Steam Doubled its Profits in 2011

[Gahars]

You read that right. Seventh.

I'll let the article speak for itself.

Year-over-year unit sales for 2011 grew by more than 100 percent, the seventh consecutive year of double - not double-digit, but straight-up double sales growth. Stop and think about that for a moment: exponential sales growth for seven uninterrupted years. That's a hell of an accomplishment.​

It's also 780 Petabytes of data delivered to over 40 million accounts from across the globe, five million of whom were logged on simultaneously at one point during the 2011 Holiday Sale. More than 14.5 million copies of Steamworks games, including Skyrim, Modern Warfare 3, and Deus Ex: Human Revolution were registered in 2011 alone, a 67 percent jump over the previous year, while in-game item trading broke the 19 million mark. Steam now has over 1800 games on offer, including 18 free-to-play releases.​

Source: The Escapist

Seriously though, that's insane. I wonder how Gabe Newell is celebrating...

 

[Guild McCommunist]

Between TF2 going free-to-play (which could attract plenty of people to using Steam altogether), Skyrim (my friend's list was basically "X is now playing Skyrim" for about a week after its release at least), and some other big PC titles this year, it's no surprise.

BUT THE PC MARKET IS DYING. We all know it.

 

[Satangel]

I wonder how much it would have grown without Skyrim and MW3.... Those 2 games probably made up for 50% of the growth/profit.

 

[prowler]

Hats.

 

[Jax]

Is EA even trying with Origin...?

 

[sputnix]

if BF3 was released on steam profits would have been so much higher, but hey like they care their still, I mean with all that money gabe should be able to afford a liposuction
*drops mic* I'm out

 

[Celice]

I wonder how much of the sales factor into this profit count

 

[Ace]

It's nice to say that Steam has decelerated piracy somewhat. This is pretty good proof of it, too.

 

[Fluto]

Lol 780 petabytes!!
780,000,000,000 mb of data given to players
Its is a very good market.

 

[rehevkor]

I pirate some PC games, I freely admit that. If when I do buy them I only ever buy them when they're on Steam.

 

[Gahars]

This seems to be a common attitude in Steam users, and I'd guess that a lot of Valve's success comes from (going along with what AceTM said) fostering it. They've proven that to fight piracy, you don't need to punish the customer; when you offer a great service along with great values, people will come.

 

[gokujr1000]

This doesn't surprise me at all. The way I see it is that with all the sales and how cheap they sell games for Steam has had the PC Market in their hands for a long fucking time.

 

[Gabbynaruto]

Okay, uh, can anyone explain me why Steam is so popular? I mean, the games cost almost double the price of a retail version from a normal online shop (at least here they do).And, please, no "cause it does online" explanations. You can play a game online even without buying it on steam...

 

[Maplemage]

I bet they made a shit ton of money from those Naughty/Nice winter keys in TF2.

 

[denieru7]

There's an error in the title, it should be "Its".

 

[Joe88]

I wonder how much of that money came from tf2...

also we need moar tf2 hats

 

[Rydian]

I mean, the games cost almost double the price of a retail version

lolwut?

I bought bioshock 1+2, dead space 1+2 and Amnesia for $5 each.
I got Grand Theft Auto 1, 2, 3, San Andreas, and Vice City for $10 total.
Terraria goes on sale for 75% off every so often.
Blah blah blah blah

 

[rehevkor]

I used to detest Steam, in 2004, activating Half-Life 2 bought in a shop? Absolute nightmare. Never mind having to download it from scratch. But the internet speeds have eveolved to better accomdate services like Steam.

PC gaming is still in the toilet, but Steam has helped keep its head above the surface. And slowly crawl its way out.

 

[kevan]

Okay, uh, can anyone explain me why Steam is so popular? I mean, the games cost almost double the price of a retail version from a normal online shop (at least here they do).And, please, no "cause it does online" explanations. You can play a game online even without buying it on steam...

Umm... They where selling Total War Shogun 2 one day for $22 AUD... Meanwhile at EB Games $99 AUD

 

[ShadowSoldier]

After a crappy rocky start for me using steam, I turned a leaf and like it. But, I still prefer physical copies of games.

Also, I don't like Steam Achievements. Don't feel as rewarding.