VALVe's Business Cents

[CSN NewsBot]

CNNMoney is running an editorial about the effect of "mods". It barely mentions CS, but it has a good axiom:

Unfortunately it seems that many companies have abandoned the maxim that the customer is always right. Ultimately, on this issue, these firms will find out that they've been dead wrong.

VALVe has treated its customers right. Oh wait I wouldn't want to show bias because the four of you that hated CS 1.4 will attack me and conclude that VALVe actually hates its consumers and is greedy for supporting a product for four years. Oops, emotional breakdown.



This is the Business 2.0 article he references, by the way. It's far more gaming/CS oriented.

[mouth]

...And Valve has treated its customers right how?



It's not the barely existant "support" that's greedy, it's the 3 goddamned re-releases of HL, with each one coming out at full price. And, on the contrary, that's part of the reason that i'd wager that they like their consumers VERY much.

[stooopid]

This article misses the point...



Valve made millions of dollars from selling the boxed version of CS ... but thats nothing compared to how well they could have done. Billions of player minutes per month and not a single cent from all that consumer surplus. Thats a management/economist major's nightmare!



Valve NEVER WANTS THAT TO HAPPEN AGAIN! And to make sure it doesn't they're rolling out Steam. Steam will be setup to spray advertising on you and make you pay through the balls. Get ready to be raped by Valve's profit-margin penis.



-stooop

[rizzuh]

mouth wrote..

...And Valve has treated its customers right how?



It's not the barely existent "support" that's greedy, it's the 3 goddamned re-releases of HL, with each one coming out at full price. And, on the contrary, that's part of the reason that i'd wager that they like their consumers VERY much.

I wrote the part after the quote just for you!



You confused "not agreeing with gameplay decisions" with "I'm going to think that valve doesn't support a product that it most obviously does."



I don't care about re-releases and I don't see why you do seem to focus on them so much. It's plain business sense to squeeze every penny out of a francise that you can. It's not like your HL Plat. edition gets you any more than my copy of HL I got in Jan, '99. How does this apply to continual support? Oh lookie here, none. Things like Voice Comm have yet to be packaged.



What are you even saying? Do you think people buy HL Redux because they hear VALVe supports the product? Then isn't that a good thing, that they're getting more sales because of proven support rather than the type of four-thousand gore zones?



I find it hard to believe you think that. In fact I doubt you even know what you think.



How VALVe makes money by pumping money into an older product beats me. The game is on the shelves. They make money from the game, not the patches. They make money from the re-hashes of the game, not the patches that came out after they were released.



For the record it's quite easy to find HL: GOTY from 1999 for $20 and HL: CS from 2000 for $25-30. These are not full-price titles and receive every single benefit from every single patch made to HL or CS or TFC or DMC or DoD or Ricochet.

stooopid wrote..

Valve NEVER WANTS THAT TO HAPPEN AGAIN! And to make sure it doesn't they're rolling out Steam. Steam will be setup to spray advertising on you and make you pay through the balls.

Except that Steam is free and will run on top of the $40 copy of HL that I bought almost four years ago.



Some of you people are clearly Negative Nancies and deserve to be shot. You deserve the lack-luster support you find with almost every other company.



Enjoy Team Arena.

[blaz1n_azn]

Rizzuh's been taking anger pills again...



Run away small children and rodents.

[stooopid]

rizzuh wrote..

...

Except that Steam is free and will run on top of the $40 copy of HL that I bought almost four years ago.

...

fine for now... but the future of distribution is changing... Valve is getting their act together now so that a CS-like phenomenon can never happen again without in-the-loop revenue.



Believe me now or believe me later.

[disabled]

contrary to what some people think, valve is doing a good job. Without them and the packaging of CS, CS would've died down a long time ago. Some people say the flood of newbies has slowed down the game, but it only adds more blood to the system

[stooopid]

disabled wrote..

contrary to what some people think, valve is doing a good job. Without them and the packaging of CS, CS would've died down a long time ago. Some people say the flood of newbies has slowed down the game, but it only adds more blood to the system

I'd agree with that. Having trash-talked Valve so much, I should also add that for the mostpart they have done what they could to make CS a success. And thats great. I'm just pointing out the unrealized potential that is out there. Sooner or later someone is going to do it and I'd bet Valve wants to be it.



-stooop

[MikeJ]

mouth, stooopid, we're missing one more. Paging GonePostal, GonePostal you are needed in comment page #5279.

[stooopid]

MikeJ wrote..

mouth, stooopid, we're missing one more. Paging GonePostal, GonePostal you are needed in comment page #5279.

haha... at least i'm known for something :)

thanks mike

[Kuros]

And when they can no longer milk HL, they will finally release TF2, with CS2 as a mod. People who play TFC want to play TF2 and I think many people who play CS will migrate to CS2, except for the conservative bastards who don't want any changes. This way, Valve will maximize profit of TF2 by bringing a huge chunk of the HL community directly to TF2. Perhaps they will throw in a sequel to some other successful mod for HL, like DoD, to sweeten the pot.

[stooopid]

Kuros wrote..

And when they can no longer milk HL, they will finally release TF2, with CS2 as a mod. People who play TFC want to play TF2 and I think many people who play CS will migrate to CS2, except for the conservative bastards who don't want any changes. This way, Valve will maximize profit of TF2 by bringing a huge chunk of the HL community directly to TF2. Perhaps they will throw in a sequel to some other successful mod for HL, like DoD, to sweeten the pot.

now your catching the idea...

[-:Nighthawk:-]

LOL, rizzuh lays down the smack.



I have to admit, disabled surprised me there... good job buddy, I was expecting something more negative. Thanks for proving me wrong.



And yes MikeJ, we're definitely missing GonePostal here. And depending on his mood, perhaps Garry, though not to the same extent. Likely he'd just rip on all the people posting in favor of Valve, instead of the company itself.



As far as Valve's business model, I see absolutely no problem with how they're working things out. I know when CS:CZ comes out, I'll buy it. I don't buy many games, but Valve's history is good enough for me to pick that game up without any demo. And yeah, they'll make a load of money off of it, and use part of that to pay the people who continue to support CS. Works for me.



But don't let me stop you... flame on. Tell those bastards at Valve how horrible they are for making money while providing you with the best game ever. Tell them how you expect to be payed to continue playing their game, afterall, everyone owes you everything, and you owe nothing to anyone, right?.



Sheesh...

[JdeFalconr]

God forbid that we, as the consumers, would ever do anything but take. I mean, really, how could anyone ever possibly expect us to show gratitude or at least thank those who have provided us with this game. Now, it couldn't possibly be that some people in the computer game industry produce and support games for any other reason besides profit... I mean that just doesn't make sense, does it?! There's no way in hell that the possibility could exist that someone wants to provide a service or a product out of a desire to do something for someone else, is there? Well, I'll be dammed if I pay my money for someone else's hard work.



Ok enough of the dripping sarcasm. Seriously, I don't think it's a good move on our parts to immediately assume the worst intentions from another party. Now I'm completely open to the possibility that VALVe is just a money-grubbing empire. But come on, we can't just conclude that it's so right off the bat. Show a little gratitude, people, or at least patience, for what anyone, I would think, would identify as hard work done by a company, a fair amount of it undeserved by us and unrequired of them.

[CyberKnite]

mouth wrote..

...And Valve has treated its customers right how?



It's not the barely existant "support" that's greedy, it's the 3 goddamned re-releases of HL, with each one coming out at full price. And, on the contrary, that's part of the reason that i'd wager that they like their consumers VERY much.

Firstly, wouldn't that be Sierra, not Valve since they actually publish the product? Also, here in the UK you can get the Half Life Generations pack (HL, OPFor, Blue Shift and Counter-Strike) for about £15/20 (about $20-30). Seems fair to me; four games for about half the price of a brand new one. (Granted, the oldest is four years old, but its a game still being supported).



IMHO, Valve has basically gone out of its way to keep its consumer base, which is how it should be in a capitalist economy. Unfortunately (for both Valve and gamers) this has meant any other projects have been put on hold while resources are diverted to areas where Valve isn't even making that much profit. In a way, I'd understand a decision to reduce the amount of support for HL/CS if it meant Valve being able to work on/put out new games, like HL2, CS2, TF2 (awful lot of 2s there ).