This repository contains CAD files for the external shell (surface topology) of Steam Controller and the Steam Controller Puck, under a Creative Commons license. This includes an STP model of each, an STL model of each, and an engineering drawing with critical features/keep outs for each.
Feel free to use these to make your own Puck holders, Controller sweaters, or whatever else you want to create!
I really hope that when Gabe feels the need to step down one day, his successor has the same vision and values that he does. My Steam account is the oldest account I have, and at this rate, it's...
I really hope that when Gabe feels the need to step down one day, his successor has the same vision and values that he does. My Steam account is the oldest account I have, and at this rate, it's going to stay that way.
Meanwhile, on the orange website: "But they're destroying videogames with their evil 30% share!" (paraphrased) I'm not defending or disparaging Valve's cut - I don't know nearly enough about the...
Meanwhile, on the orange website: "But they're destroying videogames with their evil 30% share!" (paraphrased)
I'm not defending or disparaging Valve's cut - I don't know nearly enough about the finances of videogame production to have an opinion - but it's so endearingly naive when people seem to be arguing that the vast majority of studios would be better off without what Valve brings to the table...
Even just by existing - even if a studio or publisher doesn't deal with them at all - Valve is preventing a great deal of enshittification or (see the mobile market) races to the bottom.
(Also, to a smaller degree: "How dare they demand less from higher volume games?" I have no words...)
It's a business plan that works for them and works for their customers. Sure, in a perfect world, Valve would take fewer dollars in a moral stance of support for developers or maybe as a...
It's a business plan that works for them and works for their customers. Sure, in a perfect world, Valve would take fewer dollars in a moral stance of support for developers or maybe as a counterweight to suggestions like GTA ought to cost $80 USD by The Bank of America for... Reasons?
I'm not surprised that they don't go full hero. They're one if the few profitable, private games companies doing what they're doing, if not the only one. Keep that tall head down and be the shining star when the sinking AAA oligopoly finally sinks.
I love Valve for all the many genuinely wonderful things they've done for their customerbase. And a fair chunk of nice things they've done for developers too. They are easily one of the best...
I love Valve for all the many genuinely wonderful things they've done for their customerbase. And a fair chunk of nice things they've done for developers too. They are easily one of the best companies in gaming today, by far. All that despite being a monopoly, which makes it extra impressive.
But I love them despite their cut. I obviously don't know the finances myself either, but I do know that Gabe's a billionaire, and I find it extremely unlikely that they need that 30% for almost anything they're doing. If anything at all. Of all that Valve does, the store cut is among their biggest vices, and the only thing I consider worse is their various lootbox schemes. If you ask me, they could take 20% and still be just as wildly successful, if not moreso — the only thing required would be that "success" not be the business definition of "having the most amount of money."
30%, at least in the 2000s, was a significantly smaller cut than brick and mortar stores and dealing with physical inventory, which is why it's also what Apple / patreon / most other online...
30%, at least in the 2000s, was a significantly smaller cut than brick and mortar stores and dealing with physical inventory, which is why it's also what Apple / patreon / most other online retailers take by default.
It could definitely be revisited but "shelf space" on Steam is a legitimate asset, if only because of the download/patching/cloudsave infrastructure they provide, much less everything else in the platform. ( I have a weird love of the useless trading cards ) I feel like more of the complaints come from want-to-be competitors like Epic than developers.
The 30% is worth it, yes. This is because Steam is a huge platform with massive reach and provides lots of useful tooling. But that's a distraction from what I'm actually concerned about. The way...
The 30% is worth it, yes. This is because Steam is a huge platform with massive reach and provides lots of useful tooling. But that's a distraction from what I'm actually concerned about.
The way I see it, there are a lot of small developers who're struggling to survive, and the 30% cut is hindering that. It doesn't matter to me here if the cost/benefit calculations work out writ large — what matters to me is that Valve does not need to charge that high of a cut, even after accounting for what they provide, and by doing so regardless they are being greedy. It's unjustified, and they should stop.
Incidentally, other stores also do not need to charge 30%. I'll grant some leeway to Patreon because they're not as gigantic, but Apple could absolutely afford to lower their cut significantly.
I agree. You know, that extra 10% could also go toward charting a new way forward for games, be it through seed funding novel ideas, incentivizing development in cutting edge, yet under supported...
I agree. You know, that extra 10% could also go toward charting a new way forward for games, be it through seed funding novel ideas, incentivizing development in cutting edge, yet under supported areas (maybe this is just my pet VR love speaking, IDK) or at the best least, building up their own library of novel IP.
Nintendo used to be the innovator, but from what I've seen, they're the rich company that plays it safe on old IP and dependable, but cheap last gen hardware. Valve could certainly fill those shoes -- they have the golden reputation to do it.
All of that said, I think that the answer for "why" they're not striking out like a Paragon is that:
We live in very uncertain times (AI, business model transformation),
The tech oligopoly is powerful and looking to eat smaller companies for lunch at every opportunity and
Despite being rich, I wonder if Valve is "major things" rich. They're not a publically funded company and probably don't have access to the same level of capital as those who do. By taking major risks, they stick their necks out in ways that M$ or others just wouldn't have to.
Or 4., they've grown complacent and want to rest on their laurels while everything burns. Not out of the realm of possibility as it happens to all heroes, it seems.
I'd prefer this to taking the 10% for it's own sake, yeah. But I kinda feel that Valve is able to pursue these things without that 10% – again, Gabe is a billionaire – and so I think we could have...
You know, that extra 10% could also go toward charting a new way forward for games, be it through seed funding novel ideas, incentivizing development in cutting edge, yet under supported areas (maybe this is just my pet VR love speaking, IDK) or at the best least, building up their own library of novel IP.
I'd prefer this to taking the 10% for it's own sake, yeah. But I kinda feel that Valve is able to pursue these things without that 10% – again, Gabe is a billionaire – and so I think we could have both. Even besides though, I lean towards a lower cut regardless, as there's a whole lot of "established company/rich person plays sole deciding factor in what gets funded" going on today and I think we could do with less of that, you know?
As for the why, I find #1 believable as a factor (if not the whole), but I have doubt for #2 and #3. The latter because of the scale they operate at while also being a de facto monopoly (and also, again, Gabe is a billionaire). The former because I don't think Valve would want to sell to begin with, and is in too good of a position to be threatened by attempts at force; Amazon and Google both failed miserably, and Epic put a much better effort forward and is still failing badly. Even Microsoft didn't do a great job challenging them, and is practically giving up at this point.
Personally, I think it's mostly #4. I think the company is insulated enough from the consequences the rest of us are facing that they've become accidentally ignorant regarding the severity, and thus they just don't think of 30% as being a big deal. Or, put another way, they want to think about games and hardware instead of finance, much like we often do. But unlike us, they don't have to think about finance due to their success, so they don't.1 It's understandable, but ends up kinda negligent.
1. As an aside: This tracks with stuff I've seen their employees say before, too. I don't have a link, but I remember a talk they once gave in which they described... I think it was anti-cheat stuff? ...as "treadmill work," which they didn't want to have to do because it was boring or something along those lines. So they tried to find more permanent solutions, which is what the talk was about. Outside the talk though, those solutions don't really work, because they don't really exist. Good anti-cheat in most PvP games is unfortunately an unavoidably endless tug-of-war with cheat developers.
You're probably right on 4. Damn shame, but lazy water brings everybody's lazy boats up or whatever 😔 Easy money makes for entitled yacht owners. I hope they prove us wrong.
You're probably right on 4. Damn shame, but lazy water brings everybody's lazy boats up or whatever 😔
Easy money makes for entitled yacht owners. I hope they prove us wrong.
I wonder if they took a smaller cut whether they'd be beaten out of the market by a more profitable competitor (Epic, etc.) that took a higher cut. Would Valve have the power they did today if...
I wonder if they took a smaller cut whether they'd be beaten out of the market by a more profitable competitor (Epic, etc.) that took a higher cut. Would Valve have the power they did today if they didn't have the money to be able to act in the way they choose?
If they did it going forward? No, I don't think they'd have to be concerned about Epic or anyone else. The network effect they have is extremely strong, and that's not even accounting for Steam's...
If they did it going forward? No, I don't think they'd have to be concerned about Epic or anyone else. The network effect they have is extremely strong, and that's not even accounting for Steam's excellent featureset or Valve's own extraordinary titles being nigh-exclusive to it. The profit they make by way of customer volume is absolutely immense.
Prior? Who could say. Even in the past, Valve's own games were extremely strong contenders that could've buoyed them even if they didn't manage to get the same market share. If you ask me, they might not have been as successful as fast, but they could've easily taken a lead eventually just waiting for competing services to shoot themselves in the foot as they so often do.
I’m well outside of the target market for the controller, and I balked at the price tag regardless… but dammit this should be the industry standard. Huge kudos to Valve for leading by example!
I’m well outside of the target market for the controller, and I balked at the price tag regardless… but dammit this should be the industry standard. Huge kudos to Valve for leading by example!
You'd rather they host on GitHub and have the controller reverted to v1? (I'm extremely oversimplifying and misconstruing the whole snafu from two weeks ago for the sake of the joke)
You'd rather they host on GitHub and have the controller reverted to v1? (I'm extremely oversimplifying and misconstruing the whole snafu from two weeks ago for the sake of the joke)
Genuinely curious,why the Gitlab shade? Can't self-host Github and most other solutions are not nearly as feature-complete. And using your top competition's source control seems an unwise choice.
Genuinely curious,why the Gitlab shade? Can't self-host Github and most other solutions are not nearly as feature-complete.
And using your top competition's source control seems an unwise choice.
I really hope that when Gabe feels the need to step down one day, his successor has the same vision and values that he does. My Steam account is the oldest account I have, and at this rate, it's going to stay that way.
Yeah the best case scenario is that he hand picks his successor based on some long term employee who he believes will carry the torch.
Within the week. Bless vision and values driven businesses.
Meanwhile, on the orange website: "But they're destroying videogames with their evil 30% share!" (paraphrased)
I'm not defending or disparaging Valve's cut - I don't know nearly enough about the finances of videogame production to have an opinion - but it's so endearingly naive when people seem to be arguing that the vast majority of studios would be better off without what Valve brings to the table...
Even just by existing - even if a studio or publisher doesn't deal with them at all - Valve is preventing a great deal of enshittification or (see the mobile market) races to the bottom.
(Also, to a smaller degree: "How dare they demand less from higher volume games?" I have no words...)
It's a business plan that works for them and works for their customers. Sure, in a perfect world, Valve would take fewer dollars in a moral stance of support for developers or maybe as a counterweight to suggestions like GTA ought to cost $80 USD by The Bank of America for... Reasons?
I'm not surprised that they don't go full hero. They're one if the few profitable, private games companies doing what they're doing, if not the only one. Keep that tall head down and be the shining star when the sinking AAA oligopoly finally sinks.
I love Valve for all the many genuinely wonderful things they've done for their customerbase. And a fair chunk of nice things they've done for developers too. They are easily one of the best companies in gaming today, by far. All that despite being a monopoly, which makes it extra impressive.
But I love them despite their cut. I obviously don't know the finances myself either, but I do know that Gabe's a billionaire, and I find it extremely unlikely that they need that 30% for almost anything they're doing. If anything at all. Of all that Valve does, the store cut is among their biggest vices, and the only thing I consider worse is their various lootbox schemes. If you ask me, they could take 20% and still be just as wildly successful, if not moreso — the only thing required would be that "success" not be the business definition of "having the most amount of money."
30%, at least in the 2000s, was a significantly smaller cut than brick and mortar stores and dealing with physical inventory, which is why it's also what Apple / patreon / most other online retailers take by default.
It could definitely be revisited but "shelf space" on Steam is a legitimate asset, if only because of the download/patching/cloudsave infrastructure they provide, much less everything else in the platform. ( I have a weird love of the useless trading cards ) I feel like more of the complaints come from want-to-be competitors like Epic than developers.
The 30% is worth it, yes. This is because Steam is a huge platform with massive reach and provides lots of useful tooling. But that's a distraction from what I'm actually concerned about.
The way I see it, there are a lot of small developers who're struggling to survive, and the 30% cut is hindering that. It doesn't matter to me here if the cost/benefit calculations work out writ large — what matters to me is that Valve does not need to charge that high of a cut, even after accounting for what they provide, and by doing so regardless they are being greedy. It's unjustified, and they should stop.
Incidentally, other stores also do not need to charge 30%. I'll grant some leeway to Patreon because they're not as gigantic, but Apple could absolutely afford to lower their cut significantly.
I agree. You know, that extra 10% could also go toward charting a new way forward for games, be it through seed funding novel ideas, incentivizing development in cutting edge, yet under supported areas (maybe this is just my pet VR love speaking, IDK) or at the best least, building up their own library of novel IP.
Nintendo used to be the innovator, but from what I've seen, they're the rich company that plays it safe on old IP and dependable, but cheap last gen hardware. Valve could certainly fill those shoes -- they have the golden reputation to do it.
All of that said, I think that the answer for "why" they're not striking out like a Paragon is that:
Or 4., they've grown complacent and want to rest on their laurels while everything burns. Not out of the realm of possibility as it happens to all heroes, it seems.
I'd prefer this to taking the 10% for it's own sake, yeah. But I kinda feel that Valve is able to pursue these things without that 10% – again, Gabe is a billionaire – and so I think we could have both. Even besides though, I lean towards a lower cut regardless, as there's a whole lot of "established company/rich person plays sole deciding factor in what gets funded" going on today and I think we could do with less of that, you know?
As for the why, I find #1 believable as a factor (if not the whole), but I have doubt for #2 and #3. The latter because of the scale they operate at while also being a de facto monopoly (and also, again, Gabe is a billionaire). The former because I don't think Valve would want to sell to begin with, and is in too good of a position to be threatened by attempts at force; Amazon and Google both failed miserably, and Epic put a much better effort forward and is still failing badly. Even Microsoft didn't do a great job challenging them, and is practically giving up at this point.
Personally, I think it's mostly #4. I think the company is insulated enough from the consequences the rest of us are facing that they've become accidentally ignorant regarding the severity, and thus they just don't think of 30% as being a big deal. Or, put another way, they want to think about games and hardware instead of finance, much like we often do. But unlike us, they don't have to think about finance due to their success, so they don't.1 It's understandable, but ends up kinda negligent.
1. As an aside: This tracks with stuff I've seen their employees say before, too. I don't have a link, but I remember a talk they once gave in which they described... I think it was anti-cheat stuff? ...as "treadmill work," which they didn't want to have to do because it was boring or something along those lines. So they tried to find more permanent solutions, which is what the talk was about. Outside the talk though, those solutions don't really work, because they don't really exist. Good anti-cheat in most PvP games is unfortunately an unavoidably endless tug-of-war with cheat developers.
You're probably right on 4. Damn shame, but lazy water brings everybody's lazy boats up or whatever 😔
Easy money makes for entitled yacht owners. I hope they prove us wrong.
I wonder if they took a smaller cut whether they'd be beaten out of the market by a more profitable competitor (Epic, etc.) that took a higher cut. Would Valve have the power they did today if they didn't have the money to be able to act in the way they choose?
If they did it going forward? No, I don't think they'd have to be concerned about Epic or anyone else. The network effect they have is extremely strong, and that's not even accounting for Steam's excellent featureset or Valve's own extraordinary titles being nigh-exclusive to it. The profit they make by way of customer volume is absolutely immense.
Prior? Who could say. Even in the past, Valve's own games were extremely strong contenders that could've buoyed them even if they didn't manage to get the same market share. If you ask me, they might not have been as successful as fast, but they could've easily taken a lead eventually just waiting for competing services to shoot themselves in the foot as they so often do.
I’m well outside of the target market for the controller, and I balked at the price tag regardless… but dammit this should be the industry standard. Huge kudos to Valve for leading by example!
Yea but on Gitlab?! Ew. Jokes aside this is a really cool and nice gesture to the community!
You'd rather they host on GitHub and have the controller reverted to v1? (I'm extremely oversimplifying and misconstruing the whole snafu from two weeks ago for the sake of the joke)
Local TFS or nothing!
Genuinely curious,why the Gitlab shade? Can't self-host Github and most other solutions are not nearly as feature-complete.
And using your top competition's source control seems an unwise choice.
Amazing work for a medieval monk investigator.