Steam Surpasses 30 Million Users Mark

[DigiQ8]

Valve has announced that Steam has surpassed 30 million user accounts, growing a whopping 178% in 12 months. The number of simultaneous players online also rose to over 3 million. Meanwhile, more than 6 million unique users access Steam everyday.[br]

In addition to new user growth, Steam sales during the trailing 12 months increased by more than 200%, putting it on track for a sixth straight year of realizing over 100% year-over-year growth in unit sales. And over 200 Steamworks games have been shipped since the suite of services was released two years ago. In addition, the Steam Cloud (introduced in Spring 2008) has surpassed the 100 million files saved milestone.[br]

Steam has been very successful in the last year, and according to Gabe Newell the service is on "track to record the biggest year in its six year history"

The year has marked major development advances to the platform with the introduction of support for Mac titles, the Steam Wallet and in-game item buying support, and more. We believe the growth in accounts, sales, and player numbers is completely tied to this work and we plan to continue to develop the platform to offer more marketing, sales, and design tools for developers and publishers of games and digital entertainment

 

[Insano]

Who's the boss?

 

[Eejit]

That's not fair to their competitors, they should stop providing a better service and selling so many games.

 

[Krynn72]

They should give GFWL some of their customers so they can work together better.

 

[Marler]

Partly due to Steamworks on games like Modern Warfare 2. I've no problem with Steam, just wish Valve would hurry up with Episode 3!

 

[Shakermaker]

more than 6 million unique users access Steam everyday

PC gaming is so not dead.

 

[kupocake]

Dead? My lord no. Comparatively unprofitable? Perhaps I'm not enough of a team player, but I've just looked through my account history and you know, I've never paid more than £9.99 for a game through Steam (Crysis Warhead and Braid). Either Valve are busting open an archaic, arbitrary pricing model or PC gaming is just going to end up as a market for indie games and blockbusters alone.

 

[StarBob]

Dead? My lord no. Comparatively unprofitable? Perhaps I'm not enough of a team player, but I've just looked through my account history and you know, I've never paid more than £9.99 for a game through Steam (Crysis Warhead and Braid). Either Valve are busting open an archaic, arbitrary pricing model or PC gaming is just going to end up as a market for indie games and blockbusters alone.

I think Steam is reinvigorating profitability in PC gaming. Where it was once a matter of overwhelming DRM in pointless attempts to stop pirating, Steam made DRM easy and friendly. Also, Steam has stated before that discount sales ultimately result in higher volume post-sale and more money. Just cause you only pay 10 funky L's for games doesn't mean the everyone else is only buying games when they go on sale. Steam probably hasn't pulled a lot of people off their consoles, or out of the woodwork, but they have certainly made PC gaming an attractive venue for developers from the biggest to the smallest. Also, console gaming is losing loads of profits from resale. So much so that they've taken steps to discourage private resale as in the case with EA making one time use codes to play multiplayer. How far will that go? I don't know, but it's obvious they wouldn't do it if it they weren't losing money. Not to mention the licensing fees that accompany console gaming. So comparatively, I think PC games are profitable. Steam went the way of Wal-Mart. High volume with lower profit margins will win you the hearts of many and ensure future sales and growth i.e. the last six years.

I just hope Valve turns some of that capital into developers to get their games out before I die of impatience.

 

[Otto-Grainer]

I can't understand anything from that post, but this is Good News! Hurry for 30 Million!

 

[Anddos]

steam uses alot of electrcity

 

[Maestro]

It also generates a lot of electricity.

 

[VirusType2]

steam uses alot of electrcity

You aren't thinking. It uses a hell of a lot less energy than retail, including manufacture, shipping around the world, etc. Hell, they have to have all those lights in the store so you can see what you're buying.

You also have to drive to the stores and back!

 

[QUINTIX256]

How many of those new users are simply people who bought Civilization, not expecting or wanting steam (like my dad)?

 

[Paulaner]

Good. Now, where's my celebration sale?

 

[ríomhaire]

30 million users and not a single one can be added to my GFWL friends list. :angry:

 

[MuToiD_MaN]