Antitrust lawsuit against Valve over Steam's 30% commission gains class-action status

[midian182]

What just happened? Valve will soon have a new headache to deal with in the form of a long-running lawsuit that has just been classified as a class action. Wolfire Games' suit, which accuses Valve of engaging in anti-competitive practices, will now move from just two developers fighting the gaming giant to any devs, publishers, or individuals that sold games on Steam since 2017.

Wolfire Games originally filed its antitrust lawsuit against Valve in April 2021. It claimed that the company uses Steam's position as undisputed market leader to take a large cut of sales: Valve takes 30% of all item sales up to $10 million, after which point the cut falls to 25% for sales up to $50 million, then 20% for all sales above that figure.

It was also claimed that Valve's cut keeps game prices artificially high on Steam, and that Valve pressures developers not to sell their games cheaper on other stores that take smaller commissions.

The original suit was dismissed without prejudice in November 2021 as the complaint did "not articulate sufficient facts to plausibly allege an antitrust injury based on that market." Wolfire was given 30 days to file another complaint to address the issues, which it did. The suit was combined with another antitrust lawsuit against Valve filed by Dark Catt, a multimedia production and VR game developer.

Gabe won't be happy

According to court documents seen by GamesIndustry.biz, United States District Judge Jamal N. Whitehead has now granted the companies' motion for class certification. Both Wolfire Studios and Dark Catt will be the class representatives for the action.

The judge also denied Valve's request to exclude the testimony of an expert, economist Dr. Steven Schwartz, whom the two studios called to argue their case.

The class is certified as all persons or entities who, directly or through an agent, paid a commission to Valve in connection with the sale or use of a game on the Steam platform on or after January 28, 2017. The person or entity must have been based in the US and the game purchased or acquired by a United States-based consumer during the Class Period.

If the case does succeed, Valve would likely be on the hook for a lot of money – compensating multiple parties instead of just two is a lot costlier. It could also lead to a rethink of its policies and commission rates.

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Antitrust lawsuit against Valve over Steam's 30% commission gains class-action status

 

[NumberNine]

Yacht club shrinkage.

 

[VariableSpike]

Hmm, we'll see how this pans out, but hopefully won't cause any trouble for valve - there is a reason as to why it is the leading storefront, and that can be evident with people's attitudes to the epic games store, publisher platforms like origin and so on, sure, there could be arguments made against them pushing developers to never sell for less commission or a lower price elsewhere, but otherwise a lot of it seems to be pure consumer choice

 

[ScottSoapbox]

30% is too high, but proving monopoly power will be more difficult as there are multiple was to sell to PCs (unlike iPhones).

 

[Kotters]

Damn bargain for what steam offers compared to the rest of the industry.

 

[FaTaL]

No other platform is even close to being anywhere near the same ballpark as steam.

Epic, EA, Ubisoft. They all absolutely suck.... why? none of them have reviews from customers that have purchased software on their platform.
And they all lack transparency because they know it'll bankrupt them as a company when veil is lifted on how their products are absolute dogsht. Why do you think these big developers limit what games they sell on Steam?

 

[yRaz]

Damn bargain for what steam offers compared to the rest of the industry.

Yeah, steam has to provide 3rd party support for games for decades after a purchase. Not to mention they are investing their profits into Linux gaming. We could see steam break 5% Linux users by 2030. Once 1 in 20 gamers are running Linux, it isn't so easy for publishers to ignore it. You sell 20 millions copies of a game? Well, you're leaving a million linux sales on the table, that's $60,000,000.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

Hmm, we'll see how this pans out, but hopefully won't cause any trouble for valve - there is a reason as to why it is the leading storefront, and that can be evident with people's attitudes to the epic games store, publisher platforms like origin and so on, sure, there could be arguments made against them pushing developers to never sell for less commission or a lower price elsewhere, but otherwise a lot of it seems to be pure consumer choice

I agree. If someone feels 30% is too high, they are free to publish on humble, GoG, I believe origins will take 3rd party games, and they can of course self publish. The PC is an open platform.

Valve does a lot for PC gaming. It maintains an internal chat and voice chat. They have doen more for gaming on mac and linux then anyone else. The work they've done to make Linux viable is nothing short of a miracle compared to anyone else.
The crown jewel is their review system. Nobody else is that open with problems or shows off problem developers that well. Everyone else is either secretive or curated to the point of uselessness.

Epic has to pump millions into free games to get people to use their launcher. IMO that is way more of an antitrust issue, bribing users, then anything Valve has done.

 

[WhiteLeaff]

It doesn't make any sense, there are many other platforms for selling games, and owners of large IPs could sell on their own sites if they wanted to. What a circus the justice system is becoming lol

 

[kiwigraeme]

I can't see how this can succeed, unless stuff in the back ground we don't know about

Steam is not just a storefront, but a whole ongoing support package

Not even close to Apple who provides lots less service and far more impositions

Also I think these develophers are probably Karens and dumb AF

They have no F N idea how lucky they are not having to sell physical media at brick and mortar . If their games tanked, not only would they have to lose development costs, but production , shipping , bad creditors , admin etc

What markup do you think store fronts use to charge . Only the best would make it in the door, shovelware will be on some 50 games for $10 disk

Get good, lots of small guys become pretty rich over simple games - geometry dash , dredge etc

You see tosspots like this every day , why is the coffee in a 5th avenue cafe , piazza san marco , latin quarter etc so expensive , it's only $3 out of paper cup at my gas station. What a F N rip off

No wonder they aren't making money as stupid AF about cost of business, real estate, back end support etc .

Do you want to work with crappy developers on steam , no support , no promise DLC ( steam now refunds , but may be out of their pocket - if took money and run )

 

[Skjorn]

No other platform is even close to being anywhere near the same ballpark as steam.

Epic, EA, Ubisoft. They all absolutely suck.... why? none of them have reviews from customers that have purchased software on their platform.
And they all lack transparency because they know it'll bankrupt them as a company when veil is lifted on how their products are absolute dogsht. Why do you think these big developers limit what games they sell on Steam?

GOG is the best. Hands down. Valve says your account is on borrow.

 

[Watzupken]

It doesn't make any sense, there are many other platforms for selling games, and owners of large IPs could sell on their own sites if they wanted to. What a circus the justice system is becoming lol

The justice system is nothing more than just a place for corporates and individuals to try and make money and/or to turn something favourable. The fact here is that there are alternatives to release games, so not sure why they choose to use Steam, then complain that the fees are too high. Seems to be a lack of common sense nowadays. The problem is not just isolated to this case with Steam, but getting very common.

 

[Ultraman1966]

The justice system is nothing more than just a place for corporates and individuals to try and make money and/or to turn something favourable. The fact here is that there are alternatives to release games, so not sure why they choose to use Steam, then complain that the fees are too high. Seems to be a lack of common sense nowadays. The problem is not just isolated to this case with Steam, but getting very common.

It ain't justice system, it's a Legal system. Your point is very valid!

 

[Jeff Murray]

When Steam posted their "You don't own the game" notice, I thought something was coming.-this might be it.

 

[Puiu]

Frivolous lawsuit that has no chance in court.