lmfao, so that clause has been in the agreement since 2017 at least, and these devs didn't even know what they signed?
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The best thing about that reddit post is that term has apparently been there since 2017 yet if you read twitter a bunch of indie devs are losing their shit (granted many are the same opportunistic bunch crying about indie apocalypse constantly).
This means that all of these devs never read the deals they signed. They treat their contracts that are so important to them like most of us treat ios updates
This means that all of these devs never read the deals they signed. They treat their contracts that are so important to them like most of us treat ios updates
On the one hand, life would be better without having to read legalese to protect yourself from horrendous terms of service from companies you use and work for.The best thing about that reddit post is that term has apparently been there since 2017 yet if you read twitter a bunch of indie devs are losing their shit (granted many are the same opportunistic bunch crying about indie apocalypse constantly).
This means that all of these devs never read the deals they signed. They treat their contracts that are so important to them like most of us treat ios updates
On the other hand, if you're running a goddamn business, there's no excuse not to fully read the legalese.
And the fact that these terms are a surprise are confirming my long-standing opinion that most of these indie devs aren't actually businesspeople, which is why they feel so entitled to shit from Valve.
After the old article about regional pricing and the developers saying they didn't know Valve was selling their games for for less in other places, that really isn't far fetched. After all, they are also not looking carefully at even the "price" section of their games before clicking things.This means that all of these devs never read the deals they signed. They treat their contracts that are so important to them like most of us treat ios updates
Not that will matter because these developers just want to make Valve the bad guy, but even if you read that clause in the worst possible way and Valve actually enforced it, it just basically boils down to "you can't have a store page and use the steam community/features without also selling the game there", which isn't all that unreasonable to begin with.
See, I now fully support EGS exclusivity deals. It's clear many devs urgently need that money to take reading lessons.
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"Steam continues to be a tax with no benefits for devs."
Except these very same devs who are saying Valve has no benefit for them are bitching that they can't utilize the "benefit" of a store page to advertise their games before jumping ship to Epic..."Steam continues to be a tax with no benefits for devs."
lmao at these dipshit devs and their echo chamber. I've always been an "individual contributor" in my career, but even I know enough about business to know that 1. You're not getting jack shit for free from a company (such as free advertising) unless you're in a position where them giving you free shit massively promotes their business, and 2. Read your fucking contracts and understand them fully. This has gone to the point of parody. If I ever felt bad about shunning indie devs because they felt they had to take an exclusivity deal, I don't anymore. They have to be taking the piss at this point. Are these the same people calling game consumers entitled? Lordy.
Just want to make sure... that section of the TOS refers to software already released on the store needing to match the versions release elsewhere right?
I was able to correctly parse that the first time and my livelihood doesn't depend on it, right?
I was able to correctly parse that the first time and my livelihood doesn't depend on it, right?
to be fair when was the last time anyone really read any agreements, including your current employment one lol.
indie devs are not a real business in the sense that most do not have money for a lawyer up front, and just because it's in the contract doesn't mean its really enforced or legally enforceable. Many employment agreements contain non competes, and as a buddy of mine says , we would love to see them try to enforce it. of course most people don't even realize that its in their employment agreement and most of the time companies don't bother to try to enforce it.
did you read your agreement to use all the gaming platforms you use?
do you think you own the digital content you purchased?
do you know what you agreed to , in terms of your personal data being used? (big reason why the GDPR exists, which technically only covers EU citizens)
wonder what it says?
do you think a corp is going to restructure their agreement for you?
do you know how much it would cost to have a lawyer look over things?
want to risk burning a bridge with one of the major platform holders?
this is why companies want to own the platform, it puts them in a hugely unfair position and they know it.
very similar to the power they wield with employment agreements.
the only ones you see negotiating for the most part are the other big corps because they have teams of lawyers
who can spend time going back and forth and reading agreements.
Its the same reason why so few people actually negotiate offers from companies for employment
how many of you actually read thru your employment agreement and negotiated terms before starting work?
Ill go first, never read it, but did negotiate on stock and salary. so i guess i read that part lol.
indie devs are not a real business in the sense that most do not have money for a lawyer up front, and just because it's in the contract doesn't mean its really enforced or legally enforceable. Many employment agreements contain non competes, and as a buddy of mine says , we would love to see them try to enforce it. of course most people don't even realize that its in their employment agreement and most of the time companies don't bother to try to enforce it.
did you read your agreement to use all the gaming platforms you use?
do you think you own the digital content you purchased?
do you know what you agreed to , in terms of your personal data being used? (big reason why the GDPR exists, which technically only covers EU citizens)
wonder what it says?
do you think a corp is going to restructure their agreement for you?
do you know how much it would cost to have a lawyer look over things?
want to risk burning a bridge with one of the major platform holders?
this is why companies want to own the platform, it puts them in a hugely unfair position and they know it.
very similar to the power they wield with employment agreements.
the only ones you see negotiating for the most part are the other big corps because they have teams of lawyers
who can spend time going back and forth and reading agreements.
Its the same reason why so few people actually negotiate offers from companies for employment
how many of you actually read thru your employment agreement and negotiated terms before starting work?
Ill go first, never read it, but did negotiate on stock and salary. so i guess i read that part lol.
If you're not reading the agreements and contracts you're signing for employment, you're a bona fide moron, full stop.
Look, you want to access a gaming service so you can play online with your friends? Yeah, I can see skipping past the text in a rush. I've done it too, even though it's probably stupid to not fully understand all the ways that a service like PSN or XBL could screw me.
Skipping past the terms of service for a service for my business? No, that's idiotic. I don't read every minor revision to the terms that Amazon or Shopify or my freight distributor partners put out, but assuming I'm not a failure of a businessman, I'd want to read those terms at least once and check on any major revisions that get announced. Or at least have someone at work read them once to make sure there's nothing horrific in them.
Look, you want to access a gaming service so you can play online with your friends? Yeah, I can see skipping past the text in a rush. I've done it too, even though it's probably stupid to not fully understand all the ways that a service like PSN or XBL could screw me.
Skipping past the terms of service for a service for my business? No, that's idiotic. I don't read every minor revision to the terms that Amazon or Shopify or my freight distributor partners put out, but assuming I'm not a failure of a businessman, I'd want to read those terms at least once and check on any major revisions that get announced. Or at least have someone at work read them once to make sure there's nothing horrific in them.
Tommy Refenes calls Epic Games Store exclusivity deal 'a total no-brainer'
‘I don’t know who wouldn’t take that deal’ When Super Meat Boy Forever eventually launches, the PC version will only be...
www.destructoid.com
He sounds pretty confident. I think a lot of these developers are going to be unpleasantly surprised when real sales numbers start trickling in.Repost?Tommy Refenes calls Epic Games Store exclusivity deal 'a total no-brainer'
‘I don’t know who wouldn’t take that deal’ When Super Meat Boy Forever eventually launches, the PC version will only be...
I really don't know and I'm especially not sure how to interpret a "50% price cut" before launch.
Is it to build a substantial player-base to be able to push down hard on micro-transactions, or is it because the game is already behind expectations?
For the rest: Sure, why buy a product on EGS over other Stores if it's not exclusive.
All I wanted to say: The game is being pushed hard and it will be used to fuel the pro EGS propaganda. Victory will be proclaimed, excellent preorder numbers will be presented without taking a preemptive 50% cut into account.
They won't, because the exclusivity deal is guaranteed sales.
Their next game's sales though, if they ever get around to making one, might be a real shock.
First-year sales are indeed guaranteed but word of mouth is a very strong factor in pushing indie game sales and for that to happen you need actual humans playing your game. By the time SMBF launches on Steam it may very well get swept up by more recent releases.
First-year sales is the time games sell the most though, while post-launch sales is a nice bonus, company's bottom line is usually more dependent on how well the game performs during the launch window.
Timmy gives them enough money not to care about the rest of game sales though.
I mean, of course, more sales is always a good thing. But, as is extremely noticeable, looking at devs behaviour, the amount they get from EGS is more than enough.
Thing is, this won't last.
You guys are talking about this clause been in the agreement since 2017, do you have source of that ? It starts spreading like it's something new and I'd like to have a source to back my replies
I absolutely read every contract I personally sign and where my income or large payments are involved, yes (not stuff like eulas). Story time: I have an LLC for contracting work, and I received my first contract, with a gigantic multinational company for a project that would be maybe 16 weeks. The contract they sent me was LONG. I understood most of it, but I hired an attorney to look it over just in case. Turns out the contract was massively one sided, all hidden in the squishy legal language. My attorney advised not signing it. We sent revisions.
The negotiating over these revisions took weeks, and the company accepted most revisions but refused to budge on the most egregiously unfair clauses. In the end, I ended up turning it down, and they were SO ANGRY. Their project leader was beside himself, yelling at me over the phone that his project's schedule was blown up. He didn't like hearing that the problem could be solved today with a fair contract. But, the lawyers have all the power in these situations, even when it's screwing over their own company.
It ended up costing me thousands on attorney fees, but it was a valuable lesson about running a small business. I could turn down the contract, because I didn't need the work -- most companies do sign this stuff, because as you said, they're not in a position where they have any negotiating power. The pressures that a small game dev company (a real business, btw) is under are probably crushing, a real matter of survival. So I get why they may not scrutinize Steam's legalese -- they may not have the option to turn it down anyway.
I think you're definitely right about whether Valve will enforce this clause. It would be a PR nightmare if they sued small devs -- it would make everyone mad, including me, who is currently mad in general about the anti consumer state of the game industry. The clause is probably one of those just-in-case things, where if someone egregiously tries to screw them over, they have recourse. It wouldn't be responsible for a company to not include a clause like that. It's also not unfair at all, and for devs complain about it is a massive eye-roller.
Lol.
Other than that, why do they want to be on Steam when they don't care to release on Steam as soon as elsewhere? Could it be because that is actually part of their marketing/advertising/promotion/visibility so that's another thing that Steam offers alongside, I dunno, being a whole distribution channel that you want to utilize if your game releases on it alongside all their other online and offline support services, market reach, emerging market support, and so on? What bs. If that agreement is a "tax" and "taking" then don't agree to it and don't release on Steam (or only put it up when it's 30 days to the intended Steam launch, duh).
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I don't want to shit up the Steam thread with too much BL3 talk, but holy shit some of these reviews!
A 63 from PC Gamer (Guess I can't call them Epic Gamer anymore lmfao)
And Polygon:
A 63 from PC Gamer (Guess I can't call them Epic Gamer anymore lmfao)
And Polygon:
EDIT: Also from the Polygon review, excuse me?
Probably some ramshackle way of distributing pre-release games because it’d be too difficult to do on accounts with other games, or some shit like that knowing Epic.
Between the no console keys and no reviews for non-American sites, it seems like they were more in security freakout mode.
Great reaction pic from an outstanding and underrated animeThis will be an interesting launch.
In the case of Blands 3, at least the subreddit and Discord will be large enough that you should actually be able to get some answers, unlike some of the smaller indie games on EGS.
So I tried to answer my own question, only thing I found is this update announcement from 1st December 2018 (when they changed revenue share).
steamcommunity.com
But I couldn't find other announcements for others updates, does Steam announces every update to his Steam Distribution Agreement ? Could it be possible that this is truly an update from a few days / weeks ago ?
Is there a way to check old Distribution Agreement versions to know exactly when this was added ? As long as I know, it could have been there from the beginning.
Steam :: Steamworks Development :: New Revenue Share Tiers and other updates to the Steam Distribution Agreement
Today, we updated the Steam Distribution Agreement with several important changes. Actual Authority members can review all the terms and details with their next login in to Steamworks but we wanted to highlight a few of the changes\additions in this note. The value of a large network like Steam...
But I couldn't find other announcements for others updates, does Steam announces every update to his Steam Distribution Agreement ? Could it be possible that this is truly an update from a few days / weeks ago ?
Is there a way to check old Distribution Agreement versions to know exactly when this was added ? As long as I know, it could have been there from the beginning.
According to JaseC who is very much very knowledgeable about this topic, that 2018 update was indeed the last update to the SDA.So I tried to answer my own question, only thing I found is this update announcement from 1st December 2018 (when they changed revenue share).
Steam :: Steamworks Development :: New Revenue Share Tiers and other updates to the Steam Distribution Agreement
Today, we updated the Steam Distribution Agreement with several important changes. Actual Authority members can review all the terms and details with their next login in to Steamworks but we wanted to highlight a few of the changes\additions in this note. The value of a large network like Steam...
But I couldn't find other announcements for others updates, does Steam announces every update to his Steam Distribution Agreement ? Could it be possible that this is truly an update from a few days / weeks ago ?
Is there a way to check old Distribution Agreement versions to know exactly when this was added ? As long as I know, it could have been there from the beginning.
Apparently, Steam also sounds out a ton of emails every time such a change happens.
launch better go smooth on EGS or Randy's going to be fuming lol.
How the hell Randy can be so ruthless and fragile at the same time?
reading Shenmue thread about limited edition
If they think that the buyer is 100% Shenmue fans then they should learn about this beautiful thing called symbiosis between limited stuff and scalper.
If they think that the buyer is 100% Shenmue fans then they should learn about this beautiful thing called symbiosis between limited stuff and scalper.
The same way conservatives refer to anyone bothered by their bigoted/shortsighted/etc ideology as weak skinned snowflakes but have the toughness of cheese cloth, they project like crazy. I don't know his leanings, but he definitely projects with the best of them
Maybe now finally gaming journalists will start to be anti egs, now that they are forced to use it.
Nah, it's an opportunity to declare EGS perfectly fine and user friendly platform.
Ok last word about this :
I guess that says a lot about people who tried to make this a new thing on social medias and about all websites that followed this without checking for one sec.
But at least we learned something about this, that Valve doesn't enforce this rule, but can and maybe will in the future.
Borderlands 3's Review Situation Sure Is Strange
Borderlands 3 reviews hit the internet this morning, but only at a select few websites, thanks to a bizarre scenario that publisher 2K says is in place because of security concerns.
kotaku.com
Lol. Idk what 2k expected, not get called out by Kotaku? Reviewers not mention this bizarre arrangement that puts their high investment new product in a poor light?Borderlands 3's Review Situation Sure Is Strange
Borderlands 3 reviews hit the internet this morning, but only at a select few websites, thanks to a bizarre scenario that publisher 2K says is in place because of security concerns.
Strangely, article is written by actual journalist Jason Schrieier, I guess Grayson tried but his fingers refused to type any negative words about EGS.
HOLY ****!Borderlands 3's Review Situation Sure Is Strange
Borderlands 3 reviews hit the internet this morning, but only at a select few websites, thanks to a bizarre scenario that publisher 2K says is in place because of security concerns.
Look if EGS sent us broken copies where we're losing 6 hours of progress, That game would get like a 3/10 at the most.
But none of the big names have the balls to do that because they're afraid of being blackballed.
Idk if Polygon actually scores games as opposed to just having written reviews, like BL3.
I'm miffed that Control for wasn't dinged for its technical issues, especially because the largest console install bases got fucked performance wise and it took Digital Foundry to alert people to this fact. Performance and glitches that exist on day one fucking matter. People reading reviews day one aren't interested in you being kind and not factoring in those issues to your score of the game.
They clearly didn't read the SuperMeatBoy dev's comments or they'd know its way more sustainable to take 1 time money with tons of strings attached than to foster a community who will reward you with continued sales if you dont fuck them over. What are they even thinking?!
This is so shortsighted as to be almost comical. Who knew angel investing without the ownership stake would be so good for devs? But a new model of sustainability? Refenes obviously didn't read Epic's statements about not doing this forever making it as sustainable as oil is a sustainable energy source....Repost?Tommy Refenes calls Epic Games Store exclusivity deal 'a total no-brainer'
‘I don’t know who wouldn’t take that deal’ When Super Meat Boy Forever eventually launches, the PC version will only be...