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Valve and GabeN get too much love. (discuss.tchncs.de)
submitted 1 month ago by to c/unpopularopinion@lemmy.world
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Yes, the Steam Deck is great, and Steam is definitely one of the best games platforms there is. And Valve has done great work supporting Linux and open source development, and forcing more transparency for sellers on Steam.

But I feel like people sometimes just love valve for everything they do. GabeN is still a billionaire, buying super-yachts and stuff. Valve makes a ton of their money from gambling on loot crates in CS2 and TF2, and have not done enough (imo) to stop even more predatory third party item gambling sites. And whenever I bring stuff like that up people keep defending Valve.

We should be able to praise their great games and hardware, at the same time as criticising other parts of the company.

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[–] 3 points 1 month ago* (1 child)

I agree and am with you in believing that too many people see them with rose colored glasses.

Some truth nukes 💣:

  • Steam is a storefront that is very good for consumers and that has a [benign] monopoly according to almost every metric.

  • They exclusively sell licenses, not ownership, of games.

  • Their pioneering and aggressive defense/proliferation of "loot crate" gambling mechanics has been one of the worst in gaming, ever.

  • Valve as a game developer is functionally dead. Their brand image is built on 4 IPs from two decades ago.

  • Gabe Newell has credibly been cited as being 99% hands-off with the daily operations at Valve for years, and if you do love Valve/Steam for what they do, it's an insult to the actual staff to credit their work to some CEO.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Most laws don't have a problem with becoming a monopoly, the issue arises when you use your monopoly to stifle competition. Do we have any evidence of that?

    Also, given how copyright works, no one sells games, only licenses. The only games that could be sold are public domain - even FOSS software is license-based. Now, if you mean that the way Steam works that you can most often have access removed from a game after you've purchased it, that would be a more correct statement with competitors who behave differently.

    As for Gabe's influence, he set the direction and attitude of Valve. That isn't a day-to-day operation, but is vital to the operating principles of the company (which includes loot crates). This is no different than the CEO (or whoever) of Costco insisting those hot dogs can be bought for cheap. That is also not a major part of what he has to deal with while actively running the corporation, but everyone knows about it.

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  • [–] 0 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    You're right about monopolies, which is more than most Valve defenders are whenever the argument comes up. I've commented on this before, so I'll just repost my thoughts:

    "Monopoly" is neither illegal nor immoral. It's a de facto label given based on observation. A "good" company can still be a monopoly.

    Steam distributes ~75% of all PC games. It took me less than 30 seconds to find that that was the same market share needed to indict USMC in 1954. This is what happens when you hahave an entire (multiple?) generations who have grown up with gutted anti-trust policies.

    ETA from my other comment ITT but worth reiterating:

    ETA: Monopolies are generally allowed to exist in the US until they start either harming customers or engaging in flagrant anticompetitive measures. Without either of these, there is no victim class to sue. The Sherman Act makes it much easier to litigate instances of "harming customers."

    There are tons of existing private monopolies in the market today that are allowed to exist just because no one's sued for harm. The Govt. doesn't just go around trust busting without cause.

    The glass bottle industry is dominated by Owens, which has a ~85% market share but is allowed to continue because they're ostensibly the best for the economy. Glass bottles are cheap to buy and no one's really eager to start a competing plant. If either of those changed then trust busting might begin, but that doesn't mean they're not already a monopoly.

    You can argue what kind of monopoly that Steam is, but the idea that it's not is completely unfounded in reality.

    On hurting competition, there is room to debate. Over the past couple years, Valve has been under some serious scrutiny for their [benign] monopoly and whether or not it stifles competition. Courts in the UK have certainly seen enough support for this claim to allow a £656m class-action lawsuit to go-ahead.. In the US, a new lawsuit was recently filed alleging that Microsoft and Valve have been in collusion for decades and that Steam's no-tolerance price parity rules stifle competition and ruin any chance of smaller stores from making profit on margin.

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