On Steam, developers pay Valve a lot of money, namely 30%. But one developer says that’s still the best that’s possible.
In the minds of many gamers, Steam is an unavoidable platform. Most games can be found here, the interface is easy to use and everything is practically in one place. But at the same time, Steam, or rather Valve behind it, is considered “greedy” because they keep a whopping 30% of the revenue from game sales. Some fans worry that the developers would be left behind.
A developer now explains why this isn’t such a bad thing – and why he would even prefer that you buy his game “Cosmoteer” on Steam, even if he has to give away 30% of it.
Cosmoteer: Starship Architect & Commander Trailer
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What game is it? It’s about the developer of Cosmoteer. Cosmoteer is a game in early access. You have to design your own spaceship – from scratch. You decide how many floors the ship will have, where individual machines and weapon systems will be installed, and what shape the ship should have. Every decision will subsequently influence how well your crew gets along on the ship and how long the ship can hold out in battle.
What did the developer say? In the Steam forum, “Walt Destler”, one of the developers of Cosmoteer, was asked whether he was thinking about selling keys outside of Steam. They could then be redeemed on Steam and he wouldn’t have to give up 30% each time. Destler replied:
It takes a lot of effort to build your own store and maintain the site. For some stores I would even have to negotiate contracts, which would cost me time and money for lawyers. And even if I did all that, Steam would probably still outsell all other platforms by x100. Frankly, it’s just not worth the effort, except maybe for really big games.
Yes, Steam takes 30% of the revenue. But when someone comes to Steam and buys the game, Steam usually rewards the game with free advertising on Steam, which more than makes up for the 30%. So honestly, even if you could buy Cosmoteer keys somewhere else, I’d still rather you buy it on Steam because in the long run I think I’ll make more money that way.
Why is Steam so lucrative? The advertising aspect in particular is likely to have a particularly strong impact here. New games are not only displayed prominently on various pages on Steam, but wish lists and even friends lists are also marketing. After all, players are informed when their friends are playing a certain game – and that alone indirectly generates advertising and attention that you might not get on other platforms.
Even though Steam looks quite expensive from the outside with its 30% and that was even an argument used by Epic Games as to why people should switch to their launcher and platform, many developers seem to be more than happy with Steam. Some have already said in the past that the 30% may look like a lot on paper, but that the size of Steam, the reach and the attention that the Steam Store draws to a game, in most cases this “loss” is more than offset.