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Topic	Why is Jim Sterling complaining that it's easier for bad games to get on Steam.
adjl 06/12/18 8:51:36 AM #39:	Dikitain posted... Key word: purchased Steam doesn't purchase the keys, they just provide an outlet for them to be sold. Again, similar to a mall. -Consumer gives Valve $20 for a game -Valve pockets $8 and gives $12 to developer -Developer gives Valve key for game -Valve gives key to consumer All of which happens more or less instantly, because of how digital distribution works, but Valve is very much the middleman here, not just an outlet where developers can peddle and distribute their own wares. Even more so where I believe what actually happens is that Valve is given a distributable copy of the game and the rights to generate their own keys for it. Valve sells copies of games. Steam is a store, not a marketplace (the actual Steam Marketplace aside). Bear in mind that Valve does have to approve every game before it ends up on Steam. That pipeline is there. At this point, they've automated it such that there's no human input and it lets just about anything through that isn't a virus or pirated copy of another game, but the paradigm is very much a matter of "will you sell this game for me?", not "I'm setting up shop on this platform and selling my stuff." Dikitain posted... Except Valve doesn't set the price, the developer does. Sure in a regular store a distributor can set a "suggested retail price" but the fact is the store can still sell the goods for whatever price they want. Not so with Steam. Even during Steam sales it is the developer that decides how much a game get's discounted. That's just a matter of policy. There's nothing inherent to Valve's business model that prevents them from setting prices as they wish, they've just chosen to let developers pick their own prices because that works well. Dikitain posted... Malls don't give a damn about the quality of the shops there, so long as they pay the rent. Charging rent is itself a form of quality control, but beyond that, malls do care to a certain extent. A mall's reputation strongly affects how much rent they can charge, and a big part of a mall's reputation is the quality of the stores therein. Malls can therefore influence who gets to set up shop by adjusting their rent. Dikitain posted... Why would a platform with unlimited resources to sell everything under the sun care what should and shouldn't be sold there? Because they don't have unlimited resources. Storage space? Yes. Bandwidth? Effectively. Storefront? That's very finite, and taking up that storefront with an endless torrent of garbage makes Steam pretty useless for marketing new games. Dikitain posted... Anyone thinking they should even have quality control in the first place is insane. They're making more than enough money to be able to pay a dozen people to try out the hundred new games they get a day to make sure they at least work. Especially where the only reason they get so many new games is because they've earned a reputation for letting anything through, so the job would only get easier with a bit of vetting to discourage using the platform as a dumping ground for unplayable asset flips. I do like that Steam doesn't have stringent standards. That's a considerable boon for anyone starting out who doesn't have the resources to penetrate more exclusive markets. Turning down stuff that is actually, non-hyperbolically garbage doesn't have to hurt that, though. You can have low standards without giving up on standards entirely. --- This is my signature. It exists to keep people from skipping the last line of my posts. <cite>adjl posted [p:903052359] in Why is Jim... [t:76697117]...</cite> <quote><cite>Dikitain posted...</cite> <quote>Key word: purchased Steam doesn't purchase the keys, they just provide an outlet for them to be sold. Again, similar to a mall.</quote> -Consumer gives Valve $20 for a game -Valve pockets $8 and gives $12 to developer -Developer gives Valve key for game -Valve gives key to consumer All of which happens more or less instantly, because of how digital distribution works, but Valve is very much the middleman here, not just an outlet where developers can peddle and distribute their own wares. Even more so where I believe what actually happens is that Valve is given a distributable copy of the game and the rights to generate their own keys for it. Valve sells copies of games. Steam is a store, not a marketplace (the actual Steam Marketplace aside). Bear in mind that Valve does have to approve every game before it ends up on Steam. That pipeline is there. At this point, they've automated it such that there's no human input and it lets just about anything through that isn't a virus or pirated copy of another game, but the paradigm is very much a matter of "will you sell this game for me?", not "I'm setting up shop on this platform and selling my stuff." <cite>Dikitain posted...</cite> <quote>Except Valve doesn't set the price, the developer does. Sure in a regular store a distributor can set a "suggested retail price" but the fact is the store can still sell the goods for whatever price they want. Not so with Steam. Even during Steam sales it is the developer that decides how much a game get's discounted.</quote> That's just a matter of policy. There's nothing inherent to Valve's business model that prevents them from setting prices as they wish, they've just chosen to let developers pick their own prices because that works well. <cite>Dikitain posted...</cite> <quote>Malls don't give a damn about the quality of the shops there, so long as they pay the rent.</quote> Charging rent is itself a form of quality control, but beyond that, malls do care to a certain extent. A mall's reputation strongly affects how much rent they can charge, and a big part of a mall's reputation is the quality of the stores therein. Malls can therefore influence who gets to set up shop by adjusting their rent. <cite>Dikitain posted...</cite> <quote>Why would a platform with unlimited resources to sell everything under the sun care what should and shouldn't be sold there?</quote> Because they don't have unlimited resources. Storage space? Yes. Bandwidth? Effectively. Storefront? That's very finite, and taking up that storefront with an endless torrent of garbage makes Steam pretty useless for marketing new games. <cite>Dikitain posted...</cite> <quote> Anyone thinking they should even have quality control in the first place is insane.</quote> They're making more than enough money to be able to pay a dozen people to try out the hundred new games they get a day to make sure they at least work. Especially where the only reason they get so many new games is because they've earned a reputation for letting anything through, so the job would only get easier with a bit of vetting to discourage using the platform as a dumping ground for unplayable asset flips. I do like that Steam doesn't have stringent standards. That's a considerable boon for anyone starting out who doesn't have the resources to penetrate more exclusive markets. Turning down stuff that is actually, non-hyperbolically garbage doesn't have to hurt that, though. You can have low standards without giving up on standards entirely. --- This is my signature. It exists to keep people from skipping the last line of my posts.</quote> ... Copied to Clipboard!
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