Steam

And thats the big divider. A fundamental schism between people who use video games as a vehicle for socializing with friends vs people who play videogames for the love of the art form and enjoyment of the genre.

The "want to play with my friends" types follow the hype train. They consume games as a social product. They go from one AAA multiplayer to the next as their social groups collective interest waxes and wanes. They buy game consoles based purely off what their other friends have. They aren't that deeply invested in the 50 years of history, industry practices, or current culture trends of games. They dont care about nerd shit like privacy and dont care about always online requirements or optimization. AAA shooters, mobas, and sports games appeal to these types.

The "art form enjoyer" types are the people who grew up with this stuff and have an intrinsic interest in game industry practices. People who played hundreds of single player games to experience a story or beat a challenge. The people who care enough to notice the constant corporate commodification ofthe art into slop and the never ending plays for control over the game you paid to own or shoving microtransactions everywhere. Its the people who will put their foot down and vote with their wallet just because of shit anticheat or always online or being unoptimized UE5 garbage. Also the type of people who will give indie games made by small developers who treat the community well while providing the opportunity to run community servers.

Theres overlap but to me it seems lot of the industries anti-consumer practices are born and bread in the triple AAA " want to play with my friends" honeytraps. Those kinds of players are the most apathetic, most willing to chase hype trains, buy the newest consoles, consume the same reheated product, willing to put aside personal philosophy and bend over backwards to take the corporate cock to play a game with friends.

But like I was a teenager once during the 360/ps3 games so I have empathy. The socialite tribal monkey instincts for connection and communication are a big driver very hard to resist. Theres nothing wrong with playing games with friends but I wish it would stop being used as an put for enabling shitty products and practices. "Sorry nerds I'm a real person who wants to play with my friends normal people ain't got time to care about voting with their wallet or having an invested interest in making sure I can play the product I paid for 10 years from now with hardware I already own" is such a common undertone justifying the apathy.

"Y'know that shit installs spyware on your computer right? You wanna play some Dota instead?"

Do you just passively accept things that your friends do, or do you actively engage in the decision making process?