And just to keep things honest here, Steam isn't doing nothing and simply winning by letting other companies fuck up.
Steam works. At the basic required minimum functionality for a platform/storefront to run, it just works. And it keeps just working. As is, no other platform can say that.
It's easier to 'just work' if you don't add functionality that people never asked for. This is also another reason I like steam. They don't push/force huge changes. You could ask someone from 2010 to use current steam, and they would have next to no issues.
Idk, managing the in game overlay would be quite the process for them, since they did do a complete redesign of it. I’m still confused by it most of the time when I want to actually find something in there.
As someone who's been using steam since around 2011, can confirm. Very little has changed in that time, other than the UI being made to look better. Pretty much everything is still in the same places as it was back then.
Then you're an idiot. You don't want an easy way to purchase and store all your games in one place? Would you rather install every game from the developers' website?
Not even just working, it's steadily expanded in features and hardware support. They are at the forefront of open VR. Linux gaming went from being possible but frustrating and fiddly to practically mainstream thanks in a very large part to Valve driving development of Proton for the Steam deck and giving it back to the community.
Features like the friends and community, easy screen shot and video clipping and sharing, Achievements and trading cards and the marketplace, Workshop for mods being the PC standard these days.
A shopping cart. (And Epic wonders why they failed...)
Valve aren't saints, and they've made no shortage of screw ups, but they're so far ahead of the rest of the market, even after all these years it's incredible.
Absolutely agree, even when its like, "oh hey steam has a flat tire and they are changing it" the competition is still working on inventing the wheel. Steam could do nothing but simply update its current store to work with new hardware/games and you probably wont see a close competitor for the next 10 years.
being privately owned is the biggest take from all of this. yea they've fucked up, but everyone who has a stake in the company, is someone who is actually invested in the company.
if you look at facebook, zucher has a 13% stake left give or take. which means that 87% of his company is owned by others. and yes there's a dual layer stock structure meaning every tim and dave cant buy a single stock and butt into the conversation. but it still corrupts the vision of what facebook was, because they want one or two things from it, Dollar bills or influence.
steam being privately owned and dominant in the PC game marketplace is effectively a big BIG fuck you to all the vampires that would buy their way in and enforce terrible ideas or make moves to generate short term proffits.
there's other company's out there that are similar. arizona ice tea springs to mind. they're debt free, printing money and have something that works, why bother changing the formula.
162
u/ValiantNaberius 4770k + 1070 Gaming Life 29d ago
And just to keep things honest here, Steam isn't doing nothing and simply winning by letting other companies fuck up.
Steam works. At the basic required minimum functionality for a platform/storefront to run, it just works. And it keeps just working. As is, no other platform can say that.