I don’t understand why some of you think indie gaming is somehow crucial to the gaming industry. The majority of people I know either don’t care about indie games at all or if they do only play very specific ones. I think you are massively overestimating just how much the consumer actually cares about indie games.
And imposing a fee of a few grand would also not kill indies except for the ones who have no money or times to do this properly. Just lmao at saying this would kill steam. If 90% of indie games vanished from steam right now 99% of steam users would probably not even notice or care.
EDIT: I would also like to add that even games like Super Meat boy and Brad took huge amounts of time/money to make. As a mere hobby developer, you would not be able to make even those kind of games.
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As of yet indie gaming is not important to most people because quite frankly while the gaming industry has generated some irritation it has not yet generated enough irritation to cause people to reconsider how they spend their money, although we would be remiss if we did not take into account that recently EA games created the most hated comment in reddit history.
But with that being said there is something to be said about industries being forward looking, and I am going to assume that by your presence here that you are aware that there are indeed game engines available to the public and that these game engines are improving in usability at the same time the public is becoming more and more literate in programming all the while digital assets are collecting here and there and for the most part are very accessible to the public, and it would be the mark of a very short sighted company to exclude an entire market. The very act of excluding a market could give said market the credibility it needs for consumers to begin taking notice the next time when some idiot in PR generates the next most hated comment in reddit history.
The reason why steam will publish almost any crap title right now is so that they don’t create their next competitor, Steam is winning but it is their game to lose.