What's It Really like Working at Valve?

[@JacobGeller]

Not the most important takeaway, but the graphic design of this video is sooooo lovely

[@LastofAvari]

Anni rocks indeed.

[@Lifeline4603]

PMG has amazing graphic designers. Even I sometimes lose track of the video subject because I'm just stunned at how good the graphics are.

[@grify]

jacobbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb

[@Wayclarke]

Is Valve too libertarian to fire an orbital laser?

[@thegeekclub8810]

It really is gorgeous!

[@boxhead6177]

The reason Valve's Lawyer is reading the emails, is cause they nearly lost their court case in Australia by default cause they didn't read their email saying they were being served... so a judge ordered a press announcement and gave permission to proceed with the trial with Valve being declared absent, Valve learnt of the case from a games media blog that said they were being sued :P Now a lawyer reads all their emails :P

[@boxhead6177]

P.S They still lost, and Steam has a refund policy because of it... but yeah, they have lawyers read their emails now, still don't reply, but they read them :P

[@Megthep3p]

@@boxhead6177 Ah, time to think of a new way to gain ground on Valve's communication (or fair additions to steam)

[@hughjass2024]

sure, but the lawyer didn't just read the email, they checked the linkedin profile of the person who sent it

[@ItsNevet]

@@boxhead6177 You should edit this PS in to the original comment, it's interesting.

[@nathandts3401]

Why not just have software that flags certain words? Seems a lot more reasonable and efficient.

[@raphamaster]

Gabe`s biggest praise will always be keeping Valve a private company and being able of making his vision about a company a reality, for better or worse.

[@N1c0T1n3__]

SO basically, a narcissistic shithole?

[@nicekeyboardalan6972]

Yeah libs dont get that kind of thought.

[@peacemaster8117]

I think his libertarian principles are admirable, you can see it in how Valve is steadfastly committed to not buying platform exclusivity contracts even while Epic abuses that tactic to try and bite into their market share, or how Valve is steadfastly committed to remaining hardware agnostic in VR, even while Meta abuses that tactic to try and bite into their market share. What he's built is incredible, even if I have a lot of criticisms about Valve and how they're run.

[@peacemaster8117]

It's kinda funny how much Gabe doesn't seem to really "get" game development. Look up his demands for real-time moss growth mechanics for one example.

[@jimboslice1237]

@@N1c0T1n3__ let's see what other non-" narcissistic shithole" is doing. Ubisoft? major losses and mediocre gameplay. Take two sitting on NBA, NFL, and FIFA doing minimal. EA was once the most hated company. Activision Blizzard loses the charm and offering bob kotick and diablo immoral

[@toddm1532]

A private company hired the very best employees it could, and chose to remain mostly apolitical, except for giving $10,000 to every employee to donate as they saw fit. Steam is incredibly successful with incredibly talented employees cobbled together in a unique structure. This video is a miss.

[@MegapiemanPHD]

Valve learned a long time ago that, when it came to game development "It's better to say nothing and be wrong then say something and still be wrong." and have gone on to apply that mentality to everything.

[@Palozon]

The problem is that it's hardly true. They've squandered the goodwill they had not by over promising and under delivering, but by doing and saying nothing at all as their games burn.

[@JurisKankalis]

@@Palozon When you listen to whatever the neighbour's dog barks - you'll soon believe anything - and forget what your own beliefs were, if there were any in the first place. Valve is incredibly invested in their games. All three Half-Lives and their derivatives released by Valve, as well as both Portals (lack of sequels?) have been extremely polished. Both in terms of gameplay, existance of glitches or lack thereof, their story, design, "feeling" of the game environment - they are all very loved and cherished. And it shows. They're one of the most cherished and loved games worldwide. And no, as hard as this might be for you to understand - they're not going to release another HalfLife just to create a quick cash-grab - or just because thousand fans are screaming that they "deserve" it. If you had raised a child which you were proud of - would you be willing to rush and make many other children - because, well, this one turned out all right? If you would - you'll never understand Valve's psychology in appearing to be outwardly "stingy" with their continuations of popular games and "brands".

[@aolson1111]

They haven't squandered anything. They are one of the most popular game companies, and most people would rather buy their games on Steam, even though they have plenty of opportunities.

[@dropit7694]

We must remember that in a broad market the single player experience is not as profitable as a multiplayer service with smaller transactions for content. Our nostalgia for polished single player experiences are left to AA developers or indie that have a focused project in mind and are willing to take a risk.

[@Palozon]

@@JurisKankalis this comment wasn't "lol, valve can't count to three." There have been critical technical issues threatening the health of their multiplayer games for years at a time unfixed, and their silence reinforces their perception as a do-nothing company to the communities that have lost patience. Nobody is underrating valve games.

[@AnarchoPurp]

It kinda seems like the incentive structure for employees at Valve could explain why they’ve developed a reputation for not releasing sequels. Why work on those when short-term projects are so highly rewarded?

[@KillahMate]

That is in fact the most popular explanation for why Valve doesn't release traditional sequels. They are instead focusing as much as possible on games-as-a-service, because those can be made and released (and monetized) in much smaller steps.

[@boxhead6177]

They do long term projects but they got to see the risk and reward as something so powerful to add to Steams Value, that Gabe himself will sign off on it... like VR or Steam Deck. Like Half Life Alyx and the Appeture Science VR game only exist to sell more VR. Like a game only exists when its already attached to another high reward project.

[@logangraham3689]

@@boxhead6177 or Aperture Desk Job to Steam Deck

[@KillahMate]

@@logangraham3689 Also worth reiterating that Aperture Desk Job is 20 minutes long, making it pretty damn short-term as far as game projects go.

[@unknownpotato8691]

True. Kinda surprise HL Alyx somehow got made with in that kind of environment.

[@liquidatedrice5274]

What's wrong with a company wanting to remain neutral on an issue outside their industry?

[@TosmatoSoup]

well i would say that as a company as popular as valve is they have a lot of social authority on the culture as a whole and should therefore be encouraged to use it responsably

[@marl0e]

@@Sepko Except a significant amount of the employees there did want the company to be neutral. Maybe do your homework lol

[@Sepko]

@@marl0e Tell us more about this imaginary homework I have to do that debunks what I said, champ

[@decimusanothos5178]

Why does a corporation need to represent the political beliefs of its emoloyees? Corporations serve one single purpose - generate revenue at all costs, bolstered by the bodies of their employees. Not even your workplace is your friend.

[@NuiYabuko]

Black people are outside the games industry?

[@Finnigan28]

Well, steam has the most 3rd world country friendly prices, and that's not even mentioned here. That alone, combined with discounts offered frequently and a LOT of games available, makes it a lot better than any other store

[@KatzenminzeWarVergeben]

Yeah, discounts are cool and all, but they dont help the people working at valve. This video wasn't about Steam being a worse video game store than video game store x or video game store y, it was about the way valve as a company functions and what problems this way of functioning causes.

[@spicy_mint]

IMO giving employees $10k to donate to whatever they want is better than any statement they can make "words are cheap" and all that. Sure someone can keep the cash for themselves but that isn't a reflection on Valve, that's on the employee.

[@wordshurt2676]

Seeing how mansions were bought with blm money....

[@professortbag]

Why does a video game studio need to make a statement about BLM? Why does any company need to? Do shoe companies need to make a statement? What is the point? Watched the rest of the video, I believe this was most of their points 1) no statement about BLM 2) flat structure bad, people need to rate each other :( 3) Valve allowed every employee 10k dollars to donate to whatever they want, some may support things they agree with and not what we agree with :( 4) Diversity is low and they tend to just keep employing white men 5) They take a 30% cut of all profits when other companies don't take as much :( It's a private company and one of the more successful ones out there, if they were really doing badly they would change. Business is just about making money and they are doing fine, what's the problem. I think the 10k to every employee is a great idea. Some can be selfish and keep it but how do you know they don't actively need that money? Others can donate it, it's a win win. You shouldn't dictate where the money goes, they don't even need to donate anything. 30% cut has been the norm for a long time and it's probably due to the fact steam has the highest users and can afford to do so. It's just part of the price of doing business. If it failed them, they would change it. Epic games haven't really made a dent despite taking (12%?). Seem it's not a problem. As for the diversity, diversity shouldn't exist for diversities sake. There's going to be plenty of talented game devs that aren't white men and they will find a job somewhere. Talented people will get hired. This will become Valve's jobs when these people help create a fantastic product that outshines them. They can hire whomever they want and if they suffer, they suffer. We don't need to put pressure on them or any other company to change just because. Honestly the worst thing about this video was finding out Gabe thinks the sopranos is shit. He has such poor taste. Rest of the video is the usual garbage but come on Gabe.

[@Greg_tf2]

Exactly why would a games company care about race or identity they care about making games

[@nathandts3401]

Support black employees. Encourage black customers that you're a place to shop that doesn't agree that American police should use lethal force just because of the person's skin colour. Both pretty valid, wholly business related, reasons. I don't believe companies when they release those statements or slap a rainbow background on their social media pages, but there's clearly a financial reason to trying to ally. Even if you're a company full of middle aged white men

[@dropit7694]

@@nathandts3401 So you want companies to virtue signal. Not only is that misleading people to believe a company is an actual ally and promotes change, when it isn't, it also removes them any social responsibility because hey you can't criticise them, they support x movement. They slapped a rainbow on their logo for a month or made a public statement on how diversity is important, even though the stats show the leadership and top earners is always people from wealthy backgrounds. No company would seriously support defunding the police and lobbying for such changes out of pocket because diverse customers want their products, not their social views.

[@NuiYabuko]

@@Greg_tf2 Because they want to sell their games to the largest amount of people, so also black people, women, LGBT+ community, people with disabilities etc.

[@Greg_tf2]

@@NuiYabuko that's that sad truth of it

[@redpanda4818]

Valve isn't evil for not wanting to get political. Lots of BLM protests took things too far, and it was smart of Valve to stay silent on the matter. A company isn't required to be diverse either, even though it is rude to cherry-pick employees based on things they can't control. In the end, things have been good with Valve, and people shouldn't force their opinions onto a company.

[@gljames24]

I like that you make the distinction that a Flat Style of management doesn't imply a worker cooperative or vice-versa. Ownership structure and management structure are separate things and can be mixed and matched to best fit the market and stakeholders.

[@KoolAidManOG]

In this case it is an implicit leadership structure where the lack of official titles allows for a lack of direct accountability from upper management

[@nathanlevesque7812]

flat style just sounds like a vacuum bound for structures driven by unbound-factionalism

[@totlyepic]

"best fit the market and stakeholders" - In a true cooperative, there are no external stakeholders; it's just the workers. Also, yes management structure and ownership structure are separate, but in a cooperative, everyone has the ability to influence decisions; the management role is given by the consent of those that are managed for the purpose of making things run smoother, not taken as a position of authority.

[@RoyKoopaling]

@@totlyepic What you're saying doesn't make any sense. Of course there's external stakeholders for a cooperative. If there were no external stakeholders, there'd be no customers!

[@testest12344]

@@totlyepic You mean shareholders, not stakeholders.

[@Yasin33]

I was wondering why this video got a decent amount of dislikes, but at 18:00 I knew why...

[@edol33t]

Personally I think that companies shouldn't have any responsibility with regards to societal messaging they don't directly influence. When companies put out any kinda of statement it always comes out as virtue signaling.

[@Woodenbiker133]

I instantly think of Pride month. All the companies making rainbow colored packaging as if they actually care about the issue, which they dont, they just want your money

[@joemomma3648]

You're describing ___ Capitalism, when companies co-opt progressive messaging and movements as a PR exercise. Most commonly Black Capitalism (racial issues), Pink Capitalism (feminism) and Rainbow Capitalism (GSSRM pride). My personal favorite is the Raytheon rainbow profile picture but the completely nondescript Kylie Jenner Pepsi commercial is an all time classic too.

[@RonaldoLuizPedroso]

I love the idea that "We have no boss" and the boss show up in a meeting and lay that law and acts like it is a collective decision.

[@hannarchy6554]

And, since he's so comfortable taking advantage of the rolling desk policy and inviting himself into group meetings, he also accepts his salary being decided by the ranking system which is reviewed by all the people who work with him over the year!! /heavy sarcasm

[@irek1394]

@@hannarchy6554 Im sure as the owner you wouldnt say anything ever... I get it that this company has problems but first look what every other corpo is doing

[@KoolAidManOG]

@@irek1394 Every other corporation doesn't pretend that everyone is equal while having a hidden but very powerful social hierarchy with no direct accountability. At least with other companies you have some idea what you're dealing with, upper management doesn't get to hide from accountability due to the lack of titles, etc

[@dominateeye]

@@irek1394 Nobody here is saying that other corporations are better than Valve. What people are saying is that Valve isn't better than other corporations just because the flaws and the exploitation strategy are different. An actual worker cooperative would be better for workers than both Valve and traditional game industry companies by leaps and bounds.

[@irek1394]

@@dominateeye They are better though. The video just brings up all the bad things. If you want to look up videos about how bad many corpos are and that is not even comparable. The fact that not everyone fits in a certain environment isnt a good thing but who fits in a normal corpo environment? Even less people The fact that there could be better ways to handle things doesnt make Valve bad.

[@angelrosas3724]

"no no no why isn't valve like the other companies" This is a good thing even though I still have problems with them.

[@peacemaster8117]

If Valve doesn't tell me that racism is bad, how am I supposed to know what to think?

[@meepk633]

Wait. What's Gabe's beef with Sopranos? I think that's the most mysterious thing here.

[@Yutappy99]

Hiring based on the idea of diversity requires that you consider a candidate's skin colour. But if you hire someone based on their skin colour then doesn't that make you a racist?

[@internetguy7319]

Not being racist isn't being colorblind, it's not degrading people for their race. MLK never said "treat everyone equally" on a policy level, he actually advocated for helping black people specifically. If you have two drivers in a race, and one of the racers gets a 30 minute headstart, just because now they are going at equal speeds doesn't make the overall world "equal"

[@doctoranimationda5491]

@@internetguy7319 mate and look now what have happened to majority of black population stuck on repetitions that don’t go and improve their lives themselves . The answer is the same as with people who got constant Covid check or people who will 100% get their pensions. No matter what this sort of help doesn’t help you need to just give people the opportunity and treat them the same form base level to the highest. Merit of what valve and all companies should strive for. And valve is right to higher people based on their merits of their characters then on their skin.

[@Spo8]

I don't know if I can really get behind the criticism of their $10k donation stipend. I feel like there are plenty of arguments against a more strings-attached approach, including them spending a long time coming up with a list of acceptable charities, leaving off charities that may be most important to certain employees, and the factor of your employer being aware of and tracking your philanthropic spending. It just feels like a stretch here to bash Valve for treating their employees like grown ups while giving a really hefty sum for charity.

[@peacemaster8117]

For some reason they're just desperate to have the corporation echo their specific political beliefs: supporting the employee's right to support their own causes is somehow not progressive enough.

[@MaskedRiderDouble]

The most damning thing about this video is that Gabe Newell seems to not like The Sopranos.

[@snowballeffect7812]

lmao

[@FigmentForever]

The Shah of Iran agrees

[@tomstonemale]

I don't know man, I personally was bored to tears until I dropped the show by episode 5. Then again, I was expecting something like "Analize This".

[@peacemaster8117]

"The Sopranos" is okay, if you like generic mobster stories, but it's not as good as "Sex With Hitler".

[@davidemelia6296]

Sopranos was and still is garbage. Just a big pile of boring stereotypes and 'the same old actors' wrapped in a onesie. If you like that stuff, it's fine, I guess.

[@dr.w5099]

The claim made in the video that "Valve's attitude towards BLM challenges the idea that Valve is a structureless company" is hilarious. No matter whether you think Valve should make a public statement about BLM or not, it is clearly stated in the video that there is no consensus in Valve about whether the company should say things about BLM. So the silence towards BLM is a direct consequence of the flat structure in Valve, not the opposite as the video suggests. Because there is no consensus, no actions are taken. It would however take strong management motives (which Valve clearly doesn't have) to make a statement about BLM under such circumstances. If you think it's a shame for Valve to not speak up about BLM, then you should also blame its "structureless". Just because the flat structure is something you don't want (or don't dare) to criticize doesn't mean you can just attribute the good things to it and bad things against it. That's not reasonable

[@irek1394]

some people claim they want the workers to have more to say in the company but at the same time complain when those people arent a hive mind

[@shiftymcgee4183]

Yeah the entire section on the BLM and the free speech stuff was pretty biased. This is all old news at this point. They still spun it as a negative even though Valves collective *actions* literally spoke louder than any tweet from another shitty corporation. Despite the best effort of the People Make Games, the premise of the video was always meant as a loaded rhetorical question. Frankly if the most dirt they could dredge up on valve is that they're **not** discriminating on skin color when hiring? Fantastic, one more reason to like Valve. In addition to that, Valve is still significantly MORE diverse than the city it resides in. Bellevue Washington demographics show the population is only like 2% black where as the number of black valve employees is 8%. They're successful and their structure works. Look at the tech industry right now, amazon fired about 20,000 tech people, and google, microsoft, and facebook each fired about about 10K tech people each. This is really just a sneed video about Valve being too rich or too libertarian or too white. Yawn.

[@nathandts3401]

A flat structure doesn't mean there can't be company values, it just means being able to work without management.

[@decimusanothos5178]

Why would you look to a faceless producer of goods and services for political validation?

[@edwardnewtonLA]

@@shiftymcgee4183 Your point about their demographics would make more sense if Valve only hired from the Bellevue area. Since they definitely don't, you have to look at the demographics of where they do source people (presumably, anywhere, if they're truly fair), and in that situation, their demographics are wildly off. If the response is, "well, they're not sourcing from ANYWHERE, they're sourcing from areas they know to look, and people they trust" - - that is where implicit (aka, unintentional) discrimination comes in, and that's how you end up with a company with mostly white dudes, when the rest of the world is mostly "not white dudes."

[@giantenemycrab5596]

When it comes to game development studios valve feels like some ancient civilisation that’s managed to stay uncontacted for thousands of years. So interesting seeing what actually goes on in there!

[@Sujad]

Probably why they're as successful as they are. Diversity and Fentynal Floyd are why the tosser presenting this video should be ignored.

[@nicekeyboardalan6972]

And its good why do people try to ruin stuff

[@Cinnamon1080]

@@nicekeyboardalan6972 Talking about things isn't trying to ruin anything.

[@nicekeyboardalan6972]

@@Cinnamon1080 Why don't they leave them alone there's nothing wrong with this just seething dorks mad at success. I pray Gabe uploads his brain into internet before he dies to stop this stuff.

[@mrCabbages_]

@@nicekeyboardalan6972 They made an entire game on why that's a bad idea

[@Korfio]

Company makes shitloads of money, doesn't want to change the way it works. Shocking. Well not that shocking. In fact, kinda makes sense. You can't argue with results

[@Argusthecat]

Okay, but like, they're defining success by a single metric. Money. Which is sort of a problem - or at least, can lead to problems arising - when the world actually has things in it *other than money*.

[@Hoichael]

​@@Argusthecat yeah, other things like... quality? like creating games that are both by fans and critics widely regarded as some of the absolute best of all time and doing so consistently, time and time again, over the course of multiple decades? like creating a holistic gaming hub and, against all odds (launcher based, forced to use for a lot of modern games, etc... - steam is to this day the ONLY platform of its kind that people actually enjoy using), succeeding in doing so, a platform that an immense amount of players have for more than a decade cherished and adored "as its own thing" and not just as a shallow utility to play games - things... like that? Nothing and no one is beyond criticism but reducing valve to a dull money printing machine is so far off the mark that I'm seriously wondering if your comment is ironic

[@dominateeye]

@@Hoichael Perhaps, but also perhaps things like how employees feel about their workplace and job security; how well they can exercise their legally protected labor rights; how equitable and fair the hiring, review, and firing processes are; whether they even have the ability to actually negotiate their salary as opposed to just having to accept what the boss says; the responsiveness of management to employee concerns about the business, the work environment, and the company's wider world impact; you know, things like people.

[@Hoichael]

@@dominateeye Are we talking about mcdonalds or valve?

[@happy_crustacean7104]

@@Hoichael Why are you arguing with these people who obviously have only bad faith arguments to put out?

[@DanielGriffiths]

Honestly this video was a bit of a miss for me. It could have been a really interesting look into how Valve works internally, and you guys touch on that a bit like with things like the stack ranking system. However I feel I didnt really learn much about how Valve works from this video, it focused too much runtime on the diversity aspect. I will praise the animations though, they were top notch.

[@Rahfzerz]

The first half was neat at least! A few tidbits here and there about how the company operates. I generally agree though, I would have appreciated a video that spent more time looking at the inner-workings of the company and history versus complaining they won't return your emails after bombarding them with the same loaded questions and expecting a different answer

[@Johnny-mp2ew]

But that's not what this video was supposed to be about. He's an investigative journalist, not a propagandist for valves hiring team.

[@KoolAidManOG]

@@AfutureV If anything the negative things in the video are pretty understated. Everything he talked about with regards to how their structure and compensation system leads to a toxic environment that impedes Valve's ability to ship new product has been an open secret in the game industry for a very long time. The results speak for themselves, just look at how terribly supported things like their forums, tech support, and free-to-play games are. I'm actually surprised that a video like this has taken so long to come out.

[@Sujad]

@@Johnny-mp2ew Nobody who genuinely cares about games cares about forced diversity quotas and Fentanyl Floyd. Such garbage has nothing but damage everything that they've tainted.

[@brandonmorel2658]

@@AfutureV Valve has allowed itself to be hit by pieces such as these. Their lack of openness invited unfavorable views.

[@Ansible2]

Great presentation. I'm saying this as a black person who lives in the United States. I don't think it is Valve's responsibility to support political stances and certainty not organizations like BLM. Steam's regulation isn't perfect, but I also think that what you imply is similar to the arguments used to claim gun violence is linked to/caused by games which worries me about the precedents it would set to police these games in a market place as ubiquitous as Steam.

[@thewhitefalcon8539]

FYI BLM isn't an organization (even though someone stole the label and made it the name of their organization)

[@nathandts3401]

There are non-racist reasons as to why certain people don't like BLM, mostly that right wingers are afraid of property damage more than people dying. Most are racist, but the ambiguity should probably let it pass it openness is what Valve want to do. That being the case, general racism, sexism and homophobia are just objectively immoral and should be banned. Harmless characteristics you were given at birth should be protected.

[@AngelicDirt]

Sir, there was a post of a tumblr screenshot I saw not too long ago. In it, someone explained that they had a friend who was deaf and liked Little Mermaid. The show for that movie came out, and when the episode with Ariel's young, deaf, POC friend was introduced, previously mentioned young deaf girl nearly cried in delight of being represented, and in a positive light, no less. ... Correct representation matters. If Disney could squeeze it out of it's constipated ass, so can Valve.

[@peacemaster8117]

@@AngelicDirt So your argument for including skin colour as a factor in Valve's hiring process... is because you saw a tumblr screenshot where someone told a story about a deaf girl crying because she saw The Little Mermaid? You really need to rethink your perspective on these issues mate.

[@peacemaster8117]

"I also think that what you imply is similar to the arguments used to claim gun violence is linked to/caused by games" Excellent observation.

[@95keat]

I think giving your employees the money to donate to causes (perhaps controlled) by the company is a much better way to do it than the normal model. And the part later in the video that critiques it be because "they may give the money to groups I don't like" is a bit silly.

[@AG-ld6rv]

The way diversity is discussed in this video is bizarre to me. One thing Valve does is it doesn't hire people straight out of college like tremendous companies (Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Twitter, etc.). Instead, they only hire people with a ton of experience who have proven themselves already, perhaps with 10 to 20 years experience climbing high at another company. The simple fact is the percent of people who are women or not white working as a software developer 10-20 years ago in America was close to 0%, so yes, when they only hire people with 10-20 years of rockstar performance, they're going to have a vast majority of white men. In another 20 years, I'm sure the ratio will get a little better. It will really depend on how many highly successful women there are with that much experience who want to work at Valve. Even just about 10 years ago at my college, there was about 2 women total over all my courses, and the rest were all white men. It has gotten better more recently, but like I said, Valve doesn't hire recent graduates. It will see improvements in diversity by a lagging factor of 10-20 years due to its high standard of entry. This isn't a problem with Valve. If you think it's a problem at all (women are free to pursue whatever profession or lifestyle they want), the problem is with parents, schools, government, the attidue of a woman's friends, etc. The end result of a company picking from valid candidates is not the problem. This is being conflated with stuff like racism in the 60s where being black actually meant, no matter your qualification, you will not get hired at many places. I'm sure people in power sometimes decide things either consciously or subconsciously based on gender, but you have to demonstrate that has happened. Valve hiring mostly white men out of a group that is comprised almost 100% of white men is not evidence of that.

[@anirudhviswanathan3986]

It could also be that some of the women who DO have that experience level just didn't have a good time in the industry and left it for good (after all, the games industry is known for being absolutely grinding on the soul). There's a HBR article about why even though women make up for a solid portion of college graduates in STEM fields, very few stay long in their industry of choice. And from their anecdotes received from surveys, most of them said it was due to the misogynistic culture entrenched in those specialized fields. Things like getting tasked admin work during their internships even though they were hired to do specialized STEM tasks, which is absolutely asinine, while their male colleagues got tasked the more challenging STEM problems(even if the women were equally qualified).

[@glerg6051]

I find it funny that they allow anything that they decide isn't "illegal or straight up trolling" on steam, meanwhile as a developer I know that they've got a complete list of things that they "won't publish" that they've just completely ignored I guess. It's publicly available in the steamworks documentation, and I guess it's worded as "What you shouldn’t publish on Steam", but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be self enforced if that's what they mean by that. Anyway's here's the list copy and pasted in case anyone's curious: Hate speech, i.e. speech that promotes hatred, violence or discrimination against groups of people based on ethnicity, religion, gender, age, disability or sexual orientation Nude or sexually explicit images of real people Adult content that isn’t appropriately labeled and age-gated Libelous or defamatory statements Content you don’t own or have adequate rights to Content that violates the laws of any jurisdiction in which it will be available Content that is patently offensive or intended to shock or disgust viewers Content that exploits children in any way Applications that modify customer’s computers in unexpected or harmful ways, such as malware or viruses Applications that fraudulently attempts to gather sensitive information, such as Steam credentials or financial data (e.g. credit card information) Video content not directly related to a product that has shipped on Steam. Non-interactive 360 VR Videos Applications built on blockchain technology that issue or allow exchange of cryptocurrencies or NFTs.

[@Par-Crom]

Can I ask about "non-interactive 360 VR videos" ? I don't do VR so I'm guessing what's the matter with videos not being interactive ? Wow I didn't know they stated against shitcoins and NFTs ! (and I think this is a good idea to keep it like this because it's just too easy to scam people with this at the moment).

[@unknownpotato8691]

@@Par-Crom On the VR thing, I'm guessing it's just a way for steam to differentiate between a "game" and "video media", and exclude the latter from steam. Like they likely want to emphasize that steam is a game platform, not a video platform. Although Im not sure why they have the need to do that, since I've never seen an instance of VR videos being sold as games before.

[@scaper8]

It seems that they also will knock out almost anything that has or even implies sexually explicate material if it's in a "anime"-like form. Whole swaths of visual novels don't make approval or have to be seriously edited to get on it. The best anyone can seem to figure is that it's in an attempt to stop simulated child predation; but that means that they're treating all animesque=lolicon, which is it's own bag of worms, or this is someone with clout's personal disliking, and it's getting heavily inforced, which goes right back to these invisible (and thus, impossible to dismantle) power dynamics.

[@ava5030]

@@scaper8 I genuinely think you have no idea what your talking about. A while back I got gifted as a gag a game called "Treasure hunter claire" by Kagura games. Out of curiosity I checked it out. Not only is it anime-esq, it is straight up hentai that has loli characters in it. And judging by the fact that the publisher of this game has over 30 different games that are just hentai, I don't think anything anime related has any issues making it on to the platform for being "too risky". EDIT: I just checked again, they have exactly 105 different games published that are all anime and hentai. Sure does seem anime gets da censorship now does it?

[@scaper8]

@@ava5030 I know of the many stories of may visual novels getting turned down or demanding edits. The theories are not my own, but those of a number of creators.

[@TheLukio]

I kind of like Valve more for not putting out a "Black LIves Matter" statement like many other companies did at the time. It's not like most of them cared about the actual issues, they just put it out to curtail to current opinions and thus perhaps sell more products. In very few cases do I really believe that large corporations actually bother about such things when they make statements, they do whatever makes the most profit. It actually got to a point where it was laughable, like they just suddenly crawled out under a rock and just made a "#BLM!" and then disappeared again on social media etc.

[@DanielGriffiths]

When a company makes a tweet like that it usually comes across as virtue signaling. A tweet wont change anything, companies need to put thier money where thier mouth is, and Valve did exactly that.

[@HonkieWithaBoomstick]

I agree. I also feel like this applies to people's complaints about diversity. Valve hires people based on skillset, rather than race, religion or gender. Why make statements on political issues your company isnt involved in when doing so just makes you look soulless? Its more respectful not to say anything rather than have your merketing tean put together a new flavour of the month virtue signaling campaign for max profit. These 2 reasons are why valve is a much better company than Bethesda, Ubisoft, Epic, Riot, CDPR Is their entire staff actually has marketable skills for the industry. Ever other company is bloated by 80% diversity hires and people who have no idea what they are doing and are fresh out of college. Hence why AAA games are all garbage and poorly optimized now is these companies waste millions paying teams that get NOTHING done and have no talent.

[@nathanlevesque7812]

donations plus statement isn't just a PR move

[@nathanlevesque7812]

@@HonkieWithaBoomstick >literally blames diversity for poor game quality >only mentions companies that fight against equality ok boomer

[@Hubbleshubbles]

@@DanielGriffiths Really agree. I think it's even worse when megacorps like Nike do it. The outrageous hypocrisy of putting out a statement like that while exploiting and slave waging people in East Asia and around the globe in sweatshops and other inhumane working environments is quite unbelievable.

[@DRA5IEL]

Something that always bothers me about people on the side of censorship is that they claim the people against censorship "aren't taking a moral stance" it shows a complete lack or inability to understand the other person. It shows an incredibly narrow view of what morals actually are. One's personal morals are not the only morals in existence and are not automatically the best options. For the people that believe strongly that censorship is an evil act refusing to censor what isn't illegal is a moral stance. You can absolutely disagree with someone elses morals but don't dehumanize them by claiming they don't have any.

[@peacemaster8117]

Right, from their perspective a moral stance is either "Supporting Black Lives Matter (Good)" or "Opposing Black Lives Matter (evil)". The idea that morality could be more complex than that just passes them by.

[@internetguy7319]

@@peacemaster8117 Centrism is also bad. There, fixed it.

[@danielhjelmtorp2445]

Sounds like a fantastic company to work at! Right values that you should be a high performer and not focusing on energy draining stuff like diversity or political stuff, focus on the core to build a good business

[@larryinc64]

I'm not sure I like a lot of the reporting of this video. A lot of this video seems less about "this is what it's like to work at Valve" and more "This is how I personally want Valve to be run." Not that I generally disagree with your stance on a lot of things and a lack of diversity in a group consensus situation puts some people at a clear disadvantage. I just think this video could of been a lot more informational on a company with a unique but not flawless structure. Too much of this video is "here is me briefly explaining how the setup works with actions needing a consensus from people with differing opinions, and now let me spend 25 minutes saying they should only listen to the people I agree with." and I think that leaves a rather empty call to action on what they should do differently. Like overall this video came off as kind of a bait-and-switch to me.

[@vlad_ussr8390]

I agree some parts are meh and not good about valve. But about politics, i agree with valve here. Its a video game company and a video game distributor. It shouldn't matter much for it. What should is profit and adequate work environment and pay.

[@mikeandikes5972]

SANITY

[@AximVidya]

why is it always some far-right literal ghoul spouting this "politics shoudn't matter" BS? oh right it's because you know your politics are utterly 100% indefensible so this is your best shot of sneaking it in, gotcha.

[@Asas_TV]

The reason why Valve is considered so separate from EA, Epic games, Ubisoft, etc is simply because they don't make themselves stand out when it isn't needed. They don't make stances on controversial topics if they don't need to, they don't get in controversy publicly when they can help it, and they definitely don't make their internal problems public unless rogue employees try to. Valve sits there in the back doing its own thing privately and quietly which is how they rarely gets the ire of their users but obviously that doesn't make them immune to any criticism / problems as some of the more egregious things in this documentary has shown.

[@Robospy1]

I agree. I think more companies should be like this.

[@harunocaleon5786]

People Make Games has an obvious bias.

[@nathandts3401]

Disagree. They get away with the indifference because people like Steam. Until Blizzard started releasing flops like the Warcraft 3 remake and announcing mobile Diablo, they had a similar untouchable reputation. The Hong Kong censorship, the workplace sexual harassment, union busting all got largely shrugged off. Overwatch 2 may have been the final nail that opens them up for widespread criticism now though. People are just more willing to criticise companies or people they don't have pre-existing loyalty to. A 15 year old Steam account with 1000-2000 games probably fosters a lot of brand loyalty.

[@Robospy1]

@@nathandts3401 I think it's probably a combination of both. People like what Valve makes and Valve doesn't comment on anything that could drive away customers if they don't need to.

[@AngelicDirt]

@@Robospy1 ... Quietly sopping up money until they do something dangerous with it?

[@walli6388]

NGL, but I got no problems with a company just saying nothing.

[@totallynotabot151]

..and "content creators" get to benefit from it too because they can pad their videos with outrage about nothing being said.

[@nathandts3401]

Saying nothing is fine. Hosting the crap, that nobody else will, makes it look like you agree though.

[@walli6388]

@@nathandts3401 That's a different thing

[@Bizargh]

"One of Gabe's arguments was that these games will make a bigger splash if we say no to them, rather than if we say yes and then nobody buys them." There is enough history of that seemingly happening (As far as I saw it, anyway) to compel me to find agreement with that as I almost feel that more people know about the game 'Hatred' because not only did it get the rare A for Adult by the ESRB (Which is a distribution death-sentence compared to other regional equivalents like the more confidently-used PEGI 18), but it was pulled from Steam Greenlight only to then have it reinstated on the platform with an apology from Gabe Newell. Nowadays, the game is mostly looked back on with a "That was a lot of fuss made over a rather unremarkable game, wasn't it?" when it's not getting jokes made about it by the developers & audience for the 'Postal' franchise (Again, as far as I've seen it), but there are other examples of "Games getting a moment of attention due to, intentional or not, their subject matter causing platform holders to be hesitant to distribute them" in the past, of which I must admit I can't provide immediate examples of besides me saying "Go see what the likes of John 'Totalbiscuit' Bain or 'Jim F------ Sterling, Son' were covering during Steam Greenlight's busier days". But of course, that means that Valve is ultimately leaving those judgement calls upon the Steam customer-base, which can leave one with the question "How well are Steam's tools whether user, community or algorithmic helping customers curate their personal shopping experience if not curate the shopping experience platform-wide?". In my personal case, it's been a very long time since I saw a game on Steam during my daily use that was being "overtly racist", "a clear-cut scam" or "intentionally looking to cause a fuss" besides 'Sex with [WWII Dictator I think KZbin doesn't like you mentioning]' or 'Furry [Aforementioned WWII Dictator]' getting a bit of a fuss mostly via joke reviews (Plenty of sexually explicit games via the 'New & Trending' or 'Popular Upcoming' pages on Steam during quieter periods, but not a lot that I otherwise don't see arrive on GOG or gives me the impression that it crosses lines of legality, regardless of their spectrum of tastefulness and/or mechanical substance), but this could be due to the 31 games I currently have "Ignored" (Much of them are games like FIFA, NBA 2K, WWE 2K, Red Dead Online & Infestation: Survivor Stories 2020, but there are some sexually explicit games on that list that I must've found particularly distasteful or reportedly shallow beyond their explicit nature to add them there) contributing to what I see splashed at the top page beyond what my current Steam Library, Wishlist or other data already is. But I'm only one among 28mil peak users at the time of writing, so I'm barely even a paint-stroke in that whole picture. And that's not accounting for the developer's experience of using the platform, of course (Of which I do actually have one friend with a game on Steam, but nothing too useful to add here). I guess the long & short of it is; It does seem that Valve would rather leave the answers to more complicated questions in the hands of it's customers & tools or not say anything that they can't materially back-up in the present (I'm pretty sure 'Half Life 2: Episode 3' was what made them ultimately do the latter much more consistently if they weren't doing so after Half Life's many delays or Half Life 2's development hurdles). But that's so much more frustrating & unhelpful when you're among the staff working within Valve's offices on their payroll or it's becoming clear that a complicated problem requires a solution that Valve themselves must make the call on what that is.

[@maessof91]

Only the first few will make a splash, if there is a consistent rule system, news articles will quickly fall off. This is done with other media.

[@kuhpunkt]

This video is a prime example. Has anybody ever heard of "Tyrone vs Cops" before this video? Now it's got the attention.

[@Bizargh]

@@maessof91 You do raise a good point. What is also worth mentioning is - as a comment here reminded me of - that Steam actually does have a "What you shouldn’t publish on Steam" as well as a "Accepted types of Content" list publicly available in the Steamworks Documentation under 'Getting Started > Onboarding > Rules & Guidelines', which as far as I recall last made headlines when "13. Applications built on blockchain technology that issue or allow exchange of cryptocurrencies or NFTs." was added in '21 or '22 during the height of the NFT buzz. I don't know if KZbin comments will tolerate a URL for that, but I can copy-paste the contents and hope the aforementioned information can lead you direct to the source via search engine (How well it is enforced by Valve for releases before or after the writing or updating of this document is not something I can chime in on, though): *What you shouldn’t publish on Steam* 1. Hate speech, i.e. speech that promotes hatred, violence or discrimination against groups of people based on ethnicity, religion, gender, age, disability or sexual orientation 2. Nude or sexually explicit images of real people 3. Adult content that isn’t appropriately labeled and age-gated 4. Libelous or defamatory statements 5. Content you don’t own or have adequate rights to 6. Content that violates the laws of any jurisdiction in which it will be available 7. Content that is patently offensive or intended to shock or disgust viewers 8. Content that exploits children in any way 9. Applications that modify customer’s computers in unexpected or harmful ways, such as malware or viruses 10. Applications that fraudulently attempts to gather sensitive information, such as Steam credentials or financial data (e.g. credit card information) 11. Video content not directly related to a product that has shipped on Steam. 12. Non-interactive 360 VR Videos 13. Applications built on blockchain technology that issue or allow exchange of cryptocurrencies or NFTs. *Accepted types of content* We are primarily accepting games for distribution on Steam. Non-game software may be accepted for distribution if it fits into one of the following categories: - Animation & Modeling - Audio/Video Production - Design & Illustration - Photo Editing - Educational & Tutorials - Finance & Accounting - Player Tools - SteamVR Tools (Drivers, Overlays, Utilities)

[@nathandts3401]

Their reasoning is almost certainly that they'd prefer to just take their sale percentage whilst being untouchable by pointing to the policy. Not giving a platform to the game may make people talk about it more, but those people aren't going to leave Steam to go buy that game on the developer's website. Principles matter to me and they should have certain restrictions in place.

[@NuiYabuko]

@@nathandts3401 But as another comment mentioned, it'd probably work for a few then drop off. If you were to buy a few "outrage games" and they'd all be serviceable at best and absolute dumpster fires at worst, you might be less likely to buy more of them.

[@SacredDaturaa]

That Valve's supposedly flat hierarchy leads to a dysfunctional, insular work environment should be no surprise to anyone who's worked at small, family-owned companies with no formal structure. What that actually means in practice is that the hierarchies are hidden and less accountable.

[@adeedadude]

Great video, but the bit about 3% of respondents thinking a 30% cut is justified is a bit duplicitous. The source reveals that 72% of respondents thought a lower cut was justified, not the implied 97%.

[@rbarty]

Thank you for taking the time to highlight this so it doesn't slip by unnoticed.

[@Healermain15]

Did you see where the other 25% came from? Like were those people in favor of 30%, or neutral, or something else?

[@adeedadude]

@@Healermain15 3% responded "more than 30%", 22% responded "don't know/not sure". The 72% is also split among the amounts less than 30%; you can see the details on page 26 of the GDC 2021 state of the game industry report.

[@DaFlavourFace]

It's good that you took note but I don't think PMG implied that 97% thought it wasn't justified. Just that 3% said it WAS justified. Sure the information they provided wasn't complete, but it doesn't change the fact that only 3% actually thought it was justified, right? At least, that's not what I concluded.

[@adeedadude]

@@DaFlavourFace 43:04 It's technically true, but the wording used led me to think the poll asked "do you think a 30% cut is fair?", not, "What do you think is a justifiable amount?" like it actually is. And I think those are pretty different questions, and the actual results make more sense to me now.

[@psykosmach6132]

I feel like you just made a video about difficulties of owning a successful company in the video game industries. At the end you didn't even talk about the Streisand effect or whether those harmful games were successful or not or and whether Gabe was right. I trully believe you should do an investigation about the horrors that happened in Blizzard for the past 10 years, or about how EA, Bethesda treat their employees... You'd be surprised of how good of a company Valve actually is.

[@AdamGaffney96]

I like that you mentioned worker co-ops because it seems to me that Valve is trying to get the benefits of a co-op without giving the workers the benefits of a co-op. If your mission statement is about letting people do what they think is best for the company, but then your incentive scheme rates people individually then they're going to look at it individually and not as the company. They will do the things that lead to them personally getting the best outcome, and will burn out and leave if they aren't the type of person to do that. If you had a true structureless worker co-op where profits are disseminated throughout the work-force, then people would be more willing to do the things that benefit the company as that directly comes back to them. However currently it seems like the things that benefit the company and the things that benefit the individual are opposites.

[@peacemaster8117]

"If you had a true structureless worker co-op where profits are disseminated throughout the work-force, then people would be more willing to do the things that benefit the company as that directly comes back to them" It already comes back to them in the form of bonuses. The structure appears to be there to actually fix some of the inherent flaws that come with worker coops. There's a reason there's no worker coops who've made any sort of impact on the games industry.

[@jemolk8945]

@@peacemaster8117 Pfeh. The inherent flaws with worker co-ops? You mean like the flaw where banks aren't as inclined to lend to you, regardless of other considerations? That kind of inherent flaw? Because the only other one I can think of is that they're still businesses.

[@poacherj]

​@@peacemaster8117 "There's a reason there's no worker coops who've made any sort of impact on the games industry." Completely wrong, the world doesn't work that way. Things like worker coops exist in the same space as the 40-hour work week and minimum wage. They don't just "happen" because they're effective or ineffective, these kinds of things are fought for by workers against capitalists. Capitalists hate these things because it affects their bottom line. The reason worker coops barely exist (especially in the US) is because of laws and regulations that favour pro-capitalist structures like private companies and are against pro-worker structures like worker-coops, and until a large base of working people get politcally organised and fight for better conditions like they did before the 80s that won't change.

[@FreekHoekstra]

We can criticize “the fit” but if you do operate in a largely self-motivated structureless operation, (for example volunteering) You will realize that certain people need to be told want to do, they won’t decide to go do some thing they’re always looking for someone to tell them. Those don’t work in a company like that, and that’s really what this is targeting. If you want to run an organization, any organization, you need to identify employees that will work with your way of working. The army wants people who will except orders even if they lead to death. Valve wants the opposite they want people to think for themselves and make intelligent decisions without being told what to do. Most companies are somewhere in the middle. And honestly I think it’s OK that not everyone is able to work at valve or in the army, or any other business. I wouldn’t want to be in the Army, I wouldn’t listen and I certainly am not going to run into military gunfire, And by not doing that I would endanger many more other people, I think it’s acceptable to see the way we work requires a certain type of employees and so we hire for that. I presume that at people make games you have standards you hire for, and those standards by definition excludes some portion of the population. But someone who doesn’t have an investigative mind probably isn’t a good fit in your company. And thats ok.

[@FreekHoekstra]

That said that tyrone game, hooolyyyy shiit, thats not ok… I can understand not wanting to take a political stance, What do you comment on what do you not it’s a never ending task and you’ll be hated every step along the way. But if you take the step to ban any games that game has to be banned. Either be like Google and literally just carry everything, racist or otherwise. But if you choose somethings are too spicy for you that clearly crosses the line. Disgusting

[@abexuro]

This. I find the percentage of world population comparison a bit short sighted and sensationalist as well. They didn't even use the working age population either, and what percentage of the world works in game development in the first place?

[@Veilure]

As many other comments have pointed out, taking interviews from mostly former employees may have skewed your view a little, although I know you just worked with what you had.

[@nathandts3401]

True, but any time on a employer review site will show you that spurned employees are pretty obvious to spot. Most of these quotes seem largely considered and have positives to say before getting to the negatives.

[@poisonshroom64]

I think the central issue here is that valve is structurally averse to taking action in any direction. This is partially because any employee who tries to get the ball rolling will be held responsible for how it goes, regardless of whether its their fault or not.

[@thewhitefalcon8539]

All large organizations are like this

[@irek1394]

Im sure its harder with a strict boss over you that wont even talk to you about something he doesnt like

[@notactuallyarealperson2267]

@@thewhitefalcon8539 that’s not true. Where I work (a large software company) there’s a whole multi person, multi-week process to propose a project, get it reviewed, approved, and scheduled. If the project fails, the blame is placed on the “pod” of managers that approved, scheduled, and managed it to failure

[@thewhitefalcon8539]

​@@notactuallyarealperson2267 What you're describing *IS* structural aversion to taking action. If taking action requires a multi-week process, a lot less actions get taken.

[@totlyepic]

Yep, but there's no neutral on a moving train.

[@mikestahhh]

I don't understand criticizing Valve for not being openly pro BLM. Why does every public company have to be outwardly progressive? The Valve employees that were against a public statement make a really strong point about where to draw the line. Besides, I'd argue that the majority of companies that look progressive are simply virtue signaling and just doing it for good press. Does Nestle really care about BLM when they go and enslave children to make chocolate? Valve paying employees to donate as they saw fit is miles better than most companies, and it makes complete sense given their company philosophy, although I agree that the money should've been required to have been donated. The idea of a closeted racist pocketing 10k off the murder of a black man is gross.

[@unknownpotato8691]

It's the political climate in America. You can no longer be apolitical or moderate. Either you go all left or all right, anything in between is lambasted by both sides.

[@flashfire4]

@@unknownpotato8691 I haven't seen any people on the right criticize companies like Valve that try to stay out of politics and let their employees make political choices on their own. There are probably some people, but people on the American left are definitely more in favor of activist companies than people on the American right.

[@GardinerAlan]

@@flashfire4 The people on the right like the status quo and generally seem prefer the even more racist and awful status quo from 100 years ago, when people had far fewer rights. In pretty much all areas they prefer 'don't ask, don't tell' as it means nothing gets challenged so everything can stay the same/go backwards. Plus, 'go woke, go broke' and similar seems to be constantly trending on twitter whenever bc people on the right hate companies that do speak out and then they try to organise boycotts, burn their Nikes, etc. Or worse, look at desanctis with Disney in Florida. They also seem to love Trump's crazy pillow guy. Activism exists on all sides.

[@Eibon]

I think the larger point is that it is a data point that indicates a trend. When you look at not wanting to speak on BLM, and you look at what they allow on the store, and you look at how they handle diversity, and you look at how they handle moderation of their built-in communities, and you look at how they prioritize and value work, it paints a specific picture. Valve has chosen over and over to not take a meaningful stand against even egregious racism *on their platform* (among other problems, to be clear!), and inaction is not a neutral stance these days. It's questionable if it ever was. The BLM example is just a high-level touchpoint for this larger topic of how Valve allows or disallows certain ideas to spread on through their platforms. Valve absolutely has done some great things. I don't think the point of the video is to say "Valve is the bad man". But I think it is saying we should be concerned when such a massive player in the industry is unwilling to do much regarding even the simplest moral quandaries. I don't *need* Valve to comment on BLM, but we do kinda need them to do something about the disgusting behavior they allow to propagate on their platform.

[@MrGloriousBastard]

@@Eibon which disgusting behavior?

[@ReverendPuffin]

The straight up trolling comment sounds like it may have been pointed at the steam greenlight submission game "Missing Information" which was a game based on the Half-Life 2 Beta leak content with stolen assets from valve by the dev team called "Gabe's Love Tub". The game was approved by Steam Users but valve did an extremely rare move and intervened to block it going on Steam without stating why. The publication regarding "straight up trolling" was realised shortly after that incident. It is believed that Gabe Newell intervened directly in that case as the HL2 leak was still a sore subject.

[@gordonfreeman8109]

Definitely shows a lot of the flaws within Valve's structure, but them not virtue signalling for stuff like BLM is hardly a cardinal sin or mortal crime. Especially considering stuff like business lip service only depreciates such things, as Malcom X warned about.

[@KoolAidManOG]

The issue wasn't even BLM, it was the fact that it was one of the few times Gabe, someone who is according to the Handbook "not your boss", overrode the wishes of the staff. "Everyone is the boss" is a recruitment tool that Valve uses. In practice there is a very powerful hierarchy that is further directed by stack ranking. Even if one doesn't care about the company making a statement for social causes, as a consumer this still has effects on things like "why hasn't there been Half Life 3?" or "why did they let TF2 die?". Valve has a broken structure that is shielded by their rent-seeking via Steam.

[@gordonfreeman8109]

@@KoolAidManOG You're certainly not wrong, that is absolutely one of the vital issues wrong with Valve. I'm just saying that's not the takeaway from this vid some some people on the left and right are gonna have. But I do agree with you.

[@KoolAidManOG]

@@gordonfreeman8109 Yeah, I think people are getting lost in personal culture war grievances while ignoring that this is symptomatic of their "some people are more equal than others" structure. It is filled with contradictions that lead to things like massive content droughts, incredible turnover and attrition rates for top talent, popular products being neglected or even abandoned despite customer frustration, etc. The "Everyone is equal and there are no bosses" handbook pitch of a worker co-op paradise is a far cry from "Gabe/The Board will shut you down". I've long felt that they need to spin off a separate gaming company and a company focused on maintenance and customer support, because trying to do it all under the current structure isn't enough. The problem is that Steam is so insanely profitable that Valve is shielded from all negative consequences of not serving their customers properly.

[@oatmealbits]

$10,000 < virtue signaling Twitter post? 🤡

[@peacemaster8117]

@@KoolAidManOG "The issue wasn't even BLM" Tell that to the guy who wrote the script for this video, since the BLM rant at the end completely overshadows the actually interesting topic of Valve's structural issues.

[@WayfaringAmoeba]

Valve is a private company and doesn't need to change its structure to accommodate being more diverse. If you don't like it then you've already self selected yourself to not work there 🤷‍♂ Same with Valve's treatment of BLM, it's a private company, they don't need to make a statement about something that has nothing to do with the work they do. Valve has no obligation to be a platform for politics, I think giving employees money to donate to the political cause they care about is much more democratic and actually representative of Valve's employees.

[@Sepko]

Allowing violent racism on their platform is a political statement, champ.

[@marl0e]

@@Sepko Incorrect

[@JustinKoenigSilica]

@@Sepko they allow everything, make a videogame about condeming violent racism and it would get published to

[@Sepko]

@@JustinKoenigSilica anti-racism and racism are not the same thing, dummy :)

[@VaNillaGTA]

Thoughtful analysis regarding the benefits and drawbacks of Valve's flat structure, the video production was fantastic too! However, I find your arguments regarding Valve's politics heavily flawed. I agree that Valve should have clear policies about what is and isn't acceptable on Steam and within Valve's development studios, because their customers (both consumers and developers) and their employees need to know where they stand. What I don't need is for Valve to make political statements about things they are not responsible for. That is why we (hopefully) have democracy, and platforms where we can speak our minds. We can choose to make our own statements as individuals, and Valve's employees are free to do so on their own social media accounts among other venues. Valve even gave their employees money with the specific purpose of letting them make a difference as they see fit, as highlighted by your investigation. Where should Valve draw the line? There are countless topics that they could make statements on, why stop at BLM? They would have to make statements every single day to comment on everything that's wrong with society. There is also no guarantee that you would agree with the topics they took stands on. It seems more like you want them to make statements on what YOU think is important, and I doubt you would ever be completely satisfied. It simply doesn't make logical sense for them to spend energy satisfying the daily whims and demands of political activists when they can focus on what they're good at; making games and services. Valve is not flawless, every company has structural strengths and weaknesses. However this video did not convince me that Valve is in crisis, it did the opposite, and though I agree that they need to work on their weaknesses, I would work for a company like Valve without hesitation.

[@Woodledude]

I think the main point you're missing in your rebuttal here is that you assume it is possible to be apolitical, and that that is preferable. What counts as political neutrality? That is inherently a political question, especially when a heavily used political tactic here in the US is using extremism to push "political neutrality" more in favor of your party by the simple act of comparison. Therefore, defining apoliticality and political neutrality is political. "Everything is fine unless we're going to be put in cuffs over it" is inherently a stance that lends credence to, and cedes power to, those who already have power, those people who are writing and enforcing the law. It is effectively enforcing a specific status quo, which seems perfectly palatable when the status quo is not threatening to you, not actively trying to suppress your existence. The slippery slope argument for where to stop with public statements and political advocacy is similarly missing the point. Anywhere that threshhold could be placed is in itself a political statement that benefits some people more than others. Valve is not being silent, even if it says nothing. It is a massive company that has a massive impact on the industry regardless of what it does, because of what it ALREADY does. Taking a 30% cut on almost all games on the platform is a form of speech, it is a statement. Remaining politically silent and unavailable for comment on actions the company takes is a form of speech. In case you're in disagreement about what quantifies speech... Let me give you an example. If I built a castle on my property in a suburb, and outfitted it with loaded ballista and vats of boiling oil on all sides, and started performing "defensive tests" in my driveway on wooden dummies, that is a form of speech. It doesn't matter if I've gotten approval from the HOA and had everything inspected and permitted, *I am definitely saying sonething.* If I then refuse to speak to my neighbors on the topic except with vague evasions like "It's all to code," I am ALSO saying something. What, exactly, is up to debate, but one might expect I have violence on the mind, and may somewhat understandably be worried about living in the shadow of my indomitable stone walls, with no real reassurance that I'm right in the head and have everyone's best interests at heart. Now suppose I invited my neighbors over for a larp-style barbecue, and made a public statement that they're all welcome to take shelter with me if anything happens. That is a very different form of speech, isn't it? And suppose we delve further into this ridicous example, and I single exactly one person out to deliberately pointedly exclude from my previous offer. That, too, is a form of speech. My example is not meant to correspond 1-to-1with Valve as a company, but I do feel that the parallels should provide some constructive food for thought in relation to your criticism of the video. The political IS personal. Companies are not people. Speech is not just words. Have a good day.

[@TheTapeandscissors]

@@Woodledude If you are a bystander to a crime, are you complicit? Genuine question.

[@chaoky]

@@Woodledude I hate this talking point, everybody knows that apolitical means not pushing for change and it benefits the status quo, that's not a big revelation, it's in the definition

[@benjoe1993]

Can't imagine how many people must've started working on Half Life 3 only to hear about the dozens of projects that came before and got rejected and ended up not even presenting it :D

[@God-ch8lq]

heavy update

[@raidenvakarian9362]

I remember reading some time ago (back when reports about Valve's work culture were first surfacing) that there were, in fact, dozens of attempts to work on Half-Life 3, nearly all of which ending not long after the honeymoon phase, when actual development starts. It's super fun to think of ideas and concepts, but it's less fun to put them all into practice into a cohesive product, which is where a lot of the Half-Life projects ended up failing. HL Alyx almost met the same fate, until GabeN personally stepped in and issued a rare command of "all hands on deck" for it. "In the Valley of Gods" was even cancelled due to this because the devs were directly ordered by GabeN to help Alyx ship no matter what.

[@peacemaster8117]

@@raidenvakarian9362 Valve needs more "all hands on deck" and less "do whatever you want so long as it makes money". Less lootboxes, more Alyx.

[@angelofdeath275]

@@peacemaster8117 seriously. what happened to the half life series is proof theres something off with valve

[@polinttalu7102]

@@angelofdeath275 Gaben not stepping in is what happened

[@georgy.design]

Important and interesting video, but I think it’s beyond unfair to bash Valve’s structure and their libertarian nature. Sure, they will block whatever hurts the store the most, or evade anything if it may hurt the company’s image, but this stance makes sense for me. All of this diversity discussion makes sense for the USA, and maybe a bunch of other countries where people claim “white folks rule ’em all”, but there are way more other countries. I can understand the diversity issue if we talk USA specifically, because Valve is based in the US. That being said, I’m not from the USA, and I cannot quite comprehend why Valve should give additional benefits to people of color or claim white folks being bad. Anyway, I think helping people from different backgrounds is good - a person’s race shouldn’t give them benefits, but the background. White folks come from a poor background, black folks too, the same can be said for everyone else. And all of them might come from a rich background. Why only non-white people should get some sort of privilege? I don’t quite understand it in this case. Adding to this, Valve’s structure allows everyone to agree on certain decisions, but people need to accumulate these opinions. I can imagine it might be hard, but invite your friends then - if you cannot do it just because of the colleagues are racist or something like that, then there’s a clear issue here. Ultimately, my main point about Valve’s political standing is to emphasize with them. Keep it in mind, I’m talking globally, not US specific. Steam is a global store, after all. If Valve starts making political decisions and align with certain sides, then what’s good can come out of it? Some will be happy, most others won’t. Gabe made a good point about the show that was described in the video. Also, let’s say, Valve says “We support BLM” and stuff like that - what about other issues in the world? Russia vs Ukraine? Armenia vs Azerbaijan? Racist and bigotry attitude to influx of people fleeing wars, for example, Russians in particular? They are facing issues in other countries just because of their passport color, but they left their home country because they disagree with the gov’s politics. Why they are being targeted and yelled at? Why locals and others tell them to go back? Again, what about the other issues like, I dunno, situations with ethnicities in China? Or even racist behavior of some locals in China who target foreigners as the main reason behind the outbreak in China? If you think some examples above isn’t even related to Steam, then why the rest isn’t? Why Valve should focus on Russia vs Ukraine, or just BLM? Why Valve should focus on the US, that’s just stupid. If you say that they should do it just because they are a US based company, then keep in mind that their statements will be thrown at a global audience. When I see events that aren’t even related to my region, I may wonder why I am even seeing them - why someone shows their political views onto me? I want to keep this discussion civil and hear your opinions. I feel Valve’s stance, and maybe it has hidden meaning, but it still makes sense anyway.

[@mz-hv2vh]

Good comment!

[@SamAsMe]

Not sure if anyone mentioned this before but these voice actors in these videos are incredible, like truly amazing job!

[@ManOfLegs]

A nice touch. Though the passive aggressive dubbed former employee complaints during the diversity segment honestly left the impression Valve's approach was pretty acceptable.

[@maxhill9254]

+1

[@snowballeffect7812]

Another thing to note is that structure of the company kind of limits the size of the company. You can only spread so far laterally in this kind of distributed manner until you face some very serious inefficiencies. This is why they focus so much on the hiring process. I'm honestly surprised they aren't in crisis over how many people quit or get fired. edit* i guess that sweet sweet steam revenue makes that a moot point, though lol. still, considering their absolute focus on profit over people, it seems surprisingly inefficient.

[@gatocochino5594]

How is this an issue? Ideally private corporations should have an upper limit of growth.

[@snowballeffect7812]

@@gatocochino5594 It's not really an issue, just an interesting aspect of the way the company runs. I'm not sure if there should be any kind of limit on growth, but definitely should be some sort of limit on compensation.

[@irek1394]

"considering their absolute focus on profit over people" you cant even compare private companies to publicly traded ones

[@snowballeffect7812]

@@irek1394 why not? lol. just because they're not publicly traded doesn't mean they can't model their incentives and finances similar to any other publicly traded s-corp.

[@irek1394]

@@snowballeffect7812 What I meant is that at worst they could be comparable to most publicly traded companies and if we believe what the video said they arent.

[@vcrbetamax]

If not saying anything, but giving money to the employees to chose who to donate to, makes you the bad guy. Then you can’t win, might as well not say anything. It’s literally the only outcome, because you’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t. This video proves that.

[@NerreraFightStories]

Ngl it sounds like a great place to work if this is all you found from a months long investigation and 16 interviews. If you asked 16 ex employees their anonymous thoughts about any company on earth you’d end up with worse feedback than this. Well made video though.

[@unknownpotato8691]

Yeah. The lack of sexual harrasment case already made them better than 90% of the gaming industry. Which, I know, isn't a high bar, but still.

[@notnullnotvoid]

@@unknownpotato8691 Can't harass female employees that you don't have, I guess.

[@madmax404]

This otherwise good documentary is kind of ruined by the diversity bias which really feels forced. Valve is something we look up to, so instead of just criticizing why isn't a successful company doing these "good things", maybe they aren't good to start with? Most loved games of history have come from places of unified culture. That should be taken as a lesson.

[@sursiks010]

Gabe's "I am definitely not your boss" t-shirt raises a lot of questions already answered by the shirt

[@KUAN0540]

Now I'm really waiting for a Riot Games video.

[@nathandts3401]

I'd really like to see some quotes about the staff culture around the reported sexual harassment and the toxicity of their players.

[@AngelicDirt]

Agreed. Last couple of months just watching from the outside have been... troubling. :S

[@KingKrouch]

The funny thing about the concept of Valve’s lack of quality control is that they’re actually incredibly inconsistent regarding this. They’ll straight up ban games that got ESRB ratings and are sold at Walmart or GameStop if someone at the company has a personal distaste towards it, while they’ll allow low-brow stuff like Cuckold Simulator, Omon Simulator, and Sex with Hitler. Of course there’s also the entire discussion around the lack of quality control (in the correct way) on Steam resulting partially in the problem of bad game releases, there has been cases where games are still sold on Steam despite missing an executable file as an example. Or any of the Arkham Knight situations that Valve seemingly hasn’t learned from. They’ve fairly recently been starting to raise eyebrows, and that’s even without the other things in this video.

[@FantasmaNaranja]

hey! sex with hitler is clearly an incredibly complex videogame with a very comple who am i kidding it's sex with hitler

[@FigmentForever]

A prime bad game release is the GTA definitive edition. Mutahar did a whole video as to why it is absurdly awful & has no active development into patches/updates.

[@river559]

@@FigmentForever I just watched that video yesterday lmao

[@matijatu]

Tf are you talking about

[@nathandts3401]

A sale is a sale to them and having the public policy of "we'll host whatever as long as it isn't illegal," is a shield they use. Before Epic came along and attracted people with exclusives and free games to try and make users feel invested, Valve has a de facto monopoly so it didn't matter how bad the service was. Epic are responsible if Valve ever decide to have standards.

[@Kirodit]

is it just me or does he look like sid?

[@GauthamThomas]

I've recently been picturing Valve as the Oldest House from Control. They've always been so mysterious.

[@WarjoyHeir]

Really enjoyed the in-depth look into Valve's structure but this one felt much more a critique than a journalist report. A lot of statements that were made painted the picture way darker than it would've come off if you just stated the facts. This type of approach takes away the viewers capacity for judgment. The idea that big companies are morally responsible to be the guiding forces in our societies came of as a given but I don't think this is an outlook that everyone agrees on and if they do there are a lot of views as to what degree of responsibility. I really appreciate the honest work but I this time I felt like I was not allowed to make my own opinion based on the facts presented, the opinion was already made for me.

[@tbone121974]

The employee structure does sound odd. In terms of appraisal, I would imagine it would become a popularity contest. As for the "no manager" approach it is natural for a hierarchical structure to develop anyway. I would say Valve being apolitical is the right choice. In my opinion, companies should stay out of politics and focus on the product or service they're giving. With regards to hiring practices as long as it is a meritocracy, that's fine. As far as what games are published to their platform, there is an argument to curate the content in terms of quality of the game.

[@AngelicDirt]

Think a little farther ahead. Companies have money. Companies like buying companies. Said parent company can come in and change how child company behaves. DRASTICALLY. ... Imagine you work at the child company.

[@pmonkey03]

I think this video brings up both a lot of valid issues, as well as a lot of non-issues.

[@PunikaProduction]

Man - I despise "stack ranking" so much. This is such a weird technique. I can't imagine my office job with such a system in place.

[@TucoBenedicto]

Conversely, I can hardly imagine being offered an above-industry standard salary, complete freedom to pick what to focus on, no crunch or overtime whatsoever and chances for earning a lot in extra bonuses AND spend most of that time at the company freaking out about if you "are being value enough", rather than trying to actually do some shit.

[@PunikaProduction]

@@TucoBenedicto absolutely! That doesn't mean I can't still despise "stack ranking" - beats working at Blizzard, that might be true.

[@AmnesiacDoe]

@@TucoBenedicto I can hardly imagine spouting the company line to shout down people shocked by poor labor practices, when the docu provides ample examples of exactly how terrifying this kind of nebulous pay scaling can be to employees with less security in life than their peers. Show a little sense or sympathy, especially when you only stand to defend your favorite toy-maker, cripes.

[@TucoBenedicto]

@@AmnesiacDoe I’m sure you can, tosser. Spare the grandstanding “holier than you” attitude for someone who cares.

[@AmnesiacDoe]

@@TucoBenedicto i really can't!! my own livelihood depends on a nebulous impression others have of my work separate from its actual quality or throughput in a way that is borderline inactionable as feedback without driving myself insane!! plenty of people live like this, and you don't just get to ignore we exist, lol.

[@italianstuddmuffin]

Good video, but some small constructive criticism. Valve is a private company, it does not have shareholders and a reputation to maintain and it doesn't need to release yearly statements about commitments to issues such as sustainability and diversity. If valve was public then it would 100% have greater commitment to some of these issues (and would need to be transparent about these commitments). It's a bad look for shareholders otherwise. Private companies like Valve tend to stay in their own lane. I will agree that as a giant in the games industry it does have examples it should be setting, but these are things the company has chosen not to get involved with. Instead they showed their commitment to their business structure by turning the power over to their employees (to spend $4,000,000 on a charity they wish) rather than have heads of the company decide.

[@nathandts3401]

Private companies do have shares... They're just not publicly traded on exchanges so the value doesn't go up and down. It moreso just indicates ownership of the company. I think it's Shark Tank in the US; the investment show where people pitch ideas for money in exchange for a percentage of their companies.

[@italianstuddmuffin]

@@TCELL24 it's not a specific issue caused by Valve, rather a problem with the industry. Over time this issue will solve itself because there's a rapid increase in women and minorities taking courses at university that the games industry can hire. Right now the hiring pool of candidates for women and minorities with the right qualifications is tiny.

[@italianstuddmuffin]

@@nathandts3401 yes they have shares but they are controlled privately. Those people that own the shares will care less about publicity and there will not be dumping of shares to cause a decline in value. It doesn't affect them in the same way it does for public companies.

[@NuiYabuko]

@@TCELL24 That's literally not how racism works.

[@osohista]

I didn't realize at first that some of the animations I'm looking at aren't by Valve but by Anni. Nice job!

[@mantlion_]

There was some good information here and this video helped debunk the idea that Valve is some literal utopia but the bulk of this video seemed politically driven and took issue with the fact that Valve isn't. The firing process does seem like it needs to be fixed but I personally take no issue with how they handle/handled pretty much everything else. Big props to the artist for this video though, amazing graphics 👍

[@ManOfLegs]

Well put.

[@Sepko]

Criticising Valve's work culture is a political stance, dummy.

[@TeleportRush]

The firing and probably the pay need solved. The latter basically makes it impossible to finish long form projects (like videogames) without upper management putting their foot down (like I hear in this comment section they did with halflife alyx)

[@NuiYabuko]

I'm really curious how many of these comments actually want companies to operate outside of politics and how many take issue with the politics discussed? Is the issue diversity and BLM? If Valve took an anti-abortion stance, would that also fall into something they shouldn't do or would that be fine?

[@mantlion_]

@@NuiYabuko I personally wouldn't agree with Valve (or basically any corporation) taking any kind of political stance, conservative stances included

[@MayaEatsBooks]

Im not finished yet but it seems like instead of the intended idea of something like a woker’s co-op where everyone works together, its more like a system in which everyone is working for themselves

[@5JSX5]

it's not a co-op, it's pvp

[@revimfadli4666]

So worker multiplayer solitaire?

[@jimbone9558]

A company that exercises its real American freedom. It’s quite simple to understand, If you don’t like the platform you don’t have to use it. If you don’t like how they run their company you don’t have to work there

[@mrbiggles1816]

You can also compete with them, show them how it is done.

[@95keat]

I feel like the critiques of the structure of valve, and the diversity/social outreach would be better served as two separate videos. They don't really have anything to do with each other.

[@hauby121]

I have so much respect for Valve after this video. Political stances should not be taken by private companies.

[@nathandts3401]

Platforming hate speech is a political stance. That stance being, at best, that revenue supersedes morality or, at worst, active agreement with the hate speech. Also, a private company, being owned by only a handful of people is even more well positioned to comment politically that a publicly traded company. Let's be honest, the apolitical position only exists so that they can take money from the porn and hate games whilst largely keeping their hands clean.

[@AaronStyles]

IMO, companies can do that, if they want to. But they shouldn't be shunned by a bunch of game bloggers for not towing their line.

[@nathandts3401]

@@AaronStyles Games journalists pretty famously don't permanently shun companies. The Ubisoft sexual harassment stuff has gone silent and they're back to covering Ubisoft stuff.

[@h4724-q6j]

@@AaronStyles What about the company's own employees, who did want to do it but weren't allowed to? The video is a reflection of their concerns.

[@h-hues]

I feel like their $10k idea is really good. Shows that they are aware, but also respects each employee's personal views and not force them into a collective.

[@ACuteAura]

My experience with Valve as a security researcher has essentially been what you expect. Be ignored for a few months, post the issue to their forums, get my steam account banned, wait another 3 months for my complaint containing "I told you about this half a year ago, this is your fuckup" to be read and getting my account silently reinstated. Also, they didn't fix the issue (would have been trivial), they simply removed the entire feature.

[@Cyberian_Khatru]

my guess is that the person who read your complaint, the person who banned you, the person who removed the entire feature, and the person who reinstated your account were all different people. not saying it's justified tho

[@Lucarioguild7]

@@Cyberian_Khatru I'd say that's pretty highly likely considering how unorganized they supposedly are

[@mickmoon6887]

Same happened to me after getting banned for no reason cuz some steam mod was mad at my comments and made their friends mad at forum only to get unbanned half way through the unban process after directing contacting an valve employee I knew but the person who banned me still work at valve

[@TucoBenedicto]

@@Cyberian_Khatru my other takeaway from that story is that maybe you shouldn’t report/expose a security vulnerability on a public forum but contact them privately.

[@DaFlavourFace]

@@TucoBenedicto Which they did, but valve ignored them for months

[@TABSF1]

Serious question, why do Valve need to make reference to BLM or any other demographic? They haven't done anything for any group if I remember correctly? I fall in the LGBTQIA+ and I don't expect anything from Valve just a good gaming platform!

[@dadiscoverychannel]

Fascinating video. I can only help but wonder what happened to stack ranking / salaries of the team that made Artifact given how that game turned out financially

[@KoolAidManOG]

The lack of a second set, despite it being finished from a design standpoint, says it all. Almost the whole team scurried like rats from a sinking ship. Anyone who stayed on to help risked being tainted by association with that failed project.

[@TucoBenedicto]

I don’t think the implication is that working on a single stinker will get you fired, generally speaking. It MAY be what the involved employees fear/worry about, on the other hand which is something that probably cripples the company’s creative output in the long run.

[@Duiker36]

@@TucoBenedicto It's not that it'll get you fired. It's that you'll get paid less. Worse, you may be seen as being responsible for the overall bonus being smaller for everyone.

[@CinnamonMuffinz]

Stack ranking sounds like my corporate nightmare. Also, a company without hierarchy is a wonderful way to avoid responsibility.

[@revimfadli4666]

​@@KingThrillgore reminds me of how some sales planners can sabotage the PPIC by purposefully under or over planning, then blame the PPIC. Imagine how bad it would be with stack ranking

[@GameTesterBootCamp]

I get the feeling that the recent Blizzard story about "stack ranking" lit a fire under the editor to get this video done. 😀

[@SpagmanAus]

American culture around not talking to colleagues about pay & conditions is why bosses have been rorting the absolute living shit out of you for 40 years.

[@TightNinja]

Good documentary but as a black man, I do not care what Valve has to say about diversity. Let Valve do what Valve does best. I truly fear what will happen to Valve and Steam when Gabe passes away. All Hail Gaben! May he show us the way!

[@TheJas20]

Nicely put, Kay

[@argorath]

gabe doesn't fucking do anything anymore, he practically already has left, stop worshipping him, it's weird

[@khaoscero]

The idea, that in a sea of gore and violence, nude bodies and sex would be harmful is so truly american, it hurts. Of course Valve should sell them. its art nepotism to not grant eroticism its fair share. And its immature.

[@nathandts3401]

Porn is more damaging than violent games. I mean violent games don't desensitise people to violence or make you more aggressive. Possibly because it's not all that similar to real violence. I don't know about porn games, but porn definitely messes with your head when it comes to sex. Typically easier for girls to notice because it's guys asking to do something they weren't expecting, but I'm sure you've notice your porn tastes change over time and vanilla stuff getting boring. That being said, I've got no real issue with porn. People just need to give themselves a reality check when they watch it. Oh, except for the rapey stuff; that's just incel bait and should be thrown in the bin.

[@als_pals]

god I've been craving this video subconciously. been getting into tf2 again and wanting to know why nothing ever happens

[@danang5]

basically the old veteran didnt see any value in TF2

[@God-ch8lq]

@@danang5 how? tf2 hat market is really damn good my entire steam library was bought using tf2 unusuals, and valve do make a decent cut

[@danang5]

@@God-ch8lq ask the old veteran valve employee that does the yearly evaluation,not me

[@nathandts3401]

The money is in DOTA 2 would be the main answer. TF2 is occasionally bringing in hat revenue, but was mostly superseded by Overwatch for general hero shooters and CS:GO for Valve shooters.

[@dropit7694]

TF2 is a hat collection game and there are many better class based competitive multiplayer games on the market. Valve would be better off making a new game from scratch

[@dungeonrobot]

I’m about to enter college next semester for a degree in game design. I’m really passionate about games and the industry but I really think these sobering dives into the issues with both are invaluable. This channel is an excellent resource and I thank you dearly for what you are providing.

[@NoWhereMan95]

I am still sad they bought Campo Santo. We’ll never see another game from them again.

[@n_core]

Especially only a few of the Campo Santo team members are now still at Valve, and the rest of them already left the company.

[@benjamin3044]

I mean this whole process sounds kind of confusing and opaque, but I also think that is the point? The status quo has been working for Valve. Not saying thats a good thing! Don't really have an opinion on the status quo. But why change when what they have is working? If Valve or Steam starts failing then I think we might see some changes.

[@benjamin3044]

@@bunshine ASK ME ABOUT HL3

[@theduke5908]

I’d start a ‘Richochet remake’ team, now that’s valuable 🤣

[@WeebJail]

idk about the black lives matters thing. is it really a company's place to take a stand here? if they do it's just saying that it's financially beneficial for us to take this political stance. anything a COMPANY could say is just soulless virtue signalling. even if they have noble goals it literally can't possibly come out as anything else because it's a company not a person. maybe it's because i'm not american but i seriously don't get the huge contention here. putting up $4million seems like a way bigger deal than throwing around clout on twitter

[@Sujad]

It's not a company's position to weigh in on political issues. Companies should be apolitical. If a game dev has to be 100% straight white male or 100% asian male to be good, keep us darkies out of it. If someone brown like me can hack it and gets in on merit, excellent for him. If not, show him the door. I'm sick of my favourite media collapsing because diversity quotas are ruining games before they're even launched.

[@OKMBVideos]

In America, companies are basically expected to say something on a hot button topic to show support to the side that has been deemed the correct side, whether that be politically Right or politically Left. This also applies to celebrities. To the people who want them to say something, it makes them feel that their movement is legitimatcized by the "big thing" But I agree with you that it's not a company's (or celebrities) place to talk about these things. You shouldn't need an organization to reinforce your convictions or to add a voice to the chorus.

[@5Hydroxytryptophan]

4 million dollars and they are not even bragging about it. They just do it. And they started that event without bragging about it, this is just how it should be.

[@peacemaster8117]

@@10z20 And yet it took up SO MUCH of the damn video. He really couldn't get past it.

[@jimboslice1237]

It says a lot when people still support Anita Sarkeesian who "killed" a game developer

[@howiieb]

This video, with a whole section dedicated to stack ranking, released *days* after Activision Blizzard stack ranking became a major news story. Iconic

[@kekgoogle4809]

except blizzard hasn't done anything good in a decade, meanwhile valve is in another universe.

[@irek1394]

Well at least Valve doesnt seem to require fucking some people over

[@alessio279]

honestly this piece was pretty fluffy. Parts of it were interesting but definitely not as hard-hitting as the rest of what you guys have made.

[@peacemaster8117]

Yeah, it's pretty toothless overall.

[@iijj]

Thank you for the video. Now I respect Valve and its founders much much more.

[@KoolAidManOG]

Nothing to respect from a company that left its glory days in the 2000s. Cowardly to settle for becoming iTunes for games

[@kobold_ts]

I really appreciate the effort you put into this video, its structure and depth, as well as the professional journalism. There is one thing I don't understand though - why the assumed lack of diversity, at a privately owned company, is an issue worth that much of your focus? Asking seriously, I don't get it.

[@neomorphosallomorphis7395]

it's because there are some social groups that are widely under-represented in the games industry: women, black, etc... not because they're less good, but because of a sexist & racist culture overall. The idea is that a place where there is no diversity should theoretically not exist given how diverse society is... yet the game industry (and tech industry in general) is extremely white, cis and male in western countries.

[@visage807]

@@neomorphosallomorphis7395 And yet they're the most successful company in the PC gaming space and have made some of the best and most enduring games of all time, sounds like the lack of diversity is working to their benefit! I know when I have my own company I'll be taking a lot of lessons from Valve.

[@NA-uz7co]

@@neomorphosallomorphis7395 but the argument is really bad. It dosent take into account if those groups want to work there or have the abilty in the first place, but there is even the problem that a theory can be flaw and it wont represent the reallity

[@bibbytenbillion]

@@visage807 smartest bateman pfp

[@davinalhany]

The video mentions why this is important: stack ranking for income and hiring. The predominantly white cis men see each other as more valuable, *regardless* of whether or not this is true. Minorities end up gathering at lower pay brackets. This is compounded by the fact that hiring is included IN the stack ranking process, and others can evaluate HOW you help the hiring process. As a result: middle aged white guys hire middle aged white guys, and everyone else is expected to say "yes" to those hires before they get down ranked. And don't even think about hiring someone *not* white cis and guy. The video summarizes it pretty cleanly: "it's not homophobia, racism, transphobia. It's *just bias*." Just the human tendency to favor those like you and judge more harshly those not like you. Years of research has shown how insidious invisible bias can be (see Harvard Implicit Association or other studies on hiring manager bias). And at a general level, it makes working at the company feel shitty for anyone who isn't... well, cis, white, guy. Not out of malice, just out of bias.

[@skilletcaso]

Honestly, based on the actual results they have to show for their structure, I can’t help but think Valve has the right idea on how to run a video game company compared to Blizzard, Ubisoft, EA, Rockstar, Microsoft, etc.

[@2-Way_Intersection]

the issue though is literally nothing gets made. the last big valve release before HLA was dota 2 7 years before (im not counting the dota spinoffs or the lab, those are way smaller scale and the former barely took off). valve is too far in the other extreme

[@woobackwednesday2299]

@UCiLfQBFe9W0CCcVffFpb6zA We're on the other side of the extreme here where they almost never release something big and new. Look at how long Alyx took to get out. They are doing the exact opposite thing shareholders in the rest of the games industry do but for the same reasons. Other companies are risk-averse for their profit margins so they just keep remaking IP's with pre-existing audiences and adding content to them, Valve employees are terrified of le magical stack ranking that they've grown risk-averse and are more likely to focus on short-term projects to increase their Black Mirror-esque social credit score instead of taking risks on longer projects which have a chance of failing and wasting hours of work time

[@JujuAdams]

They're not a video game company any more. That's the point of this entire v - yknow what, nevermind

[@aolson1111]

There's been plenty of stories of abuse at indie developers that have come out the past couple of years, but you'll ignore that while you're slavering over them. Disgusting.

[@skilletcaso]

@@KingThrillgore lol what? Epic barely even exists anymore, it’s losing exclusives left and right, devs call it a death sentence, it’s still lacking features on Steam years in, and people only use it for free games.

[@uDave247]

Despite all of the many problems Valve has, I'm still glad that it exists and offers a alternative from the homogenised corporate structure that exists in most companies, big or small. The fact that an alternative exists in of itself shall always be a positive thing in my book. That being said though I do still hope that the problems are addressed one day, though I believe it is just going to require the right person to come up with a solution that works for their unique company structure, which may or may never come. Just like the Queen, Gaben won't be around forever, and because of how so much the company operates and is perceived is due to his involved no matter how indirect, it will be very interesting to see what happens to Valve in the next 20-50 years.

[@MrAncop]

I feel like Gabe it's not your boss in the traditional sense that he's gonna come to your desk or team and tell you what to do but I can guarantee that if he has a certain opinion on a topic and you actively disagree on that opinion your chances of getting fire may increase a lot.

[@Sorrelhas]

Seems like Valve is one of the best places to work on the games industry right now (at least among the bigger companies; although that says more about the bigger game companies than it says about Valve lmao), although it's greatest strength seems to also be it's biggest weakness This video also explains why Valve just doesn't make games anymore lmao

[@God-ch8lq]

why make games when u control steam, theyre rolling in money anyway

[@Meitti]

Why take the risk of making your own games, when you can just pick the most popular mods played in Steam and fund a retail version of those instead?

[@Sorrelhas]

@@Meitti Honestly you'd think that a privately owned, well-off company like Valve would have free reign to make whatever the hell it wanted, but this video showed me why that isn't the case This "the inquisition is in town" attitude keeps people from trying anything that has a slight chance of not being successful

[@kirillholt2329]

based

[@nathandts3401]

I bet the Amazon dev studios are doing okay; company is desperate to properly break into the industry. The Star Citizen dev is probably also pretty great. Get paid a lot to work on vaporware.

[@FengLengshun]

As a visual novel player, I am somewhat happy that Valve doesn't police these games too hard but I would love if they're even more laissez-faire. I still want Fullmetal Daemon Muramasa and I'd love for less cases like Chaos;Child Noah and Evenicle 2 where permissions are given and yanked randomly. Yeah, the junk games making it through is hard, but I want to buy these games legally because it's more convenient than pirating them and I don't have the money nor patience to import them. So for me, all I want is just better consistency instead of praying whoever does the checking doesn't hate the game for a random reason.

[@the-network]

Honestly, I miss the old valve. The Half-Life 2 Valve, the TF2 Valve, or the Portal Valve. I miss their games and I miss them. Maybe one day we'll actual get HL3.

[@nathandts3401]

Stop using Steam and they might put out something to get you back. The PS3 had a failed launch, but a price cut and heavy investment in games like Uncharted, Last of Us, Infamous, etc led them to take over the Xbox by the end of that generation.

[@jianng7795]

@@nathandts3401 When other game launchers get as good as Steam, then I'll consider.

[@nathandts3401]

@@jianng7795 All of the others have a significantly better ratio of good games to bad. That's a start.

[@aolson1111]

Who gives a shit? You're not forced to buy, play, or even look at them, so why would they matter for people looking for the best launcher?

[@jianng7795]

@@nathandts3401 Here's what Steam is to me, a storefront, a game launcher, a forum, a trading marketplace, and a mod workshop. Epic Games Launcher is a storefront and a games launcher, and they're not better at it than Steam. It doesn't have written user reviews (Steam reviews are kinda rubbish but they're there), it doesn't even track my achievements properly. Origin (back when it's still online) is even worse, its top Google search is "origin not working" for crying out loud. Steam has their competitors beat by a mile, the occasional porn I see in the store is not reason enough for me to give up everything else.

[@bsteel364]

I'm not really into the idea that the company should be penalized for being "hands-off" and "libertarian" simply because the expectation is that they should take your side. I want my video game company to be a video game company and stay as apolitical as possible because ya never know when the other shoe is gonna drop. I should also note that you just advertised "Tyrone vs Cops" or whatever it was called to half a million people in the first five hrs this video has been up, a far greater number of people than would have found it if it were just left to collect dust in the catacombs of steam's enormous library.

[@nathandts3401]

I'd suggest that not platforming racism, sexism and homophobia wouldn't be a political stance. Equality in those characteristics is just the natural order. In general, a lot of the best art is political. BioShock, Metal Gear, This War of Mine, Papers Please, Mass Effect are successful games that are majorly political. Half Life 2 is political...

[@Hoichael]

​@@nathandts3401 No, the natural order is the natural order - taking the approach of explicitly and actively filtering naturally emerging content is the literal opposite of natural

[@TeleportRush]

@@nathandts3401 I would argue steam is a large enough platform to contend the definition of platforming merely by existence within the catalogue tbh. Not to say it would necessarily be a net negative to get rid of those things, but to pretend any of that does significantly well within the market or is being propped up by the owners would be a bit misleading.

[@nathandts3401]

@@Hoichael Discrimination isn't natural. It's a hangover from a primitive mindset when it comes to sexism, Hunter/gatherer tribalism when it comes to racism and religious population control nonsense when it comes to homophobia.

[@NuiYabuko]

@@Hoichael Naturally emerging content? What the f*** are you on about?

[@martixy2]

Hm, actually agree with Gabe at the end there.

[@secondengineer9814]

Valve almost seems like a company that worked hard and got lucky to become a standard for pc distribution, and is now sitting on that hoard of cash and having fun.

[@nathandts3401]

Accurate. Until Epic, they had a de facto monopoly. The libraries people have built ensure people won't leave so the service can be terrible and nothing will change.

[@aolson1111]

Pure stupidity. They don't have a monopoly in any sense. Having a library does not in any way prevent you from buying games elsewhere. Even extremely walled gardens like Xbox and Playstation can't prevent people from switching, so, by what mechanism is Valve preventing people from buying games elsewhere. If Steam truly had a monopoly, then Fortnite, LoL and WoW wouldn't be three of the biggest games in the world.

[@nathandts3401]

@@aolson1111 I think you're kidding yourself if you don't believe splitting games across launchers isn't a factor for a lot of PC gamers. PC is an open platform and there's no real reason to dislike Epic exclusivity agreements with the exception that people want all their stuff in one place. If you've had a Steam account for 10-15 years then you're probably sitting on 1000+ games. I console game, but I'd struggle to leave Steam if I had that much of an investment into that account.

[@sysriq_v.i]

Saying Valve got lucky is just wrong. At the time, most people play games on console of either Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo (and maybe some smaller company like Sega). Companies like Epic even actively reject PC because of piracy reason. So the PC space then only got support from Valve and they have years to build the steam as the PC platform as it is now. They are not lucky to be the standard, they were there from the start and were the one who shape the PC platform

[@dominateeye]

@@nathandts3401 I mean, exclusivity on an open platform like PC _is_ very much an anti-consumer practice, because it reduces competition. When you make the investment into a platform with the understanding that the barriers to your experience that you see on other platforms, like consoles, will not be present, it is not a good thing for someone to try and flout that understanding. Valve very clearly has problems. Epic has different but just as numerous problems.

[@maxeuker2949]

By the numbers, the Coast Guard Search and Rescue is harder to get into than the Navy Seals.

[@peacemaster8117]

More beneficial to society as well. Just more valuable overall.

[@bounceday]

what was the take away? they a private company, they can do what they want

[@mofka26]

Yeah, but that doesn't mean nobody can criticize them. If youtube just required an id verification for everyone to prove that they are 13+, would you be fine with uploading personal documents?

[@DenzNoble]

When private companys that agree with hardcore leftist policies they dont say a fn shit, even the more unfair that can get xd, american clown mental asylum country

[@FinalplayerRyu]

@@mofka26 Not sure if you realize, but youtube is not something essential. If you don't want to upload personal documents in such a case then don't... i know i wouldn't.