[ye-olde-sysrq]

I think the best argument you could make to say steam is a monopoly is to say that their plan is roughly:

1. Make a platform gamers love to use so much that they will still use it even if other stores are literally giving the games away for free

2. Build a brand that your target audience recognizes worldwide and trusts with their entire game collection.

3. "Exploit" the fact that your audience loves your product and brand so fanatically that you can charge the same amount on an open platform (PC/windows/linux) that other app stores need walled gardens (apple/android - literal lockin and literal near-monopolies/duopoly) to be able to charge.

I really struggle to find a way to frame Valve as the bad guy here. It's PC. There's literally nothing stopping you from just installing as many app stores / launcher platforms as you want. And it's not all-or-nothing - people DO use multiple launchers/stores. What gamer doesn't begrudgingly have Origin and at least one of EGS or the Blizzard/battlenet launcher installed alongside steam? And yet people still use steam, and spend the most money there by far.

[vintermann]

> What gamer doesn't begrudgingly have Origin and at least one of EGS or the Blizzard/battlenet launcher installed alongside steam?

That's me! Not that I could have had any of those, as far as I'm aware. When it comes to Linux support, Steam isn't just the best, the others are actively bad.

[purpleflame1257]

I have EGS installed literally because they give away free games. But their storefront/launcher is extremely slow and buggy in comparison to Steam's.