We’re not talking about the sale that started Blizzard into this mess though.
There’s also a fair few consoles that have come out over the years and are not locked down. Steam Machines are a perfect example - and no one remembers them because they were too expensive. Why were they too expensive? Because they weren’t being financed by exclusive products that drove people to the platform to cycle sales.
Even Steam basically made its inroads via exclusivity. When Half-Life 2 came out, it felt like a terrible forced piece of software that Valve was pushing. It’s never been technical capability or CPU architecture that encouraged exclusivity - hell, half of Microsoft’s good exclusives are made in Unity or Unreal, and some of them ended up getting easy Switch ports.
Actually, everyone is in love with steam machines currently. It took Valve a bit to find the right form factor and application. But they did get there. Have you heard of the steam deck? There have been other hand held PC systems before. But Valve released the definitive gaming one. And the software is there for other hardware manufacturers to use if they like.
And you’re having some heavy misremembering of history there. Halflife 2 had Physical releases outside steam. The only console it was never on was Nintendo’s. Having releases for PS2/3, OG Xbox and 360. As well as physical releases for Windows and Mac. Correct me if I’m wrong but steam has only ever been avalible for Windows Mac and Linux. So no, Valve didn’t play exclusivity games.
If I were forced under duress to pick a gaming corporation as being the good one. Good and corporation are two words that generally don’t go together. But Valve would be one of the closest. A generally flat socialist like company heirarchy. Largely platform agnostic. And has done more than any other company to reduce lockin. Their contributions to Wine and Proton are pivotal.
We’re not talking about the sale that started Blizzard into this mess though.
There’s also a fair few consoles that have come out over the years and are not locked down. Steam Machines are a perfect example - and no one remembers them because they were too expensive. Why were they too expensive? Because they weren’t being financed by exclusive products that drove people to the platform to cycle sales.
Even Steam basically made its inroads via exclusivity. When Half-Life 2 came out, it felt like a terrible forced piece of software that Valve was pushing. It’s never been technical capability or CPU architecture that encouraged exclusivity - hell, half of Microsoft’s good exclusives are made in Unity or Unreal, and some of them ended up getting easy Switch ports.
Actually, everyone is in love with steam machines currently. It took Valve a bit to find the right form factor and application. But they did get there. Have you heard of the steam deck? There have been other hand held PC systems before. But Valve released the definitive gaming one. And the software is there for other hardware manufacturers to use if they like.
And you’re having some heavy misremembering of history there. Halflife 2 had Physical releases outside steam. The only console it was never on was Nintendo’s. Having releases for PS2/3, OG Xbox and 360. As well as physical releases for Windows and Mac. Correct me if I’m wrong but steam has only ever been avalible for Windows Mac and Linux. So no, Valve didn’t play exclusivity games.
If I were forced under duress to pick a gaming corporation as being the good one. Good and corporation are two words that generally don’t go together. But Valve would be one of the closest. A generally flat socialist like company heirarchy. Largely platform agnostic. And has done more than any other company to reduce lockin. Their contributions to Wine and Proton are pivotal.