TheRetroArcade
Veteran
Posts: 1,965
Joined: Feb 2026
Joined: Feb 2026
In hindsight, who would have guessed that Valve would win against the likes of Microsoft, EA, or Ubisoft?
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.
Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.
Become a Member in Seconds
Unlock instant access to exclusive member features.
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
Want to add more newsletters?
Every Friday
GamesRadar+
Your weekly update on everything you could ever want to know about the games you already love, games we know you're going to love in the near future, and tales from the communities that surround them.
Every Thursday
GTA 6 O'clock
Our special GTA 6 newsletter, with breaking news, insider info, and rumor analysis from the award-winning GTA 6 O'clock experts.
Every Friday
Knowledge
From the creators of Edge: A weekly videogame industry newsletter with analysis from expert writers, guidance from professionals, and insight into what's on the horizon.
Every Thursday
The Setup
Hardware nerds unite, sign up to our free tech newsletter for a weekly digest of the hottest new tech, the latest gadgets on the test bench, and much more.
Every Wednesday
Switch 2 Spotlight
Sign up to our new Switch 2 newsletter, where we bring you the latest talking points on Nintendo's new console each week, bring you up to date on the news, and recommend what games to play.
Every Saturday
The Watchlist
Subscribe for a weekly digest of the movie and TV news that matters, direct to your inbox. From first-look trailers, interviews, reviews and explainers, we've got you covered.
Once a month
SFX
Get sneak previews, exclusive competitions and details of special events each month!
Join the club
Get full access to premium articles, exclusive features and a growing list of member rewards.
Larry Kuperman made his mark on the industry as part of the team at Nightdive, the games preservation and remaster specialists, but before that, he was on the front line of the digital distribution wars from the early 2000s to 2013. He helped build up the online storefront, Impulse, which was later acquired (and ultimately shuttered) by GameStop.
Valve's unlikely victory against titans like EA and Microsoft has always fascinated me, and I asked Kuperman for his take on Steam's ultimate victory when we spoke at this year's Game Developers Conference.
"The idea was coming up to all of us," said Kuperman. "Let's also remember that Steam really began as a visual way of finding your Counter-Strike server." Steam had a number of early rivals in digital distribution—Kuperman shouted out Paradox's GamersGate (don't say it)—but he thinks Steam was quicker on the draw to sell other companies' games on its own platform.
"The idea of selling games, and then selling third party games, didn't seem intuitive at the time," Kuperman said. "You're a game company, why are you selling other people's games? That was a hard thing to understand. But Gabe really had a great vision, coming out of Microsoft."
Another advantage, according to Kuperman, was Steam's "stickiness" and embrace of social elements. He noted that Steam and Impulse both let you redownload your games without restrictions, something that wasn't always guranteed—I still have a GamesPlanet receipt from 2008 that would only let me redownload Fallout 1 and 2 through the service six times a piece.
But Steam also had friends lists, messaging, playtime stats, and those little popup notifications about what your buddies were playing. "What Steam did better than anybody else was to create a community," Kuperman argued. "They established a stickiness to it, that people came back because it was Steam."
There's one more decision by Valve that Kuperman cited as key to Steam's victory: Its relatively low barrier to entry. There were so many great games in the 2000s, it's easy to forget all the small to mid-sized stu...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.
Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.
Become a Member in Seconds
Unlock instant access to exclusive member features.
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
Want to add more newsletters?
Every Friday
GamesRadar+
Your weekly update on everything you could ever want to know about the games you already love, games we know you're going to love in the near future, and tales from the communities that surround them.
Every Thursday
GTA 6 O'clock
Our special GTA 6 newsletter, with breaking news, insider info, and rumor analysis from the award-winning GTA 6 O'clock experts.
Every Friday
Knowledge
From the creators of Edge: A weekly videogame industry newsletter with analysis from expert writers, guidance from professionals, and insight into what's on the horizon.
Every Thursday
The Setup
Hardware nerds unite, sign up to our free tech newsletter for a weekly digest of the hottest new tech, the latest gadgets on the test bench, and much more.
Every Wednesday
Switch 2 Spotlight
Sign up to our new Switch 2 newsletter, where we bring you the latest talking points on Nintendo's new console each week, bring you up to date on the news, and recommend what games to play.
Every Saturday
The Watchlist
Subscribe for a weekly digest of the movie and TV news that matters, direct to your inbox. From first-look trailers, interviews, reviews and explainers, we've got you covered.
Once a month
SFX
Get sneak previews, exclusive competitions and details of special events each month!
Join the club
Get full access to premium articles, exclusive features and a growing list of member rewards.
Larry Kuperman made his mark on the industry as part of the team at Nightdive, the games preservation and remaster specialists, but before that, he was on the front line of the digital distribution wars from the early 2000s to 2013. He helped build up the online storefront, Impulse, which was later acquired (and ultimately shuttered) by GameStop.
Valve's unlikely victory against titans like EA and Microsoft has always fascinated me, and I asked Kuperman for his take on Steam's ultimate victory when we spoke at this year's Game Developers Conference.
"The idea was coming up to all of us," said Kuperman. "Let's also remember that Steam really began as a visual way of finding your Counter-Strike server." Steam had a number of early rivals in digital distribution—Kuperman shouted out Paradox's GamersGate (don't say it)—but he thinks Steam was quicker on the draw to sell other companies' games on its own platform.
"The idea of selling games, and then selling third party games, didn't seem intuitive at the time," Kuperman said. "You're a game company, why are you selling other people's games? That was a hard thing to understand. But Gabe really had a great vision, coming out of Microsoft."
Another advantage, according to Kuperman, was Steam's "stickiness" and embrace of social elements. He noted that Steam and Impulse both let you redownload your games without restrictions, something that wasn't always guranteed—I still have a GamesPlanet receipt from 2008 that would only let me redownload Fallout 1 and 2 through the service six times a piece.
But Steam also had friends lists, messaging, playtime stats, and those little popup notifications about what your buddies were playing. "What Steam did better than anybody else was to create a community," Kuperman argued. "They established a stickiness to it, that people came back because it was Steam."
There's one more decision by Valve that Kuperman cited as key to Steam's victory: Its relatively low barrier to entry. There were so many great games in the 2000s, it's easy to forget all the small to mid-sized stu...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?