Valve

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Digital Homicide Suing Steam Users, Considering Suing Valve after Valve Pulls Games from Steam

digital-homicide-logoTwo-man indie developer Digital Homicide has made more news and gained more notoriety from their response to criticism than from their games themselves. Despite having nearly two dozen games on Steam, they are perhaps best known for representing themselves in a lawsuit against critic Jim Sterling for $15 million in damages related to his reviews and first impressions videos of their games.

Now, Digital Homicide is taking their legal game to the next level. The developer is now in the early stages of filing lawsuits against 100 Steam users for $18 million and is considering taking legal action against Valve itself.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Video Games

Report: Valve Made $730 Million in Revenue in 2014

steam-money-headerOne of the advantages of being a private company is that you are not required to publicly file your annual financial statements. That won’t stop people from trying to figure out the financial health of your company.

A market data firm called SuperData has prepared a report on the revenues of Valve and Steam. Their calculations indicate that Valve made $730 million in revenue in 2014.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Video Games

Steam Launches Steam Broadcasting Streaming Service

steam-broadcasting-headerThe biggest digital store and the most popular game client in gaming isn’t enough for Valve. Last year, Steam announced the launch of their own operating system, controller and Steam-branded Steam Machine gaming PCs for the living room. Now, Steam is taking on Twitch with its latest project.

This week, Steam announced Steam Broadcasting, a new streaming service that will let you watch people play games in and through the Steam client.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

How Steam is Striking Gold with the Summer Adventure

steam-summer-adventure-headerWhen Steam launched the 2014 edition of the Steam Summer Sale, it came with a new wrinkle that no one saw coming. No, I’m not talking about the four packs of Community Picks. This time out, Steam introduced the Summer Adventure to the sale. While it looks like a little competition between users for prizes, it’s actually another quiet way for Valve to make a few dollars more from Steam.

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2 Comments Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

The Economics of Steam Trading Cards and the Steam Wallet

steam-trading-cards-headerIt’s been six months since Steam introduced their Trading Cards. When they first launched, I was utterly confused as to why anyone would be interested in virtual trading cards that had no purpose and no value. It just seemed like a way for Valve to make some money that no one would buy into.

However, having just completed the Steam Holiday Sale, it’s readily apparent that Valve has hit a home run with the Trading Cards. It’s not just the transaction fees that are making Valve money. The spin-off effect from Trading Cards does just as much to make Steam even more profitable.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

7 Best Games of the 7th Generation: The Orange Box

the-orange-box-headerAfter seven weeks, our list of the seven best games of the seventh generation of video game consoles comes to a close. While many, many great games aren’t making such a short list of great games, I think that this game won’t get too much of an argument for making it over other deserving

When a game picks up scads of awards, everyone takes notice. But how good is a company that can make multiple games, ship them in a bundle and garner accolades and win awards for each of them? That’s exactly what Valve did when they put Half-Life 2, HL2: Episodes 1 & 2, Team Fortress 2 and Portal into one award-winning package called The Orange Box.

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