Post #3271108
2026-06-03 04:42 UTC
Yeah, Steam may be effectively a monopoly, but it’s because nobody else really wants to compete with them at their level.
Steam has two types of customers. Us the gamers where we can decide which platform to use. They have an effective monopoly on us because they provide a good service. But with a large game library we are locked into steam as well and cannot just switch to a different platform. If valve ever did decide to be evil then we are screwed.
But developers are also customers of valve. And this is arguably where valve makes their money. They take a cut from the developers sales. Devs cannot just use a different platform without cutting out a huge userbase. This gives valve a real monopolistic control over developers.
Replies (2)
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@Earthman_Jim@lemmy.zip 2026-06-03 07:29
“Locked in”? “Can’t”? Huh? Can’t people just use all of the stores if they want? Steam doesn’t lock you out of the xbox app, or the ubisoft store or whatever as far as I know.
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@T156@lemmy.world 2026-06-03 08:04
But developers are also customers of valve. And this is arguably where valve makes their money. They take a cut from the developers sales. Devs cannot just use a different platform without cutting out a huge userbase. This gives valve a real monopolistic control over developers. Can they not? I was under the understanding that developers aren’t limited to steam. They can use any other platform in addition to it, the main restriction being that they can’t sell the game for cheaper on platforms other than Steam.