I think the growth of social media (and consumer reviews such as Steam) is a simple explanation. Gaming mass media is full of reviewers who often do not seem p

I think the growth of social media (and consumer reviews such as Steam) is a simple explanation. Gaming mass media is full of reviewers who often do not seem particularly interested in the titles they're reviewing, and are operating in a situation where there is always implicit (and sometimes explicit) coercion from big advertisers. Would gamers prefer that or would they prefer to listen to thousands of other gamers who presumably enjoy the a game's genre and almost certainly bought the game with positive expectations? I don't think there's any real competition there. In a way it's the same problem that media at large is facing. The media had a monopoly on information for decades. The decentralization of information and access provided by the internet destroyed that shockingly quickly. And so they're left to create draws other than information itself. And I would agree this will be a good thing. I don't see any particular benefits to the centralization of information. Like any centralized system it just creates a single point of failure.