Because it's only good for the handpicked, already high profile developers they are moneyhatting and not the panacea it's been sold as for the rest of the thousands of independent developers who are fighting in a super competitive industry and also yearning free from the shackles of Steam and the supposed mountains of shit software it "promotes". It goes ignored because it has been argued plenty of times before and like most arguments in recent PC threads it falls on deaf ears.
Independent studios beefs with Valve have been lengthy and for a variety of reasons. First it was that the gates were locked and a lot of studios couldn't get in and their curation process wasn't transparent. Between the humble bundles and prominent sales there was a gold rush for what we would now consider lower or middle of the road quality games which would end up on everyone's library simply because building up a collection of varied, affordable, community driven releases was desirable. Sales were platform wide events that garnered ridiculous amounts of attention and Valve's experimenting with different models (Free to play, hats, sales achievements, rewards (including whole games) for participating and logging in daily, the marketplace, etc. etc. etc.).
Then as more and more games made it into the system competition got more fierce and sales and cheap bundle keys got abused, indies starting lamenting the "devaluation" of independent games (something they happily contributed to as long as it was insanely profitable) and asked for more curation tools. Things like the Greenlight system happened, and other multiple competing stores and models started to pop up outside of Valve. Some failed, some are still around, greenlight got abused by developers and customers alike and imperfect a system as it as, it also became a point of contention for them.
Then the doors were truly opened to allow all of those frustrated independent developers out there who were still struggling to get in, in an attempt to make the field more fair. But the downside of course is that there is even more competition and more quality games. But it's not the only thing that has happened either. In the time all of this came to be, tools and engines have made it easier for a lot of people to make quality stuff. Plenty of storied developers long in the tooth at large publishing houses left their ranks to do smaller stuff. Kickstarter and indiegogo happened. Twitch and influencers happened, where a pewdiepide figure can play a game like flappy bird and propel it to be played by millions on his popularity alone. Major developments in the industry and market make it so that sure fire hits like Audiosurf and Beat Hazard and Winterbottom and whatever Runner wouldn't stand out anymore. We have GOTY quality stuff constantly standing out from the independent market every month, and that competition resulted in fewer dollars from consumers to go around. Then the sights moved to Steam's cut, an industry standard cut that suddenly became unfair because the platform continues to grow while these guaranteed successes dried up or became subject to many other factors.
Discoverability has become an issue of a thriving industry not just for Valve, but Steam gets a lot of the stick for it instead of all the above causes for the flooding the PC and independent space has seen. Some games have suffered, yes, but if you mean to tell me that Epic's approach is "good for the industry and for consumers" because it provides economic stability to an insignificant % of already well established independent developers I have a very long bridge to sell you. If you are one of the lucky ones to get on the ground floor of their platform launch and aggressive PR moves, good for you. I don't see how that improves the industry when it's a crapshoot the developers most affected will ever benefit from it. Epic's plan is to eventually open its store for submissions and release around 150 to 200 games A MONTH. Do you think they are going to guarantee the financial well-being of all those games like they are doing for a handful of high profiles now? Do you think they will not run into the same discoverability issues? And even worse, all their plans for influencers to dictate and directly benefit from being the high profile players of the curation process will bring about a whole host of other nasty issues when it comes to healthy competition.
The market is competitive and a lot of studios won't make it even though they totally feel they are entitled to a piece of the pie. Like people love reminding us when stanning for Epic's brand of "shark" competition, this is a business. Businesses fail. No one has a guaranteed market. Good games are competing against other increasingly great offerings more and more. This perfect, smartly curated launcher where the cut is in the single digits, submission is fast and hassle free, the developer is shielded from every negative opinion, where every passionate and hardworking independent developer big and small who considers themselves worthy of the PC market's attention, who will benefit from the same visibility that AAA stuff does, that will be able find a wide audience at full price forever without involving 3rd party storefronts, is a dream that will never exist. Steam is far from perfect, but to believe moneyhatting exclusives and taking purchasing options away from consumers is good for everyone and will lead to more, better games, is disingenuous at best.
