Here is where I come in and recommend everyone check out Playnite: https://playnite.link/

When I care about supporting a developer or publisher and they offer their product on their own storefront DRM-free, I will often go there to buy. Or I buy from GoG which takes a smaller cut. Playnite lets me launch my Steam and non-Steam games in a seamless fashion. Steam still does a great job as a game installer/patch manager, and helps me discover new games. But I'm not locked into paying them a 30% fee, which is pretty brutal for some smaller publishers.

Windows only?

It can run on Linux/Steam Deck apparently:

https://www.reddit.com/r/playnite/comments/15q2x16/i_install...

I have only used it on my Windows install, so I can't recommend this.

Who is being forced to use iOS?

Not being forced to use iOS, but if you are on iOS you are forced to use the app store.

I think the point is Valve doesn’t own the store and the platform.

They do now for the Steam Deck, but customers can always choose to play on Desktop or x86 handhelds instead.

You can install other game stores on your steam deck. You can directly install apps outside of Steam. You can even install a different operating system if you want. It's not locked to Steam in the slightest.

Let me know when I can do install fdroid on iOS.

SD is ultimately a linux computer, so you can still throw on another store if you really care. It's also a relatiely niche device, so not quite prone to monopoly effects anyway.

Literally people will look down on you if you don't buy an iPhone.

They back off when they find out my line of work, but you hear about bullying and peer pressure in school over bubbles. That does not end when you leave high school.

One VC said that people that buy Android don't have taste and wouldn't work with them. Now they say Android is for poor people. Freedom to sideload or install a custom os be damned.

>That does not end when you leave high school.

It's not a high school thing, it's just amplified during that point in life; there is always pressure to conform.

I don't care about whether or not some VC thinks I have class either professionally or personally. Avoid people that jump to conclusions and you'll be better off, regardless of how fancy their personal titles are.

Don't worry, there are a (perhaps) surprising amount of VCs who love Android.

I'm one of them. We are not all the same!

you shouldn't tie your self-worth to the mobile phone brand you use

It's easy to understand this when your matured, not so much when you are developing, or literally get excluded from activities because of that.

I mean, $800 is kinda cheap for self-worth, if we’re honest. Cheaper than a sports car or house with a view or own apartment or even one vacation someplace fancy.

But yeah, ideally one shouldn’t tie self worth to perishables.

Same goes for Steam though, especially for multiplayer games.

I believe you, but that sounds made up.

What’s your line of work that you need an Android phone?

I find dealing with Android users from iMessage tiring but everyone I know who uses Android also uses WhatsApp and that works just fine cross platform.

Apple knows this and has curated it. Why do people think that they had specific bubble colours for messaging devices inside/outside Apple ecosystem.

They even did deep, dirty tricks like this: https://uxdesign.cc/how-apple-makes-you-think-green-bubbles-.... Not only that but Apple just love to lean heavily on their own custom functionality rather than coming up with open/reusable technologies. Apple are happy to use Wifi & Bluetooth standards to compete in the market, but not so much standards for chats/group chats (where Android users find things don't mesh as well/they don't have the same functionality as iOS users).

I can't for the life of me find it now, but I remember reading an article a while back on how Google found a way to trick iPhones into accepting Android messages as "blue bubble"/iOS messages by dumping some string onto the end or something. I'm sure it was a HN post but I can't find it, which sucks cause it was pretty funny reading.

No one is being forced to drink water as well.

No one is being forced to breathe!

So to complete the analogy, if you don't use iOS you'll die.

...?

s/you/iPhones and yes, that does align.

Literally every app developer who want to target the iPhone user market.

Don't forget, they are also forced to buy a Mac. License demand that iOS SDK must be used only on Apple hardware.

Technically no-one is being forced but network effects mean that not publishing on steam is essentially suicide for any dev without a huge marketing budget to overcome those network effects. This means that Steam is in a position where they can demand feeds in excess of what they could in a healthy competitive market.

Epic has lots of games that aren't published to Steam. They seem to be doing fine.

Epic recently admitted their store isn't profitable.

That doesn't mean the Epic Store is not profitable for the developers.

It does mean that at any point in the future the store could simply not exist with short notice.

Most game developers aren't Epic.

It's Steam or bust for the vast majority.

Epic pays those Devs for timed exclusivity on EGS, with the profits from Fornite and Unreal.

Is there anything preventing a healthy competetive market for game stores on PC? Does Steam/Valve engage in behaviour that limits competition? Alternatives do exist - itch.io, GOG, Epic Game Store, and just putting an .exe file on your website.

If the market is not being artificially suppressed (I don't believe it is), and developer still think it's financially advantageous to pay Steam's fees, doesn't that indicate the fee is "correct"?

Another way to word that, is that the benefit that Steam provides through their distribution/passive marketing service is so large that it justifies the 30% price tag. If it did not, then developers would go find another service. It's basic economics.