Steam's "indiepocalypse"

[Papahyooie]

Definition of CENSORSHIP

the institution, system, or practice of censoring; the actions or practices of censors; especially : censorial control exercised repressively; the office, power, or term of a Roman censor… See the full definition

www.merriam-webster.com

Dictionary.com | Meanings & Definitions of English Words

The world's leading online dictionary: English definitions, synonyms, word origins, example sentences, word games, and more. A trusted authority for 25+ years!

www.dictionary.com

Sorry, no it doesn't.

Those are derivative definitions. Drill down into the definition of "censor" as a verb, and you get "to suppress or delete as objectionable"

Neither steam nor EGS try to supress or delete anything objectionable. They may simply not sell it. They are not actively trying to get rid of anything. You can't come to my donut shop and demand that I sell you a hot dog, and claim that I'm censoring hot dogs. You don't have a right to have EGS or steam sell you anything. Censorship implies an active aggression; that they are attempting to supress your ability to access content. They are not. They simply aren't selling it to you, and that's their prerogative.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Those are derivative definitions.

Opinion. Those definitions are stated almost verbatim from two of the printed dictionary's I have from the 1980's and 1970's.

Drill down into the definition of "censor" as a verb, and you get "to suppress or delete as objectionable"

That does not denote "coercion". Your point is still incorrect and out of context.

 

[Papahyooie]

Opinion. Those definitions are stated almost verbatim from two of the printed dictionary's I have from the 1980's and 1970's.

That does not denote "coercion". Your point is still incorrect and out of context.

That's not an opinion... Derivative, as in you posted the definition for a derivative word, not the root word. In other words, the definition of censorship: "the institution, system, or practice of censoring " is useless without the definition of "censor" itself, which I provided.

In order suppress, once must coerce. It is inherent.

Definition of SUPPRESS

to put down by authority or force : subdue; to keep from public knowledge: such as; to keep secret… See the full definition

www.merriam-webster.com

"to put down by authority or force "

That's coercion.

Definition of COERCE

to compel to an act or choice; to achieve by force or threat; to restrain or dominate by force… See the full definition

www.merriam-webster.com

"to restrain or dominate by force"

"to achieve by force or threat "

"to compel to an act or choice"


Need I go on? You not understanding the nuance of a word doesn't change that nuance. EGS cannot censor content unless they actively seek to remove it from other venues (presumably through government or other coercion.) I'll use the example again.... They're a donut shop, and if they refuse to sell you a hot dog, that is not censorship of hot dogs. If the donut shop attempted to shut down all sales of hot dogs in the area, that would be censorship.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Need I go on?

Not at all.

 

[R-T-B]

You say that like it's a bad thing.

I kinda detest it myself.

As long as there are filters let the publishers publish. Steam has such filters. This is all the "morality" anyone should ever need. Got kids? Age limit that shit.

While that is true, it is the ethical, moral and in many places lawful obligation to keep adult-like content out of the easy reach of children. Anything less is wildly irresponsible.

So criminalize letting kids on the internet without a filter. Stop forcing filters on others in the meantime.

 

[lexluthermiester]

So criminalize letting kids on the internet without a filter.

Yeah, that'd work. We could always rebuild the World Trade Center out of pudding while we're at it..

ILR, whenever there are products of an "adult" nature, the store selling them have a section of their store dedicated to them which minors are not allowed in. Hate to say it, but the internet needs to be setup the same way, IMHO.

 

[R-T-B]

Yeah, that'd work. We could always rebuild the World Trade Center out of pudding while we're at it..

I'd still prefer it over what I view as a violation of liberty. But we may just have to agree to disagree there. That's ok... more people need to understand that, and I know you do so no worries.

 

[Papahyooie]

Imagine parenting your own kids, and being involved in their lives. That'd never work.

 

[R-T-B]

Imagine parenting your own kids, and being involved in their lives. That'd never work.

It's underrated.

 

[rtwjunkie]

I thought this was a discusssion about the abysmal state of Indies on Steam?

 

[delshay]

Right now my games library consists of:

252 Steam (that will probably go up tomorrow on the Steam Sale)
102 GOG (no DRM and gems from the past )
10 Origin (because I have to)
2 EGS (because they are the only one's to carry Clementine's Story forward and $5 each was pretty cheap)
2 MicroSoft Store (the worst online store by far imo)

The only problem I can see with such a large collection of games is backing it up. I added 3 games in the last two days & I think my SSD has around 1TB of data. I started the back-up about 5 hours ago & it has still not finished as of typing this.

 

[Papahyooie]

I thought this was a discusssion about the abysmal state of Indies on Steam?

It is. The abysmal state of indies on steam is because of curation (not censorship, as some have implied, as that is the wrong term.) Some people want more curation because "think of the children" while still complaining about the effect it has on indies. Most people just want steam to conform to their OWN tastes, and curate accordingly.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

I think the crux of the problem is that it is too easy to make games now thanks to Unity and GameMaker as well as asset stores for them. Steam is right in not wanting to play gatekeeper them all because who is to say which deserves to be on the market and which don't? At the same time, there's only so much money to go around in terms of purchasing games. Steam has vested interest in promoting the AAA games because of fear of losing them off the platform (like Ubisoft is doing taking EGS exclusive contracts) and what little money was going towards indies before now shrunk even smaller in order to incentivize AAA to stay.

It's fundamentally a conflict of interest: indie versus AAA, and Steam choose AAA; thus, the indiepocalypse begun.

Indie has to find a new market which is why Fig is trying Open Access. Thing is, Open Access appears to be as much of a failure for indies as Early Access is judging by Vagrus:

Page Redirection

It may be the crappiest time ever to be an indie developer.

 

[Papahyooie]

I fail to see why indie developers are clinging to Steam and other storefronts in the first place... In this world of unparalleled ability to market virally, in a world where you can reach nearly 2/3 of the planet on Facebook alone, why are indie devs still giving Steam a cut of their money? You're indie devs. Where's that avant garde spirit?

 

[rtwjunkie]

I fail to see why indie developers are clinging to Steam and other storefronts in the first place... In this world of unparalleled ability to market virally, in a world where you can reach nearly 2/3 of the planet on Facebook alone, why are indie devs still giving Steam a cut of their money? You're indie devs. Where's that avant garde spirit?

It’s probably because of the large user base they can reach. In fairness, many are also releasing on GOG, so all their eggs are not on the Steam basket.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

In this world of unparalleled ability to market virally...

99.99999999999999% of content doesn't go viral. Something going viral is the marketing equivalent of winning the lottery. If the expectation of marketing is the campaign going viral, you're planning to fail.

...why are indie devs still giving Steam a cut of their money?

Because it used to be the best way for an indie title to get noticed. Now the old guard is sticking to it because there's no better alternative...and a degree of optimism and naiveté.

Where's that avant garde spirit?

"Spirit" doesn't put food on the table or pay for rent. At the same time, game development is a full time job (often double or triple full time).

It’s probably because of the large user base they can reach. In fairness, many are also releasing on GOG, so all their eggs are not on the Steam basket.

GOG's userbase is many times smaller than Steam's. That's fundamentally why Steam's Early Access is preferred over GOG. On top of that, GOG is very picky. If you're trying to get your first game distributed, GOG likely won't be interested unless you're well known in the game business.

 

[advanced3]

Can I actually filter out all the Hentai games on Steam?

 

[lexluthermiester]

In fairness, many are also releasing on GOG, so all their eggs are not on the Steam basket.

This and I hope more happens in future.

Can I actually filter out all the Hentai games on Steam?

They are filtered out by default, you have to go looking for them, but that doesn't take much.

 

[Papahyooie]

99.99999999999999% of content doesn't go viral. Something going viral is the marketing equivalent of winning the lottery. If the expectation of marketing is the campaign going viral, you're planning to fail.


Because it used to be the best way for an indie title to get noticed. Now the old guard is sticking to it because there's no better alternative...and a degree of optimism and naiveté.


"Spirit" doesn't put food on the table or pay for rent. At the same time, game development is a full time job (often double or triple full time).


GOG's userbase is many times smaller than Steam's. That's fundamentally why Steam's Early Access is preferred over GOG. On top of that, GOG is very picky. If you're trying to get your first game distributed, GOG likely won't be interested unless you're well known in the game business.

Not viral as in spontaneous. There are plenty of ways to force your content in front of millions of eyes in this age. That's my point. Not that they should just share it to some back page of reddit and hope it gets shared on facebook. (And to be clear, I just mean "in this age of viral marketing"... not that that's the only way.) And while spirit may not put food on the table, neither does *not* selling copies on steam. All I'm saying is, being optimistic and naive is at at their own peril.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

There are plenty of ways to force your content in front of millions of eyes in this age.

Where it will be subsequently ignored as an ad.

 

[R-T-B]

I thought this was a discusssion about the abysmal state of Indies on Steam?

Wow, so it is. Course Correct, hard to starboard!

 

[Papahyooie]

Where it will be subsequently ignored as an ad.

If ads didn't work, you wouldn't see them everywhere you look lol.

 

[Assimilator]

The only problem I can see with such a large collection of games is backing it up. I added 3 games in the last two days & I think my SSD has around 1TB of data. I started the back-up about 5 hours ago & it has still not finished as of typing this.

Why would you backup your games? Just re-download them if you lose your drive, as long as the actual saves are okay (and 90% of the time they're synced to Steam's cloud so they are) then no problem.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

If ads didn't work, you wouldn't see them everywhere you look lol.

It takes 1000s of impressions to get a single click.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Why would you backup your games? Just re-download them if you lose your drive

And if the games suddenly disappear from the store he bought them? Backups are a good thing.