zlacker

Steam keys sold off steam do not give valve a cut.

>>throwa+(OP)
Valve is definitely getting some kind of money out of the deal.

>>jsjohn+8e
They are not

"Steam keys are meant to be a convenient tool for game developers to sell their game on other stores and at retail. Steam keys are free and can be activated by customers on Steam to grant a license to a product."

https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys

>>throwa+(OP)
I wonder what a user is worth to Steam?

They didn’t have to acquire the user themselves and now they have more eyeballs on their service. How many of these users buy a few things later and make waiving the fee worth it?

Steams not doing this out of the goodness of their hearts.

>>2muchc+of
nobody claimed otherwise, only that its trivial to sidestep the 30% fee, even if you wish to remain distributed by steam.

>>throwa+(OP)
Right, they believe their store value is enough for them to compete with 0%.

>>jsjohn+8e
I'm a developer who uses Steamworks. Keys are free for us to generate and sell at will. Valve reserve the right to say no, but from what I can tell, their only policy is to not take the piss (selling millions of keys), and not to charge more to customers who buy directly from Steam.

>>jsjohn+8e
I didn’t mean to say they are getting a direct cut as sibling commenters indicated, but Valve definitely is getting at least some kind of money indirectly out of them offering this.