Steam Early Access seems extremely helpful for developers, especially if they're launching a brand-new game and want to get a pre-emptive sense of players' reactions. You launch an in-progress build. You make some useful cash selling to your most ardent fans. You use their feedback to iterate and improve the game before the 1.0 launch. However, in some cases Steam Early Access may be detrimental to PC game-makers - at least, that's what one veteran Valve dev, whose credits include Half-Life 2, Portal, Left 4 Dead, and CSGO, argues.
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