Community MetaSteam | September 2019 - Valve, I Know What You Did Last Summer!

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Le Pertti

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Oct 10, 2018
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Wow just wow at the indie devs raving about the end of indie gaming. Yes good luck getting in EGS, because unless you have a lot of wish lists on Steam you aren't getting on EGS. Oh right...XD
Can we please post this kind of tweets in the Epic Store topic? I'm really, really getting tired of reading this kind of bullshit, and it's strongly demotivating me from playing games. If the Epic Store becomes "the" new place to buy indie games, I'll just quit gaming and find another hobby. I'm starting to loose the last bit of respect that I still have for games developers and publishers.
While I agree, in this case it is kind of directly about Steam.

Also I'm in the same mindset as you, but I keep reminding me, I have enough games on Steam as it is to last me a decade!:D
 

xinek

日本語が苦手
Apr 17, 2019
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Interesting that wishlisting numbers are changing a lot. But there really isn't enough data available to build a story about what's really going on here. Presumably, people haven't stopped or reduced the amount of games they wishlist, so some other games must be getting added to wishlists? Also, are wishlists a feature for consumers or developers? From what I've seen so far, Steam customers like the algorithm a lot. This is one of those times where detailed reporting on numbers across all of Steam would be really interesting to see.
 
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Ascheroth

Chilling in the Megastructure
Nov 12, 2018
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Interesting that wishlisting numbers are changing a lot. But there really isn't enough data available to build a story about what's really going on here. Presumably, people haven't stopped or reduced the amount of games they wishlist, so some other games must be getting added to wishlists? Also, are wishlists a feature for consumers or developers? From what I've seen so far, Steam customers like the algorithm a lot. This is one of those times where detailed reporting on numbers across all of Steam would be really interesting to see.
Valve did that :)
To get a feel for the breadth of titles that were being visited, we measured how many games members of the experiment group visited via the "Recommended For You" section compared to a sample of customers who were not in the experiment for a few days. The results were very promising: we saw a 75% increase in the number of unique games visited, and a 48% increase in the average visits per game.

(Experiment is the new algorithm).

What all the devs complaining seem to have in coming is that they're talking about unreleased games.
 

yuraya

MetaMember
May 4, 2019
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I am kinda happy Valve is tweaking their algorithm so that released games get more exposure. That is the way it should be. People always crying about how games get buried and always want better discovery. Well you won't solve that problem by focusing so much on unreleased games while constantly feed this preorder hype culture. Steam community needs to worry about released stuff much more than unreleased. That is how it used to be. Today everyone is obsessed with what is coming next month instead of talking about what released last month. Unreleased games will get the special treatment once they are out.
 

Line

meh
Dec 21, 2018
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Their new algorithm is pretty bad.
But that has more to do with tags being meaningless. You just can't find anything you're looking for by searching for "anime", rogue-like" or "horror". There's just too much random stuff lumped together under those terms.

Maybe we do need more of the "Souls-like" tags, at least they're honest.
What the fuck does "adventure" even means nowadays? It goes from Ubisoft titles to point and clicks and platformers. Useless! If the recommender adds the tag to your tastes, you get wacky results.

Removing the tags is not going to help, far from it since definitions are so muddy and so common. You'll just lose tangentially related games because a few people think that they should have that tag.
 

Deleted member 113

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itch.io is right there :kissing-face:
And I'm glad it is.
I buy from itch.io frequently as well. :)

I really don't understand why these people think it's the store obligation to promote their games.
Plenty of developers have mailing lists, and never bother to post updates. Plenty of developers have social media accounts, but instead of promoting their games, they prefer to engage on this "hive mentality" chat, blaming Steam. As a potential customer, and a guy that buys plenty of games on day one, all this crap achieves is that it makes me add you and your games to my ignore list.
 

Rockin' Ranger

Rangers With Candy
Nov 7, 2018
501
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Some prick is tryna hack my gog account fucking prick COME HERE AND FIGHT ME LIKE A MAN
I had someone on my friends list get their account compromised and whoever has it now messaged me that I had been accidently reported for having duplicate items and if I didn't add someone else who totally works for Valve and explain it to them my account would be banned.

Unfortunately my attempt to get them to give me the login info for the account they stole in return for not reporting them just got me blocked.
 

Mivey

MetaMember
Sep 20, 2018
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The only way to really judge the impact is to have a comprehensive view of the store, and the only one who has that is Valve. I hope they'll start talking about that kinda data in some anonymized form soon. Looking at anecdotal tales from Indie devs is less then useless
 
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Samson

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Aug 2, 2019
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I'm just going through the store pages of some of the devs that say their traffic changed after the algorithm update.

ScourgeBringer is down 66%, Planned Release Date: Coming Soon

Dreamscaper down to "virtually" 0 impressions, Planned Release Date: Coming Soon

Unbound: Worlds Apart says Steam has "killed" them, Planned Release Date: Coming Soon

Nanotale - Typing Chronicles is down 20-30%, Planned Release Date: Q4 2019

Woodland Games dev of Urban Explorer says "same here [to traffic being down]," Planned Release Date: 2020

Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Master says they're down 10-20%, Planned Release Date: 2019

Transformice Adventures says they almost doubled, Planned Release Date: Late 2019

Fly Punch Boom! says they're down to "Steam Summer Levels," Planned Release Date: 2019

Magical Diary: Wolf Hall says they saw an increase in traffic, Planned Release Date: Coming In 2019

I'm too lazy to keep going through these Tweets at this point, but I have to wonder if the difference that's "killing" impressions is when your release date is set. It seems like the games that are actually slated for 2019 have seen smaller decreases (and possibly increases), while the games that are doing the worst are the ones with completely unassigned target release dates.
 

Tizoc

Retired, but still Enabling
Oct 11, 2018
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So in greedfall
I can enable reshade but my controller isnt recognized by the game =_=
Anyone know a workaround for this?

Fyi i need to rename the dx.dll file into d3d11.dll for the reshade preset ro work.
 

Wildebeet

First Stage Hero
Dec 5, 2018
798
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Stating the obvious here, but I'm surprised/not surprised that so many indie developers haven't yet accepted that there are too many people making too many games. No algorithm or store front can possibly help them.

Also if you're the developer of Tommy's Ninja Quest, Rogue World 4, Shoot Space Blocks, or Untitled Cat Platformer, they were never going to sell anything in any year on any store. But every dev thinks they're the next big thing shakes internet fist at valve
 

Cordelia

MetaMember
Jun 10, 2019
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I need to stop clicking on the twitter links you guys post, since I end up spending 5-10 minutes blocking people. :grinning-face-with-smiling-eyes:

I mean, come on:



Steam should promote games that launch elsewhere.
That sure makes sense.
See
I don't know if it was already posted, but I think this is interesting:

 

Alexandros

Every game should be turn based
Nov 4, 2018
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I think I would like a change to focus on released or soon to be released games. Too many times just last week I saw a sweet game in "similar games" and it says Coming 2020/2021 and I was just sad....but still added to wishlist lol
Agreed.
 
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I did see that.
But, what does it change?

Why should games that are yet to launch (and may never be) receive preferential treatment over games that are about to launch, or already launched?
As a customer. I really don't get it.
 
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derExperte

MetaMember
Dec 9, 2018
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Horace 20% off, cool, cool.
SolSeraph 50%
198X 30%

I think I would like a change to focus on released or soon to be released games. Too many times just last week I saw a sweet game in "similar games" and it says Coming 2020/2021 and I was just sad....but still added to wishlist lol
I kicked almost everything off my wishlist that doesn't have a concrete date in the next ~4 weeks (Halo is staying, no matter what). Thanks to this thread, social media and Steamdb I'll know if something interesting is coming up and it makes everything easier to manage. Can't handle endless, unsorted wishlists.
 

Tizoc

Retired, but still Enabling
Oct 11, 2018
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Horace 20% off, cool, cool.
SolSeraph 50%
198X 30%



I kicked almost everything off my wishlist that doesn't have a concrete date in the next ~4 weeks (Halo is staying, no matter what). Thanks to this thread, social media and Steamdb I'll know if something interesting is coming up and it makes everything easier to manage. Can't handle endless, unsorted wishlists.
Should be $11 on wingamestore if you are interested.
 
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Samson

Junior Member
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I think I would like a change to focus on released or soon to be released games. Too many times just last week I saw a sweet game in "similar games" and it says Coming 2020/2021 and I was just sad....but still added to wishlist lol
I would be okay with seeing more games that have less concrete wish lists...if Valve allowed for multiple wishlists and list tagging/annotations.

As it is, I usually just have to rearrange everything that's a long ways off to sit towards the bottom of my wishlist, and it's a huge mess of like 500 games.
 

Ge0force

Excluding exclusives
Jan 12, 2019
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What all the devs complaining seem to have in coming is that they're talking about unreleased games.
With Epic moneyhatting the most wishlisted games on Steam right before release, it makes perfectly sense that Valve shifts recommendations to games that can actually be bought on Steam.

This is just a business decisions in response to Epic's tactics.
 

Ascheroth

Chilling in the Megastructure
Nov 12, 2018
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With Epic moneyhatting the most wishlisted games on Steam right before release, it makes perfectly sense that Valve shifts recommendations to games that can actually be bought on Steam.

This is just a business decisions in response to Epic's tactics.
Lol no.
Valve really doesn't give a shit about Epic from all we've seen.
A shift to favor released games over upcoming games with vague or even without release dates is only natural when you want your customers to find more games that look cool and can be immediately bought (aka Valve gets money).
 
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