Other companies didn’t pay the arbitration fee so valves system was a bit better than the rest. Realistically, the consumer always gets fucked.
The point is more that Steam is getting praised for this, while it’s just to make class action lawsuits, like the one they were just served with for their anti-competitive and monopolistic behaviors, much costlier for the other party.
This is manipulation to sell more copies and nothing more.
In any case, AI voices are empowering to the Indie scene. Fully voiced games used to be exclusive to triple A gaming, indie gevs just simply can’t afford it.
I feel for the voice actors just like I feel for the translators that all had to change domaine ten years ago, but progress is progress and it’s dumb to stifle innovation to save a few jobs.
The consumer would benefit from a higher quality of games, since they would become more lucrative to make and the available budget after a successful title would be higher.
There’s also the indie scene that would benefit from every dollar. A 30% middleman tax can affect a lot more than just the price.
Cutting ceo pay is a good idea too but one problem doesn’t forgive another and regulating soft monopolies would be a first step in that direction anyways.
30% fees are insane. Those cost are passed down to us the consumer. We get shittier game because a third of the profit goes to these marketplaces.
I get the epic hate bandwagon but what the fuck is up with the constant bootlicking? Google sucks for doing this and all the other platforms as well. They ALL employ monopolistic tactics to keep their moats, stop defending them because the circle jerk tells you too.
There will be outrage, they will go back on their cloud gaming decision but not on the disk drive. Orchestrated to screw over their users while making their fans think they are being listened to.