[elmokki]

I wholeheartedly wish the new Dominions 3 price is under 20 usd (or eur thanks to price discrimination being so very easy). Preferably closer to 10 than 20 usd to be honest. I bet pricing like that would earn Illwinter more too, but supposedly they don't care about money. Well, yeah, there are two possible reasons that I find rational for stopping Shrapnel distribution: They want to sell more for more profit or they want to sell more so more people can enjoy the game. I bet that price elasticity of the demand for Dominions 3 is such that the optimal monopoly pricing is closer to $20 than to $30, but I can guarantee the game sells more with $20 than $50 price tag.

That said especially Steam but also Gamersgate and Desura will probabily give a hell of a lot more exposure to the game too than Shrapnel's obscure webshop.

The only single way that would make more players genuinely a bad thing is if you had to take newbies to multiplayer games due to servers being totally open - especially in very team play orientated games and public servers that is a real concern. However, in Dominions 3 you can choose who to play with should you feel like that.

More players means more players for multiplayer and also more user made content. That's just all good.