Right, a game console, such as the Steam Machine. And unlike traditional game consoles, you have options if Sony / Microsoft etc decide to increase prices or remove games from your existing library at will. Especially now that physical discs are going away.
It’s a little better with ARM to x86 since we have fast user mode emulators now such as FEX. Of course it’s not really “native” but good enough for the Steam Frame for example.
A large proportion of games on Steam are DRM free or have minimal, easily removed DRM.
Mind you, it’s the big budget games that tend be riddled with heavy DRM and anti-cheat malware, so the proportion of a library that isn’t recoverable (without piracy) could be higher.
Sure, but that’s why they should be required to maintain it by law, or to provide some other mechanism for long term access.
People were just too dumb to understand what was so good about it.
I wouldn’t have trusted Microsoft to follow through on this in the long term. I have little doubt they would have removed that concession as soon as they thought they could get away with it.
They’re also shutting down PS3 and PSVita store access, to add insult to injury.
VMs are frequently blocked as well by anti-cheat implementations, unfortunately, so no guarantee it will work.