Gabe Newell says 'everybody benefits' from competition with Epic
https://tinyurl.com/vc2qb66
Conversations about the Epic Games Store often pivot on one central point of
contention: Is it fostering competition with Steam, or is its practice of
landing exclusive game releases "anti-consumer" because it keeps them from
being released on Steam, the platform of choice (or at least of habit) for
the majority of PC gamers? Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney believes it's the former
—and so does Valve boss Gabe Newell, it turns out.
In an interview with Edge Magazine (via GamesRadar), Newell said that
"everybody benefits" from the competition in the long run, although it can be
rough getting there.
"Competition in game stores is awesome for everybody. It keeps us honest, it
keeps everybody else honest," Newell said. "But it's ugly in the short term.
You're like, 'Argh, they're yelling, they're making us look bad.' But in the
long term, everybody benefits from the discipline and the thoughtfulness it
means you have to have about your business by having people come in and
challenge you."
Interestingly, Newell said that it's not competition that bothers Valve, but
attempts to stamp it out. Newell referenced the Apple store, but the comment
could also be seen as a quiet shot against Epic, which very carefully curates
what it allows on its store. Valve takes a completely opposite approach with
Steam, by allowing nearly unrestricted access to developers.
"We get a lot more freaked out not by competition, but by people trying to
preclude competition. If you ask us which is scarier, it's people falling in
love with Apple's model of controlling everything and having faceless
bureaucrats who get to keep your product from entering the market if they
don't want it to, or designing a store in a way that minimizes software's
value-add to experience and stuff like that."
While Newell didn't say that Epic directly spurred it to make Steam better,
2019 was a very active year for Valve. It launched the new Steam library
after years of work, Steam Remote Play and Remote Play Together, updated its
discovery tools and created Steam Labs to try out even more experimental
stuff, and did more behind-the-scenes for developers.
Competition notwithstanding, Steam continues to roll along as far and away
the big dog in the digital storefront pack: Earlier this week, with people
kept home by the Covid-19 coronavirus outbreak, it set a new record by
surpassing 20 million concurrent users, with 6.2 million of the in game.
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Steam的老闆 Gabe Newell 在接受 Edge Magazine 的訪談時提到了他對Epic的看法，也
能看出他的理念。
我大概只譯一下那幾段，我英文不是很好，盡量......
In an interview with Edge Magazine (via GamesRadar), Newell said that
"everybody benefits" from the competition in the long run, although it can be
rough getting there.
在Edge Magazine的訪談中 (藉由 GamesRadar)，Newell 說長期來看在競爭之中「大家都
會受益」，儘管要達到這程度可能很艱難。
"Competition in game stores is awesome for everybody. It keeps us honest, it
keeps everybody else honest," Newell said. "But it's ugly in the short term.
You're like, 'Argh, they're yelling, they're making us look bad.' But in the
long term, everybody benefits from the discipline and the thoughtfulness it
means you have to have about your business by having people come in and
challenge you."
「遊戲商店之間的競爭對每個人來說都很棒。這讓我們保持誠實，也讓每個人都保持誠實
。」 Newell 這樣說道。「但在短期來看這是醜陋的。你可能會這樣看﹝阿，他們一直大
吼大叫，他們讓我們看起來很壞。﹞但長期來看，每個人都將受益，從你必需讓人們更加
了解和挑戰你的業務時所帶來的紀律和體貼中受益。」
Interestingly, Newell said that it's not competition that bothers Valve, but
attempts to stamp it out. Newell referenced the Apple store, but the comment
could also be seen as a quiet shot against Epic, which very carefully curates
what it allows on its store. Valve takes a completely opposite approach with
Steam, by allowing nearly unrestricted access to developers.
有趣的是，Newell認為對Vavle造成煩擾的不是競爭，而是試著滅絕它。Newell 提及了
蘋果商店，但這些評論其實也意指了他對Epic不喜的部份。那就是鉅細靡遺地整理了商
店中被允許的部份。而Valve在Steam上採取了完全相反的做法，那就是同意開發者們可
以幾乎無限制的接駁。
"We get a lot more freaked out not by competition, but by people trying to
preclude competition. If you ask us which is scarier, it's people falling in
love with Apple's model of controlling everything and having faceless
bureaucrats who get to keep your product from entering the market if they
don't want it to, or designing a store in a way that minimizes software's
value-add to experience and stuff like that."
「我們感到驚訝的不是競爭本身，而是人們試著排除競爭。如果你問我們什麼才是最可怕
的部份，那就是人們完全愛上了蘋果的模式。即為完全控制一切，還有著不露面的官僚把
控著你的產品能不能進入巿場，又或著以最小化軟體的增值部份的方式或經驗上類似的東
西來設計商店。」