lawsuit initiated by Wolfire Games goes, but for the time being, Valve is making money hand over fist selling games on Steam. The platform boasts over 132 million users, so it's perfectly reasonable that developers and publishers feel they have to use Steam – and give away a slice of their revenue – in order to reach the largest audience possible.

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[–] Krauerking@lemy.lol 1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys

That's the policy on steam keys. If you are not using their steam keys it's not covered by their contract agreement at least.

The lawsuit is not yet finished and while we can take their complaints into account we can't take them for fact.
The case was already dismissed once because they argued the 30% was controlling the market but it's been there since day 1 of their storefront and has not changed to force game price changes. Beyond that they argue that Valve bought servers to take them offline to push players to them but... That's not really on this point of price controlling or the ability sell non steam keys.

Literally RuneScape does this by offering memberships not available on steam.

If you see something I am missing from the lawsuit please let me know, preferably without the hostility if you can manage.

[–] stevedice@sh.itjust.works -1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Again, this is not about Steam Keys, it's about Steam using shady contracts to bully developers into price parity on completely unrelated stores. Yes, runescape is cheaper on Epic, the incredibly broad nature of these rules that allows for selective wishy-washy enforcing is also part of the lawsuit.

If you see something I am missing from the lawsuit please let me know, preferably without the hostility if you can manage.

The whole thing because you didn't read it and, given that you keep bringing up Steam Keys, which is not what we're talking about, I'm skeptical that you can read at all.

[–] Krauerking@lemy.lol 1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

So, you think a good way to correct someone is to directly insult them because you find their points unrelated but yours perfect? Rude. And the only thing steam controls via contract is the ability to sell your games via steam keys for price parity.

And you misunderstood my point. RuneScape isn't even on the epic game store so you aren't reading my words carefully. You are projecting your own hypocrisy.

[–] stevedice@sh.itjust.works -1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

No, I think you deserve to be insulted because you are talking out of your ass about something you didn't read. Again, this is about the price veto policy. This is not about Steam Keys (here's me hoping italics help with your dyslexia).

And yeah, I thought you meant runescape on the EGS not on their site. It doesn't matter because it has zero bearing on the discussion, I only addressed it because you didn't read the thing you're talking about.

[–] Krauerking@lemy.lol 1 points 49 minutes ago (1 children)

You started in with being extremely rude so I'm just gonna move to ignoring your other commentary now.
Shocking I know.

[–] stevedice@sh.itjust.works 1 points 21 minutes ago

Sorry that my mean words hurt you more than Valve abusing you.