Why does game company need a publisher when they can host on Steam or one of it’s lesser competitors and pay YouTubers to get the initial word out?
Probably because they can also finance the games being made. Indie devs generally don’t have much money.
Just take a loan. Build a portfolio to convince the lender. Hire some marketing people.
Valve is not the one setting the prices. The publishers/developers are. One could argue that they are increasing their prices becauses of Valve’s cut, but they aren’t. A Ubisoft game for example costs the same on Steam as it does on the Ubisoft store, which is obviously not taking any cuts for its own games.
Also, 30% is the industry standard. Here is a nice overview IGN made in 2019. https://oyster.ignimgs.com/wordpress/stg.ign.com/2019/09/GameRetailerCuts_infographic-1.png
Edit for the price parity argument: If the parity would have increased game prices to include Valve’s cut, AAA games would have gotten 30% more expensive many years ago. But they didn’t.
