A new lawsuit was filed earlier this month in the UK that alleges Valve, owner of Steam, has been overcharging 14 million PC gamers and abusing its dominant position in the UK.
Valve has a had a stranglehold on the PC games market for a long time and with this claim we’re challenging the status quo
Nothing has stopped competition from making their own platforms; god knows every god damn company out there has tried (Origin, Uplay, etc.) and failed to delivery a basic and functional option!
The reason Steam is (and will continue to be )successful is because they developed and listened to their user base without being greedy scumbags!
Vicki accuses Valve Corporation of shutting out competition in the PC gaming market by forcing game publishers to sign up to pricing restrictions that dictate the lowest price games can be sold for on rival platforms.
I had heard about it in the past and if true, I feel that is quite an uncompetitive practice, probably made possible by the dominant position Valve has.
The first point is one we’ve heard repeated many times before, but there’s never been any proof on it. Which perhaps the Wolfire lawsuit and this may actually bring to light. An accusation doesn’t necessarily mean they’re right though. Something people get confused on often is Steam Keys, which are completely separate to Steam Store purchases.
Saying “Don’t sell Steam keys off-platform for more than X% less than the game is priced for on Steam” and “Don’t sell your game elsewhere for more than X% less than the game is priced for on Steam“ are very different things. Steam openly does the former; I’ve never heard a reputable report of them doing the latter. The Wolfire lawsuit is explicitly about the former practice, for example.
The press release for this lawsuit reads like it’s about the latter, but I suspect that’s solely for optics. I reviewed the website dedicated to the lawsuit (steamyouoweus.co.uk) and thought they might have some more concrete evidence - nope, nothing. Under the first question in FAQs they have a link to their key documents, but the documents are “coming soon.”
Until they actually substantiate their claim, this lawsuit is just noise.
Nothing has stopped competition from making their own platforms; god knows every god damn company out there has tried (Origin, Uplay, etc.) and failed to delivery a basic and functional option!
The reason Steam is (and will continue to be )successful is because they developed and listened to their user base without being greedy scumbags!
I think this is the key claim:
I had heard about it in the past and if true, I feel that is quite an uncompetitive practice, probably made possible by the dominant position Valve has.
The article also says
Saying “Don’t sell Steam keys off-platform for more than X% less than the game is priced for on Steam” and “Don’t sell your game elsewhere for more than X% less than the game is priced for on Steam“ are very different things. Steam openly does the former; I’ve never heard a reputable report of them doing the latter. The Wolfire lawsuit is explicitly about the former practice, for example.
The press release for this lawsuit reads like it’s about the latter, but I suspect that’s solely for optics. I reviewed the website dedicated to the lawsuit (steamyouoweus.co.uk) and thought they might have some more concrete evidence - nope, nothing. Under the first question in FAQs they have a link to their key documents, but the documents are “coming soon.”
Until they actually substantiate their claim, this lawsuit is just noise.
Adding a link to my other comment: see points 204 and 205 in the filing for where it alleges Steam enforces pricing for non-key sales.