Without steam pc would probably be dead and buried

That and half life 2 I mean heck you pretty much can’t find physical copies of pc games anywhere

I mean physical copies are dying for all consoles and GameStop will probably go out business because of this but pc got hit the hardest and they don’t even carry physical copies of pc games

@davillian is this discussion worthy enough 🤨

Probably.

Na. The PC is too versatile and evolving a platform to die.

Even back when those morons are Gametrailers about 12-14 years back were declaring it was over I knew this.

And guess what? Pc outlived Gametrailers.

No it wouldn't.

It would be hit hard, but even without Steam, PC still has things like League of Legends, Fortnite, and World of WarCraft of which most people do not use Steam for.

That's not even remotely true. PC is the most versatile, resilient medium by a loooooong shot. It'll outlive everything else.

Probably have Goodoldgames and Epicgames if Steam didn't exist.

If not Steam, it would've been some other store.

Steam was absolutely terrible when it launched, but Gabe did something that no other store has done since; he opened up the platform completely to the community and gathered feedback on what they wanted as opposed to "standard" features of a platform.

This is why PC gamers stick with Steam, regardless of whether Epic offers developers higher revenue shares and gives away free games.

They just cant match the feature set and sense of community Steam offers developers and gamers.

If Steam didnt exist, it would've been GOG, Playnite or Itch.io. Something led by gamers

Maybe, maybe not. When it comes to technology, if Steam wasn't around, someone else would have took the mantle.

I like GoG more.

There's a reason physical isn't around like it use to be and it's because of Steam. If we changed the past to where Steam never existed then either physical PC games might still be around to larger degree or maybe the transition to digital occurred another way but still happened all the same.

As long as games are developed on PC's, there's going to be games on PC. As far as Physical copies, PC is always ahead of the curve and Consoles catch up. Just like SSD's where a major selling point like it was something new and PC's have had them for a decade before them. Digital only is inevitable really. They tried last gen, got push back, and they really locked it down this gen with much less resistance.

Lol at buying a physical copy of a PC game in 2025.

PC gaming would still be huge without steam. Heck a lot of the biggest games are not on Steam like League of Legends

Knowing there are many possibilities, how do we know for certain that the PC platform would die IF Steam never existed?

Sure, maybe. Probably more likely another company would have filled that hole, or that physical would have continued.

I think it's fair to say Steam helped the PC resurgence, but there were other factors that got us here too:

XBox had similar architecture to PCs. Console to PC ports got easier, and then even XBox peripherals became PC compatable. PS4 using x86 architecture added more momentum.

Digital distribution opened up markets in smaller countries that consoles mostly ignored. One of these countries might be a drop in the bucket, but 100 of them adds up.

Media is going digital. Sorry, I love my physical game collection, but that's just how it is. Steam wasn't the first distribution platform, it's just the one that caught on. Like, you wouldn't say, "Internet searches would never have happened if it wasn't for Google". Internet search engines were everywhere in the early days. Google just took over by being better and/or having better marketing.

Ah Steam, the "good" monopoly as Hermits call it lol.

Yeah without it Hermit would run to consoles, and then complain about it endlessly 🤣🤣🤣

This totally makes sense because PC gaming was nowhere before Steam.

I for one was certainly not gaming on it since the early 90's, and people before me were certainly not gaming on it since the 70's and 80's.

I am 200% serious as well, and DEFINITELY not being sarcastic.

Look. Look at my face.

😐

See how serious I am?

That's the dumbest shit I've heard today. But it comes from a console gamer, I guess. Those are clueless.

Nah. Someone else would've taken the mantle, like what pedro said. Maybe not in the same timeframe as Steam, but someone would've.

If grandma had a dick, she would be grandpa.

Math checks out

Without electricity PC would be doomed!

You don't say

In today's age, not necessarily lol.

So, you're calling yourself clueless, weird.

Wow, what a zinger.

Really though, unlike console gamers, I game on everything and don't make really dumb threads about subjects I'm clueless about.

That's just a very common theme around here in general. Common sense & thinking before posting goes out the window.

It's cringe as ****.

Steam has a monopoly, so the OP isn't as clueless as you say.

If Steam wouldn't be a thing, there would be another thing. The idea that PC would be dead and buried without it is retarded.

It is really that simple. Coming to think of it, that maybe the problem.😂

I see you edited out that Steam doesn't have a monopoly when they absolutely do, they have 80% of the PC market. So, while it might not have died it wouldn't be as big have Gaben not fooled you lot.

@last_lap: Yeah come to think of it, I think we've covered before that what Steam has is actually called a monopoly.. Can't say I hate it though, Steam is great. Could've been way worse.

Yeah, most hermits think it's a "good" monopoly when Steam takes a larger cut (30%) from devs when other like Epics store take much less (12%) I guess it's good to rip off devs huh.

If they sell many more copies on Steam than EGS, then yes.

EGS sucks, they better take a smaller cut.

PC doesn't need Steam just like it didn't need Microsoft.

When Microsoft decided to ditch PC gamers and Cliffy B called PC gamers a bunch of losers, we didn't just roll over a die.

PC gaming is where it is at because of MS Direct-X. 🙃

DirectX is where it is at because of riding the coattails of OpenGL. Microsoft sat on the OpenGL ARB for a long time, bought core patents from SGI covering technologies in OpenGL, then made patent claims against OpenGL, trying to stifle the competition and possibly make developers hesitant to use an open standard that is considered encumbered so that they could push a proprietary one.

I mean you buy a game on both, click on the games icon to load it to play it and yet egs sucks, but hey why would hermits buy games that help out the devs more when 25% of hermits steal their games anyway.