Indie developer behind ‘Overwhelmingly Positive’ rated shipbuilder argues that Steam’s “free advertising” is worth the 30% cut

One indie developer has argued that selling games on Steam is worth the 30% revenue split because games can find bigger audiences on the platform “in the long run.”

To recap, when you buy a game on platforms like Steam, Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo’s eShop, those companies take a portion of the revenue – usually 30% – and leave the remainder for the publishers and/or developers. Walternate Realities, the indie developer behind acclaimed shipbuilder Cosmoteer, was recently asked about the split in a Steam forum post.

“Have you considered selling Steam keys elsewhere like via your own page or on the Humble Bundle store or other digital stores,” one player asked. “This would allow you to sell the game outside of Steam while the actual game and its features would still be tired to Steam. You might also be able to bring in a bit more profit since alternative places may take a lower cut than Valve does.”

“Selling Steam keys is certainly much easier than making a whole non-Steam build of the game,” Walternate Realties responds. “We may do that in the future, but there are a couple reasons I’m not currently doing that.” 

One reason is that maintaining additional store pages is too much of a time sink. “After doing all that, Steam will probably still outsell everything else combined by 100x, so honestly, it’s just not worth the effort except for really huge games.”

“Yes, Steam takes 30% of revenue,” the developer continues, before pointing out that if someone buys a game on the platform, “Steam will generally reward that game with free advertising” on the platform that “makes up for the 30% cut.” The bigger player base and higher visibility mean Walternate Realities would “prefer you buy [Cosmoteer] on Steam,” even if you could find keys elsewhere, “because in the long run, I think I’ll make more money that way.”

Steam’s unquestionably the biggest digital games storefront because it does its best to get out of your way, though storefronts like GOG (DRM-free games) and Itch.io (smaller indie gems) fill out niches. The Epic Games Store tried to compete with Valve by offering smaller revenue splits and paying for exclusives – it even went as far as withholding Fortnite from Steam until the platform scraps “these ridiculous 30% fees” – but it failed to attract a competing crowd.

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