Galewind:
Guess you don't own any EA games or bother to read anything about them:
http://www.ea.com/information.jsp
List of all the 06 AND 07 titles ea just canceled online service on in the last couple months, along with a list of previous titles they've canceled online play on.
There's xbox, xbox 360, playstation, and PC in the mix (along with some other gaming platforms).


Mark: While its true that Steam only offers similar features to people who own it, there's a not insignificant amount of people who own a steam game. Remember, half life and half life 2 are the most popular online FPS games in the world for PC. Many times more player on that than any battlefield games for instance.
http://archive.gamespy.com/stats/
Also, the reason you can communicate with anyone on xbox live is because its a common platform. Steam is also a common platform.
If developers take more advantage of steam it might be possible to grow it into something like xbox live as well. Steam is starting to sell many popular new games through its service. Call of Duty 4 for instance came out on steam pretty much the same time it was released in retail box.

This comment was edited on Dec 5, 20:28.