Their grand strategy games are a small niche of games that are too complicated for mass market appeal. The consumer promise they make is that those games will be gold standards of their small niches if they have enough time to develop a massive project. There has to be some financialisation model if you want them to sustain development long enough for a really complex model of the entire planet, since 8+ years of development costs more than the $50 you paid at release. Pick your preference:

1. More frequent sequels like other large publishers. This splits the modding community, broken systems stay broken in abandoned games, and the sequels are rushed.

2. A subscription fee like World of Warcraft. It will cost as much if not more than the DLC and you can't choose to not buy it. It won't get you anything new and major expansion packs will still probably be sold separately.

3. Cosmetic DLC only to fund feature development. I've spent too many hours on paradox games since Victoria 2's release and don't think I've ever bought one. I don't even listen to the sound in most games so I'm not going to buy more music packs.

4. The current model. It isn't as egregious as Total War, I buy maybe 1/3rd of the content DLCs based on what interests me, and Victoria 3 will be infinitely better in 2035.

5. Buying non-Paradox games instead. You end up with a dozen half-baked clones of their games that fail to do half of what the paradox game will over its lifespan. They all cost $50, have their own monetisation schemes and splintered/nonexistent mods, and they aren't as satisfying.

Any streaming service wants more for less, but anyone will buy slop. Paradox offers you an authentically Catholic spreadsheet and calls it a game. I've never been able to convince someone in my life that it is even if it's more engrossing than most shooters. Their market can only come from loyalists who want the most detailed Catholic spreadsheet possible or simplifying it for mass appeal until it's a protestant word document.