According to VGC , 2023 saw a huge number of games landing on Steam: 14,535 new games, an increase of nearly 2,000 compared to 2022, according to the rankings of analytics site SteamDB.
According to market research firm Circana, no other game distribution platform can compare to Steam, with even Nintendo's popular eShop only seeing 2,360 new games last year.
Steam released over 14,000 games in 2023
The number of games released on Steam has exploded over the past few years. In just five years, Steam has gone from releasing 8,134 games in 2019 to over 6,000 in 2022. And it shows no signs of slowing down, with Steam releasing 80 new games in the first four days of 2024 alone. Assuming that pace continues, that number could reach 29,000 games by the end of the year — double what it did in 2023.
The main reason for this rapid growth is that game creation tools are becoming more accessible and user-friendly, allowing many individuals and small-scale game development teams to participate in the market. In addition, the loose censorship of the parent company Valve, because Steam is not too strict in choosing games, leading to a series of titles appearing on this platform, many of which are low-quality products.
This 'open' policy has also caused many players to complain, as it has become increasingly difficult to find good games on Steam and quality titles are drowning in a sea of 'junk' content. The same situation is happening on Nintendo's eShop, although the number of new games on the platform is only a fraction of what Steam is.
Despite the impressive numbers, the flood of games coming to Steam comes with concerns about quality and platform management. Hopefully, Valve and Nintendo will come up with appropriate solutions in the future to both ensure openness and improve the quality of games appearing on Steam and the eShop, bringing a better experience to players.
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