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Steam's New Revenue Split Agreement Gives Game Developers More Money

Steam's New Revenue Split Agreement Gives Game Developers More Money

By Rishi Alwani | Updated: 3 December 2018 18:54 IST

Highlights

Valve continue to take 30 percent for sales upto $10 million
It will take 25 percent for sales between $10 and $50 million
Over $50 million it will take 20 percent

Valve, the company behind the world's biggest digital distribution platform for PC games, Steam, has announced that it would be making changes to the revenue split between itself and game developers. Much the like App Store and Google Play, Valve takes 30 percent of all game sales on Steam. Though there have been some exceptions for those within the Steam Direct program. Now, it's 30 percent for the first $10 million in game sales, 25 percent for sales between $10 million and $50 million, 20 percent for sales above $50 million. It appears to be an attempt to keep big budget AAA game makers like Ubisoft and Bethesda from moving away from Steam entirely. At the same time, it's far from helpful for indie developers who struggle for discoverability and sales on Steam to begin with.

"The value of a large network like Steam has many benefits that are contributed to and shared by all the participants," a post from Valve reads. "Finding the right balance to reflect those contributions is a tricky but important factor in a well-functioning network. It's always been apparent that successful games and their large audiences have a material impact on those network effects so making sure Steam recognises and continues to be an attractive platform for those games is an important goal for all participants in the network."

There will be changes regarding sales data confidentiality as well which could make for some interesting developments in the months to come.

"We've also made a change to the agreement regarding confidentiality of your sales data," the post continues. "We frequently get questions from partners who want to talk with other developers\third parties or publicly about the sales of their games on Steam. We've heard you, and we're updating the confidentiality provisions to make it clear that the partner can share sales data about their game as they see fit."

With Discord, GOG, Uplay, and Origin to choose from in addition to the Microsoft Store, do you still use Steam? Let us know in the comments.

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