When it comes to digital marketplaces to purchase games then for years now Valve’s Steam marketplace has been the dominant go-to source. It’s been around for ages and it allows players to purchase games from a reputable source. Likewise, this storefront has a user-friendly interface with plenty of features to make it a nice hub for a community to connect with. However, over the past couple of years, there’s been a pretty big competitor that Steam has to work against.
Epic Games opened up the Epic Games Store and at first, this was a service that most probably was quick to write off. While Epic Games is known for some big-name title hits like bringing out the Gears of War franchise and one of the biggest battle royale games of all time, Fortnite, it seemed like a long shot for the company to make much of a stand against the already established Steam marketplace. However, Epic Games was ready to throw down some major cash and revenue split offers to ensure that their service may seem more appealing.
One of the first big moves Epic Games made was offering developers along with publishers a better revenue share. Steam currently has a revenue split that gives 33% of revenue compared to Epic Games Store’s 12%. Recently Microsoft made the same move and offered 12% as well which meant that game creators could rake in far more money using something like Epic Games Store exclusively or by simply offering their game for players to purchase.
Recently, Wolfire Games who released Overgrowth had filed an antitrust lawsuit against Valve. The founder of this studio, David Rosen, noted that Valve would remove his game from the Steam marketplace if he offered his games at a discounted price through competing services. This was something David was hoping to do to get more money for the game he created. Now there is a big debate online with developers chiming in on what Valve will and will not allow when it comes to studios.
There are statements on both sides right now and it will be a wonder if Valve has any kind of a monopoly. With that said, there’s a big push for Valve to match the revenue split that both Epic Games and Microsoft offer which is 12%. For now, it’s a waiting game to see just what comes from all of this legal mess.
