Most applications would be fine with a button on Windows looking like a Windows button, a button on Mac looking like a Mac button, a button on Android looking like a Material Design button and a button on iPhone looking like a UIKit button.

You need consistency in the icons, layouts and concepts, but you don't need every widget to look exactly the same on every platform.

> Does Microsoft themselves build their apps this way?

I'm not sure anyone could really answer this question considering how fast Microsoft's various silos pinball between UI conventions. All of them are (I would hope) based on various iterations of their own internal tooling, but looking from Windows 7 to 8, 10, and then 11, you get such stark differences in UI language that you feel like you're looking at competing products.

That being said, I would personally very much prefer apps that are built to mimic the system they are a part of. One of the worst sins of that one, IMO, being iTunes on Windows which has always been and continues to be a flaming dumpster fire for a number of reasons, but most especially it's UI. It is a Mac app that is parked in Windows. It looks like a Mac app, it operates like a Mac app, it's UI conventions are that of the Mac, with the one major difference being they stuffed the window controls in the window in an incredibly slapdash way to account for Windows not having the system bar.

But yeah, for any marketing people here, I have not once nor will I ever give a single molecule of a shit about your brand identity. Make your software good. Ideally make it mesh with the system it's in. I couldn't fucking care less what color everything is.

Only because they change the system theme every 45 minutes.

I, for one, miss customized installers. We've kind of lost out on those what with the move to digital distribution.

Gone are the days of my friend accidentally having his volume cranked when he inserted the Red Alert 2 disc, not knowing it would blast out "WARINING! Military Software Detected!"