Big news today is that Fallout 76 will not be released on Steam:

https://www.pcgamer.com/fallout-76-wont-launch-on-steam/

Some people claim that next Bethesda games like Starfield, the next Doom and Elder Scrolls games also wont release on Steam. Most people probably already know EA has left Steam years ago and they have their own Origin store. Microsoft still sells some smaller titles on Steam, but their biggest games like Forza and Gears Of War are only on Windows Store. Activision did release Crach Bandicoot on Steam, but their big games like Destiny 2 and the next COD will be on Battle.net. Epic has their own platform and are not releasing their games on Steam, just like Blizzard. I'm very surprised Ubisoft still sells their games on Steam, even though they have Uplay. I think GOG would give a major blow to Steam if Cyberpunk was only on GOG, but I believe I have read they will release it on Steam too.

In the next few years, Steam could easily be left with only indie titles and smaller AA publishers that can't afford operating their own store.

I get the feeling that this is going to be a "They'll come crawling back" situation.

I feel like this as well. I think EA and Blizzard it'll work for them not being part of Steam because EA has basically monopolised sports games and Blizzard because it's always had subscription based games much like ArenaNet, but I feel like games which are more sort of short lived, I guess for lack of a better term, such as most Bethesda titles or especially WB titles or games that more likely to attract a modding community that they will tend to do better on platforms like Steam.

I would like to see Steam have less of a monopolistic hold on the pc games market tho tbh

Good. Hopefully it will give AA publishers like THQ Nordic more spotlight.

With F2P models, always online models, and a few other things going on, it makes perfect sense, especially with the whole #waifuholocaust thing that was going on there for a little bit (devs don't like the insecurity of potentially being told off, which is why we hear some devs criticizing GOG). There's also the devs who are sick of the saturated market. The problem is, there's too many devs and products, but not enough screen realestate to put your game before customers, and so some devs (especially devs with really bad games) feel like they're being treated unfairly (to be fair, some really are), so the word is: publish somewhere else, or by yourself, especially since steam's DRM isn't automatically implemented for all titles on steam (unlike what some publishers think), and cross platform issues erupt when you expect the code to work everywhere (which is why you develop in an HLL anyway). tl;dr: Steam isn't what it's cracked up to be.

On the flip side, this could be good news for consoles which were supposedly going away.

EDIT: https://www.pcgamer.com/the-biggest-issues-with-steam-in-2017-according-to-230-developers/

EDIT2: Notice Itch.io is more popular with some devs than GOG, which is saying something.

Doom Eternal will still probably see a steam release, I see fallout 76 not being on steam as a temporary at best thing, its probably to get some use out of the Bethesda.net launcher that they have had going for a while and to attract people to it, when it fails they will just release it on steam.

Also take everything read on the internet with a grain of salt, even what I said just now.

but that is how think things will pan out.
time will tell.

I refused to use any of these platforms until recently when I really wanted Stellaris. And even now, I usually just wait for it to come to GoG or skip it.

Battlefront 2 made me finally give Origin a shot. Unfortunately most of my time playing is spent on a VPN. I didn't have a problem until recently and now I can't even visit EA's basic website on the VPN. For whatever reason, they updated Origin and block all VPN connections, so I can't even play my game offline. It has offline functionality, at least they say it does, but the "Keep Me Logged In" button does absolutely nothing and I have to log in with a connection every time. If I use my hotspot on my phone to log in and try to play SP offline, it does an authentication check and closes down demanding that I not only log back into Origin, but authenticate my Origin by also logging in to EA. Therefore Origin and the games I have on it are lost to me.

This is a perfect example of screw all of these platforms and let's go full DRM free. EA basically told me to fuck off when I tried support. I bought the Elite Trooper Edition, so almost $100 for this game that I can't even play the SP portion anymore.

So no, judging by my experiences with the different platforms, I don't think Steam has much to worry about.

my thoughts exactly!

This move has been tried a couple of times before and resulted in gog and steam getting stronger and will probably keep happening. Times like these I'm glad I'm a gog gamer.

If that means I can get the stuff I do not care that much about for kind-of-free with services like Amazon Prime and (!!!) get the stuff I care about without any online DRM on a physical disk I'm in (with a major emphasis about the latter part) :P .

But no, chances are pretty good that I'd rather stop gaming altogether than going for 30, 40, 60 or whatever $ amount game streams at least in case of single player games. And I do not play more than one (or one and a half) MMO at a given time and with their constant decrease of quality/increase of greed I do not spend much there anymore either if at all.

*sigh* Since I still do not go to any online DRMd platforms like Steam, Origin, that new Beth thing or UBI it can be argued that I already have moved out of gaming already and its not for the lack of interest in the games or money to get them; although a majority of post release reviews of the modern AAAs made me sigh in relive that I saved money from a major disappointment ;)

Just an FYI it looks like Blizzard and Activision have joined forces as Battlefield 4 and destiny 2 are part of the blizzard launch software
I wouldn't be suprised if Bethesda implements it's own Blizzard like launch software for future games, their already selling junk on the CC (creation club) why go through a 3rd party when you can milk right from the teet?

I've also noticed many of the "New" releases on steam are indie, not that it's a bad thing, just saying Steam is loosing ground.

Battlefield 4 is EA...

Yep, said it from the beginning. This is the perfect game to push Bethesda.net. It's popular enough that people will find/buy it anyway, and that way they don't have to share a cut of the microtransactions with Steam, something that no doubt is a huge part of the planned future income of Fallout 76

Other than some EA/Microsoft titles, it seems that the games are not seeing release on STEAM are games with a focus on multiplayer. I wasn't going to play Fallout 76 anyway, so this doesn't affect me.

However, when I start getting pissed is if Bethesda decides to also keep singleplayer games exclusive to their platform. I was really excited about what I imagined Starfield could be. An original space setting, with all the Bethesda tropes, singleplayer experience. We'll just have to wait and see.