Exclusive deals are bad for consumers - there's no way to frame it otherwise. And it's not like Epic paid full price for all of the games they gave away.
The only real downside for consumers is having to install Epics software. Exclusive deals tend to have a timelimit after which they can be distributed on other platforms as well. The upside is cheaper games and some badly needed competition for Steam.
They limit customer choice. Different platforms have different features and policies, which we should be able to pick between. If I want good Linux support, I go to Steam. If I wanted something else that someone else did better, I'd go there. With exclusives, that choice is gone.
