Discord is now imo the best positioned competitor to Steam based on their latest updates.
They're launching a full self-service game publishing platform and only taking 10% revenue, instead of Steam's 30%. Discord already has the gaming focused community and their store has already been doing very well and is super easy to use. If Discord broke into the streaming market there would be no reason to ever leave it for some people. Buy your game, talk to friends and join their games, watch streamed games - all from one client.
Discord does already have some integration into games with the rich presence stuff and some games you can even jump into from a chat. The overlay also works like as if it's chat within a game.
I might argue that Epic is also positioned to take on Steam. Small cut of proceeds, and they have a HUGE audience of kids about to age into the gaming market who have only ever played Fortnite (and don't have the baggage of a huge Steam library.)
I love Discord though, and I generally agree with your analysis.
>they have a HUGE audience of kids about to age into the gaming market who have only ever played Fortnite (and don't have the baggage of a huge Steam library.)
This never occurred to me before. When you put it like that it really does make me think they could be an extremely strong rival to Steam.
Do you have a source for "their store has already been doing very well"?
I buy quite a few games, but can't see a compelling reason to buy anything from Discord. I also don't know anyone else that's bought a game from them yet either.
I also use Steam to buy games but unless Discord lands some super good unique tripleA names, I don't see many people moving away from Steam...even considering that there are other games marketplaces popping up left and right.
They're launching a full self-service game publishing platform and only taking 10% revenue, instead of Steam's 30%. Discord already has the gaming focused community and their store has already been doing very well and is super easy to use. If Discord broke into the streaming market there would be no reason to ever leave it for some people. Buy your game, talk to friends and join their games, watch streamed games - all from one client.
Discord does already have some integration into games with the rich presence stuff and some games you can even jump into from a chat. The overlay also works like as if it's chat within a game.
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