The Devs take a pay for timed exclusivity and this helps development.
This is only in the case of Indie Devs. And again, only if the deal is struck before the game is done. For any studio tied to a publisher, it’s just money up front for the publisher.
Plus, I remember the stories some Devs told of how egs tried to strong-arm them into going exclusive. Didn’t score them any bonus points in my book.
But as I said, everyone has they’re own principles.
If they had stuck with being a cheaper alternativ for Indie Devs and maybe followed it up with even more favorable deals for using their Engine and being on their platform, I wouldn’t have had a problem with them. It would have been a good strategy to compete with Valve.
Like GOG did with retro games. Tapping into something Valve didn’t focus on.
But they didn’t. It all came down to a shitty attempt at Storefront Exclusivity. And that isn’t competition, that is just removing customer choice.
I can’t actually think of anything off the top of my head. After I stopped buying AAA titles from the obvious scummy companies, pretty much everything has been at least as good as expected.