Are you saying that Steam/Valve doesn't have any lock-in contracts? So, if my game is sold on Steam then I could let people 'port' it to another provider?
That would surprise me, but it would be great.
That would surprise me, but it would be great.
Or do you exclusivity contracts? There are certainly games that were sold on Steam and are now exclusively available on Epic's Store. Satisfactory is an example that comes to mind. Copies sold on steam are still honored there, so the contract probably doesn't allow you to force users off steam after the sale.
In general I'm quite amazed at how little abusive practices Valve has shown while having a quasi monopoly for such a long time. Stagnation is probably the one, if you want to count that. I hope they won't become worse under pressure. And I certainly have little trust in other companies trying to replace Steam to behave as well.