For years, Valve Corporation’s Steam storefront has held a monopoly on PC gaming. However, one of the industry’s biggest players might change that. Ubisoft chose not to list its recent blockbuster The Division 2 on Steam, and according to a company executive, that’s all Steam’s fault.
In a recent interview with the New York Times, Chris Early, Ubisoft’s vice president of partnerships and revenue, spoke very poorly of Steam. He called it “unrealistic,” saying that it does not reflect the current trends and needs for the industry. As a consequence, Ubisoft chose not to sell The Division 2 on Steam, and has instead sold it on competing storefronts like the Epic Games Store and its own Uplay service.
It’s unrealistic, the current business model that they [Steam] have…It doesn’t reflect where the world is today in terms of game distribution.
-Chris Early, Ubisoft Vice President for Partnerships and Revenue
Although the Epic Games Store has proven to be contentious among gamers, it can’t be denied that it often presents a better deal for game creators. Early specifically criticized Steam’s revenue sharing system, in which the platform takes 30% of revenue from every game sold on its platform. This is in stark contrast to the Epic Games Store, which takes only 12%, leaving developers with higher revenue in the end. Uplay is an even better prospect for Ubisoft – since the developer owns the platform, they get 100% of all profits.
This isn’t the only controversial digital-related news to come from Ubisoft lately. Recently, the company suggested that a new Splinter Cell game is in development, but not for traditional consoles.