Epic Games Store - the console war comes to PC

[Jarpie]

Get fucked Epic Games.

 

[Space Satan]

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Not too happy about encouraging the anti-Epic drama queen camp but the Exodus numbers indeed feel off. Steamspy is useless now but it's likely Last Light sold a few million copies, two at the least. If Exodus sold 2,5 better that means 5 million copies just in a month from the release. That's gargantuan for a game like this. Those are AAA sales.

If a small fraction of Fortnite players decided to sample the new offerings, maybe. Without them, no way.

Last Light didn't sold 2 millions. Last Light Redux did. Last Light sold only 20 000 copies on steam, which makes Epic's claim of selling 2.5x more copies seem true.

 

[cvv]

Last Light sold only 20 000 copies on steam

Still too many, I heard they only sold 148 copies, all bought by the devs and their families.

 

[Belegarsson]

So a friend of mine who isn't a gamer at all in the last 15+ years, suddenly told me today on FB that there's an "interesting looking alien strategy game showed up as ad on my news feed". He sent me a pic of that ad, turn out it's Phoenix Point. He told me it kinda reminded him of Ascendancy "but with edgy marines bros and edgy aliens" (straight up from him), so he asked me how to buy it. I hold a certain hatred towards Epic Games Store but I won't be an ass and prevent him from playing it, so I decided to help. He has a PC left from his son who's in college now, shit's quite good, haswell i5, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD, the GPU (GTX 550ti) is pretty old so I bought him a new PSU and stick my leftover RX 550 into it.

The difficult part begins. Dude only uses a tablet to read news and use facebook, his business doesn't require tech efficience (at least for himself) he's completely clueless when it comes to anything related to PC. He has a gmail tied to the tablet, so we used it to set up an Epic Games Store account.

... but when I tried to register, it said this account has been used. Okay that's bizarre. I clicked forgot your password, never received any password reset mail. Sent in a support ticket, they asked us to provide proof of purchase to verify ownership (wtf we never created an account, how the fuck can we have proof of purchase of anything). Sent back another ticket, waited for like 2 or 3 days again, they finally gave us password reset link. We got it working, nice!

... then we got this "error": account disabled.

So we found out the hard way: somebody somehow registered an epic store account on my friend's gmail, probably played Fortnite on it, cheated in it and got it banned - my deduction after reading this post. We spent 4 days just to wait for support tickets for nothing.

We created a new email, new account using it. Went to buy Phoenix Point, it got SSL error or some shit at the final stage twice. We tried the third time, it worked, game now appears in library. Friend found out he just got charged 3 times, called bank, after investigating, they guaranteed money will be back within 7 days.

Buying games on the store is more challenging than playing the game itself I guess

 

[Alienman]

I think you forget to tell him one important thing.

The game is not finished. Talk about baptism of fire when it comes to PC gaming

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Wait. is Phoenix Point OUT?

 

[Makabb]

There is no war, give it a year or two and Epic will die a slow death and the 'exclusives' will be back on steam.

 

[GrainWetski]

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/artic...-the-industry-better-but-gamers-dont-see-that

Epic Games Store is making the industry better but “gamers don't see that”
CEO Tim Sweeney addresses backlash against exclusivity deals, promises human curation to block “shock controversy games” like Rape Day

It must have been satisfying for Epic Games to see the PC sales figures for Metro Exodus.

The post-apocalyptic shooter was arguably the first major new release for the Epic Games Store, and certainly the first high-profile exclusive. The company proudly declared during its GDC keynotethat Metro Exodus sold more than 2.5 times the amount its predecessor Metro Last Light did through Steam.

As we observed earlier this week, there are limits to how much this tells us about how well the store has been established, but at the very least it proves Epic is doing something right. In fact, CEO Tim Sweeney tells us the game performed, "way beyond our expectations."

"A critical challenge from the beginning has been looking at projects on Steam and asking how we can achieve those levels of success on our store," he says. "Metro Exodus far exceeded even Steam projections in sales, and this really proves that it's about the games, not about the stores."


Tim Sweeney, Epic Games

But for some in the PC gaming community, it is very much about the stores. Metro Exodus' exclusivity deal provoked the ire of devoted Steam fans, who have complained and even resorted to the usual tactic of review bombing the previous Metro games on Valve's store.

It's not the only example, either. Snapshot Games was also criticised for making its upcoming strategy game Phoenix Point temporarily exclusive to the Epic Games Store.

When asked for his take on these reactions, Sweeney reiterated the aim of the Epic Games Store is, "breaking the 70/30 stranglehold that's pervaded the industry for more than a decade," and that its methods in doing so were never going to please everyone.

"Changing the way that games are sold is a big disruption to everybody," he says. "I understand that -- I've personally unsubscribed from Netflix twice as their selections of movies changed. But this is a necessary step forward for the games industry if we want to enable developers to invest in building better games, and if we want the savings to ultimately be passed on to gamers in the form of better prices.

"Ultimately, this is about making the industry a better place, starting with the terms available for developers. I understand gamers don't see that. They don't see the hardship of making a payroll and seeing the store suck out 30% of the revenue from it. It can be jarring to see the industry is changing in ways that are typically invisible to us as gamers."

Epic isn't about to hold back on those exclusivity deals. At this week's keynote alone, it announced an expanded partnership with Ubisoft (although it's been left to the Assassin's Creed publisher to share details), plus exclusives from Take-Two label Private Division and the rights to the PC debut of Quantic Dream's PlayStation titles.

It's worth noting these exclusives aren't technically exclusive any more, with Epic partnering with Humble Bundle to enable all games to be sold on the Humble Store as well. Sweeney says Epic is also open to, "working with other highly reputable stores to enable more options as well," although this is unlikely to instantly quell the frustration that has been growing among certain Steam users over the past few months.

The CEO adds: "It's important for game developers to hold strong and sometimes be willing to go through criticism as we do things that are necessary for the industry."


Metro Exodus sold 2.5 times more on Epic Games Store than predecessor Last Light did on Steam

With such strong support from developers and publishers after the first three months, Epic Games is confident it can win over more partners -- even those, like Electronic Arts, who are trying to establish their own stores.

"The key for them is they want a direct relationship with their customers and a fair share of the revenue from their games," Sweeney says. "They build their own ecosystems because they felt they weren't getting the deal they deserved on Steam.

"The world deserves lots of stores. It's all very healthy for the industry to see lots of competition on lots of different fronts. Just look at all the gamers who installed Origins for the first time to play Apex Legends, all the Korean gamers who probably installed Steam for the first time to play PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds. Great games drive stores."

It turns out free games also drive stores, as Epic announced its first free offering -- Unknown Worlds' Subnautica -- was downloaded more than 4.5 million times during the two-week promotion, and Monomi Park's Slime Rancher is currently on track to beat it.

"The free games have been a huge success, much bigger than expected," says Sweeney. "We've gone around working with game developers and paid them for the opportunity to release their games for free for two weeks. That's brought in a huge number of new gamers.

"The wonderful thing is we're bringing in new gamers to the Epic Games Store more economically than we would if we paid Facebook or Google for ads. Instead of ads, free games are driving the store forward."

Sweeney is keen to get as many titles onto the Epic Games Store as possible, but this ambition is still tempered by the desire to offer a high-quality catalogue. Given the recent controversy over visual novel Rape Day and Valve's slow response, the Epic CEO is quick to assure such a title will never appear on his store.

"We are going to maintain a reasonable quality standard for games," he says. "It'll be open to games of all sizes, but not the junky asset flips or shock controversy games that are built just to make noise. PC is an open platform; there are lots of stores, so I don't feel like any particular store has a moral obligation to carry low quality or highly controversial projects."

Does this mean the Epic Games Store will have a greater focus on curation than Valve's marketplace, with more effort placed on monitoring what developers submit?

"Absolutely," Sweeney concludes. "This needs to be a human process that takes quality into account so the customers can trust us to supply good games."

It's the kids who are wrong.

 

[Belegarsson]

I think you forget to tell him one important thing.

The game is not finished. Talk about baptism of fire when it comes to PC gaming

That's why I installed Xenonauts for him while waiting for Phoenix Point. God bless GOG. Times like this is why I appreciate DRM free games.

 

[Infinitron]

I appreciate the honesty here - he's aware of what he's doing:

When asked for his take on these reactions, Sweeney reiterated the aim of the Epic Games Store is, "breaking the 70/30 stranglehold that's pervaded the industry for more than a decade," and that its methods in doing so were never going to please everyone.

"Changing the way that games are sold is a big disruption to everybody," he says. "I understand that -- I've personally unsubscribed from Netflix twice as their selections of movies changed. But this is a necessary step forward for the games industry if we want to enable developers to invest in building better games, and if we want the savings to ultimately be passed on to gamers in the form of better prices.

"Ultimately, this is about making the industry a better place, starting with the terms available for developers. I understand gamers don't see that. They don't see the hardship of making a payroll and seeing the store suck out 30% of the revenue from it. It can be jarring to see the industry is changing in ways that are typically invisible to us as gamers."

Will Tim Sweeney be remembered as the man who had to hurt PC gaming in order to save it? Time will tell.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

I don't see epic store games costing less than on steam.

 

[Alienman]

Yeah, what a hero!

Oh, Video games surpassed Hollywood in revenue?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

and if we want the savings to ultimately be passed on to gamers in the form of better prices.

Yeah, sure. Nobody believes this.
Weird how their cut went from 30% to 12% but the price I pay is the same.

 

[GrainWetski]

I don't see epic store games costing less than on steam.

They won't. They even cost more for some regions because Epic's cut means they can't pay certain fees since they already run the store at a loss.

Sweeney's just a cunt that's trying to destroy PC gaming. He won't succeed unless he plans to lock down every PC to his shitty store somehow.

 

[Infinitron]

15 years ago probably nobody would have believed that AAA publishers would regularly be discounting their games by 75%, but now that's normal. I'm skeptical too, but we'll see. If there is a price drop, it's more likely to occur at mid-range (the big AAAs are stuck at $60 because they have to maintain parity with console prices)

 

[Alienman]

Is he the Soros of gaming?

 

[flyingjohn]

Does anybody think this has some specific parallels with how Microsoft started buying pc dev's to make the xbox version the primary platform back in the early 2000's,just on a much larger scale?
I think it will have the same effect.
Thanks to assured sales/compensation the dev's won't care bout their genre fan base and will tr to dumb down to maximize profits.
And low epic store sales will probably lead to the same devs goign bankrupt relatively quickly and going back to begging on kickstarter/steam.

 

[Gerrard]

and if we want the savings to ultimately be passed on to gamers in the form of better prices.

Yeah, sure. Nobody believes this.
Weird how their cut went from 30% to 12% but the price I pay is the same.

Just like the removal of boxes and physical media reduced the cost of games.

 

[hexer]

Holy shit!
Epic already has 37 exclusives

https://www.gamewatcher.com/news/Epic-games-store-exclusives#

 

[Dexter]

https://techcrunch.com/2019/03/21/epic-games-ceo-says-apex-legends-hasnt-made-a-dent-in-fortnite/

Is he trying to sound like a generic Bond villain?

 

[Duraframe300]

Epic Games Store is making the industry better but “gamers don't see that”

CEO Tim Sweeney addresses backlash against exclusivity deals, promises human curation to block “shock controversy games” like Rape Day

It must have been satisfying for Epic Games to see the PC sales figures for Metro Exodus.

The post-apocalyptic shooter was arguably the first major new release for the Epic Games Store, and certainly the first high-profile exclusive. The company proudly declared during its GDC keynote that Metro Exodus sold more than 2.5 times the amount its predecessor Metro Last Light did through Steam.

As we observed earlier this week, there are limits to how much this tells us about how well the store has been established, but at the very least it proves Epic is doing something right. In fact, CEO Tim Sweeney tells us the game performed, "way beyond our expectations."

"A critical challenge from the beginning has been looking at projects on Steam and asking how we can achieve those levels of success on our store," he says. "Metro Exodus far exceeded even Steam projections in sales, and this really proves that it's about the games, not about the stores."

But for some in the PC gaming community, it is very much about the stores. Metro Exodus' exclusivity deal provoked the ire of devoted Steam fans, who have complained and even resorted to the usual tactic of review bombing the previous Metro games on Valve's store.

It's not the only example, either. Snapshot Games was also criticised for making its upcoming strategy game Phoenix Point temporarily exclusive to the Epic Games Store.

When asked for his take on these reactions, Sweeney reiterated the aim of the Epic Games Store is, "breaking the 70/30 stranglehold that's pervaded the industry for more than a decade," and that its methods in doing so were never going to please everyone.

"Changing the way that games are sold is a big disruption to everybody," he says. "I understand that -- I've personally unsubscribed from Netflix twice as their selections of movies changed. But this is a necessary step forward for the games industry if we want to enable developers to invest in building better games, and if we want the savings to ultimately be passed on to gamers in the form of better prices.

"Ultimately, this is about making the industry a better place, starting with the terms available for developers. I understand gamers don't see that. They don't see the hardship of making a payroll and seeing the store suck out 30% of the revenue from it. It can be jarring to see the industry is changing in ways that are typically invisible to us as gamers."

Epic isn't about to hold back on those exclusivity deals. At this week's keynote alone, it announced an expanded partnership with Ubisoft (although it's been left to the Assassin's Creed publisher to share details), plus exclusives from Take-Two label Private Division and the rights to the PC debut of Quantic Dream's PlayStation titles.

It's worth noting these exclusives aren't technically exclusive any more, with Epic partnering with Humble Bundle to enable all games to be sold on the Humble Store as well. Sweeney says Epic is also open to, "working with other highly reputable stores to enable more options as well," although this is unlikely to instantly quell the frustration that has been growing among certain Steam users over the past few months.

The CEO adds: "It's important for game developers to hold strong and sometimes be willing to go through criticism as we do things that are necessary for the industry."

With such strong support from developers and publishers after the first three months, Epic Games is confident it can win over more partners -- even those, like Electronic Arts, who are trying to establish their own stores.

"The key for them is they want a direct relationship with their customers and a fair share of the revenue from their games," Sweeney says. "They build their own ecosystems because they felt they weren't getting the deal they deserved on Steam.

"The world deserves lots of stores. It's all very healthy for the industry to see lots of competition on lots of different fronts. Just look at all the gamers who installed Origins for the first time to play Apex Legends, all the Korean gamers who probably installed Steam for the first time to play PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds. Great games drive stores."

It turns out free games also drive stores, as Epic announced its first free offering -- Unknown Worlds' Subnautica -- was downloaded more than 4.5 million times during the two-week promotion, and Monomi Park's Slime Rancher is currently on track to beat it.

"The free games have been a huge success, much bigger than expected," says Sweeney. "We've gone around working with game developers and paid them for the opportunity to release their games for free for two weeks. That's brought in a huge number of new gamers.

"The wonderful thing is we're bringing in new gamers to the Epic Games Store more economically than we would if we paid Facebook or Google for ads. Instead of ads, free games are driving the store forward."

Sweeney is keen to get as many titles onto the Epic Games Store as possible, but this ambition is still tempered by the desire to offer a high-quality catalogue. Given the recent controversy over visual novel Rape Day and Valve's slow response, the Epic CEO is quick to assure such a title will never appear on his store.

"We are going to maintain a reasonable quality standard for games," he says. "It'll be open to games of all sizes, but not the junky asset flips or shock controversy games that are built just to make noise. PC is an open platform; there are lots of stores, so I don't feel like any particular store has a moral obligation to carry low quality or highly controversial projects."

Does this mean the Epic Games Store will have a greater focus on curation than Valve's marketplace, with more effort placed on monitoring what developers submit?

"Absolutely," Sweeney concludes. "This needs to be a human process that takes quality into account so the customers can trust us to supply good games."

 

[CyberWhale]

Is he trying to sound like a generic Bond villain?

Has the looks to match it as well.

 

[GrainWetski]

Does anybody think this has some specific parallels with how Microsoft started buying pc dev's to make the xbox version the primary platform back in the early 2000's,just on a much larger scale?
I think it will have the same effect.
Thanks to assured sales/compensation the dev's won't care bout their genre fan base and will tr to dumb down to maximize profits.
And low epic store sales will probably lead to the same devs goign bankrupt relatively quickly and going back to begging on kickstarter/steam.

It is exactly what Microsoft did with one of those Womb Raider games for the Sexbox Cum. The same people saying how great this is for PC gaming screeched about that, no doubt.

 

[hexer]

So what can we expect from this abomination, this console war unwillingly brought upon our prestigious PC market over the years?
Higher game prices as sales dwindle over a divided market?

Is he trying to sound like a generic Bond villain?

Has the looks to match it as well.

Man, give power to the nerd and he either creates something awesome or breaks everything to shit in a second.