this post was submitted on 15 Jun 2024
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To be fair, on point 2 it's not really a Valve issue as much as it is a problem with platforms/ecosystems as a whole. If Apple and Google can't even handshake to make messages on their OSes more compatible, then what about their competing app stores? Where they aren't incentivized to be cross-compatible with something like in-app purchases (I know that in some cases purchases carry over to other platforms, but usually it's because of a 3rd party account that keeps track of the premium currency or whatever for that game specifically or a network of games. It's not something done at a platform level). Same would apply to Steam and Epic.
And specifically with Steam and Epic cross-compatibility with DLCs, barring other storefronts for the moment like GOG, etc., I don't have trust in Epic doing so in good faith. If I'm not mistaken, Tim Sweeney made a huge stink on Twitter a long time ago about not having access to Steamworks. If anything, I feel like Epic would want this to happen just so they can piggyback on Steam's work with little effort on their part (relatively speaking) to create an actually feature rich storefront.
Unless something unprecedented happens like the EU making Steamworks an open-standard somehow or some other system be in place, then I doubt point 2 would ever happen or be a substantial argument for the suit.
I'm sorry but do you hear yourself? A multi billion dollar company is not incentivised? To what? Follow the law? Tying is not allowed... The fact it's hard should not be a factor. It's also not as if they have not had some time to fix this issue already. But as you write, there is no profit in it (following the law).
But this is the essence. It is not profitable to follow some laws, and if a company chooses to not follow it. They have been told by their lawyers this is a potential liability many times. Then you bring down the hammer.
Oh my mistake, when I read it I thought it was "of course you buy DLC on Steam, where else would you get it" rather than interpreting it as a hard rule they have. Oops.
Still I think my point still stands in terms of tying existing in a more substantial way. I'm not against tying because that's a good practice. I got burned by Muse Dash not syncing DLC between Steam and other platforms.
Also some quick thoughts, but I assume this tying rule is to prevent DLC duplication? Like, you get a DLC from some place and get the same one on Steam. And to my knowledge, War Thunder skirts around the issue of DLC tying by having a webstore and that's a pretty big game, though I'm not sure they necessarily count as DLC...
I wrote this at 5 am, so sorry if I don't manage to bring my point across properly.
Well the question is indeed why can't I buy my DLC on epic if I purchased the game on steam. If the price on epic is better at the moment I want to buy. The answer is because these things are tied to the purchase on the platform.
Indeed some publishers work around this by having their own back end/ launcher etc. but then still have you ever seen anyplace it is possible to buy the game on steam and then buy dlc on epic or GOG? I can't think of any. Only option then it buy directly from the publishers launcher.
And the fact this is hard to solve.. it is going on for over a decade and hundreds of millions of profits where made by publishers, valve and other storefronts.