> * Just works

I don't game very often, but the way Steam "just works" can't be understated enough.

It's not perfect. I've run into weird bugs occasionally, though they were likely the fault of a specific game.

However, it's miles ahead of other game launchers I've dealt with. I'm a casual gamer, so if I end up fighting the game launcher and update mechanism for more than a few minutes, I'm just going to give up and do something else. Steam has come as close as I've seen to streamlining that experience for me.

Along the idea of streamlining and reducing the mental overhead of actually playing a game - it's great to have my entire library in one place. I refused to use any of the other launchers because I don't want to have to hunt down accounts in 5 years when I get a taste for nostalgia from a game that I don't own on Steam.

Untitled Goose Game got me back into piracy after 15 years of abstinence because of the anti-Steam launch. I would have gladly paid were it on Steam.

Ironically, that game was written by Panic, the same studio thats perfectly contented with paying Apple 30% of their revenue on their other apps...

It was developed by House House, Panic was the publisher.

Developed by House House, published by Panic

It also "Just works" in linux. None of the other launchers do that :)

I did have some problems with some games that claimed to support Linux but wouldn't run on latest 64bit Ubuntu or take issue with whichever graphics drivers I was using, but yeah, generally Steam games would simply work whereas the rest either wouldn't or would require layers of indirection like WINE and a lot of fiddling.

Yeah. Now in my older days I really appreciate the "Steam play" proton layer.

It just sets up everything for me so I don't have to mess with lutris, various wine versions and whatnot.

I've found that using the libraries included in steam also removed all manual "fiddling" compared to running it with native arch linux libraries.

Completely. I remember consoles supposedly being "just works", but then the PS3 required a 20 minute updates whenever I turned it on. I stopped playing as many games during that period. Without Steam I would probably not PC game.

> but then the PS3 required a 20 minute updates whenever I turned it on

I have the same experience with Steam. After not using for a few days, it begins downloading hundreds of megabytes of updates and has to restart itself before you can do anything with it.

The 'it just works' part is something that i really struggled with and it tainted my view of stream for good. I absolutely hated when it forced an update download and wouldn't let you do anything about it. tryin to pay a game and then bring forced to wait an hour or something (my internet used to be bad)... was infuriating and ruined many gaming sessions.

I never got a fondness for stream as a result and avoid it whenever possible.

On that note, i was really surprised to find out that epic let's you start plenty of your games without having to open the client. That's a killer feature for me. Family sharing is too.

To add to all the things you mention that just work, it's also a social network - a lot of games make it easy to setup multiplayer games with Steam friends. For these games, you don't have to go through the work of linking with friends' game accounts for every game you play.

Family sharing is a step in the right direction but in the old days with CD:s, you could buy it once and play multiplayer games together with your family and friends. Now you need separate accounts for everyone and a copy of each.

In Sweden we pay a tax on each harddrive and other storage media to cover this sharing. It's alled Private sharing tax. It's distributed between creators by some organisation. Steam and other online stores prevents this law from working as intended. This has put me off Steam from the beginning already.

I believe Steam got so big because they were first to deliver what everyone wanted, buy games without having to wait until release in your country. In Sweden we often had to wait half a year or more before the games showed up. I did not buy games on Steam for years because of the sharing aspects. I wanted to be able to share the good games with my kids or friends. On steam you don't own the games, you only rent them for a one time fee. Steam can take them down at any time.

The tax you refer to is for backing up purchased content on external hdd and such only. You seem to misread the law to cover piracy (sharing with friends).

> Privatkopieringsersättning är en lagstadgad kompensation för det inkomstbortfall som kopiering för privat bruk av musik, film och tv från en laglig förlaga medför för kulturskapare med upphovsrätt i de kopierade verken. Ersättningen betalas av tillverkare eller importörer av sådana lagringsmedier som är "särskilt ägnade för" privatkopiering,[1] som tomma CD, DVD, externa hårddiskar, USB-minnen och mp3-spelare.

https://sv.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privatkopieringsersättning

The thing I like the most about Steam, and this outmatches everything else, is the regional price localization. 60 USD is not worth the same around the world, and Steam compensates for it.

This is the thing Australians hate. We don't get a straight $ for $ conversion. As a general rule we get charged more for the same digital download because of regional pricing.

A reasonable price has to be found by buying steam keys from [HumbleBundle/GreenManGaming/etc].

I don't play the latest anymore. I will wait a year or two and get it on sale. I get a patched, solid game with well known reviews and the community wiki already filled out(so valuable in many modern games!), for much cheaper AND with that much cheaper price I don't have to worry so much about being gouged because my digital download has to travel further...

Australians are incredible wealthy. In my experience (I lived in Aus for 5 years) Australians have no idea just how wealthy they are compared to other, even Western, nations.

You are probably right. I don't know enough to compare country citizen wealth.

But while your point is relevant to the marketing person, it is irrelevant to me as a consumer.

As per most humans of course, I never feel like I have enough. Like many, I have a mortgage and so am required to work until the day I die to keep a roof over my family's head. Not a glamourous roof, but ours.

So when I have friends overseas getting the same digital files as I am for less money, I feel ripped off.

For physical items in Australia you could argue the large distances for transport explain the cost/convenience difference.

But on the internet where the cost of information transport is negligible, a minimum 20% mark up is too blatant for the exact same convenience.

> * Steam sales

I think it's worth adding that Steam's (more recent) refund policy is also a big deal. Even if you don't need it, knowing that it's there can influence buying decisions because it feels more like you can "try before you buy" (although this actually involves paying before you get to try and then putting yourself in a situation where Steam could refuse to give you your money back).

After using Steam almost exclusively for years, picking up a Nintendo Switch was jarring because there's pretty much no way to walk back from a purchase even if you have only played it for a few seconds (or just downloaded it). This also goes with games perpetually sitting at AAA release day price points, release dates often being unclear or promoted more than the actual release and sales affecting your wishlist being undercommunicated in comparison to Steam.

Steam simply lures you back in by sending you that e-mail that the game you wishlisted five years ago is currently on sale at a 90% discount.

It is not rare that I buy a game at full price, and it's on sale within a week from my purchase.

In fact Valve has recently decided to shorten the big sales cycle to one every 28 days (plus the small weekly flash sales).

All of these points seem to exist for the iOS App Store (apart from the Steam sales, but there are other advantages as well).

I think the takeaway is that on Windows there is a choice, and people (users and developers) actively choose Steam, whereas on iOS there just is not that choice. The market cannot exercise a preference.

For me the big difference is that using steam is a choice whereas using the app store is required. Developers use steam largely because they want to, not because they have to.

Also (at least for me): Linux support. This is by far the one killer feature for me.

There are a million ways to distribute an APK so I'm not sure where that parallel came from. I'm anti steam until they add decent support. I've dealt with marketplace issues too many times.

There is huge difference. Google makes it's harder and more user-hostile to install APKs from 3rd-party sources. They also create vendor lock-in ecosystem where half of Android features are only available when using Google Play Services that might not work unless you use Google Play.

On other hand Steam is just a software that works across multiple OS.

Marketplace is the one area where support is a negative; they can't be returning items to people because of accidental purchases, upsetting the seller which is likely just another regular gamer/steam user.

I think Humble Bundles did a lot for Indie Games. And of course phones and web games, and before that Flash Games.

Wow, this is basically a description of the Apple App Store.

The App Store is not even close to the convenience and features of Steam.

Awful search, awful review system, confusing interface and.. that's it? I don't see how the app store even compares.

You forgot that Apple's App store hast the best, and incidently only, reviews for iOS Apps. For the same reason it also features the 'best' search for consumers using Apple devices.

Apple store is also annoyingly assuming you speak the language of the country where you live in. It doesn't allow you to choose "English" for example, if you are accessing it from Germany..

Except it's not.

Biggest piece of the puzzle is there is no alternative. You are 100% forced to use the app store.

No one forces you to use steam. There is generally always another way to buy a PC game, and if a developer chose to put it only on steam.. well, then that's the developer's fault and not steam's fault (I get that steam is mostly a monopoly on PC, so that's not entirely fair to say, but still.. the developer can always just throw their game on GOG or itch.io etc easy enough).

So Apple's entire store is built upon forcing you to go put your product there, offering no alternatives, and then taking a large cut. Not to mention almost the entire mobile market is a hot piece of trash creating apps/games that are only there to suck up your money in microtransactions/ads or whatever. And Apple encourages that because they want the cut of all the bullshit money they pull out of people.

Steam doesn't do that. Sure you can find some little garbage people put on there, but that's few and far between and not the norm- I pretty much never see that on my daily use.

Steam still operates in a way that provides a great platform for people who love to make games and people who love to play games.

Any comparison to the mobile market of ios/android is entirely disengenious.