Tim at it again

Not the same thing. Imagine if Target offered an upcoming product in ads and let you pay for it ahead of time, only for Walmart to THEN buy it out as an in-store brand and refuse to honor the purchases of anyone who'd bought it from Target.

People accept when companies make something they made themselves or financed from the beginning exclusive because otherwise it would never be made. They take issue when something is already made then bought at the last moment as an exclusive.

I agree on the first point, but that's not really an EGS issue. It's a problem with the developers and publishers who accept those deals, and usually they're kickstarter based shit anyway, so I really have no respect for people who are dumb enough to "invest" in video games.

By all means, be upset at scummy devs who take these deals for a last minute cash injection. But it's weird to shoot the messenger.

Why should Epic be exempt at all for the blame? Both the devs (or publishers in many cases) and Epic are complicit.