How can we keep monopolies from happening when only the first company to 'new thing X' can make money at it? In some cases there are two sources, such as with smartphones but that is only because of physical hardware. At any rate, this is terrible for everyone.
Except Steam was not the first nor will be the last to create an online game store. They have been the most successful. That is a large distinction you missed.
I don't know of any before Steam that offered games from other publishers. I know there were some that seemed to only sell their own games. I'm not positive though since I was perfectly fine going to the brick-and-mortar store and buying discount or used AA and AAA games when that was still allowed and not made verboten.
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I don't know of any before Steam that offered games from other publishers. I know there were some that seemed to only sell their own games. I'm not positive though since I was perfectly fine going to the brick-and-mortar store and buying discount or used AA and AAA games when that was still allowed and not made verboten.
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I don't know of any before Steam that offered games from other publishers.
Steam initially offered only Valve games. Later they expanded to 3rd party games; there were concerns if Steam would treat non-Valve games fairly.