Isn't that exactly what companies use as justification for DMCA and DRM protection?

Without those, you'd have sites full of pirated game downloads easily found through search engines. DMCA takedowns force those sites into shady corners of the internet, making them harder to find and riskier for the average user. And (effective) DRM makes users have to wait for a crack which may take weeks or months.

The result is that it's easier for the average person to just log into Steam/Epic/PSN/eShop and spend $60 to play immediately.

The point is that legal threats keep any centralized platforms that might do vetting small. That probably accounts for the vast majority of the effect. Beyond that the old fashioned "DRM" of a CD key is generally going to be more than sufficient to prevent "acts of convenience".

I'm sure there are exceptions but the usual claims take the observation about a minor speed bump and add a bunch of made up BS to justify consumer hostile practices.

Notice that there's nothing stopping a centralized darknet platform that vettes torrents from popping up. But as far as I know no one feels like bothering. That should give you some idea just how low the bar is here.

> you'd have sites full of pirated game downloads easily found through search engines.

That's literally the situation today. It is that easy. People still mostly don't pirate games though.

The reason why publishers like DRM is because it allows them to turn anything into a subscription-lite service plus tracking and advertising.

> just log into Steam/Epic/PSN/eShop and spend $60 to play immediately

You spend $60 on games? I just add them to my wish list at launch and buy them when they're 30, 20...

I have more unplayed games than time anyway.

It will never happen precisely because of anti piracy measures