Region locking games, awful supports, trade restricted for some days if you don't use an authenticator, the platform is opened to all sort ot games, this could be good but it's also abused by a lot of scummy devs who release unfinished, buggy mess again and again (like Infestation or whatever is called now, or Vendetta, now not available anymore).
Yeah, Steam now looks like a harbour in which all ships can dock, but now always this is good. And I don't forget the stuff they did under christmas with the caching problem honestly.
Also paid mods (backpedal), and the CS:GO stuff last week (backpedal too).
Did you read about why they have the trade restrictions. It is pretty reasonable when considering what they detailed.
Region locking is not the fault of Valve / Steam when the devs / pubs drive that decision based on the consumers. Localised pricing is heavily exploited by many in higher priced territories seeking the cheapest deal, which devs / pubs don't like for obvious reasons. The pricing in regions like Russia / India is due to necciessity and based on the value of their currency and other commodities value for them vs western countries. It isn't viable for them to sell at such low prices everywhere, at which point when it gets exploited, they either opt for region locking or blocking the game in "low tier" countries or excessively pricing in those regions (which is ridiculous). There are terrible tactics in Europe and Australia that persist though for everything with poor currency, but that certainly isn't steam specifc
Scummy games / crap in early access / greenlight is exactly what you get with an open store front. The advantage is no bar to content, and the issues become preventing malware, scams and alike. That certainly is something Steam need to improve, but that is not something that will ever be fully fixable the way Steam is. Considering the pros and cons of the system, I'd still say I prefer Steam so long as they can filter the shit away from recommendations. Doing a tiny bit of research and no blindly pre-ordering is all one can do. Early access by its nature is a dubious concept. People that jump onto it should know the risks and have themselves to blame if they don't - the store pages are pretty clear on that.
I see no problem with back pedalling. I rather see a company admit to mistakes and reverse them than keep rolling. Part of what has made Steam great was that experimentation and willingness to try different things. However I definitely share the sentiment in the sense that much of what Valve do now is unfinished stuff that they take time to iterate on, often with a shit experience in the interim. They know it works, but they also know the customer experience is crap in that period, which is not something I like with the exception of when these are in beta and not pushed.
