Epic wanted exclusives by pulling games from other platforms. I will never spend a single cent on Epic Games. I’m happy to spend it on Steam, especially games that I have pirated before (Commandos series for example) or indie games (Banished anyone?).
For bigger games such as Civilians, I’ll purchase it on Steam and then pirate so I don’t need to run Steam. I am a big fan of patches to remove the intro screen.
The fact that it’s impossible to change game on an ongoing/completed game is exactly the reason why everyone is angry. This is distortion, simple, just like the example of car being charged for miles mentioned in the article. It’s no coincidence that games are advertised as “built on …” since game engine decides how the game is built.