There is no hope of displacing a dominant storefront solely by adding marginally more store features or a marginally better install experience. Epic is on record as saying exclusives are the only way it can force a more competitive rate for developers onto other storefronts, effectively cornering itself into a place where it can't adjust its rates in favour of itself without being accused of hypocrisy. Being able to control more of the pipeline for developers using its popular Unreal Engine would obviously be lucrative, but like Sweeney himself notes, there really isn't any room for digital storefronts to actually get better at what they do. It's hard to really pin down what Epic Games' true motivations are for getting into distribution, beyond cold hard cash. Epic has also had to field rebuttals to claims that it is somehow compromised owing to megacorp TenCent's investment in the company, whose data is potentially at the mercy of the Chinese regime. The company claims that your Steam data is only stored locally, though it's still an odd, invasive practice. Only time will tell if that aspect is true, and Epic has already made itself questionable in regards to trust, considering it was caught scraping Steam data without your permission. Epic Games' window of opportunity to get into the space is shrinking fast, particularly when you consider that Apex Legends is eating into Fortnite's dominance as the go-to free-to-play shooter, diminishing Epic Games' wide audience exposure on streaming platforms.Ī bigger revenue share for developers and creators is an admirable goal, if it is indeed the goal, and not simply a gimmick that will gradually go away as Epic's store scales in size and complexity. It doesn't have a large console platform to leverage like Sony and Microsoft, it doesn't have native control of any operating systems like Windows or Google and TenCent's Android stores, and it doesn't have a bustling social platform, like Discord, YouTube, or Twitch. Truth be told, Epic Games is a total underdog, with Steam clocking in 47 million daily active users as of January 2019.Ī bigger revenue share for developers and creators is an admirable goal, if it is indeed the goal. With Google poised to deliver its own streaming platform, a resurgent Nintendo on the up and up, with TenCent and likely Amazon waiting in the wings to deliver something similar, the competition for gamer's time and attention has never been more aggressive. While larger publishers might have competitive reason for wanting to support Epic Games over Steam (to attempt to force Steam to adopt a more generous developer revenue cut), many of the smaller publishers and developers accepting Epic Games' money is very much a case of literally helping to keep the lights on. Ultimately, therein lies the bottom line. However, this is where we are, and we will continue to develop the game to the maximum of our ability. Unfortunately I can't please everyone, and I regret that we were just not in a position to consult our backers over this move. I still think the offer of a year's worth of free DLC, plus a Steam/GoG key at the end of, is a good deal for the inconvenience caused. Lead designer Julian Gollop issued this comment in response to some of the criticism.įor the inconvenience of pressing button B instead of button A to launch your game, we made a deal that helps us get over the finishing line without my staff wondering whether they will have a job at the end of it. For those who paid for the game in good faith, upfront, the broken promise has led to a huge wave of refund requests on crowdfunding platform Fig, and a whole load of discontent on the fledgling game's subreddit. Phoenix Point was crowdfunded, with promises of a Steam version to backers. Coffee Stain issued similar statements regarding the way things had been handled, noting that the situation was "frustrating" in the above video.Īnother recent high-profile bait and switch comes from Phoenix Point, which is an upcoming XCOM-style tactical game from the original XCOM creator. Satisfactory unceremoniously vanished from Steam before jumping onto Epic Games, leading to widespread confusion amongst the game's fanbase. Upcoming (rather awesome-looking) factory-building simulator Satisfactory was revealed as an Epic Games Store exclusive, despite garnering a large following on Steam as it moved towards early access.
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