this post was submitted on 17 Feb 2024
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B-BUT STEAMS MONOPOLY? MONOPOLIES ARE BAD (/s)
Not sure which part of that was sarcasm or if it was the whole thing.
Monopolies are bad, but it's hard to classify steam as a monopoly. There are a lot of store fronts out there.
Monopolies aren't necessarily bad. They're usually more efficient due to economies of scale. They can abuse their monopoly, but that's nothing that can't be fixed with a little nationalisation.
The fact that we should buy games on other platforms because steam has a "Monopoly" was the sarcasm. In a vacuum monopolies are bad, but steam is the powerhouse it is because all other options are crap, multiple store faces that you have to log into are actually annoying and not really adding anything to the average consumers life, AND Steam does more for the consumer than we could reasonably expect ANY company this far into our late stage of capitalism would do. Steams current position on the gaming market is incredibly unique and not part of the normal monopolistic paradigm, and as soon as steam enshitifies, it will lose a lot of its position
Best would be if we'd own our games and stuff outside the stores, then we'd have the option to choose where we go and maybe stay.
Well GOG already exists, and functionally so does piracy. I have zero worry about my games because even IF steam heel turns when GabeN dies, I'll just redownload my whole library and start pirating if not fully switching to GOG. Functionally the PC gaming sphere is not at risk in any way because of Valves position as PC gamers by nature are more web aware than other demographics. In fact, with the Steam Deck, Valve may actually be bringing more of the casual gaming sphere into the PC gaming market