For indie developers, hoping to hook any attention amid the onrush of Steam‘s daily releases can feel a touch like adding glitter to a single drop of water in a tidal wave. Discoverability has long been regarded as a problem on Valve’s storefront, yet according to developers, something may recently have changed for the better.
In a recent newsletter Simon Carless, founder of GameDiscoverCo, states that Valve recently made an adjustment to the Discounts & Events banner on Steam’s homepage, prioritizing personalized offers based on player interests in a manner that may highlight smaller games and developers running sales more often. In short, if you play a lot of horror games, you’ll probably see a more varied selection of them showing up there when on sale.
It’s not just analysts noting the difference, however. Tim Bender, CEO of Manor Lords publisher Hooded Horse, also highlighted the difference on LinkedIn, showcasing an example in which an indie game had received almost the entirety of its six-month visits through the Discounts & Events grid within the last month.
“This change took a source of traffic that was non-existent for niche indies, and suddenly made it the best source of traffic in the entire store,” Bender writes.
He also noted that Hooded Horse’s own “slightly larger” games had also seen a more modest improvement, with one title gaining 14k store page visits in the past month when compared to 6k in the preceding five months.
“This is great for everyone – players are getting more relevant recommendations, and publishers/developers are having their games shown to the right players – but it’s most transformative for smaller indies that previously weren’t seeing placement in this section,” Bender continues.
This sentiment was echoed by numerous indie developers and publishers in the comments and quote replies, each highlighting dramatic recent growths in wishlists, page visits, and sales as a result of Steam’s changes.
“I think Steam is doing very well – much better than the console owners – given how many games release on the platform,” writes Nicholas Lovell, co-owner of Trash Goblin developer Spilt Milk Studios. “Players are finding games they want. That so many of us trying to release games for the players is a problem for us, not a problem for the players. And Steam is helping. A lot.”
The discoverability change is one of several tweaks Steam’s storefront has undergone recently, including the addition of a personal release calendar and a welcome selection of filters and sharing options for wishlists. The rate of releases doesn’t look to be slowing, so here’s hoping that this run of quiet changes helps more deserving games find their audiences.
