And I’d say that it is 100% deserved. Stardew Valley is a once in a lifetime kind of game and has one of the best developers you could ask for. Free new content and updates for 10 years and it’s still like $20 and frequently on sale. The developer actually tweeted out once that if he ever charged for new content that he’d want everyone to publicly shame him.
“I swear on the honor of my family name, i will never charge money for a DLC or update for as long as I live. Screencap this and shame me if I ever violate this oath.”
Stardew Valley is the gaming industry at its best and one of the best indie games out there.
Hehe yeah. To celebrate the recent patch increasing multiplayer to 8 people. We basically started like a DnD group sessions style of playthrough. We would meet weekly and play for like 8 hours at a time. Was pretty great.
But at the same time there are plenty of indie devs that sell games for $30 and then have a few $15 DLC on top of that after a few years. Not throwing shade at those other devs, more just saying that the dev for Stardew Valley could have sold DLC and nobody would have questioned it but chose not to. You could be like Stardew Valley and keep the game cheap, free updates, and frequent sales or you could be like Factorio and refuse to ever put your game on sale and up the price every couple of years and come out with a $20 DLC. And I’d be shocked if Stardew Valley has made less money than Factorio in the long run, especially with it being the in number one place right now.
And yet those small studios are one flop away from bankruptcy. Stardew Valley is a one in a million success story and should not pose as a benchmark. Barone decided to continue as a more or less single dev, but you can‘t blame talented young designers to expand their team to realize more ambitious projects and sacrifice economic safety for that simply because they now employ people. Barone can do updates ten years later and postpone Haunted Chocolatier for that, you can‘t do that if multiple people depend on their salary.
I think it’s fair, and sometimes good. I’ve been playing Stationeers recently and it’s fantastic. It’s priced reasonably, and it’s an amazing game. They have a few DLCs, which are purely there to give support, not new content. It’s for you to pay the devs more if you have the money to give them and want to.
However, they’re also losing money on the game and have said they never expect it to be profitable*. Most games aren’t Stardew Valley, and they’re struggling to survive. Stardew doesn’t need to make more money. Most small/indie studios do.
*It’s the studio making Kitten Space Agency, which they’ve said they want to be free, with the option to donate. I think they’re allergic to making profit and only like making cool games. I’d highly recommend checking out their games, if only because they seem to be doing development for the sake of the games.
Idk Stardew Valley is a passion project if I’ve ever seen one. Sure, concernedape is making extraordinary profits, but it has to feel way better to have a decent size of the planet’s population playing and connecting with the project they poured their heart and soul into.
I buy things in early access for just such a reason. If it looks like something I’ll like, I’ll buy it early to support development. If it’s great then great. If it falls through then I’m out a bad investment of like, $10.
I’ve got probably a hundred indie games in my library that I’ve supported in exactly such a fashion, from raw pre-alpha to 1.0 release to post-release content update or dlc. They aren’t all winners. But many of them were worth the cost of investment and then some.
Mate, it’s one man, Self-published, pulling in the proceeds of a game that has sold 41 million copies. Even if he has made $5 per copy, that’s over $200 million dollars. The profit margin on his time even after 10 years is insane.
I didn’t realize it had sold quite that many. I knew he spent a lot of time working on it, like 70 hours per week for 4.5 years, but that still works out to at least an enormous $12,000 an hour! Even if he kept at 70 hours/week for all ten years, it’s still only half that number, far greater than you or I will likely ever see.
Steamcharts showed about 150,000 concurrent players playing the game when I saw a few days ago; I’m shocked at just how popular it is as well. I think he could basically just work on it 70 hours a week for the rest of his life and it would still be a great hourly rate.
My only issue has always been that I cannot throw more money at the ape. So I buy the game for gaming-adjacent friends and almost always ruin their lives convert them
That’s what I do too. I’ve bought it for all my friends or have convinced them to get it. Feels like I’m a drug dealer trying to push it on everyone I know lol.
Couldn’t agree more. I’ve re-purchased the game for Switch and iOS after already having it on my PC for ages. I didn’t really want to play it on those platforms but just wanted to give more money to concerned ape.
The copy of Minecraft I bought back then no longer works (there was a bunch of buggy account change stuff that never worked for me). My copy of stardew valley still just works.
I think Deadlock is pretty up there. That said, it’s closer to Smite than it is a hero shooter. The community-driven character builds mean meta is pretty fluid and it has what I would describe as a very accessible MOBA-centered design. I don’t care for MOBAs much, but to say Valve isn’t innovating here would be disingenuous. I think my only problem with it is that it’s lacking something that makes the gameplay loop feel satisfying, but that may just be my bias against MOBAs talking.
That said, it’s closer to Smite than it is a hero shooter.
I haven’t played Smite since it came out, but has it really changed that much that it’s no longer a hero shooter? 🤨 It was like Overwatch, 2 years before Overwatch came out.
Hm… Maybe that’s what I am thinking of. I know for sure that Smite is the reason Tribes: Ascend was left for dead, though, and that’s reason enough to hate it.
It’s been hilarious watching Overwatch take notes from Paladins, the “Overwatch clone”, more and more lately. 5v5, hero builds, more of a brawly playstyle… OW2 at times feels like a blend between OW1 and Paladins.
Not only they copied the way Paladins works but some heroes too. Kiriko is just Io, even the fox theme is the same. Maui is Raum. Freja looks a lot like Cassie but at least the playstyle is different, the other two have the same playstyle
It might feel wrong to call their last proper sit down at a couch/desk singeplayer experience a “classic”, but its older than Half-Life one was when it came out.
That makes me feel old and I wasn’t even around for HL1. How’s your back feeling, millennials?
We’re at that age where you have to exercise and watch what you eat if you want to be in good health (and not have your back hurt.) The friends I grew up with who haven’t touched a vegetable in their life, no longer happen to look healthy and thin.
I’ve been biking so much lately that my legs are getting hella toned, the rest of my body is starting to tone too and I’m feeling much more alive and healthy than I have at any other point in my life!
This is my second season. I’m biking about 5 hours a week right now, averaging about 40-50 miles per week. I don’t know how obvious the toning would be to others but I can certainly see it, since y’know I’m the one who sees myself the most
One great benefit of the stop killing games initiative is the spotlight being put onto EULA’s. we all knew this is the wild shit EULA’s tried to dictate for years now, but now we have media actually reporting on it. even if SKG goes nowhere, at least we’ve had a revival of this massive consumer issue.
I feel we are gonna need to reach at least that 1.4M with all the companies being against it and actively lobbying. I bet they they are gonna be extremely nitpicky with the signatures to invalidate as many as possible.
If you search “EULA deleting all copies of any materials or software in your possession” you’ll see this shows up in pretty much every EULA for every piece of software, including most games. Phasmophobia, Baldur’s Gate 3, Risk of Rain 2, and Steam itself show up on that list.
Lies. Steam themselves say they’ll make efforts if they can to make games playable, as far as they can influence steam services at that point. They EXPLICITLY say you can keep any game you’ve already downloaded.
You become a subscriber of Steam (“Subscriber”) by completing the registration of a Steam user account.
TERM AND TERMINATION
A. Term
The term of this Agreement (the “Term”) commences on the date you first indicate your acceptance of these terms, and will continue in effect until otherwise terminated in accordance with this Agreement.
B. Termination by You
You may cancel your Account at any time. You may cease use of a Subscription at any time or, if you choose, you may request that Valve terminate your access to a Subscription. However, Subscriptions are not transferable, and even if your access to a Subscription for a particular game or application is terminated, the original activation key will not be able to be registered to any other account, even if the Subscription was obtained in a retail store. Access to Subscriptions ordered as a part of a pack or bundle cannot be terminated individually, termination of access to one game within the bundle will result in termination of access to all games ordered in the pack. Your cancellation of an Account, or your cessation of use of any Subscription or request that access to a Subscription be terminated, will not entitle you to any refund, including of any Subscription fees. Valve reserves the right to collect fees, surcharges or costs incurred prior to the cancellation of your Account or termination of your access to a particular Subscription. In addition, you are responsible for any charges incurred to third-party vendors or content providers before your cancellation.
C. Termination by Valve
Valve may restrict or cancel your Account or any particular Subscription(s) at any time in the event that (a) Valve ceases providing such Subscriptions to similarly situated Subscribers generally, or (b) you breach any terms of this Agreement (including any Subscription Terms or Rules of Use). In the event that your Account or a particular Subscription is restricted or terminated or cancelled by Valve for a violation of this Agreement or improper or illegal activity, no refund, including of any Subscription fees or of any unused funds in your Steam Wallet, will be granted.
Every time Valve has brought it up before, it’s been in interviews where they have mentioned they have contingency plans to make your library available somehow if they ever have to close up shop. Though, originally Steam had a way of creating physical backups in the program itself. If it still does, it’s been moved somewhere in the UI I don’t know about. But you may not need it anyway, because back then games were stored in their own proprietary containers (GFC files). These days, it’s the same structure as any other installation and you can often just copy that to something and not even need cracks for it to run.
I get that they say this in interviews, but that is not what their user agreement says. They can remove games from your library and revoke access to your account. To my knowledge, they’ve never abused this power but it’s still in their agreement. My point is nearly every company has agreements like Ubisoft has. There’s no reason to single out theirs.
What’s attempted to be singled out isn’t the “we can terminate your access at any time.” They are claiming that Ubisoft’s suggests you need to destroy the copies you already have if they stop supporting it.
Though it doesn’t even look like that is actually the case looking at the very clause the article is quoting. It’s the standard “we can revoke your ability to download this thing at any time” shit. Where the fuck does it suggest users have to destroy their copies?
Upon termination all licenses granted to you in this Pact shall immediately terminate and you must immediately and permanently remove the Game from your device and destroy all copies of the Game in your possession.
10.2.3 you must immediately delete or remove the Game from all computer equipment in your possession and immediately destroy or return to us (at our option) all copies of the Game then in your possession, custody or control and, in the case of destruction, certify to us that you have done so.
So why Ubisoft? It’s common in lots of games. Do people want to change EULAs in general or just want to hate on Ubisoft for doing something that’s common?
Ubisoft is generally shit all around so maybe it’s just bias. Or maybe they do have such a clause in something, they just didn’t quote the actual relevant bits in this article.
It’s pretty common to say “hey we can turn this off at any time and you will not be entitled to a refund and won’t be able to access anything via our online services” but this “hey if we decide to shut down the online services, you need to delete everything related to it you have on your device too” is new. And even more consumer hostile.
If Larian goes belly up, they can suck my left nut if they think I am gonna delete BG3 off my hard-drive.
Upon termination for any reason, You must immediately uninstall the Product and destroy all copies of the Product in Your possession.
Even though this clause seems to be in most EULA I’ve never heard of it actually being enforced. I’m guessing it’s to prevent some kind of loophole where you can agree to an EULA, install a game, and then terminate your agreement in order to use the game without needing to follow any rules. If you can terminate the agreement at any time without needing to delete the game, then why not always do that?
You probably could. Buy game, download game, make backup of game, refund game, maybe crack the game you now have backed up, play game basically for free. But it’s just piracy with extra steps. And if you do it enough, they probably will ban your account from even making purchases.
As a Subscriber you may obtain access to certain services, software and content available to Subscribers or purchase certain Hardware (as defined below) on Steam. The Steam client software and any other software, content, and updates you download or access via Steam, including but not limited to Valve or third-party video games and in-game content, software associated with Hardware and any virtual items you trade, sell or purchase in a Steam Subscription Marketplace are referred to in this Agreement as “Content and Services;” the rights to access and/or use any Content and Services accessible through Steam are referred to in this Agreement as “Subscriptions.”
It’s in the quoted text: “Including third-party games”. I’ll bold it.
B. Hardware, Subscriptions; Content and Services
As a Subscriber you may obtain access to certain services, software and content available to Subscribers or purchase certain Hardware (as defined below) on Steam. The Steam client software and any other software, content, and updates you download or access via Steam, including but not limited to Valve or third-party video games and in-game content, software associated with Hardware and any virtual items you trade, sell or purchase in a Steam Subscription Marketplace are referred to in this Agreement as “Content and Services;” the rights to access and/or use any Content and Services accessible through Steam are referred to in this Agreement as “Subscriptions.”
I’m one step ahead of them. I’m not installing them in the first place. The utter gall of them removing The Crew permanently, and then saying ‘But hey, it’s ok, you can buy The Crew 2 instead’. Fuck off .
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