Do NOT get a "free" Steam key if you want to support Frontier

xondk

X
Badben said:
My goodness what a silly idea. Some people are under the imperssion that Valve is somehow forcing Frontier to use their service, and that Frontier is somehow losing money because of this. First of all, Frontier is a multi-billion dollar company, so is Valve. Frontier decided to sell their product through steam. They did this for theirown financial reasons, better marketing and so on. Froniter knows the full implication of being on steam, they also understand the financial implications of giving out steam keys to all existing players. If it was really so financially destructive to do so, they would not have done it. But to clear it up a little more, I think it works like this. Any one who buys the game now through steam, Valve will get a cut, sure, makes sense. But in what way will me linking my account, who I have already paid frontier in full, take money away from frontier in the future? When I launch ED, it starts their launcher, ever notice that all the extra products, merchandise, paint jobs, etc. are all advertised within their launcher, not on the steam page. Also I assume all future expansions for ED will most likely be sold through the ED launcher, not steam. You don't need to worry so much about Frontiers financial situation, Valve is not evil, they are partners working together. Any one who hates steam for one reason or another, but loves PC gaming needs to do some soul searching. Steam has single handedly brought PC gaming from the dead. 10 years ago all the predictions were for consoles to take over, now it's exactly the opposite, and we have steam to thank for that.
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I think you misunderstand the point some people are making, they want to support the game with 100% of the profit, rather then any cut going to steam, and if steams cut is 30% then it is huge for what steam is providing, people should be free to chose to support the game as they wish. So there really needs to be some clarification on this matter, and if steam has an NDA that prevents clarification then that is a problem.

And also, no, steam didn't bring pc's back from the dead, they were never really dead, people suddenly had consoles that could compete with pc's at the time, however with increased resolutions 1080p and such rapidly coming, consoles quickly fell behind pc's and pc's naturally rose with those that wanted to be able to run games better, yes, steam made it easier to have your game collection in one place, but with DRM controversy and such springing up from that, and now there is a push to remove DRM from gaming, which I believe is going to happen since we've seen how DRM can negatively affect games. I mean the old games you can get on steam have steams own DRM in it, preventing many modding scenario's to get old games to run at newer resolutions.

GOG and their GOG galaxy is probably when it releases fully going to be something people will consider though yes, steam's massive catalog will still hold attraction, will GOG take a cut? probably, no clue how big it will be, but at the very least you get your game DRM free, and with the client being optional.

That said steam is far from at risk, but just saying steam holding cards this close to the chest and not letting game devs reveal what is going on seems quite suspect.
 

DeLorean

DeLorean
Wow. If this is true, I find it astonishing that Steam can earn such a percentage of future purchases from people who bought ED from Frontier, then switched to play it through Steam. True, Steam has been a great boost for Elite, and great that Steam users (I'm not one, by the way) can consolidate their games.

Seriously? If you found ED before Steam became involved, would you willingly give 30% of all future purchases to Steam for, erm, the same game, rather than that 30% going to Frontier?
 

msyblade

M
Please support my favoriite game.

Give your money to FD, not Gabe. Please. Please. Steam keys LITERALLY remove profits from this galaxy to make Gabe Newell a bit richer.
At the price of our galaxy. He has enough money, Please inject your support for FD support, not Gabe, Please. He's the richest man around. We need a game, I know you like being "auto-updated", but at the price of our galaxy? Please stay with FD (PS, I love Valve and everything they've done! HL3 confirmed!
 

xondk

X
daan2002 said:
i think this thread is the biggest conspiracy theory i have ever seen next to JFK stuff
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I don't think it is a conspiracy theory really, considering how tight lipped the whole thing is with how much steam earns from being the platform for games, that is really suspect, heck we don't even know if it is 30% but here's the thing, steam isn't allowing anyone to tell anything about it and they aren't saying anything themselves, and with the whole deal with paid mods where the payment info was revealed, well steam could help themselves a lot by revealing the truth..
 

daan2002

Banned
daan2002
xondk said:
I don't think it is a conspiracy theory really, considering how tight lipped the whole thing is with how much steam earns from being the platform for games, that is really suspect, heck we don't even know if it is 30% but here's the thing, steam isn't allowing anyone to tell anything about it and they aren't saying anything themselves, and with the whole deal with paid mods where the payment info was revealed, well steam could help themselves a lot by revealing the truth..
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well let me leave this here any one re call paid mods 75% cut was going to go to valve you want something sold through a store be online or physical they get a cut no if and or buts
 
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Crunch

C
No-one held a gun to Frontier's head. It was a business decision they made after a lot of consideration of the business benefits. You, the consumer, decide where to spend your money on and if Steam gives Frontier more market coverage from consumers what is the problem? Frontier accepted the implications and benefits from having a relationship with Steam, not you.

What a ridiculous thread. A lot of people in the gaming community seem to think spending £40 on game suddenly entitles them to have a seat on the developer's Board. Do you honestly think they haven't considered what this means to their business?
 

daan2002

Banned
daan2002
Crunch said:
No-one held a gun to Frontier's head. It was a business decision they made after a lot of consideration of the business benefits. You, the consumer, decide where to spend your money on and if Steam gives Frontier more market coverage from consumers what is the problem? Frontier accepted the implications and benefits from having a relationship with Steam, not you.

What a ridiculous thread. A lot of people in the gaming community seem to think spending £40 on game suddenly entitles them to have a seat on the developer's Board. Do you honestly think they haven't considered what this means to their business?
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me and my friend want stock options :D
 
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xondk

X
Crunch said:
No-one held a gun to Frontier's head. It was a business decision they made after a lot of consideration of the business benefits. You, the consumer, decide where to spend your money on and if Steam gives Frontier more market coverage from consumers what is the problem? Frontier accepted the implications and benefits from having a relationship with Steam, not you.

What a ridiculous thread. A lot of people in the gaming community seem to think spending £40 on game suddenly entitles them to have a seat on the developer's Board. Do you honestly think they haven't considered what this means to their business?
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That's just it, if we the consumer want to support frontier with 100% of the money, we should have the option to, if we do not want to give steam a cut, we should have the option to.
Right now, while I don't exactly read it that way, it seems that even if you use store.elitedangerous.com steam will take a cut if you have linked your account, and we really need clarification on this.

As for gun holding as you say, notice how many people complained about not having a steam key? frontier listened to its users and gave the key option, so shouldn't those of us that want clarification and knowledge about where our money go, be able to get that?

Also note about calling it a ridiculous thread, how is wanting to know where your money end up in any way ridiculous?
 
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daan2002

Banned
daan2002
xondk said:
That's just it, if we the consumer want to support frontier with 100% of the money, we should have the option to, if we do not want to give steam a cut, we should have the option to.
Right now, while I don't exactly read it that way, it seems that even if you use store.elitedangerous.com steam will take a cut if you have linked your account, and we really need clarification on this.

As for gun holding as you say, notice how many people complained about not having a steam key? frontier listened to its users and gave the key option, so shouldn't those of us that want clarification and knowledge about where our money go, be able to get that?

Also note about calling it a ridiculous thread, how is wanting to know where your money end up in any way ridiculous?
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in big red and to be frank no game Dev going to tell you jack this was also brought up on sto forums and we got jack nothing from them to
 

xondk

X
daan2002 said:
in big red and to be frank no game Dev going to tell you jack this was also brought up on sto forums and we got jack nothing from them to
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Well technically they already did, by stating that using the elitedangerous site is still the best way to support the game, so what you are saying doesn't really hold true.

The problem lies in the wording of what they wrote.
I read it as buying from store.elitedangerous.com will give 100% of the money to frontier.
Where as buying from steam.elitedangerous.com will give steam a cut.
And I want to make clear, I don't think anyone has anything against this if it is like this.

Heck they don't even need to reveal how big of a cut it is, they just need to clarify the matter, the thing that has people quite annoyed is IF steam takes a cut from store. because that would mean they also get a cut off merchandise, which is physical stuff, stuff steam has nothing to do with, what people are asking for is clarification, and they can give that without trouble from an NDA.
 
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Wizz15

W
Crunch said:
What a ridiculous thread. A lot of people in the gaming community seem to think spending £40 on game suddenly entitles them to have a seat on the developer's Board. Do you honestly think they haven't considered what this means to their business?
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It seems to me Frontier considered selling through Steam for more sales and exposure, which they obviously have to pay a price to Steam for. This was most apparent when at first they announced the Steam launch without mention of Steam keys for existing customers.

At some point after the announcement, people started asking for Steam keys for existing customers. It seemed Frontier reluctantly gave in to the request, probably because of goodwill or other marketing/PR reasons (almost certainly not financial, since they would get no new sales from this and probably have to pay Steam for generating the keys).

I can certainly understand their standpoint from a business perspective and for this reason this thread is not ridiculous at all. Frontier knew up until the generation of Steam keys they could count on a fixed number of people where Frontier would get the full 100% of money spent (also on future sales). With the generation of Steam keys, they will potentially see this fixed number of people shrink. Possibly even to the point where all sales will only get Frontier 70% of money spent (since everyone could be buying through Steam)*. It probably won't make the company go bankrupt, but (potentially) losing 30% on all sales is not good for any business. If development costs stay the same but you get less money from each sale that will be an issue.

I am not linking my Steam account (even though I use it almost daily), since I want Frontier to make a better game and not have to do concessions or cut corners on development time.

* This only applies if you can also buy skins/DLC and other in-game items through Steam, not just the base game
 

Patrick_68000

Patrick_68000
For me the situation is simple. I never go on Steam and I have acquired the expansion pack during the kickstarter. But it's a good thing that ED is on Steam. Because Steam is a showcase for the game
 

OnePercent

OnePercent
so If I have been a premium beta level backer thus I technically have a life time pass I should be ok to go steam since I have already given FD all the money they would get from me if I was normal customer instead or does this mean that Valve gets a cut just from buying even merchandise and ship skins too?
 

TheNunu

T
I bought the game through Steam because the price was the same. If it would had cost at least 5% less on here I would had bought it on here. To pay i need to type my payment information in, why should i give my payment information to another company if I can pay it through one that already has my payment informations anyways.
 
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