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>Steam is popular and has a loud following because it does not make unethical choices that annoy users.

I don't think that's true. I think Steam is popular because they were in the right place at the right time. Before Steam, the alternative for most games was driving to the store--that's who they were competing with. Steam has done many things to annoy users--they allow their store to be filled with absolute garbage shovelware for one.

They still thrive because of momentum. The games are there because the user base is there, the user base is there because the games are there.

It's partly first-mover advantage, but also Valve has repeatedly made moves that demonstrate their relative good will towards gamers and developers. Aside from their own (vanishingly few) games, Valve has never enforced any kind of exclusivity. You can even sell Steam keys through other vendors and Valve doesn't even get a cut. They helped launch the indie explosion in the mid oughties with their cross promotional stunts. They have so many sales, with such outrageous discounts, that many of their customers have dozens if not hundreds of games they unlikely to ever play. Said discounts set a new bar for what a sale even looks like, with '40% off' often eliciting general consensus of 'meh'. They have more tools to try and help users find games they might like than anyone. They worked with HTC to develop new VR tech, again with no exclusivity (unlike their competition). And as every Linux gamer here should recognize: they've done more to make Linux gaming a realistic option than anyone ever, and they never charged a dime for it.

As much flak as Valve gets for not curating games and letting games with questionable content slide until some internets make a fuss, Steam is actually, objectively, really great.

>Valve has never enforced any kind of exclusivity

Because they have no need to. Why deal with the backlash when they own the market?

>They have so many sales, with such outrageous discounts

How does this demonstrate goodwill towards anyone? The developers are the ones lowering the prices for those sales. And pushing down the price of games to app store level prices isn’t something we should be celebrating. There's a very good argument that encouraging deep discounts hurts the industry in the long run.

>They have more tools to try and help users find games they might like than anyone.

What do you mean “than anyone”. Versus itch.io and the brand new Epic store? That’s not really a high bar. They could have 1 tool and that would literally be more than anyone.

>And as every Linux gamer here should recognize: they've done more to make Linux gaming a realistic option than anyone ever, and they never charged a dime for it.

They never charged a dime for it because they were trying to expand their hold over the market. This is like praising Google giving away Android. Their interest in Steam is because they were worried Microsoft was going to use the Windows store to force them off of Windows.

> Steam is actually, objectively, really great

You definitely can’t say it’s objectively great because it could be a lot worse. A single player dominating the market is almost never great for anyone.

> Because they have no need to. Why deal with the backlash when they own the market?

They didn't always own the market. Steam was not embraced by PC gamers when it debuted, yet Valve never asked for exclusivity agreements while it was growing and still doesn't ask for them even as new competitors emerge.

> What do you mean “than anyone”.

I mean precisely that, more than literally anyone else selling games anywhere at all. The fact that no one else even bothers doesn't detract from the fact that they try.

> They never charged a dime for it because they were trying to expand their hold over the market.

Years ago, that was a worthwhile argument. A happy alignment of interests. But now, when it is incredibly unlikely they're going to close the OS and force everyone into a walled garden? Seems wasteful of them to expend as many resources as they do on things like Proton.

> You definitely can’t say it’s objectively great because it could be a lot worse.

Um... what? I can't say it is really great because hypothetically it could be worse?

> A single player dominating the market is almost never great for anyone.

I don't disagree at all with that sentiment, but lets give credit where credit is due here. Valve earned their position at the top for a variety of reasons, and notably they aren't trying to use that position anti-competitively. Isn't that exactly the kind of behavior we want to acknowledge and support?

I'm not going to give Epic a free pass just because they're not Steam, especially when they pull the anti-gamer shit they pull. There's already GOG and itch.io, which I'm much happier to support if I want to support someone for not being Steam.

>They didn't always own the market.

Before they owned the market they were new and trying to win customers. Exclusivity agreements tend to happen when a previously dominant player starts to lose market share, not when a company is still in a growth phase.

>I mean precisely that, more than literally anyone else selling games anywhere at all.

That's like praising Windows PCs for having the best Antivirus software in 1997. I mean yeah you're not wrong but...

Most of Steam's competition are stores from publishers with small catalogs that don't need the kind of discovery mechanisms that Steam does. GOG is has a much smaller curated selection so they same thing applies. Itch has a large catalog, but they are so small that they can't even be considered a competitor because of the network effects in Steam's favor.

>Um... what? I can't say it is really great because hypothetically it could be worse?

That sentence should have said "just because". You can't say it's objectively great just because it could be worse.

>I'm not going to give Epic a free pass just because they're not Steam

Who wants to give them a free pass? They'd probably be worse if they had a completely dominant market position the way Steam does. I don't want anyone to be completely dominant. I want competition. Their 30% cut and refusal to filter shovelware harms the industry because for 99% of indie devs, they completely control the market.

Thanks for the nirvana fallacy. The reason why steam is dominating is because they haven't fucked up yet. Competition already exists but it's going nowhere and their biggest competitive advantage is lower fees which will probably go straight into the pocket of the developer rather than result in lower prices. Steam is cornered from multiple sides and Microsoft could even completely destroy them if they wanted. In the end the customers don't benefit from the competition, they prefer their benevolent dictator over profit craving publishers.

>Thanks for the nirvana fallacy.

So a market not completely dominated by 1 player is some kind of pie in the sky utopia?

>lower fees which will probably go straight into the pocket of the developer rather than result in lower prices.

That's not how pricing works for most goods. Some money will go to consumers and some will be captured by devs. Even the money captured by devs is better for the customers than going to Steam in the long run. The vast majority of Indie devs aren't wealthy. More money in developers pockets means more and better games.

> they prefer their benevolent dictator over profit craving publishers.

Steam is already catering to profit craving publishers. They are lowering their take for large games. The only people left paying 30% are the small indie devs.

> They have so many sales, with such outrageous discounts

That was a long, long time ago. Nowadays Steam sales are pretty mediocre and almost never the cheapest discount you can get. If you want discounts, go to IsThereAnyDeal [0], if you only want Steam keys, you can check that option.

That is not to say that I don't think Steam is the best launcher and storefront of all the options I've seen and used. Even if I buy a game somewhere else (including GoG [1]), for information about the game I go to steam because it has all the info I want (and that is excluding the reviews which, as the biggest store, are also the most useful)

[0]: https://isthereanydeal.com/

[1]: https://www.gog.com/

If you compare steam to the PlayStation Store, or the XBox marketplace, their sales are much bigger, much deeper, and much cheaper still.

Can you though? Console games have always been horrendously expensive and those are actual monopolies (I assume? Haven't had a console since the Nintendo 64) for their respective consoles.

Yes, I think you can, in the PC game market everyone is competing against steam now.

They're still setting the standard, without their deep sales every winter/summer/etc. the market would change.

> Steam has done many things to annoy users

I think people forget how much people hated Steam when it came out. I'm not sure I'd really call it "right place at the right time" either, since that sort of implies wild success pretty easily. My impression is more that Steam was 2-3 years ahead of its time but Valve believed in it and stuck through the hard times.

Here are some quotes from 2004, when Steam & Half-Life 2 were brand new:

"no one I know likes Steam at all."

"Steam is one of the worst programs I've seen in the last few years. Everyone seems to have trouble with it... why would ANYONE use it?"

"Bugs or no bugs, Steam is unacceptable IMHO."

"All hail Valve, our next Microsoft Product Activation-like overlord."

"Glad to see that they have given me an excuse to not purchase the game"

"Some ideas of Steam are nice, but I still don't like the idea of buying a product through it. Skipping the publishers is a bad thing."

"Sorry Valve, but I have no intention of letting Steam ever tough my PC."

https://games.slashdot.org/story/04/10/23/0812224/half-life-...

https://games.slashdot.org/story/04/09/20/2012208/no-half-li...

>"right place at the right time"

By right place, right time I don't mean they started at exactly the right time, or that they achieved success quickly. I mean they were around when technology (broadband penetration, storage space etc..) finally reached the point where people were willing to buy most of their games online.

Most "instant success" stories aren't really instant.

>Steam has done many things to annoy users--they allow their store to be filled with absolute garbage shovelware for one.

I consider this to be an advantage rather than annoyance.

> Steam is popular and has a loud following because it does not make unethical choices that annoy users.

Not true. Valve fought (and lost) a drawn-out legal battle against the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission over the rights of consumers using Steam, including right to refunds: https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/full-federal-court-con...

The outcome of this case paved the way for Steam's current refund policy.

Do you opt in to notifications on desktop apps normally? I know Steam pops up notifications when my friends play a game for example, and though I disable this I think it was enabled by default.

I generally opt out of any kind of thing that is going to popup on my screen unannounced.

I think there is a grey area on whether those sorts of notifications you mention should be enabled by default. There is an argument to be made that they should be enabled by default, as it's basically a mechanism to train/educate the user that the feature exists. As long as they can easily opt-out.

But I do think it's a very different thing between those and what Epic is doing with advertisements regarding completely unrelated games that they want me to play/buy. It serves me no functional purpose, it only serves Epic, especially because the only reason I have Epic Launcher on my system is because it's the only way to play Metro Exodus right now; it's a means to an end.

I have no problem with Steam's notifications since they appear for a second then piss off. Windows notifications are fucking awful. They stay in your tray with a taunting (1) symbol until you get rid of them, the collective amount of time I've wasted opening that horrible right menu and clicking away notifications must be staggering.

But one is using the system standard format for notifications, and the other one is custom. If you have a problem with how standardized system notifications are handled, that isn't really Epic's fault. Although ideally, you could choose whether to use their's or the systems and customize the available settings for each.

Clarification. What is the steam tax you speak of? I understand when people use the term 'Apple tax' (for example), they're referring to a premium price on a premium product and the follow up premier prices that come with it. But as far as Steam's prices go - assuming the term is used in relation to the price of the products - I don't see any particular inflation over the price of games in a brick and mortar store. In fact, even comparing Steam prices to GOG or the Humble store, I don't think I've ever encountered any discrepancy in prices that points to a "steam tax".

I believe they are referring to the amount that the store takes out of each sale from developers and publishers, not what consumers pay.

Perhaps, but the comment is written from the consumer's perspective. Thank you for the insight, though.

note also that the steam tax is mainly fud

steam doesn't take a cut from keys you sell on your homepage or third party stores

And, importantly, their cut is completely in line with pretty much every distribution channel's cut. Notably not itch.io and now Epic.

What is Steam's typical cut?

30%-20% if the sale is t trough the steam client, 0% otherwise

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.rockpapershotgun.com/2018/1...

Neither of these items are unethical. They are just design decisions that you don’t like.

  1) By default, the Epic launcher appears to advertise "free games" via Windows notification (popups). I never deliberately opted in to this. When I first saw the notification, I was certain I had some sort of spyware on my system. It looked like a spammy advertisement you see in free mobile games. I don't believe even EA/ORIGIN has been gutsy enough to try something like this.

Funny, for years Steam did this too. In fact it's only recently that I can't recall seeing one of their announce popups

I don't recall steam ever doing this. And I've used it since the HL2 days. Are you confusing it with the popup that shows on steam startup?

What popup are you referring to? If it's the login popup, that is Steam starting up at Windows startup...

He means the huge window that opens after starting steam and logging in. The window usually has multiple pages with current deals.

I'm referring to the deals popup that appears in the center of the screen announcing sales. Back in the day its appearance pissed me the hell off

It's this: https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/28415/is-there-a-...

And it was/is default on.

Been using steam since 2011 and I've never seen an OS level notification about ... anything. There's a window that pops up with information about current deals when you open Steam (after it's been completely closed), perhaps that's what you're thinking of?

Those deals popups are even more intrusive than OS notifications.

I'd be minding my own business on my PC, Steam minimized and not being currently used, then suddenly... popup!

I'm sure they've tuned it down since but back in the day I remember being quote offended at the manner that it was shown to me

I'm not sure what you mean by "back in the day" but for as long I can remember, those deals pop-ups have only been shown when I started Steam and opened the main Steam window. And then it isn't shown again until next time I start Steam, so if I have Steam running for 30 days, I only see it once in those 30 days—when I start Steam.

It's never popped up on me while Steam was minimized or even just unfocused.

Anyway, if it was as bad as you say, clearly Valve has learned a thing or two and dialed it back, which I think it a net positive.

In my mind, using OS notifications to advertise deals is much, much worse because we should be able to trust that our OS notifications are relevant and useful, not that they're ads and spam.

In the distant past they would spawn as an unexpected popup out of nowhere

>I completely understand why people do not want to pay the Steam tax According to anonymous developer comments, Epic Tax is higher than Epic advertises due to extra "associate" (or "influencer") packages that add extra 5% to 20% on top of the 12%.[1]

[1] https://archive.fo/7Xtvt

> When I first saw the notification, I was certain I had some sort of spyware on my system.

Apparently you were correct, based on this story.

When they're giving aweay award-winning games that are currently selling for $20 on Steam, is it really bad that they're letting you know?

This argument is nonsense. Perhaps they should robocall me to tell me as well?

If I want to be notified about anything (except emergencies) I should have to explicitly opt into it.

How can you complain about all these AMAZING DEALS we're offering?

>1) By default, the Epic launcher appears to advertise "free games" via Windows notification (popups). I never deliberately opted in to this.

How's that any different than steam showing popups for newly released games on startup?

>When I first saw the notification, I was certain I had some sort of spyware on my system. It looked like a spammy advertisement you see in free mobile games. I don't believe even EA/ORIGIN has been gutsy enough to try something like this.

So you're upset that the notification made you think your computer was infected? And you expect that epic games to have forseen this outcome?

>2) Epic launcher defaults to starting when Windows starts. I never explicitly opted in to this. I'm sure I "affirmed" this somehow via some kind of user agreement, but I don't ever remember seeing an explicit option.

AFAIK steam does the same.

edit:

Here are the default settings for a fresh steam install: https://i.imgur.com/2SNpi1O.png. As you can see, steam engages in the same "unethical" behavior as epic.

gp is referring to a Windows system notification, it appears in the bottom right. They don't look like the Epic client.

The notification related setting in your screenshot causes the pop-up window upon launching Steam. But it's a window that belongs to the Steam client. It has the obvious interface styling of Steam and is titled "Steam - News".

I agree with you that the "launch on startup" option would be better as opt-in.

I agree with gp that Windows notifications are a step worse.

edit- changed description of pop-up

>I agree with gp that Windows notifications are a step worse.

Let me get this straight: you think that showing a medium sized banner ad in a window is better than a few lines of text using the OS provided notification API? Why?

If the position was reversed, I could very well imagine the opposite argument. eg. "boo epic shows this massive ad in your face, whereas steam uses a discreet notification"

It's the same reason that nobody likes advertisements in their push notifications on their phone: it takes your attention away from the currently active program/app you're using. Steam's huge box shows up only when you intend to open steam, while Epic's Windows notification might as well pop up while you're doing your taxes.

Not who you were replying to, but I agree with him.

Notifications - whether they were intended to or not, are way more intrusive in my usual workflow, and I would posit the majority of people find it the same.

This is down to the fact that the steam popups advertising games are in the same icon and styling as the rest of steam -> i.e. You alt+tab or click on your steam icon and close or view it as clearly a steam thing. It also pops up during first start only.

A windows notification I find to be much more attention grabbing and not clearly defined as a particular program, and if I find it to be an ad, I'm immediately put out by this as I'm being advertised to by a program in my system tray, where I'm used to that being configuration info and/or notification of something minimising/complete etc.

Any information they give me through the notification tab is now in jeopardy of being ignored because I've been taught that they are ads now.

This isn't unique to steam for me, I'm totally used to programs opening up additional windows upon opening, but any programs that advertise through system notifications have long since bothered me.

It’s not the same thing at all. The advertisements on Steam show when you launch Steam. It’s practically a home screen.

The Epic ads appear to show whenever they want, even if Epic launcher is minimized to the system tray. You can be doing something entirely unrelated to Epic on your OS and it will pop up.

Steam does not do this. Either way, why do you think almost every single web browser has pop up window protection built-in?

>Let me get this straight: you think that showing a medium sized banner ad in a window is better than a few lines of text using the OS provided notification API? Why?

Because the banner ad does not distract me from something else while the notification does. The banner shows up when Steam starts which means my attention is on Steam and specifically on waiting for it to start. The notifications come up any time which means I'm specifically focused on something else.

> Let me get this straight: you think that showing a medium sized banner ad in a window is better than a few lines of text using the OS provided notification API?

Jesus fuck yes.

> Why?

The OS notification system is for important stuff that I actually give a damn about, not your company's spammy bullshit. Steam shows me a window that's obviously part of the Steam client and only when I launch it. That's significantly, ridiculously, miles and miles better.