Hot take but I blame gamers stuffing the pockets of these sort of publishers by lapping up early access and pre orders. It gives publishers no incentive whatsoever to change their ways because they still have the only thing they truly care about: money.
It's absolutely the gamers. They're in a competition with Apple fans to see who will purchase literally anything a company makes. Patient gamers is where it's at. Buy the good games a few years after release with all the bugs fixed, extra content, and on sale.
with the enormous amount of old games available for trivial cost, and games like terraria, stardew valley, and deep rock galactic which cost less than a AAA title and the devs just sort of refuse to stop updating their game for free, we're at a point where dropping 70 dollars on a game is just self harm.
why place the blame on the millions of people buying the games instead of the few dozen companies making the games? do you think it’s easier to get a million people to change?
Doesn't matter what is easier or the numbers involved. Fact is power lies in the money spent by millions funneled to a dozen, making them so potent. Millions don't even need to change their ways, even a significant minority can start making bottom lines bleed like a mf.