https://www.gamesindustry.biz/wolfire-and-dark-catts-antitrust-lawsuit-against-valve-granted-class-action-status

After all, this seems like exactly the sort of axe to grind that they would perhaps consider having at. If you know, GOG was still on their original principles.

Now mind, this case seems like hot horse hockey, with the plaintiff making wild claims, but as a chance to strike Valve down a peg? Take a swing while you got it, I say.

Anti trust usually works if there is proof to assume a monopoly with intent or a situation where there is no competition in a field. Well....there is competition.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

So unless there is proof of monopoly. It is dead before it begins.

Wait, Steam is still on a 30% cut? I thought they lowered it like GOG since Epic has done so when it came out. Monopoly-like power/influence so that they can do pretty much whatever without regards for anything else can be enough. Anti-trust doesn't necessarily only apply to situations where an entity is the only player in a field. Is Steam a monopoly? No. Does it have monopoly-like power? One could argue, that yes. Look at the recent notion of breaking Chrome off of Google for example.

Them being able to stay on a 30% cut (a lot more than GOG's or Epic's 12%), ignoring anybody else but still maintaining the massively overpowering part of the market share, and with many games releasing exclusively on Steam and nowhere else because of that, could be grounds for something like this. Will it succeed against Steam's likely army of lawyers? Doubtful.

And now I understand even more why some choose to sign the 1-year Epic exclusive deal.

Im not defending steam. There is a difference between being popular and intentionally screwing other groups over.

Google screwed other groups over.

Once again, there must be proof of intent.

Found the numbers for Steam (scale of 30%-20% depending on sales), but can't find a decisive source for GOG. I doubt however, that it's 30%, seeing as how the Fair Price Package on GOG was killed about a week after Epic came out with its 12%.

As for profitability of Epic, they spend a lot of money on the exclusivity deals and constant freebies, with which they're trying to compete with Steam. Mostly in vain so far, but you can't really compete with Steam normally at this point. They have also stated that they didn't expect to be profitable for at least several years, which they can easily afford due to Fortnite money. The losses of Epic through the store are like a drop in the ocean.

If they took a flat 30% cut before and had to adapt to a sliding scale in reaction to Epic and Steam, that eats into their profits because they pay out more to devs/publishers overall. Which in turn they have to compensate by dropping the FPP.

Doesn't mean they're not starting with 30% still. There is a reason why that's still the starting point for just about every digital distributor.

I'd say EGS profit isn't on selling games, but on selling user data.
Must we not forget that they're owned by Tencent, and, albeit their launcher offer mostly DRM-Free games, people use it for free and multiplayer games a lot.
If the average Epic Games Launcher user is like the average Steam Launcher user, they set it to open when the PC starts (if they ever turn their PC off at all) and it is 24/7 collecting user data all around..