Why it should be their responsibility where at that time the games were not published by them (not sure how it's gonna work out with TEW though)? Owners happily "ate" the broken ports and gave favorable reviews. And after all these years they suddenly feel abandoned? Where they were before?
I find it absolutely hilarious, because they have been waiting years for fixes to arrive, without a lot of complaining.
The question is where were you when Nier Automata and TEW originally released on PC?
The Steam review histogram tells you everything you need to know (pay attention to the ratio of negative reviews over time and when the spikes are) - Nier Automata in particular was a shit show at launch. Complaints everywhere, negative reviews and lots of people refunding the game. So no, people did not just accept it.
What typically happens over time with bad PC ports:
- After the initial backlash dies down and when becomes apparent that the developers aren't bothering to fix their crappy port is that someone (or a group of people) will sit down and fix the game in the form of a mod.
- After the release of said mod people will start to buy the game again, especially at discounted prices and they can then have a good experience with the game
- The reviews become more positive over time due to most people using the community fixes which then leads to more people buying with confidence with the mindset of using the available mods
If the above never happens then the PC version is forever tarnished and people will treat it as such. The ideology that PC gamers just "eat" bad ports is bullshit and begs the question, do you even game on PC? You weren't here for the launch of Batman Arkham Knight when things got so bad that WB were even offering refunds to those who had bought the game via 3rd party key sellers and had redeemed the game. I know, I got one despite redeeming my key from GMG, it was unprecedented.
I know it might be hard to believe if you look at things through the lens of a console gamer, but the vast majority of PC gamers have standards and when they are not met the developers/publishers know about it. The reality is that modding community have come to their rescue more times than they would like to admit and I'm sure there's an element of "modders will fix it" when some of these guys are considering launching games in the state that they do on PC. Bottom line is that their existing customers who bought and supported their games should be taken care of and also get these updated versions. Anything less is the beginning of a scummy practice that won't do any favours for anyone involved in the long run.
The only thing hilarious here is the usual white knighting just because Microsoft are again getting heavily involved in the PC space. GFWL, Xbox Live gold for PC, UWP and now this nonsense. There's always something that you guys will leap to defend without having any prior knowledge about the platform.
Let's wait for //build.