this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2025
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Debunking the grey market beyond Steam (www.gamesindustry.biz)
submitted 2 weeks ago by misk@sopuli.xyz to c/games@sh.itjust.works
180 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

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.

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[–] ChairmanMeow@programming.dev 10 points 2 weeks ago (7 children)

It is true. Valve does not enforce price parity for non Steam keys. Here is an example where the dev says that they are offering a better price on EGS because of the better cut:

https://twitter.com/HeardOfTheStory/status/1700066610302603405

https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/heard-of-the-story-ff3758

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1881940/Heard_of_the_Story/

Pretty clear example of the same game having a lower base price on Epic than on Steam.

Wolfire claiming Valve does this is something different from Valve actually doing it, and that's where the dispute lies. According to Valve, Wolfire's explanation of the price parity policy is incorrect.

Here's the policy itself: https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys#3

You should use Steam Keys to sell your game on other stores in a similar way to how you sell your game on Steam. **It is important that you don’t give Steam customers a worse deal than Steam Key purchasers. **

The policy is pretty leanient regarding the "worse deal" aspect. You're allowed to have a sale on one platform but not on Steam, as long as you offer "something similar" at a different moment to Steam users too.

It's OK to run a discount for Steam Keys on different stores at different times as long as you plan to give a comparable offer to Steam customers within a reasonable amount of time.

Even if you violate this policy, Valve will still sell your game, they may just stop providing you with Steam keys to sell.

I don't see Wolfire winning this tbh.

[–] Toribor@corndog.social 4 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

So can developers just 'create' steam keys out of thin air that can be used to activate their game on steam? Does Valve get paid when the keys are created or activated? Or not at all?

Seems fair maybe if it's using all of Steams infrastructure, considering developers can distribute the game themselves without steam keys.

[–] ChairmanMeow@programming.dev 7 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Yes, that is the big thing many people are missing. Valve takes a 0% cut from Steam keys sold outside of their platform. The 30% does not apply.

The only rule Valve sets out here is that you don't sell those Steam keys for less on other storefronts. Which imo seems fair enough if Valve is doing the distribution and asking for nothing in return.

The big sticking point is whether the 30% cut isn't too high in the first place.

[–] Toribor@corndog.social 3 points 2 weeks ago

Yeah that's a pretty important distinction. I can buy Rimworld from the Steam store, or I can buy a Rimworld Steam key straight from the Ludeon website for the same price or I can buy a DRM copy for less I just won't get Steam features like automatic updates, cloud saves, or the mod workshop.

Seems reasonable they don't want you using the platform for distribution while undercutting the storefront price.

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