Epic Games Store - the console war comes to PC

[Perkel]

I am willing to bet if humble bundle got that exclusivity you would see no outrage despite having none of "features" standard retards speak of. Because it is not about features. They know such a move will not make a dent to Steam because Humble does not have enough money to make a dent on steam.

It is about Epyc spending money for exclusivity and they are floating on money which means more games will come as exclusives to their platform which scares them. Because this could be the end of Steam monopoly. And when they will lose a lot of market share new devs will now be able to pick and choose which store offers them the best therms.

And this is what scares steam niggers. Because in that moment Steam will not be anymore automatic assumption to release their game on which means their Steam store will not get almost all games like now but part of them.

 

[Dexter]

Is Perkel ignorant

Honestly, especially from all the AMD shilling and weird posts he makes in the "Science" section, I always thought he might have some sort of brain damage. Often he manages to post things that don't really even have anything to do with the topic at hand or are just confused, incoherent or bizarre, far away from making any sort of coherent point, let alone sense although he has his spells of lucidity every now and then.

He may have retarded opinions, but you, mister "VR and Ray Tracing are the future of gaming", calling him shill is funny.

I've never used the phrase "VR is the future of gaming" and wouldn't make such a stupid prediction - I leave that "PC gaming is dead", "tablet gaming/computing is the future" stuff to the knowledgeable "journalists" and "analysts". I've actually stated that it's unlikely to replace traditional gaming, but it along with AR will play a big part in the next ~20 years though and will have gradual growth.

Ray Tracing is the future of 3D real-time rendering and will be ubiquitous in ~10 years time, as it already is in the movie/CG industry. I'd be surprised if there are still any major 3D engines that support rasterization 15 years from now, and you can quote me on that. No whining about "overpriced NVIDIA cards" or "gimmicks" will change that. This seems rather obvious and like a bit of a no-brainer for anyone that knows anything about 3D rendering.

 

[cvv]

This thread does not deserve anything else.

What does.

Spoiler

mmm oneliners are easier than I thought, maybe it'S time i act like an oldfag too

 

[Perkel]

Steam niggers watch out. Apocalypse is upon you:

https://playdauntless.com/news/epic-migration-faq

Dauntless Joins the Epic Games Store
- Dauntless accounts will be migrating to the Epic Games store this year.
- The current Dauntless patcher will be retired after all accounts are migrated.
- You will use your new Epic Games account to log in to Dauntless in the future.
- For extra questions, check the FAQ at the end of this article.

Another one. They previously had only their own site and they were planning to release their game in feature on steam.

 

[Belegarsson]

I am willing to bet if humble bundle got that exclusivity you would see no outrage despite having none of "features" standard retards speak of. Because it is not about features. They know such a move will not make a dent to Steam because Humble does not have enough money to make a dent on steam.

I'm pretty sure Humble Bundle kinda has some kind of timed "exclusives". Right now, you can only access the game Roombo: First Blood in humble trove which is granted from monthy subscription and the game will be released on steam in Q2/2019. Of course, people don't complain about it because it's humble, game's DRM free.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

That's your third post ITT, a third shitposting jumble of faux "lel look at these retards lel" oneliners. You do tend to be on the edgy/weaponized autism side but usually you have at least something caloric to say.

Nice of you to keep a count

I'm afraid shifting the blame ain't gonna work though, unless you want to clarify how "fighting anti-consumerism with bigger anti-consumerism is obviously ok for the consumers" line of reasoning makes a lick of sense.

And cut the autism thing. It's way too ironic, even for this forum.

 

[Perkel]

It is fascinating to watch whole thing happen live.
It reminds me that time when Final Fantsy XIII was announced for Xbox and whole internet almost combusted from consoletards swearing this is actually wrong choice. Pages upon pages were written with arguments upon arguments.
And now everybody just laughs how retarded those people were.

The fear of Steam losing its monopoly on PC releases really fucking scares them.

 

[Perkel]

Oh shit i somehow ommited that shit:

Nobody who currently likes Steam likes it because they are a fanboy.

They like it so much that Discord practically became #1 gaming service overnight and Steam now fearing loosing even more "tesco community" is planning to making its own Discord answer.

 

[cvv]

clarify how "fighting anti-consumerism with bigger anti-consumerism is obviously ok for the consumers" line of reasoning makes a lick of sense.

He does have something to say.

2L8 zbuj. Written a wall of text some pages back. L2R.

Now I just want to sit back and oneline about how everyone is a retard.

 

[Perkel]

dear steam niggers:

 

[J_C]

I am willing to bet if humble bundle got that exclusivity you would see no outrage despite having none of "features" standard retards speak of. Because it is not about features. They know such a move will not make a dent to Steam because Humble does not have enough money to make a dent on steam.

We can't test this theory, but I think you are wrong. Everybody here is butthurt because of the exclusivity. Developers choosing exclusivity on a platform which is worse than Steam from a customer perspective just adds salt to injury.

 

[GrainWetski]

So that makes two of them better than Epic store.
It still means steam is shit because it is last.

So is it safe to assume you will be throwing out any console you might own since Nintendough/$ony/M$ take more than(or at best, the same as) Steam then? Or are you just a hypocritical little bitch like the devs still releasing on consoles while crying about Valve's cut?

 

[J_C]

It is fascinating to watch whole thing happen live.
It reminds me that time when Final Fantsy XIII was announced for Xbox and whole internet almost combusted from consoletards swearing this is actually wrong choice. Pages upon pages were written with arguments upon arguments.
And now everybody just laughs how retarded those people were.

The fear of Steam losing its monopoly on PC releases really fucking scares them.

Difference was that FFXIII going Xbox was a good move because it gave more options to gamers. So whining about that was actually retarded. Whining about companies taking away choice is understandable.

You can spin this however you want it, but the fact is fact, moving to a worse platform exlusively is a bad thing from a consumer standpoint.

 

[Paul_cz]

I'm in a complete shock seeing what you actually are. I have never attacked you personally, I just ripped into Steam. A fucking corporation. And you came swinging, all cheek-blushed and angry.

A couple of pages ago I wrote a wall-o'-text serious, no-trolling, no-pushing-button post about the entire thing but you just repeat your low-brow, myopic BS about the eevul Epic. Epic is not the point, are you physically able to understand NOBODY loves Epic here? It's not about them specifically?

We've always got along great and I've tried to calm you down, offered peace. But if you insist on bellowing and screaming about me being moron with bulging eyes and spit on your chin because I said I hate a near-monopolistic status of a giant corporation then I'm telling you this my friend and compatriot - you ARE brainwashed. Scary brainwashed. And until you calm down and snap out of it I'm done with you.

Did you forget where you are? this is the codex. When someone posts something moronic, they get called a moron, call the other side moron, proceed with the argument and all's good because everyone knows in this place, we can insult each other without passive aggressive snark bullshit like on other forums. It is freeing, if anything.

Now, if you could address what I said - that if Epic actually competed on benefits to customers instead of the opposite, people would be perfectly fine with that - that would be swell.

I seriously think your idea that we defend steam because we are steam fanboys is moronic. It is not about steam. It is about forced artificial bribed exclusivity to the worst available store. I want games to be purchasable on gog, steam, epic, gmg, everywhere.

 

[Perkel]

There are two things here:
- short therm
- long therm
Only one of them matters and it is not short therm.

Other stores making a dent in Steam market share is great news for everyone.
And while you don't see difference now as consumer, devs already see that difference.

Soon Steam will have to for the first time ever fight for consumer, doing promotions, giving out free games and so on ON THEIR OWN instead of effectively devs paying for it.
That is how competition works.

 

[cvv]

we can insult each other without passive aggressive snark bullshit like on other forums. It is freeing, if anything.

Now, if you could address what I said - that if Epic actually competed on benefits to customers instead of the opposite, people would be perfectly fine with that - that would be swell.

Peace accepted.

As for addressing it, I have. This post has everything I have to say to this topic, as best as I can without writing a book. If you read this and still remain confused about my motivations then let's drop this boring debate already and go back talking about actual games.

 

[vonAchdorf]

Please no more free games. I estimate that half my library at Steam and GoG is free games, which are handed out like candy from all the stores.

 

[Rinslin Merwind]

Perkel calling other people "steam niggers", screaming about how people who didn't like Epic Store is "steam fanboys" and he is doing it while hysterically defending a distant corporation FOR SEVERAL DAYS, because bunch of people wasn't impressed by digital store. Talking about real fanboyism there. I must say borderline insane fanboyism, because no sane person would defend with such dedication a corporation that consist from people that barely known to this person. Or maybe I wrong and Perkel shilling, but in such unprofessional manner that if I would work in Epic Games - I would fire him outright.

 

[Paul_cz]

we can insult each other without passive aggressive snark bullshit like on other forums. It is freeing, if anything.

Now, if you could address what I said - that if Epic actually competed on benefits to customers instead of the opposite, people would be perfectly fine with that - that would be swell.

Peace accepted.

As for addressing it, I have. This post has everything I have to say to this topic, as best as I can without writing a book. If you read this and still remain confused about my motivations then let's drop this boring debate already and go back talking about actual games.

Ok, I read that now.

Steam's position on the PC market is not pro-consumer ok. It's the exact opposite.

I disagree. Yes, in the beginning steam, while useful for patches, was unreliable and barely working app. Valve have turned it into extremely useful, pro-consumer (and pro-developer) tool. OF COURSE THEY ALSO BENEFITED. But they benefited by providing useful product, which is different than what Epic is doing. Thanks to steam, we got so many japanese games on PC, for example. Humble exists. Kickstarter games were possible. All possible due to Steam's infrastructure and free key generation.

Not to mention from that moment on there have been HUNDREDS, if not zounds of third-party games exclusive to Steam. Not only you couldn't run them without Steam, you couldn't even BUY the key anywhere else.

The huge ass difference being, every single one of those third party games was put on steam because developers chose to do it, Valve never paid them anything. To me this is a huge difference compared to what Epic is doing. Also, Valve bet on the PC gaming at a time when Epic fucked off to consoles and blamed PC gamers's piracy for it. So excuse me for not being enthusiastic about Epic the big savior now.

The most fucked up hurdle for any competition is this little thing called platform lock-in/vendor lock-in. Google it. TLDR if a platform reaches a critical threshold, consumers become too dependent on it and switching comes with such an inconvenience it's almost impossible to lure people away with just the same or higher quality of services. If you have all your contacts and message history on Facebook, all your songs on iTunes, all your ebooks on Amazon or all your games and friends on Steam, you won't cross over to the competition just because they offer a better chat and smoother client UI. Not saying Epic's simplistic approach helped - they should've hit the ground running with something equally robust as Steam. But it's utterly naive to think that's nearly enough against such a cement block case of a vendor lock-in as Steam.

People are screaming their heads off because someone is dragging them from the Gaben's warm womb into some other alien, cold world. Sweeney and his gang are not stupid, they knew it'd happen. And I'm super interested how are they gonna play the PR game now. I agree they made a mistake betting on a stripped down launcher but as for the exclusives, they did NOT have a choice. And WE don't have a choice. If we want Steam to be checked by a true, full-blown competitor, there will be blood. Epic has to get their shit together fast and rethink their naked client approach. They reacted to the refund policy backlash fast so hopefully they are learning animals.

But they'll never got anywhere without being mean and poaching devs away from Steam. There will NEVER be any competition without a bloody, fierce and hopefully short war of territory. They WILL have to break the platform lock-in by dragging a critical pool of gamerdom onto their platform kicking and screaming, against their will. Just like Steam dragged people onto Steam against theirs, when they pushed through a huge backlash, claims about anti-consumerism, petitions and even calls for regulators to intervene IIRC. In two, three years Steam have built up a critical pool of users, locked them in and since then enjoyed a near-monopoly status with hundreds of exclusives in a wonderful, content silence of the lambs. Until now.

This stuff is obvious. Everybody knows it and realizes it. BUT people are complaining precisely about the things you also mention.
Epic could have chosen to compete in terms that would make people like them. They could have funded development of their own great games and provided launcher with great features. They could have finished Unreal Tournament, and not let it die. Instead they ripped off PUBG and hit a jackpot due to being first on consoles. Effectively it is money paid by morons on consoles for microtransactions in Fortnite that are now hurting PC gaming scene.
They did nothing good, instead they are bribing devs to restrict games to their client. So they can fuck off.

Now obviously, if they see the light, stop bribing developers, develop their client in useful ways, people can always come around.

btw, appreciate the slashdot link. What a blast from the past. Back in 2004, I was also suspect of Steam. Didn't like it. The moment I started liking it was the moment I first discovered the functionality of joining a friend in a game by righclicking on him in the steam friends list. So much pain in the ass went away instantly.

 

[Konjad]

Maybe sales on Epic Store will actually be high because with every game players will get a free Fortnite skin, and nobody cares about TF2 hats anymore, so Gaben has nothing on Epic

 

[agentorange]

The huge ass difference being, every single one of those third party games was put on steam because developers chose to do it, Valve never paid them anything. To me this is a huge difference compared to what Epic is doing. Also, Valve bet on the PC gaming at a time when Epic fucked off to consoles and blamed PC gamers's piracy for it. So excuse me for not being enthusiastic about Epic the big savior now.

This at least to me is one of the most important things. EPIC telling PC gamers to fuck off was at around the same time as Valve releasing the Orange Box. I think a lot of people forget how big a deal the Orange Box was, but I'm pretty sure it was responsible for a lot of people taking to steam at the time. It was three PC centric games released for a great price, at a time when a lot of other PC developers were slinking off to consoles, and Valve continued to support TF2 long after release (and this was way before microtransactions became a big thing, so a developer continually releasing new content for a multiplayer shooter was pretty novel then). Not to mention stuff like the ARGs for the release of Portal 2 and the various holiday events (which admittedly they have kind of given up on lately which is a bummer). What did EPIC do? Stop making Unreal games in favor of Gears of War (the literal originator of popamole).

Basically Valve actually took a pretty big chance with Steam, it was untested waters and they were betting on PC when other losers like EPIC ran off. So now that EPIC has made it big by appealing to braindamaged normies with Fortnite (for which they abandoned development of UT4 mind you) and has more money than they know what to do with, they come in and try to buy developers out and throw "free" games at people to try and get them use their service. No thanks.

 

[cvv]

 

[cvv]

snip

So it basically boils down to this - you believe a hopeful competitor can break Valve's platform lock-in by just offering better services. And I don't. Mainly because it has never worked anywhere. Not in such a strong case of lock-in. I don't believe any competitor can succeed without being just as aggressive as Steam was in the beginning. THAT was my whole point this whole time.

Fight for exclusives is part of rivality in many areas of business. Everywhere you look. Customers don't like it? You bet. But it's still a thing. Nobody likes a war. War still remains a thing.

Honestly, I don't REALLY think anyone has a chance anyway. I don't have much hope anyone will be ever able to lure any critical pool of PC customers from Steam. Not with better services, not with exclusive deals, not with free anal sex. Not Epic, not Microsoft, not Amazon, not God almighty himself. The lock-in is too strong. In the same way nobody will ever beat Facebook or Amazon or Uber at their own game.

All those platforms will stay the quazi-monopolies on their own turf forever. After all they've created it. It'll only change when the turf changes. When radically new services arrive. For games that'd be direct streaming I suppose. God knows when that star trek shit arrives tho.

 

[RapineDel]

If Metro devs decided to make it exlusive without Epic money no one would be kicking here because they would know Metro devs are just stupid and sooner or later they will go back to Steam.

Epic spending money is what scares steam negroes here. Because they know Metro is not the end and soon some games they actually like will end up as Epic store exclusives. So they will have to leave their Tesco Community Center and all of their Tesco awards, Tesco levels will mean nothing.

You're forgetting there's a third option here and it's the way most of us are going to go after this debacle (TPB). Why would anyone be scared if they can simply play the game for free and not feel guilty since too many parties involved have annoyed them?

I think most people looking forward to the game (Existing Metro fans or people looking for hopefully the closest thing to Stalker) wanted to give their money to 4A games, but if it means having to cave to Epic then those people will mostly wait for Steam or go straight for the torrent when it gets cracked. This isn't some decisive issue which the Codex is going with the unpopular opinion, every corner of the internet including the normally deluded Resetera are livid with this news and it's not going to be swept under the rug. In fact, if this news came out 3 months ago it might have blown over but by waiting for the last minute it's going to have a costly move on first week sales, the most important period.

Epic have got it wrong on so many levels, they're the Bethesda2018 of 2019 and it's going to cost them. There's some great things they could've done to compete with Steam, even if they wanted to have exclusives. A good target would have been assisting publishers who put out shoddy PC ports, assisting in the process to get them up to scratch, making them exclusive in the same way but being able to take credit for a great PC release. Instead they're taking games people are optimistic about, but not excited for and ensuring they'll be dead on arrival for the sole purpose of taking games away from Steam.

Epic is a cancer and it's in ever customer's best interest for them to fail, there's absolutely no positive to the store succeeding. If they succeed and take a chunk of Steam's revenue, Ubisoft, EA, Activision, Bethesda will all double down on their own launchers knowing the Steam loyalty is gone and everything will simply be divided up, it will be Steam and Epic competing for the scraps of third party games and that's about it. As I've stated previously this isn't about Steam, I think the best solution one day would be a third party hub that ensures launchers are gone, has friends lists and works across multiple operating systems. That's not happening anytime soon though so for now Steam is the best option.

 

[J_C]

The huge ass difference being, every single one of those third party games was put on steam because developers chose to do it, Valve never paid them anything. To me this is a huge difference compared to what Epic is doing. Also, Valve bet on the PC gaming at a time when Epic fucked off to consoles and blamed PC gamers's piracy for it. So excuse me for not being enthusiastic about Epic the big savior now.

This at least to me is one of the most important things. EPIC telling PC gamers to fuck off was at around the same time as Valve releasing the Orange Box. I think a lot of people forget how big a deal the Orange Box was, but I'm pretty sure it was responsible for a lot of people taking to steam at the time. It was three PC centric games released for a great price, at a time when a lot of other PC developers were slinking off to consoles, and Valve continued to support TF2 long after release (and this was way before microtransactions became a big thing, so a developer continually releasing new content for a multiplayer shooter was pretty novel then). Not to mention stuff like the ARGs for the release of Portal 2 and the various holiday events (which admittedly they have kind of given up on lately which is a bummer). What did EPIC do? Stop making Unreal games in favor of Gears of War (the literal originator of popamole).

Basically Valve actually took a pretty big chance with Steam, it was untested waters and they were betting on PC when other losers like EPIC ran off. So now that EPIC has made it big by appealing to braindamaged normies with Fortnite (for which they abandoned development of UT4 mind you) and has more money than they know what to do with, they come in and try to buy developers out and throw "free" games at people to try and get them use their service. No thanks.

This a million times!