> We released the EA many years ago

Early access and the marketing schemes around wishlists are the most ridiculous things to me. If we really want to stand out from the crowd, do a launch like EA did with Apex Legends (I.e., announce/launch full game same day).

The game being fun is the most important thing. It's also the most unlikely thing so we shouldn't let it bother us that much when it sucks ass. There are lots of low risk/effort ways to determine if a gameplay concept is viable that don't require a decade of hopes and prayers.

Steam is the most hardcore gaming platform. It is very good at detecting charlatans. The market for asset flip low effort trash has been oversaturated for a decade now. Games like the one in the article are dime a dozen. Literally a dozen things just like this launch every single day on Steam and other platforms. You've got to be realistic about the number of participants in this market. Blaming Steam is like blaming gravity at this point.

I feel like Early Access has been doubled edged, bust mostly leaning towards great, for me.

I've gotten to have oodles of fun playing games like Satisfactory at a discount for years before they went 1.0 .

On the other hand, I've also played some games so much in early access that I ran out of interest/energy before the game released with an actual narrative (I think Subnautica and The Long Dark were like this).

But I'd say the latter problem was much smaller than the benefit I got out of playing the game early and cheap.