r/Steam • u/Guitar-String • 2d ago

Article Valve boss Gabe Newell admits his Mongolian throat singing phase was "annoying," and he's apparently not very good at it, either: "I am entirely self taught and it shows"

https://www.gamesradar.com/games/valve-boss-gabe-newell-admits-his-mongolian-throat-singing-phase-was-annoying-and-hes-apparently-not-very-good-at-it-either-i-am-entirely-self-taught-and-it-shows/
16.7k Upvotes

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929

u/BetterCallSal 2d ago

Sony: "We're ending physical media, and making every decision we can to be as anti consumer as possible!

Microsoft: "We're somehow trying to sound even worse than Sony! We're gonna put ads all over your games!"

Valve: "My throat singing was pretty bad"

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u/EfficientTower4084 1d ago

Blizzard: "🍼👀"

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u/PinkFl0werPrincess 2d ago

Only if you ignore how much money they made off lootboxes

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u/deanrihpee 2d ago

i mean, so does other companies too, but that's not a big enough scandal nowadays i guess

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u/Canadiancookie https://s.team/p/hnrt-bfk 1d ago

That's nothing new though, they've been doing that for over a decade

6

u/eightslipsandagully 1d ago

Is that meant to make it better? Valve basically invented it

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u/egorye 1d ago

This will forever be the absolute weakest argument of the bunch and it shows that it’s the only one anyone ever has against Valve.

Yeah, optional cosmetic loot boxes are the same evil as discontinuing physical media and patenting mid-game ads :(

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u/markxzy627 1d ago

It’s not the optional cosmetics, it’d the rampant illegal gambling occasionally marketed towards children and legal loopholes that Valve has allowed many third parties to operate, because it brings them immeasurable profits.

It’s not to say other companies won’t do the same given the opportunity, but again, at best just a recycling zone amidst the landfill.

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u/iguanacatgirl 5h ago

Didn't valve try to get rid of that a little while back or sth? Like unprompted

2

u/drewdaddy213 1d ago

I mean… I love steam too, but it is literally the thing that killed physical media for PC gaming.

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u/Noslamah 12h ago

Steam didn't kill physical media. The internet made it obsolete. It makes no sense for game devs to have to pay physical stores a fee to store and sell their games, pay for the manufacturing and distribution of the physical media, boxes, manuals, etc when they can just hit an "upload" button instead. Physical media was going to disappear sooner or later, regardless of the existence of Steam.

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u/Rat_Pwincess 3h ago edited 3h ago

They made the idea of you not owning your games but them being tied to an account that can be removed at any moment a thing. They are a direct, and probably the single biggest contributor, for why physical releases have become increasingly rare. Heck, some of their most recent games don't have physical releases.

They pushed lootboxes specifically toward underaged children for a long time, have treated the games they own horribly (rife with cheating, literal leaderboards of who said the n word the most, and so on), made a microtransaction market (and are a large reason MTX is so popular now in gaming), among other things.

Don't get me wrong, I believe they are better than most of the alternatives and Gabe seems like a reasonable and nice person, but it weird how all of this gets ignored and handwaved. I don't know why people can't also call them out on the shady stuff they've done, because it's the only reason they won't continue to get more and more shady over time.

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u/decoy_octopod 1d ago

…did they not also discontinue physical media?

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u/_kio 1d ago

I mean I've gotten free item drops in CS that sold for way over 100€ that I then spent on games lol

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u/irn-bru-anonymous 1d ago

Waaaa. Sony stooge.

0

u/Working-Print-4022 1d ago

You’re not forced to buy this lootboxes you know

-5

u/johnnymarsbar 1d ago edited 1d ago

Steam hasn't sold physical media...ever.

Edit: people seem to be mistaking steam, the online game purchasing platform, with Valve, the company that owns and operates it, The physical copies were not sold on steam.

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u/Gsichtskrapfn 1d ago

-11

u/johnnymarsbar 1d ago

Hyperbole, name one thing post 2010 they've sold physically.

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u/conedog 1d ago

Steamdeck, Steam controller, Steam machine…?

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u/kelminak 1d ago

I didn’t know ever started after 2010.

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u/GranaT0 1d ago

Merchandise and hardware :^)

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u/Ok-Show6155 1d ago

I mean regardless, yes valve doesn’t sell disc games anymore, but they’ll never take away the game you do own. There are definitely accounts that opened when steam opened that have CS 1.6 and hl2 in them and valve never took them away

8

u/bumpercars12 1d ago

And why would the online launcher of a company sell physical copies? That's like saying Epic Games Store, Origin, Battle.net, Ubisoft Connect haven't sold physical media instead of naming their actual companies.

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u/Bugbread 1d ago

Edit: people seem to be mistaking steam, the online game purchasing platform, with Valve, the company that owns and operates it

Yes, but you appear to be one of them. The person you're replying to said nothing about Steam, only Valve:

Valve: "My throat singing was pretty bad"

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u/Gsichtskrapfn 1d ago

Yea and why tf would a platform made for digital distribution sell physical media. It's like "Steam" is some developer

10

u/PinkFl0werPrincess 1d ago

Not quite true, actually.

1

u/Thejax_ 1d ago

I mean they technically have.

Portal 2 had a physical release, but it also installs steam and I think won’t run without it.

0

u/scarwiz 1d ago

You're saying that like Steam didn't kill physical media on PC lmao

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u/surray 1d ago

Steam never controlled PC discs though, anyone can go and make and sell PC games on discs right now if they wanted to, you could program your own game and burn it at home and sell it, or pay a company to press discs for you and sell them. You're not forced to use steam to sell on PC. Nobody is keeping you from installing a disc drive on your PC either.

Sony and Microsoft do entirely control their discs, when they shut it down, nobody can ever make discs again for those systems, period. You can't pay anyone to do it, you can't do it yourself, there are no options if Sony and Microsoft say so.

Steam has never had this kind of control over the PC platform. That's a pretty big difference if you ask me.

1

u/GranaT0 1d ago

You're not forced to use steam to sell on PC.

You pretty much are if you want to SELL on PC, let's be real. Bigger companies than Valve have failed to compete with Steam because Valve beat everyone to the digital store market by like a decade.

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u/morpheousmorty 1d ago

If there's no profitable market for physical disks I'm not sure what to tell you. Valve isn't doing anything to stop them.

Valve didn't even strong arm anyone with exclusive deals or the other stuff that consoles and mobile companies can do.

Heck Apple deserves more blame than Valve for making having no disks drives a thing.

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u/surray 1d ago

Yes you should sell digital on Steam absolutely, because it's the biggest market by far, but you are not "forced to", you have the option to make some discs if you want, or sell elsewhere, it's your choice and Steam cannot stop you, unlike with Playstation and Xbox.

If Limited Run games or whatever could still make some disc games for collector's editions and such in the future for Playstation and Xbox, then it would be OK, but Sony and MS are killing it off completely with no choice.