[donmcronald]

It's not the same. Anyone who wants to develop a SaaS offering that requires a mobile app, which is basically everything nowadays, MUST take into account Apple's App Store and the Google Play Store because almost all of the target users will have those devices.

A game developer selling an exclusive to Epic is much different. They're not gatekeeping the platform which is the PC and no one is being forced to use the Epic store for distribution to get their games on the PC.

So to get access to 100% of the market on mobile platforms, you MUST deal with Apple AND Google. To get access to 100% of the market for anything on the PC platform you MAY deal with Epic, Steam, all of the above, or self-distribution. The difference is that developers get to choose which distribution strategy and platform makes the most sense for them in terms of cost, support, target audience, etc..

It's like if Walmart and Target were the only stores in North America and most buyers only shopped at one or the other. Would "choosing" not to sell your product at Walmart be a real option at that point?