Video Game Updates

this isn't true- you don't have to update games. it's up to each individual game to decide.

Games are being updated for a lot longer these days.

I have a game on Steam; this information is not inaccurate. Although now there is a new system in place to allow for unlimited updates no matter how often.

Games were not updatable at the time of the quote, which makes an incredibly huge difference from products that can be regularly updated to fix issues.

Video games that didn’t need software updates :)

I'd classify that as a "new edition"... since they own the code and assets, I'd suppose they just rewrote the bindings between the old game logic and the new game engine, not that they patched it at the binary level.

Retroactively in terms of previous installs or in terms of already published games?

The game won't change. You still have the exact game you paid for.Except maybe with more bug fixes now that Microsoft has a justification for continued expenditure.

I bought the game. Later, a platform for building modified versions grew around it. Even later, another platform with pricetags on the modified versions appeared. All along, the game that I've bought has been gaining features for free, although I'm also free to be a traditionalist and load+play the game that I originally bought. None of this seems like something that's harming me.

The game has regular updates, so sort of.