it's mostly a joke, but it's rooted in the history of steam:
Act1
scene 1
- Half life was created by gabe newell, who worked at microsoft, when he realized that doom was installed on more machine than windows, so he left microsoft to found valve
scene 2
- when they made half life 2, they use the popularity of the first game to be the first video game developper to move to digital store, there was no half life 2 in the box you bought, you had to connect on internet, download steam and then enter the code in the box to get half life 2
scene 3
- as there was no game on steam only half life, they made half life episodic and another game (sin), but then since they were popular they attracted other people to be in the store, so they stop after episode 2 of half life, they still continue to make game like left 4 dead, team fortress 2, portal, dota 2 etc ... always capitalizing with the business trend discussed at the time but not fully realized (digital distribution, game as a services, episodic, micro transaction, etc ...)
Act 2
scene 1
- epic is an old traditional dev doing stuff the traditional way, with a focus on tech, they coasted and lead many of the tech improvement in the game industry, to the point where they could sell their engine
scene 2
- the world start changing around them and they were not the best dev anymore, but still having great IP, however most success around them was made with the engine they made, they eventually start to focus more on maintaining the engine rather than making game, but then it got challenge by a newcomer that started to eat their market share from the bottom, unity ...
scene 3
- they got bough by tencent a chineese company, they were dabbling for a long time with a project mixing the then trendy minecraft and shooting mechanics on top of popular horde mode, this was called fortnite, it was a moderate success and a micro transaction confusing hell, up until pubg come around and they added a new mode call "battle royale" to that game ... which as blown up to the phenomenal success it is now
Act 3
scene 1
- radiant down is a dev that started as a support company for other big video game dev, they notably ported okami on wii and did the psp god of war game, they got known for the massively visually impressive game of the order 1884, which also kinda flopped, and they pivoted on VR and offered to this platform its first real high profile success with lone echo. Although that's a success among early adopter, vr still need a killer app
- scene 2
Fortnite is a killer app, it was so popular that epic decided to bypass google play on mobile, and got away for it, given that google play is a store so integral to mobile, that's quite a feat! with fortnite they have created an infrastructure capable to handle million of customer, and attract them, so why not opening it to other dev so they can sell their game on it too? I mean complaints have been leveraged by dev about how difficult it is to start now on steam, and big publisher are also leaving steam because it's better to hold all their published game into their own specific store. All have big IP with big pool of dedicated user able to pull people into their own infrastructure, just like half life 2 was able to start steam in a world where digital distribution was inexistant. All are kick started by a killer app...
- scene 3
Valve was very instrumental to the rise of VR, funding part of the platform dev, and having a hardware on their own with the htc vive that support their own steam ecology. Problem is that VR isn't really taking off, no people outside the enthusiast really care about it, nor there is notable IP only offering experience on that platform, and credible competition for the store start appearing with twitch, epic and discord store. Valve has acquired the dev who has made the critically acclaimed walking simulator "fire watch" who expend on narrative storytelling, and also was instrumental in that genre with the stanley parable, all of which are first person ... if only valve a narratively rich popular first person genre to attract people to vr and his ecosystem, something that everyone want? Something like a ... killer app?
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