Reasoning Behind App Removal?
Game client isn't a category on steam so they do actually have a point there. The client would also make steam liable for the content it has, and I'm not sure valve wants all of the shit on Itch.io to be associated with thier gamefront.
So besides the obvious "we're not gonna support your sevice that takes money from ours," there are valid reasons for removal.
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I'm pretty sure there's bunch of categories that also don't really fit. But then, it was "a recent change", so Home Budgets Software already released are safe I guess.
As for "all of the shit on itch io", Valve isn't really that much better, with all those GabeN Simulators :P
So I think it's more of a "nah, we already are forced to promote Uplay, don't need to promote anyone else, find some good excuse before McDonalds puts their app".
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I don't think Valve is much better. I'm not sure of itch.io's content, but I heard it has some adult games which Steam is against. By allowing you to download itch.io's games through it's client through steam, it may seeem like Valve is in support of those games.
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It is itch.io not itch.to
I agree with tree, doesn't belong on Steam.
Also i wish itch.io would not just focus on the clunky metro look.
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I don't see their app having a place on steam. I guess pizza places should make steam apps too.
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I'm down with this. Achievements for ordering so many pizzas, cards based on $$ spent on pizza, buy pizza with wallet funds...
Now that I think about it, why is this not a thing yet?
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I think it was uploaded on April 1st, as somewhat of a joke...
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Also, I'm not sure that valve would make money off this. The client seems to just be downloading owned games, not purchasing them, so you'd still purchase through itch.io website, not through steam.
I may be wrong about that, I can't do much into researching this at school.
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Of course they won't allow that. Putting competition (ok, "competition") app in their shop? LOL
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Weird idea. I mean what's next? Origin on steam? or uplay on steam?
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Really don't see what's of note here, I'd guess the reason they even tried was precisely for the attention from threads like this, trying to create controversy where there's none.
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So... Imagine it. You own some kind of the store... will you fill it with ads and recommandition (like "go shop") to someone's else's store? And who needs another client. I use Steam, Uplay and Origin. i am not gonna tolerate any other.
Go to "Best Buy" and try to open "Walmart" store in there.
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reminds me of last thanksgiving. Right next to Pathmark supermarket was a huge billboard advertising a free turkey at Shopright supermarket. I LOLed tremendously
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I my mind Valve has been reasonable and continues to be reasonable with things like MMOs and their downloaders... But this is really a step too far... So it make sense not to allow it on store.
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It's interesting how you clickbaited up your title. You clearly were a bit familiar before you created this thread yet your title says that Valve blocked a game. Then you clearly indicated they prevented their competitor from putting their own desktop app on Greenlight. These are distinct and important differences, which is why pretty much no one has found fault with Valve.
Also, as Movac says, seems like the date of the campaign to vote for the itch.io app is kind of important.
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Changed "Game" to "App" in title,
It'd come up in a search result on google, I was looking for "₹ steam" at the time and it came up in the "In The News" section. Reason for searching for ₹ was because of This on tremorgames a ₹250 Steam Wallet Code. Equivalent to about $3.75, I'd looked to see what the "trick" was, or where they'd got the few codes from, since its ordinarily $1 = 990 coins (at "sale" rates anyway, they take a higher cut if you buy coins for PP). Would have been getting a "discount" of about 740 coins.
I guess someone may have paid with indian rupees to buy extra coins, and they used that money to buy steam cards, or something.
I've never followed itch.io beyond that, never even visited the site until today, and specifically the app link. April fools or not, seems a bit odd to have seen the article on Kotaku. It comes across more like a random blog for a group of people, rather than a news site, but would have expected them to report actual facts, if it had been an obvious joke, as the itch.io blog seems to suggest.
Where the hell did I come up with "itch.to" from anyway? Guess just sounds better then ".io"
"Itch to game". "Itch io game" ...
Still, it poses an interesting question. What if it had been an actual game? Full of advertisements to itch.io, or "by" itch.io. Plus fact if indeed posted by them, it's a $100 down the drain purely for an april fools joke.
It's the only item on greenlight by the uploader.
The itch.io desktop app on steam
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What if it had been an actual game? Full of advertisements to itch.io, or "by" itch.io.
For the first part it's not. As for the second every game does that, when was the last time you launched a game that didn't say who it was made by? Ubisoft games launch another client after loading the game, but Uplay is not an app on Steam, I'd imagine someone could make a game that forces you to launch Itch.io, but the game needs to be purchasable from Steam.
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Kotaku (Steamed is the section of Kotaku just for Steam) is a well-known blog, part of the Gawker Media family. It's a bit tabloidish (as is all of Gawker Media).
Gawker Media is the one that just lost the lawsuit to Hulk Hogan.
I read Kotaku--I read a lot of Gawker--but I'd barely call what they do journalism. It's very uneven. There are sometimes excellent articles there, and then there's a lot of nonsense. It's kind of like most of the rest of the internet. I mean, there's definitely journalism there, but it's often undermined by lazy hot-takes, clickbait headlines, and the fact that there are just way too many people in the world who have careers or hobbies where they're supposed to be informing people of something but lack the insight, integrity, or writing skill to accomplish it even at a decent objective standard even when the outward appearance of the article is that it's supposed to be an objective viewpoint. If that makes sense.
Journalistic standards for gaming aren't that high in the first place, but the actual story on Kotaku isn't factually inaccurate. But the story is a bit obtuse and the headline is definitely misleading. If "app" is replaced by "storefront" it doesn't make someone who reads the headline think that Valve is just muscling out a rival, but makes it clear the rival is trying to embed their own service into Steam. But this is what you get in the 21st century. You get good clickbait with a headline that implies something that isn't really true.
Doesn't much matter, I guess. I'll still be reading Gawker Media nonsense.
Anyway, the move was a good one by itch.io regardless, though. Gives them a bit of publicity. It's worth $100 to have Kotaku and any other sources that may reference this generate some traffic to itch.io. Which was much more likely their intent than expecting Steam to allow them to get away with digital storefront inception.
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I believe that they knew from the beginning that a game client won't be accepted on Steam and they only did it to "troll" and gain attention towards their platform. Also, itch is as much competition to Steam as that 10x10m store at the corner of your street is competition to Carrefour.
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Itch.io did it as an april's fool joke and it's completely reasonable for Valve to deny a game client to be available through their game client. I don't even see why would anyone want that lol.
Does itch.to take any of the profits, or charge anything for indie developers on their platform?
Itch.io has "open revenue sharing" system where they let developers decide how big of a cut Itch.io gets from each sale. And yes, developers are allowed to set the revenue share to zero, which makes it so Itch.io doesn't get a cut from the sales at all.
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it's valve's decision and they probably have a good reason to remove it. :3
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Itch.to's application doesn't meet the greenlight requirements
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Almost anything can get on greenlight and most of the time get greenlit, not matter what it is. Probably they have to talk with valve first, I don't know if it should be allowed or not.
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Almost any game can get through Greenlight. A "competing" game store is a completely different thing.
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Itch.io allows developers to set the cut they will share with the platform, from 0% upward.
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In other related news, the sky is blue and water is wet.
Of course Valve denied it. Would Walmart allow you to open a Target store inside one of their store?
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Didn't knew itch.io had a client, might be handy, downloading right now.
But a client inside a client is absurd, neither valve or anybody would allow a 3rd party store inside their store.
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Considering that you can buy games which include Steam keys from itch.io... yeah, more trouble than it's worth. Not a bad April Fool's joke though.
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The title of this thread should really be "Idiot falls for April Fool's joke"
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I mean, much as openness is important, you're not obligated to deliver your competitor's products. If I were Valve, I would do basically the same thing. It's bad optics, but really it's not ethically or morally or even practically wrong, it's just an exercise of authority.
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Well, thread has run its course and is now closed. Apparently it was deemed as an april fools joke - if an expensive one. Given the account used to upload the "Itch.io desktop application" only has that on greenlight. More worrisome is the fact the news blog Kotaku posted an article as factual information.
I did learn a few things from this however, notably more about how itch.io operates. Though not where the hell I came up with them using a ".to" domain in initial writings. Whitelisted one guy, and blacklisted another too, but that's another story.
Just came across an interesting article posted yesterday. Couldn't find a thread on search, and thought might be something of interest to some. Essentially, Itch.io put an app on steam greenlight. That App has since been removed for a half arsed reason, taken to be because of "competition".
Said reason was because the application didn't fit into what they considered to be "valid categories of software", even though they go out of their way to state "recent changes" implying those changes could have been made purely as a way for them to be able to give a "real" reason for the removal.
Valve Blocks Competitor From Putting App On Steam
Looking at this as a business perspective, I don't see the problem with this. Valve, from what I've read many times, take a minimum 30% cut from any sales, so it would just be yet another opportunity to gather a bit of income for them, plus the itch.to team would essentially be advertising for steam, directing people to the app, where they might find other sales in the process.
That is, of course, if it was being sold at all. It would appear to have been This Application available on their site, allowing users to access their itch.to games on the desktop, much like steam actually is.
Which would further spark consideration that it was disallowed purely for hosting a competitor's application, likely also because, if I'm not mistaken, Itch.to hosts indie developers games at no cost, versus the $100 price tag to become a "greenlight developer" on Steam, plus cut of the sales?
Does itch.to take any of the profits, or charge anything for indie developers on their platform?
What are your thoughts? Was the removal of the application a genuine one, or had Valve found some excuse to remove it being a competitor platform for game distribution?
Would figure if Valve can make excuses to remove applications like this one that they'd get rid of some of the garbage on Greenlight, and "clearing" past Greenlight... There's plenty of topics already on this sort of subject. Some games, and even entire developers, shouldn't even exist on steam in the first place.
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