Steam put an end to piracy: Giving PC gamers exactly what they want

Steam is a digital distribution platform that PC gamers are entirely grateful for so much that pirated games are slowly being forgotten. If a game is listed on Steam, then you best believe players will flock in to play it, not because they know it will be fun, but because it’s simply a platform that knows what its community needs. 

“The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates.” 

Those are the words of video game company Valve’s co-founder Gabe Newell, which simply means that gamers want a place where they get value for their money. Even though companies need to make profits, it shouldn’t come at the expense of their customers.

So, why are newer titles not getting cracked as fast as IPs released a decade ago? Well, you can’t eliminate piracy completely, but at least provide a service that everyone is happy with.

Taking a player-centric approach

When Newell was interviewed back in 2011, he said that piracy exists because gamers lack good service, and the providers at the time weren’t willing to improve it either. I couldn’t agree more; just take a peek at what is happening in movie streaming platforms.

According to a 2024 survey by tech publication Coolest Gadgets, 80% of people viewing pirated content had subscribed to at least two streaming platforms, like Netflix and Amazon Prime. Do you pay money and still illegally obtain content? The service must be rudimentary, right? 

So, what could be the solution? Valve’s private ownership structure of Steam grants it the autonomy to prioritize gamers over shareholders. Unlike publicly traded companies, Valve isn’t tethered to quarterly profit expectations, and if users are unhappy about a certain product on the distribution platform, it can remove it quite easily. 

The Steam Platform and by extension Steam Sales are the biggest anti piracy measure that has ever existed. pic.twitter.com/bpL3cif6be

— DAKKADAKKA (@DAKKADAKKA1) February 24, 2024

This independence enables Steam to focus on quality curation and fair pricing, avoiding the exorbitant $80 price tag from developers creating mediocre games, as Sony did with Concord.

Why has video game piracy become so hard?

I am not saying that piracy is no longer a thing in PC gaming, it is still very much alive. Kingdom Come: Deliverance II launched on February 4 but already has cracked versions. 

But why were the developers so confident to launch a game without Digital Rights Management (DRM) protection software? Because they knew even though piracy will happen, players are okay with spending $60 dollars because the game is that good.

Steam stats show Kingdom Come: Deliverance II has sold over two million copies since its launch, and over a quarter of that number were actively playing the game throughout February. It was never the price of the game, it was more about who was distributing it.

Bigger is not always better

When I heard Amazon tried to venture into the online PC game store market, I initially didn’t believe they did. Why? Because the Jeff Bezos empire is worth billions, more money than any business could compete with, Valve included. It turns out that they actually did and took the biggest fall while at it.

Ethan Evans, former Vice President of Prime Gaming at Amazon, shared insights into why the tech giant’s efforts fell short in a LinkedIn post back in late February.

Evans detailed Amazon’s three attempts to compete with Steam, each of which did as much as naught point naught. The first was the acquisition of Reflexive Entertainment, a small PC game store that Amazon hoped to scale into a larger competitor. Yet, according to Evans, the effort “went nowhere.”

Amazon then tried using its ownership of Twitch, a social platform that features the “whos” of video game streaming like Asmongold, Ninja, or Nick Bartels, to build a game store, assuming the platform’s massive gaming audience would naturally transition into buying games directly from Amazon. 

Safe to say they were in for a rude awakening as users were not inclined to switch from Steam or other established storefronts just because they watched livestreams on the platform. There is demand, but the supply is more than enough to go around.

The third and most recent attempt came in the form of Luna, Amazon’s cloud gaming service. Luna was meant to provide a streaming-based alternative to traditional game ownership, but it struggled to “attract the gaming community.” The concept failed to resonate with gamers in the way Amazon had hoped.

Make the service good, we’ll pay

Amazon’s only mistake, Evans explained, was underestimating what made Steam successful in the first place. “It was a store, a social network, a library, and a trophy case all in one. And it worked well,” he said. Simply launching a new platform wasn’t enough.

By his own admission, game distributors must learn that just because you are big enough to build something doesn’t mean people will use it. 

$500 plus $70 per game. It all adds up. A PC with Steam has the same games which regularly go on sale for pennies. A good GPU will last a hell of a lot longer than 3 years… 2029 is generous. PS4s are still alive but games aren't being released for the platform anymore are they?…

— M0SD3V (@M0SD3V) March 16, 2025

It’s no wonder tech experts pushed so hard to jailbreak the PS4 console; people are getting tired of paying for services that do not really have what they are looking for. So, instead of paying for PS Plus to access Spiderman 2, a PS4 owner would rather forgo playing online and pirate the game.

The only way to lower any form of piracy is not to force people into system updates and DRMs. It’s as simple as making the service good enough that people won’t mind paying for it at all.