[2021] Ghostship Games is pretty epic....but how about some love for Coffee Stain?

While I’m definitely no fan of Epic acquiring exclusivity, please don’t blame indie developers for accepting such a deal. Making games is a very costly, time consuming, and risky endeavour, and if you can alleviate that risk with a timed exclusivity deal, guaranteeing you success and continued operation - it’s downright silly not to accept it. Often the next project is very dependant on the succes of the previous one, and if you can make sure that you’ll succeed, your game will most likely also be better for it. I totally get that it sucks from a consumer POV, but it’s a safety net in a risky industry.

Yeah, but the thing is that it's not "get lots of $$$$$" it's more "guarantee stability and ensure a sensible setup for the future" in most cases. It's not a get-rich-quick scheme - it's not free money. The Epic deals are guaranteeing a certain amount of sold copies, so essentially they're offering you a set advance, that they'll recoup if the game sells. It's not extra money in any way.
Also, consider that when you make games, you're not making a single cent until people can actually buy it.
So, Epic is offering you a somewhat guaranteed success for not putting your game on Steam first. Launching a game on Steam is by no means a guarantee of success, no matter how good your game is. Discoverability is low, marketing is expensive, and there is an insane amount of games being released every day.
The worry that this game might be your last is somewhat eliminated by taking such a deal, and that is why I personally feel that there's a lot of sense for indie developers to do so. As a consumer, I think it sucks that I can't get all my games on Steam when they are released, but I will never fault the developer for choosing that stability.