[pdpi]

> Can this even happen again? Look at PCs.

PCs are precisely where you should look to see it happening. The torrential influx of shovelware on steam has made it crazy hard to dig for indie games, to the point where I’ve stopped bothering

[BearGoesChirp]

I don't have much issue finding them on steam.

Sometimes I look through new releases, and if I see something I like, try it out and review it. Yes, this is often filled with lots of bad games. Other times I look through new games on a given category, and only pay attention to the ones positively rated. This gets rid of all the shovel ware.

But most often when I am looking at a new indie game, I have gotten the recommendation from somewhere else. Often friends or reddit.

I can't think of a better system that would allow something like alpha Minecraft of Dwarf Fortress while stopping shovel ware. I've even found some RPG maker games that were great, but can be impossible to tell apart from all the bad ones. Maybe it exists, but centralized curation is not it.

Also, the current system allows those who want centralized curation to have it. You just follow self appointed curators you like. The benefit is that if you stop liking them or want to follow more than one, you are free to. You can't just pretend all the games they don't curate don't exist, which is what happens if there was a centralized curation in place.

[logfromblammo]

You could rely on word-of-mouth recommendations.

For instance, I think you should try "West of Loathing", by Asymmetric.