Steam Tightens Rules on Game Season Passes

Valve's Steam platform is implementing stricter regulations for season pass sales, requiring detailed content descriptions and specific release windows for downloadable content (DLC), according to SteamDB creator Pavel Djundik.

The company will restrict season pass offerings to established partners with proven track records and may issue refunds if developers miss deadlines or deliver unsatisfactory content. Developers must outline DLC components and commit to three-month launch windows, with one possible delay allowed. "If you aren't ready to clearly communicate about the content included in each DLC AND when each DLC will be ready for launch, you shouldn't offer a Season Pass on Steam," Valve stated.

Free Market & FCC

[Mr_Blank]

These new rules sound useful for customers on Steam. Since Steam is a heavy weight this could impact game sales across the industry. The other game service providers don't even have to explicitly follow suit in order to benefit from this; cross platform games could meet Valve's expectations across platforms as a consequence of doing this for Steam. Will Microsoft, GOG, Epic, Apple, Google Play, Sony, Nintendo, and others follow suit?

The free market works when there is competition. A similar DLC rule from the FCC might not even be as effective of Steam doing it. Sure the FCC might get around to suing some company for breaking the rule, eventually. But Steam can knock a company down, right in the pocket book, as fast as customers complain with merit.

I look forward to seeing how this plays out with customers of Steam, purveyors on Steam, and competitors to Steam.

so cities skylines 2 players will get some refunds

[Joe_Dragon]

so cities skylines 2 players will get some refunds?

Just leave them be...

[eth1]

Any game that thinks it needs a season pass is one to avoid, anyway, as it just means they intentionally released an incomplete game, and were planning ahead to nickel and dime the players to death.

Re:

[mrfaithful]

I take your approach too. If a game has a season pass it's a "wait 2 years till they are done and buy the lot for $10 on sale." But I get the impression Valve were worried they were going to get sued as part of the problem with all the recent chatter about mis-selling of season passes. Like how Namco decided that there would be extra non-season pass DLC released which goes against the spirit of the "pass" where you pre-pay for drip-fed content.

Normally I say buyer beware and hell mend ye for falling into an

Re:

[mjwx]

I take your approach too. If a game has a season pass it's a "wait 2 years till they are done and buy the lot for $10 on sale." But I get the impression Valve were worried they were going to get sued as part of the problem with all the recent chatter about mis-selling of season passes. Like how Namco decided that there would be extra non-season pass DLC released which goes against the spirit of the "pass" where you pre-pay for drip-fed content.

Normally I say buyer beware and hell mend ye for falling into an obvious trap, but if a big player wants to end the practice I'm not going to stop them.

Pretty much this.

Which is why I've fallen off the AAA (or AAAA or Fuck it, we're using all the A's) bandwagon. You get at best, half a game for £70 now, then you're expected to shell out at least that, if not more piecemeal over time. Not to mention too many disappointing releases (I.E. Stanfield). There are games I paid £15 for years ago that have given players tons of new content for free, some have never released a DLC. Astroneer is one that springs to mind, I bought it over 8 years ago an

Re:

[thegarbz]

Any game that thinks it needs a season pass is one to avoid, anyway, as it just means they intentionally released an incomplete game, and were planning ahead to nickel and dime the players to death.

Yes and no. There are bad actors who do what you say and release an unfinished game, but in reality several of the games out there which contain season passes do so in very good ways, some are associated with free to play titles and are using this as some form of income, and others to keep an older game fresh with new and changing content. That doesn't mean the game wasn't complete before.

Based on what you're saying we can say HalfLife wasn't "complete" and should have been "one to avoid" because a later pa

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[Darinbob]

EVERYBODY releases unfinished games. That's because deadlines are king. The longer you delay the fewer sales you make. Fans will turn against you if you delay too much. I'd hate to be in games industry these days, so much of the media has become outright trolls because negativity means more social media views. Therefore there is immense pressure to release before a game is perfect, despite the negativity that results because negativity is even worse if you delay to fix bugs but a few still slip through.

D

Awesome

[nehumanuscrede]

Nothing quite like some surprise DLC dropping out within a few days of launch to motivate me to buy their titles.
( Hell, Call of Duty has become little more than an online kiosk for skins and RGB flavored weapon packs masquerading as a game )

It's -almost-, but not quite, as bad as a developers ( technically sales ) decision to drop out a game that is no where near ready on launch date.
( I'm looking right at you Projekt RED )

Due to the " just release it as is, we'll patch it later " attitude, I no longer eve

Good Guy Steam

[TrancePhreak]

Thank you Gaben. Ubisoft recently pulled a jerk move releasing an update that required DLC where it didn't before. It was some Avatar game AFAIK and I don't play it. I hope this is backlash for stuff like that.

Good

[black3d]

Intentionally ambiguous season pass descriptions are a significant frustration with some titles. For example, some games teasing future season passes which happen to include DLC already released, but not telling you that in the description so that one ends up double-dipping. Or games with multiple useless single-player cosmetic DLCs and a handful of content DLCs, dropping a season pass priced *slightly less* than those combined, but not telling you which of the content DLCs are included, so that you go for

interesting

[NateDonald]

I have only 1-2 games which require that season pass, and overall, I don't play them so often. And I don't think that new rules will change a lot for me. In general, I can say that I play less often than I used to because I just don't have much time for that. Some time ago, I was playing a lot and often, but now it can be once a week or something, and my game preferences have changed, too. I like slots and card games the most. There are so many different sites, but I know a few I like the most, and I don't