Valve faces a £656 million lawsuit in the UK for 'overcharging 14 million PC gamers' : steam

[–] entropicshart@sh.itjust.works 129 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Valve has a had a stranglehold on the PC games market for a long time and with this claim we’re challenging the status quo

Nothing has stopped competition from making their own platforms; god knows every god damn company out there has tried (Origin, Uplay, etc.) and failed to delivery a basic and functional option!

The reason Steam is (and will continue to be )successful is because they developed and listened to their user base without being greedy scumbags!

[–] TheHobbyist@lemmy.zip 37 points 5 months ago (5 children)

I think this is the key claim:

Vicki accuses Valve Corporation of shutting out competition in the PC gaming market by forcing game publishers to sign up to pricing restrictions that dictate the lowest price games can be sold for on rival platforms.

I had heard about it in the past and if true, I feel that is quite an uncompetitive practice, probably made possible by the dominant position Valve has.

[–] hedgehog@ttrpg.network 39 points 5 months ago (3 children)

The article also says

The first point is one we've heard repeated many times before, but there's never been any proof on it. Which perhaps the Wolfire lawsuit and this may actually bring to light. An accusation doesn't necessarily mean they're right though. Something people get confused on often is Steam Keys, which are completely separate to Steam Store purchases.

Saying “Don’t sell Steam keys off-platform for more than X% less than the game is priced for on Steam” and “Don’t sell your game elsewhere for more than X% less than the game is priced for on Steam“ are very different things. Steam openly does the former; I’ve never heard a reputable report of them doing the latter. The Wolfire lawsuit is explicitly about the former practice, for example.

The press release for this lawsuit reads like it’s about the latter, but I suspect that’s solely for optics. I reviewed the website dedicated to the lawsuit (steamyouoweus.co.uk) and thought they might have some more concrete evidence - nope, nothing. Under the first question in FAQs they have a link to their key documents, but the documents are “coming soon.”

Until they actually substantiate their claim, this lawsuit is just noise.

[–] TheHobbyist@lemmy.zip 5 points 5 months ago

Yes, I'd like to see some proof. There is indeed some possible confusion (intentional or not).

[–] Spedwell@lemmy.world 3 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Adding a link to my other comment: see points 204 and 205 in the filing for where it alleges Steam enforces pricing for non-key sales.

[–] hedgehog@ttrpg.network 1 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Thank you! That document is exactly the sort of thing I was looking for. Just realized (after writing most of this comment) that it's for Wolfire and not Vicki Shotbolt's case, but the commentary’s still relevant, I think.

There’s enough there that they may have a legitimate case, but there's also a lot that is, as far as I know, completely acceptable for Valve to do. The specific items you listed, as well as a couple before / after them, are the most promising, IMO, but even so, there are a couple different counter-arguments that I could see Valve making.

The first counter-argument would be that the comments in 204-205 were in the context of publishers who had already received Steam keys for the games in question and did not apply to games where the publisher had not received Steam keys.

The second counter-argument would be that Tom Giardino was not speaking to Valve's actual policy and/or that he was making empty threats that he didn’t have the power to enforce. Tom's still with Valve (according to https://www.valvesoftware.com/en/people) so they wouldn't be able to show that he was fired for giving publishers incorrect information, but it would be feasible for them to have record of him having gotten disciplinary action or something along those lines. Without something like that it's much less credible stance, but not unbelievable - they'd basically have to be admitting negligence since this is a record of the actions of a representative their company. My gut says they were at least complicit.

200 says Valve “insisted” a publisher change their price on the Discord Store but doesn’t indicate any enforcement action was taken. At first glance, 209 appeared to apply, but it, too, involves the sale of Steam keys. 230 goes into a bit more detail about 209.

I read through the filing and still don't see any instances of a game being delisted because it was being sold for cheaper elsewhere, when Steam keys weren't in play. A lack of enforcement action against publishers not using Steam keys who set a different price in another storefront would go a long way toward showing that Valve's policy was only relevant when the publishers were using Steam keys.

In either case, Valve will need to make the argument that it is not anti-competitive to require publishers to agree to these terms when requesting free Steam keys.

The arguments regarding DLC exclusivity (172-184) are another area where Valve might be found to be anti-competitive. That said, I don't think exclusive DLCs benefit consumers and I would expect Valve to argue that the intent and impact of requiring DLC be published on their platform is for consumers' benefit. I think proving something here would be dependent on the pricing angle.

I still think Valve could argue that the intent and impact of their pricing decisions are to the benefit of consumers. The specific enforcement actions brought up were all in relation to the price of Steam keys on third-party storefronts, which I think will be held to a much lower standard than restricting the price of the game on other platforms. After all, the benefits of Steam keys aren't intrinsic to Steam, and other platforms are free to offer a similar benefit to game publishers.

In 191, the plaintiff shows that a publisher could set the price on a rival platform at 20% less and make more profit than on Steam. However, there aren't any examples of enforcement actions where the discount on a rival platform did not exceed a 20% difference. Ultimately, if they don't have at least that - optimally for a game whose publisher didn't ever receive free Steam keys - the singular statement of one of their representatives might be the only concrete evidence they have. And at that point, the argument that Tom was just making empty threats has a lot more weight.

[–] Spedwell@lemmy.world 1 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Empty threats is an interesting concept, but ultimately the market is behaving as if the threats are sincere so whether or not Valve would follow through is irrelevent to whether the presence of a policy is an exhibition of monopolistic power. The need to see an actual example of a game being delisted for violation of the policy is a weirdly high standard of evidence, when the downstream effects of the policy are otherwise so apparent.

I guess we'll have to hope the courts are reasonable on this (if it ever gets out of legal limbo lol).

[–] hedgehog@ttrpg.network 3 points 5 months ago

ultimately the market is behaving as if the threats are sincere so whether or not Valve would follow through is irrelevent to whether the presence of a policy is an exhibition of monopolistic power

Courts have interpreted the anti-monopoly portion of the Sherman act, which governs antitrust law in the US, to mean that monopoly is only unlawful if the power is used in an unlawful way or if the monopoly was acquired through unlawful means.

The need to see an actual example of a game being delisted for violation of the policy is a weirdly high standard of evidence

As a smoking gun, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask for something like that.

If it’s a policy Valve denies and the only evidence of it existing is a single reply in a forum somewhere, then yes, I’m skeptical. And given that there are examples of companies that were willing to break explicit, defensible policies, why aren’t there examples of companies who broke these? Unless the plaintiffs bring in multiple witnesses to testify that this was the policy communicated to them or something along those lines, I can’t see the evidence that they did have this policy being more compelling than the fact that there’s a complete lack of evidence that they ever acted on it.

To be clear, I’m not saying Valve needs to have said that was the reason. But it certainly needs to look like that was the reason. If Valve can’t provide a valid reason for the termination, then that’s very compelling, and even if they can, it’ll come down to which is more believable.

[–] Spedwell@lemmy.world 1 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

The latter point is a claim in the Wolfire case, and is supposedly a term in the Steam Distribution Agreement which all publishers sign. It's behind an NDA, though.

There is indirect evidence of this in the following: if Steam's cut is 30%, and Epic's is 12%, and a publisher's own site has no platform fee... Why don't we see gradiated pricing across these different services?

It seems like there must be some policy or threat of consequences that keeps a game's price consistent.

[–] Orygin@sh.itjust.works 5 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I'm open to the idea steam puts restrictions on publishers. But the obvious answer would be that the publisher is taking the extra profit for themselves instead

[–] Spedwell@lemmy.world 1 points 5 months ago

They certainly do pocket the difference. But the point is the behavior we see is that what we would see if Steam wasn't enforcing uniform pricing. Publishers would pick some list price on other platforms / their own sites that undercuts Steam and also gives higher margin for themselves.

E.g. a $60 game on Steam with a 30% cut nets you ~$42. If you list the game on for $50 on Epic with a 12% cut, you net $44. The price differential works in favor of the consumer and publisher, and would convince more people to buy on the high-margin platform. A greedy publisher isn't going to keep the $60 price tag, because that just pushes consumers to buy on Steam (which has the most features).

[–] it_depends_man@lemmy.world 21 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

The claim is not true. The official rules are not forcing price parity.

You can sell on steam for 40$ and on gog or itch for 20$.

The only rule is that you want to sell a steamkey, making the game available through the service, to people buying from a different platform, you can't give out the steam key for cheaper on that different platform than steam customers can buy it on steam. You don't even have to pay steam the 30% cut if you're selling somewhere else.

You can even do temporary deal on a different platform, if you're doing a similar deal on steam "within a reasonable time".

https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys#2

And also, you are not FORCED to sell on steam. You can just not use the platform.

[–] tristan@aussie.zone 16 points 5 months ago

Given that steam let's you sell keys on other platforms (like gog, gmg, etc) and activate them on steam, and have steam handle all the heavy work of file distribution and stuff, it makes sense that steam wouldn't want you to sell steam keys cheaper on other platforms and make them wear all the cost of distribution... Otherwise they'd get no sales and end up with all the expense

The only other choice would be to no longer allow you to get steam keys to sell on other platforms or even to give away for review purposes or things like that.

[–] Ganbat@lemmyonline.com 6 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

I've read about this one. I don't know if it applies to games totally managed by other stores, but I know it originated with key distribution. The gist is, they distribute keys to the publisher free of charge, so this was so they can't undermine their pricing while still utilizing their content distribution systems.

IIRC, it basically just says that base prices have to be the same.

[–] elgordino@fedia.io 2 points 5 months ago

Yeah. If this restriction exists it’s pretty clear it only applies to selling steam keys on another platform, not for selling generally. Pretty often games are cheaper on Epic or GOG and don’t use steam for delivery.

[–] PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world 3 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

It’s misleading, at best. They don’t actually restrict sales on other platforms at all. You’re free to sell your game at whatever price you want. The only restrictions they place are on Steam keys which unlock the game for a Steam account. They restrict the price of Steam keys, because they want price parity for Steam keys. But you’re still welcome to sell non-Steam versions of your game at whatever price you want. Hell, you can give it away for free if you want, as long as it’s not giving away steam keys.

For instance, GoG doesn’t distribute games via Steam keys, so you can sell your game on GoG for cheaper.

[–] westyvw@lemm.ee 61 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Really? Don't fuck with valve. I hate every single other launcher.

They are the ONLY game service that caters to Linux users. There are millions of Linux gamers, seems to me like the other companies are abusing their dominant position of using Windows to keep linux users out. How about that?

[–] teawrecks@sopuli.xyz 4 points 5 months ago

What if the legislation required that content platforms provide an API that adhered to an open standard? Such that there could be open source clients that unify them all (not just janky ones that do their best to not break with every platform update), so that consumers can have their libraries in one place, and still browse all store deals in one place.

Ideally the legislation would also extend to all content including music, shows, movies, and internet content/streams, so that we don't have to have separate apps for Netflix, and Hulu, and Amazon, and HBO, and Roku, etc.

[–] Ostrakon@lemmy.world 47 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I feel like this suit should be DOA. The only leg they appear to be able to stand on is DLC requiring to be purchased through Steam but - how on earth would that work otherwise?

Feels like they're fishing for a settlement.

[–] 9point6@lemmy.world 7 points 5 months ago

That's not even true is it? I'm pretty sure you can buy DLC for various steam games on places like humble bundle and they activate on steam

[–] LainTrain@lemmy.dbzer0.com 31 points 5 months ago (3 children)

I was always confused by why Gaben doesn't just snap his fingers and rid us of the British isles once and for all. He is powerful enough, isn't he?

[–] ThelVadam@programming.dev 22 points 5 months ago

Our Lord Gaben is a Benevolent God.

[–] Hubi@lemmy.world 5 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Pretty sure he can just buy the UK if he desires.

[–] Infernal_pizza@lemmy.world 4 points 5 months ago

God yes please, got to be better than who we’re stuck with at the moment

[–] polonius-rex@kbin.run 5 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

you need a season antagonist

[–] jsomae@lemmy.ml 30 points 5 months ago

Steam, with its regular 80% off sales?

[–] whodoctor11@lemmy.ml 17 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Absolutely nonsense. Nothing Valve has done prevents the competition from doing a better job.

Skill issue.

EDIT: Apparently, the complaint was filed by the CEO of a "Parental Control" company that has a partnership with Meta. This story becomes increasingly ridiculous.

[–] PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world 4 points 5 months ago

EDIT: Apparently, the complaint was filed by the CEO of a "Parental Control" company that has a partnership with Meta. This story becomes increasingly ridiculous.

Yeah, there was a similar class-action lawsuit making the rounds in America a few months ago. It failed to take off, because PC gamers pretty unanimously went “lmao get off your bullshit” as soon as they saw what the lawsuit was alleging. It was very heavily advertised on Meta platforms.

[–] electricprism@lemmy.ml 16 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Is the government's out of money?

[–] ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca 54 points 5 months ago (2 children)

It's a UK law firm filing the class action suit. They're also suing Sony for £5 billion for the same thing. It's just lawyers looking for money.

[–] arudesalad@sh.itjust.works 21 points 5 months ago

You fail to explain how stupid the Sony case is. The case is about playstation having a monopoly... on the distribution of playstation games...

[–] electricprism@lemmy.ml 15 points 5 months ago

Can anyone spare £1 trillion in these trying times? I gotta buy some cheese and crackers and a box of wine.

[–] blindsight@beehaw.org 16 points 5 months ago (2 children)

Essentially, this hinges on whether demanding price parity with other platforms is anticompetitive... I think that's going to be a tough hill to climb, especially as they're only asking to not be undercut as a supplier. There's no requirement to sell exclusively through Steam, and Steam even allows developers to give Steam keys on other platforms, including with game bundles that have a total "value" well below Steam sale prices.

Like, I use Steam daily, and buy multiple games most months in game bundles, but in the last few years, I've only made a handful of purchases on Steam. One game and my Steam Deck Dock were my only Steam purchases this calendar year, and my Steam Deck OLED and two games were my only purchases last year, but in that time I added about 150 new games to my Steam library.

[–] tristan@aussie.zone 11 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I don't think people realise how generous steam is by allowing Devs to sell steam keys on other platforms and still handle all the distribution and updates and everything for a key they didn't get paid for, and all they ask is you give the same or better deal to customers who purchase direct through steam

[–] blindsight@beehaw.org 5 points 5 months ago

Yeah, exactly. Steam gets very little money from me (well, aside from the Deck), but I get all the benefits from their services. Not sure how that's monopolistic...

[–] frazorth@feddit.uk 5 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Essentially, this hinges on whether demanding price parity with other platforms is anticompetitive...

No it's not. This hinges on whether you can sell the generated free Steam keys on other sites for less than the price you have set on Steam.

You can absolutely sell your game on another site for less. You can't sell your game on another site for less and make Steam pick up the infrastructure costs.

[–] blindsight@beehaw.org 1 points 5 months ago (1 children)

This is the first I've heard it that way. I haven't read the contract though, so I can't say I'm correct with confidence.

[–] frazorth@feddit.uk 4 points 5 months ago

The only claim anyone has ever documented is detailed in the article.

An accusation doesn't necessarily mean they're right though. Something people get confused on often is Steam Keys, which are completely separate to Steam Store purchases. Valve do ask developers not to "give Steam customers a worse deal than Steam Key purchasers"

You can read through all the claimants key documents if you like 😉

https://steamyouoweus.co.uk/updates/

So far no one has ever shown Valve asking for price parity with other outlets, and this doesn't appear to be any different. Just a lawyer looking for a payday.

[–] Donjuanme@lemmy.world 9 points 5 months ago

And I face a lifestyle of carefree happiness when I buy a lottery ticket.

[–] constnt@lemmy.world 9 points 5 months ago

This is a private individual who is suing valve for her own personal gain. This isn't a government or a class action. If they win valve gives this one lady half a billion dollars. Sounds bullshit to me.

[–] PowerCrazy@lemmy.ml 7 points 5 months ago (1 children)

lol I'm as anti-capitalist as the next internet leftist, and I absolutely think it would be fucking awesome if Steam were replaced by a national digital distribution service that have flat costs for publishing, and high quality standards before allowing a game to be published. Gold-digging lawsuits aren't on the path to that better world though.

[–] robinj1995@feddit.nl 14 points 5 months ago

Not sure I'd trust a national distribution service (especially in the UK) more though

[–] sgtlion@hexbear.net 4 points 5 months ago

I assume if this were even 1% winnable that Epic Games would've done this long ago