Rockstar launches his own...launcher

[Tech614]

We can look at other games that have released games on both PC and consoles at the same time. The Witcher 3 for example sold 44.5% of sales on PC with the PS4 getting 40% and the Xbox One getting 15.5%. Dark Souls series sold 3.25 million out of the total 8.5m, and anyone who played Dark Souls 1 on PC knows how crappy the original version was.

For whatever reason RockStar delayed the GTAV port for 2 years and players bought the PS3/360 version and probably also bought the PS4/XB1 versions. Without the ability to play with friends on PS4 and XB1, nobody would buy the PC version. I believe if GTAV was released on PC at the same time as consoles and had crossplay then the sales would look differently. Pretty obvious that RockStar plans to continue to release their games on PC, otherwise their Laucher would be a waste of effort. Rockstar may have good reason to pay attention to PC because if PC sales are equal to console or even just the PS4 then they get more profit since there's nobody to take 30%.

If you want to look at Witcher 3 sales, it paints the opposite picture you think it does. Witcher was a PC centric franchise with no history on PS and yet the PS4 version of it was the top selling version for the first year of it's life aka when it was full price.

You tell me what made CDPR more money, those full price $60 W3 purchases on PS4 where most of them happened or the discounted ones that came later on PC. This ain't rocket science, you can probably guess the correct answer... But anyways this is starting to get quite a bit off topic so just gonna revert back to not looking at your replies.

[therealstegblob]

Steam's 30% asking fee is too much. I keep saying that, over and over, every time one of these stores pop up and steam knights just blindly defend it without realizing it is DIRECTLY leading to every single store, including epic.

Steam has the power to kill them all, right now, today; Gabe just needs to lower his greed stat from 100 to like 90

It's digital goods and steam is an unnecessary 3rd party middle man; why give them 30%? Those days are over

You don't need to give Steam 30% of your profit, dude. Do you not know how Steam works?

[bbr]

https://socialclub.rockstargames.com...games-launcher

After origin, blizzard, steam, epic, uplay, gog we have another one, don't you think things are getting out of hand? Soon we will need a launcher to launch game launchers to launch games...

Gog is already working on a launcher launcher iirc. Its actually pretty good

[D3athsting]

Gog is already working on a launcher launcher iirc. Its actually pretty good

Later we will have a launcher that launches launchers that launch game launchers and so on

[Vash The Stampede]

If you want to look at Witcher 3 sales, it paints the opposite picture you think it does. Witcher was a PC centric franchise with no history on PS and yet the PS4 version of it was the top selling version for the first year of it's life aka when it was full price.

Remember, we're not talking about who does best in sales but that PC sales are either good enough or equally as good as some consoles. I deliberately threw in Dark Souls for this reason, because it was a console focused game that had a very broken PC release, and yet still took 1/3 of the total sales for the series. GTAV was strange because it was released 2 years later on PC.

Rockstar has a good reason to be releasing a Launcher on PC. Though this would also mean they will no longer release games on Steam anymore.

[justandulas]

You don't need to give Steam 30% of your profit, dude. Do you not know how Steam works?

do you? Because i think you need to do a bit of homework on what steams insane cut is. They demand 30% from games put on there, and they'll mark it as far down as 20% IF It's a AAA title that sells so many millions that steam allows it like gta5

Steam's cut is outrageous, and it is 100% the reason these stores pop up at all. This predates the Epic game store by nearly a decade; remember when EA went to steam asking for their fee to be cut after dragons age and Mass effect 1, and steam said no, so EA made the origins store.

Had steam said "we'll cut out fee down to something reasonable like 15% of profits) than none of these stores would exist.

Steams hubris and greed led entirely to this road, and tbh, it could've been MUCH worse.

Even ATVI started putting their CoD games on Bnet to escape steam. Destiny had to go f2p in order to avoid the steam greed spiral, etc.

There's countless examples here of how steam is actually to blame for this mess, but steam knights will defend their gabe's greed to no end while demonizing other companies... while ignoring that steam is responsible. They are middle man software and 100% UNNECESSARY to run a game; asking 30% is downright lunacy. even 15% is DOUBLE the competitions store fees for devs/publishers.

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Remember, we're not talking about who does best in sales but that PC sales are either good enough or equally as good as some consoles. I deliberately threw in Dark Souls for this reason, because it was a console focused game that had a very broken PC release, and yet still took 1/3 of the total sales for the series. GTAV was strange because it was released 2 years later on PC.

Rockstar has a good reason to be releasing a Launcher on PC. Though this would also mean they will no longer release games on Steam anymore.

R* is another company that has been open that they would rather develop their own launcher going forward for RDR2 on pc, and GTA6 eventually than let steam take 30% of their pie for doing nothing.

Those days are over and publishers are waking up to steams out of control greed, and borderline monopoly

[Super Kami Dende]

People complaining that Steam takes 20-30% on Games, realise Steam also saves companies easily that amount on Physical Copy manufacturing. Since Companies do not give a discount to People getting a pure Digital copy.

[Justpassing]

Later we will have a launcher that launches launchers that launch game launchers and so on

Well, Microsoft launches Windows that launch game launchers. What a time to be alive!

[jcf190]

The 30% has been debunked many times. It will be around 20% for big companies like Rockstar, and while it is a lot still, compared to the cut retailers/resellers used to take, it is not that extreme. And steam is not an unnecessary middle man, it is the biggest seller of games on the market. One Thing I will never get is why the games companies do not just do as Rockstar does in this case and have their own launcher/client, and then just sell the game 5 or 10 bucks cheaper there, than on steam. That way they still get steam sales, but a big portion of players will also go for the cheaper options and buy it directly from them.


He seems to be more into VR these days, though he is still rather involved in esports, especially dota 2.

Folks also fail to realize that same percentage is charged by Microsoft and Sony to have games on their consoles. It's an industry standard, for the most part.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

More "launchers" surface against God-King Steam = more competition between companies = potential for better games = win for gamers.

Until more and more and more games start moving to launcher exclusive but perhaps that's a necessary short term loss to acheive a greater long term win?

[Rennadrel]

Steam's 30% asking fee is too much. I keep saying that, over and over, every time one of these stores pop up and steam knights just blindly defend it without realizing it is DIRECTLY leading to every single store, including epic.

Steam has the power to kill them all, right now, today; Gabe just needs to lower his greed stat from 100 to like 90

It's digital goods and steam is an unnecessary 3rd party middle man; why give them 30%? Those days are over

It'll take a significant profit loss for Gabe to pull his head out of his fat ass.

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More "launchers" surface against God-King Steam = more competition between companies = potential for better games = win for gamers.

Until more and more and more games start moving to launcher exclusive but perhaps that's a necessary short term loss to acheive a greater long term win?

Except that we know that isn't what is happening. It's splitting the PC platform because exclusivity is what is happening.

[SoundOfGuns]

Steam's 30% asking fee is too much. I keep saying that, over and over, every time one of these stores pop up and steam knights just blindly defend it without realizing it is DIRECTLY leading to every single store, including epic.

Steam has the power to kill them all, right now, today; Gabe just needs to lower his greed stat from 100 to like 90

It's digital goods and steam is an unnecessary 3rd party middle man; why give them 30%? Those days are over

And you think you are so much smarter, yea? Because you really aren't. Yea, i do agree that the 30% are to much... today. It wasn't when this fee came to be. Back then it was actually close to nothing. Valve is simply to slow. This is a flaw, yes, but they aren't greedy, even if Tim "Im not allowed near little children" Sweeney blares otherwise to his fortnite-audience.

However, despite what (and i take a wild guess here) "epic knights" tend to think... Steam is offering a lot more to developers than epic ever will outside of monetary compensation. Server management, DRM, cheat-protection, pre-load options (which - despite what incredible naive people tend to think is not just a user-benefit) and on and on and on and on... Epic does fuck all for lots of money, and the fact alone that you mention it in a positive light, be it only as alternative here shows me that you probably don't know or don't care.

Steam needs to change what amount of money it takes but offers to much to crawl down to Tencent Game Store-levels. However, even if Tencent... i mean Epic was run by raiding murder cults most developers and especially publishers would not give a shit, as long as they get 0,20cent more on each purchase. Evidently. And as long as this is the case i probably wouldn't buy into all that bawling the Gaming Industry does.

[Soikona]

Folks also fail to realize that same percentage is charged by Microsoft and Sony to have games on their consoles. It's an industry standard, for the most part.

Folks also fail to realise that Sony and Microsoft have the exact same features as Steam BUT, they also have hardware research for a new console every 4ish years (hell ever 2-3 different models of the current gen), servers such as Live, release of multiples games a year and etc. What do we have from steam? A stupid expensive VR headset, an OS that was basically dropped by steam and a controller. Going by your logic, Sony and Microsoft should be asking for more of a cut or steam should cut their cut back.

[Leyre]

They can suck a dick, the only launchers i have and will ever use are Bnet and Steam (and Origin thanks to Mass Effect )

[bbr]

Later we will have a launcher that launches launchers that launch game launchers and so on

This calls for a snoop dogg meme
Yo dawg, I heard you like launchers.

Well no, actually we don't.

Quite fond of steam, it has some room for improvement still, but at least it isn't selling my data to any weird governments, or checking my hard drive for uncensored naked ladies or such.
And the new iTV app / phone app is super useful.

[Blueobelisk]

Seems like a valid business decision.

[Lucetia]

I honestly can’t remember the last time they had a decent summer or Xmas deal that wasn’t all indie or 4 year old aaa titles.

You realize that's not exactly Steam's fault or anything right? It's the publishers who submit the % they want their game to be on sale at along if they even want it to be on sale. In the case of what is offered that's on the publishers rather than Steam.

[Zyky]

Steam's 30% asking fee is too much. I keep saying that, over and over, every time one of these stores pop up and steam knights just blindly defend it without realizing it is DIRECTLY leading to every single store, including epic.

Steam has the power to kill them all, right now, today; Gabe just needs to lower his greed stat from 100 to like 90

It's digital goods and steam is an unnecessary 3rd party middle man; why give them 30%? Those days are over

As much as I like having a shit ton of games on Steam, I have to agree. They gouge developers, which hinders further development down the line and promotes/encourages developers doing shit like lootboxes just to make enough profit to justify a game after that one.

[Mehrunes]

And you think you are so much smarter, yea? Because you really aren't. Yea, i do agree that the 30% are to much... today. It wasn't when this fee came to be. Back then it was actually close to nothing. Valve is simply to slow. This is a flaw, yes, but they aren't greedy, even if Tim "Im not allowed near little children" Sweeney blares otherwise to his fortnite-audience.

Uh-huh. A company that fought having to offer refunds or allow resale of games in courts tooth and nail, no matter how bullshit their desperate arguments got, despite those being rights given to consumers by law in areas Steam operates totally isn't greedy. I mean, it's not like they fought that because of the fact those things would cut into their profits or anything. A company that pays almost nothing to makers of paid mods and reaps most of the benefits itself totally isn't greedy either.

And please. Are you seriously trying to expect people to expect your fantastic idea that one of the biggest companies in the gaming market has people so stupid they can't realize their cut is too big in a world where physical distribution went the way of the dodo, taking the costs it incurred with it? Despite the fact that the severity of their cut has been one of the biggest talking points of one of their biggest competitors? Seriously?

However, despite what (and i take a wild guess here) "epic knights" tend to think... Steam is offering a lot more to developers than epic ever will outside of monetary compensation. Server management, DRM, cheat-protection, pre-load options (which - despite what incredible naive people tend to think is not just a user-benefit) and on and on and on and on... Epic does fuck all for lots of money, and the fact alone that you mention it in a positive light, be it only as alternative here shows me that you probably don't know or don't care.

First of all, your dichotomy here is silly to say the least. And Steam's "DRM" is truly an amazing offer to the developers. At least those who want their games to be cracked on release day.

[Rennadrel]

do you? Because i think you need to do a bit of homework on what steams insane cut is. They demand 30% from games put on there, and they'll mark it as far down as 20% IF It's a AAA title that sells so many millions that steam allows it like gta5

Steam's cut is outrageous, and it is 100% the reason these stores pop up at all. This predates the Epic game store by nearly a decade; remember when EA went to steam asking for their fee to be cut after dragons age and Mass effect 1, and steam said no, so EA made the origins store.

Had steam said "we'll cut out fee down to something reasonable like 15% of profits) than none of these stores would exist.

Steams hubris and greed led entirely to this road, and tbh, it could've been MUCH worse.

Even ATVI started putting their CoD games on Bnet to escape steam. Destiny had to go f2p in order to avoid the steam greed spiral, etc.

There's countless examples here of how steam is actually to blame for this mess, but steam knights will defend their gabe's greed to no end while demonizing other companies... while ignoring that steam is responsible. They are middle man software and 100% UNNECESSARY to run a game; asking 30% is downright lunacy. even 15% is DOUBLE the competitions store fees for devs/publishers.

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R* is another company that has been open that they would rather develop their own launcher going forward for RDR2 on pc, and GTA6 eventually than let steam take 30% of their pie for doing nothing.

Those days are over and publishers are waking up to steams out of control greed, and borderline monopoly

Do you have any concept of how fucking expensive it is to build, own and operate a server network like AWS or Steam? Those are two of the largest in the world and to operate them globally as fast as they are for on average 39 million users a day and a billion overall won't be cheap both in terms of the vast quantity of servers actually needed, not to mention the power needed to run them 24/7