About distribution platforms

Main types of distribution platforms

• Web2 storefronts. Web2 or web 2.0 game distribution platforms feature traditional non-blockchain based or traditional games, centralized finances and governance, fiat currency, digital coin, digital assets, and user accounts based on relational databases. As of today, third party traditional pc games distribution is concentrated in Steam, the PC game distribution mogul, Epic Games, Gog, and Itch.io.

• Web3 storefronts. Web3 or web 3.0 game distribution platforms are built on blockchain technology, they deliver blockchain-based or crypto games, and they feature decentralized finances, governance, crypto currency, NFT, and digital crypto ledgers replacing user accounts. Blockchain-based games distribution is much more fragmented, and takes place at crypto-friendly gaming platforms like HyperPlay, Elixir, Isotopic, Ultra.io, Metacade, or Gatheon, to name a few.

Steam: the inspiration

Steam, developed by Valve Corporation, is the biggest distributor of third party web2 PC games on the internet and owns 50% of the market, delivering impressive numbers such as 120 million monthly active users, 50k+ published games in USA, and more than 30 billion hours of playtime in 2020.

At the begginning, Valve's success was fueled by a self developed and published game, Half-Life 2, which evolved into one of the most successful pc games of all time, Counter-Strike. This franchise attracted so many players to Steam that it turned into a highly profitable third party distribution platform.

Steam used to accept crypto games, but, in 2021, they decided to ban them, claiming issues with the volatibility of cryptocurrency and the bad reputation of some crypto game developers; it's widely believed that Steam wan't comfortable with the loss of control of in-game purchases that the NFT assets represented.