As digital distribution continues to replace brick and mortar stores, Valve's power only seems to grow with every passing year. With just over seventy-eight million active members using Steam, the company all but completely eclipses its competition despite good showings from the likes of GOG.com, Green Man Gaming and many others. You can also probably argue Origin should be counted, but any distribution platform which needs to hold new titles ransom to encourage members to join is clearly doing something very wrong. However, while Steam has well earned its popularity it's hardly without some failings, as it only takes a very brief examination to pick out several critical flaws within the platform. These range from the company's basic mindset when it comes to dealing with certain issues, to failing to truly promote latest releases. These aren't teething problems either, with many failures being systems initiated to help allow games on Steam or better player access, each is a critical flaw which will only become progressively more damaging as time goes by. Should Valve ignore them, they will only hamper its success and gradually allow for another service to gradually replace it. So here's a list of those flaws, nine critical failings which are slowly killing Steam over time.
A gamer who has played everything from Daikatana to Dwarf Fortress. An obsessive film fanatic valuing everything from The Third Man to Flash Gordon. An addict to tabletop titles, comics and the classics of science fiction, whatever media they are a part of.
