lol the downvotes

"You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it."

You can buy a game license on Steam. Your only access to it is through them, you can only install and play it through their store. You need to have their program running to check your license and also probing your system to see what you are running and logging your activity. If the company so decides, they can remove your access to the game because you never bought it, they only gave you a license. This market model removes player's autonomy and keep everything locked out of players control.

Or you can buy a game on GOG. After you buy the game you don't need GOG for anything, you have full control of the installation file and can back it up however you want and install wherever you want. You can use their launcher if you want to log your activity for social features but that's optional. You bought the game and have your copy, publisher and distributor can fuck off forever.

Yet, people believe not owning and controlling the games you paid for is "better"...
(not knowing how games used to be, and what online stores have taken from you, is a tragedy)

Oh, the game is not available on GOG? That's because the publisher doesn't want consumers to have any control over the game, they want to control how, when and where you can play it, including revoking licenses if your own self-hosted private servers don't follow the moderation rules the company wants, and if you still buy it you are just keeping this anti-consumer market model viable - just like consumers made lootboxes, pay-to-win, battle passes, single player games requiring online verification, and everything that enshitified gaming viable. Market share is no metric for service quality.