Hacker News Reader

Comment by SapporoChris | Hacker News Reader

A few points. 1st: "Top 100 selling games right now, by revenue" by revenue would seem to give higher priced items like Steam Deck an advantage. 2nd: When I checked Steam Deck had dropped to #2, with Counter-Strike: Global Offensive at #1. Of course fluctuations are to be expected. 3rd: I'm seeing only 10% off, maybe it varies by location.

Question: Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is free to play. Is the revenue then from in game purchases?

View on HN

"Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is free to play. Is the revenue then from in game purchases?"

I would assume so.

CS:Go Prime was free for a long period of time - you just had to reach level 21 in the game...they only started charging again recently.

The amount of in game purchases, though? Massive. And Valve sure does like taking their cut.

What do you mean by taking their cut? Valve takes a cut from players buying games or items on Steam, but in this case Valve is the developer of CS:GO, so the cut is taken from themselves.

I wasn't clear in my response.

I mean taking their cut from players when they buy/sell on the marketplace. I assume that is where the money is made.

Oh, the marketplace where players sell to each other! Got it, that's a neat trick

> I'm seeing only 10% off, maybe it varies by location.

It should vary by model. The top seller list just shows the cheapest one, 10%. The 512GB is 20% off.

It's only in recent history that it became free to play. What you pay for now is a "verified" badge, so you can play with others who have bought the verified token, reducing the amount of low effort hackers you play competitively against.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com