#14, some people think we're already paying too much for games -- look at the complaints over Doom3 being $55, or (back in the day) Nintendo 64 games being $60. If the point of Steam was to bypass the draconian tactics of publishers (in effect, cutting their funds out of the picture), then where is the savings? Why is Half Life 2 still $50?

Valve's actions have historically always spoken louder than their words. Let's be incredibly generous and say that a developer gets half of the money from a game. If we don't see $50 games drop to $25 over Steam, what does that tell you?

Just like in the music industry, people can complain all they want about publishers and distributors, but sometimes, even if a CD is good and the music artist gets all the money, it's just not worth $14, and sometimes, even if a game is good and the game devs get all the money, it's not worth $50.

What's the benefit of taking out the middlemen, publishers, and store's cuts if we're still paying the same price? Valve's doing just fine with their slice now. You're just shifting the money grabbing tactics of the publisher to the developer. The consumers still don't win.