There is no denying that Facebook is big, and its expansion is not going to stop anytime soon. Beating about anything else on the web, Facebook is on top of the food chain.
At some points of its life, Facebook has been a popular platform for mini web games and such. This time, the social network giant wants to again dive into the gaming world, for real. The effort started in May 2016 when it introduced Games Arcade. On November 2nd, 2016, the company changes the name to become Facebook Gameroom, a platform conference for games.
Launched for developers, Gameroom is dedicated to PC apps that thrive on Steam. The digital distribution platform developed by Valve Corporation, Steam itself has 125 million users. Facebook on the other hand, has 1.75 billion.
Doing the math, Facebook is a confident competitor.
And as one of its appeal, Facebook is putting its own advertising platform into it. This way, game developers can market their products to gamers. For a 30 percent revenue share (same as Steam), Facebook wants to take away Steam's market share to become the hub for games.
Facebook as popular as it can be, is still losing to iOS and Android in terms of mobile. Back in the 2009, Facebook was still for desktop. That time, it has built a massive business on game payments by partnering with Zynga and others.
But that business has crumbled when mobile gaming of iOS and Android started to get traction. Casual web games were replaced, and gaming on Facebook is nothing more than just a history.
Covering that defeat, Facebook is taking the other way around. Gameroom is its big push into PC games, and the app itself is openly available to download on Windows 7 and up.
What Gameroom does, is allowing gamers to play web, ported mobile and native games dedicated to PC app, free from News Feed distraction.
Valve has lesser users. But it's influence in gaming has reached a large scale. Facebook that is just starting the business, needs to fight an uphill battle by convincing developers that Gameroom is able to share its massive social network reach.
It also needs to persuade gamers that a more social gaming is worth their time.
Meanwhile, Steam might be the favorite place for hardcore gamers. But Facebook with its influence, social media reach and a much larger potential users and reach, has a huge untapped wealth of capabilities, if Facebook can do it right.