The volume of Valve glazing I see on the internet has me worried. They could enshittify dramatically tomorrow, and I think they would still have positive sentiment.
People trust them. Trusting a corporation is a recipe for monopoly, pretty much without exception, historically.
And Steam is the only storefront for so, so many games. For all of Sweeny’s toxicity, I honestly didn’t feel that particular outrage against EGS, as I was already concerned by how many games are Steam-only.
They have positive sentiment because they haven’t enshittified much, in an industry that has embraced shit maximalism as a policy.
People would complain if they got worse. There would be people saying “at least they arent microsoft”, but they would still be held to higher standards than other companies. The fact they are more or less meeting those standards is impressive.
Also, steam integration is pretty un-invasive on the developer’s side. If steam went tits-up, everybody would just re-release elsewhere.
The volume of Valve glazing I see on the internet has me worried. They could enshittify dramatically tomorrow, and I think they would still have positive sentiment.
People trust them. Trusting a corporation is a recipe for monopoly, pretty much without exception, historically.
And Steam is the only storefront for so, so many games. For all of Sweeny’s toxicity, I honestly didn’t feel that particular outrage against EGS, as I was already concerned by how many games are Steam-only.
We know they will, but it’s probably not today.
Gabe will die, directives will change, Valve will slip. But probably not today.
and that “probably not today” is actually WORLDS MORE reassurance than i feel from literally any other platform (gog aside)
GoG is very underrated as well.
They have positive sentiment because they haven’t enshittified much, in an industry that has embraced shit maximalism as a policy.
People would complain if they got worse. There would be people saying “at least they arent microsoft”, but they would still be held to higher standards than other companies. The fact they are more or less meeting those standards is impressive.
Also, steam integration is pretty un-invasive on the developer’s side. If steam went tits-up, everybody would just re-release elsewhere.
They were already shitty in the past. Their stellar return policy was ordered by a court and not of their free will.
Steam has actively engaged in price fixing that has ensured no other store front can offer games for less even if they could because of less overhead.
Not only do they meet the definition of monopoly by controlling over 70% of the market, they have engaged in monopolistic practices.
They are not the good guys. They just happen to have a decent product and a lot of goodwill at the moment.