Despite facing increased competition in the space, not least from the Epic Games Store, Valve’s platform is synonymous with PC gaming. The service is estimated to have made $10.8 billion in revenue during 2024, a new record for the Half-Life giant. Since it entered the PC distribution space back in 2018, the rival Epic Games Store has been making headway – and $1.09 billion last year – but Steam is still undeniably dominant within the space.
Valve earns a large part of its money from taking a 20-30% cut of sales revenue from developers and publishers. Despite other storefronts opening with lower overheads, Steam has stuck with taking this slice of sales revenue, and in doing so, it has been argued that Valve is unfairly taking a decent chunk of the profits of developers and publishers.
This might change, depending on how an ongoing class-action lawsuit initiated by Wolfire Games goes, but for the time being, Valve is making money hand over fist selling games on Steam. The platform boasts over 132 million users, so it’s perfectly reasonable that developers and publishers feel they have to use Steam – and give away a slice of their revenue – in order to reach the largest audience possible.
Sure but it means there is no other competition though. That could be price collusion but epic takes a completely different cut amount and other stores have different prices for games.
Just because other definitions exist doesn’t answer the question, it avoids it by saying something else entirely.
Is Steam a monopoly?
Not correct either. Do you think Google has no competition?
This is a whataboutism.
Is steam a monopoly and how?
I don’t think you understand what a whataboutism is.
I don’t know why you keep asking me this question when I already answered it in my first comment. Yes, Steam is a monopoly, because they hold the overwhelming marketshare of PC gaming.
Your first comment in this chain that I am responding to is
Which is not a definition and thus why I am asking. You have not yet defined it yet seem insistent that it is.
And a whataboutism is when you bring up a parallel or comparable topic in an attempt to shift it. You brought up google in a discussion about Steam/Valve. That very much is.
Having a large user base is not a monopoly. Hershey doesn’t have a monopoly on chocolate for being the popular choice. People can and will at any time use competing products.
I remember, thanks.
You didn’t ask me for a definition.
I know what a whataboutism is. You dont. This is called an “example”. An example of a company that was legally ruled a monopoly but also has competition.
You’re missing the larger discussion around monopolies, and you’re mad because I disproved your position. You also didn’t answer my question while simultaneously repeatedly demanding that I answer yours.
You’re obviously just misrepresenting the statement I just made in the comment you just replied to.
I think it’s pretty clear at this point that you have no intention of a good faith discussion so I’m not going to entertain this any further.
You didn’t answer the questions and said you did then turn and said it was my fault for not agreeing with you.
You didn’t state how they are a monopoly you just wanted the agreement. You didn’t state how your comparison related just figured it would be obvious.
You are being a hypocrite and stating your actions on me for asking follow ups.
Do not blame me for not being able to converse when you are the one refusing to participate in a meaningful way.
You are upset that a platform is popular. That is the text of your argument as it is read. Change your argument if you aren’t getting your point across. This is just deflection to protect your own conceptions.
Try to actually disprove people next time instead of saying it’s their fault for not understanding and leaving. It doesn’t do anything other than waste your time.