Back in April, Wolfire Games filed an antitrust lawsuit against Valve, claiming that the company abuses its dominance of the PC gaming market and has formed a monopoly with Steam. It didn't take long for Valve to counter the suit with its own legal filing and now, the judge has sided with Valve, dismissing the case.
The lawsuit filed back in April claims that 75 percent of all PC games are sold through Valve’s Steam Store and argues that the company’s 30% revenue cut is only made possible through suppressing competition in the market in order to maintain a monopoly. In a counter filing, Valve takes issue with a number of Wolfire Games’ claims, and argues that the lawsuit is “devoid of any factual support”.
Valve argued that the PC digital games market is competitive, with active competition from the likes of Epic Games, Microsoft and Amazon, concluding that the Wolfire Games failed “to allege unlawful conduct, antitrust injury, market power”.
A judge has now agreed with Valve, dismissing the case, but leaving the door open for Wolfire Games to address the issues highlighted in the dismissal within 30 days. If the studio can do so, then the case will be re-examined.
Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.
KitGuru Says: Wolfire Games has not commented publicly on the dismissal yet, but if it is going to re-file the case, then it will need to include a lot more evidence to support its claims of a monopoly.