Epic Games Store - the console war comes to PC

[passerby]

What was the state of online DRM/authentication before Steam? I don't remember, if Steam was on the forefront of online side of DRM.

Steam singlehandedly made it impossible to resell PC games, that one is certain.

I personally find it positive because services like Gamestop, ebay, parcel, etc. only waste money that should go to gaming industry.
Buying used games is retarded, better just pirate - why waste time and money when in both cases publisher/dev don't see a single penny from it ?

 

[groundhog]

Holy fucking shit, are you legit retarded? Epic exclusives are proven to have only a period of 1 year (6 months in case of Borderlands 3) so it's not just 'very likely', so I'm not sure why you brought it up. But the most retarded shit I read in this quote is how you proclaimed that there are (((((Steamtard))))) developers who literally 'don't want' to release their games on GOG. Just so you know, it's been thrown around for a while now that some games like the aforementioned Grimoire, Vigilantes, and Das Geisterschiff didn't get a GOG release BECAUSE THEY'RE REJECTED BY GOG. So now, name me one developers who proclaimed they don't want to release their games on GOG for whatever reasons other than GOG rejecting them or because they're not confident in being able to pass through GOG's questionable curation system.

Please tell me you're not seriously suggesting that you think the reason most games appear just on Steam but not GOG, is that GOG refused to release them?

 

[passerby]

Which publishers or developers are selling games solely on the Epic store because of the lower cut Epic takes and have not received an advanced payment from Epic?

All big publishers that don't need advance payment to complete the game would never even consider Epic exclusive if not for the lower cut, whether they received advance payment, or not is irrelevant.

 

[Infinitron]

I wonder how much backlash Epic could have prevented with this one simple fix: Any developer who signs up for exclusivity with them would be encouraged to distribute free Steam keys to owners of their game - but only at the end of the exclusivity period.

How much of the anti-Epic anger is because people get annoyed by thinking about how if they do buy a game on the Epic Games Store, they'd want to have it on Steam a year later and have to pay again?

The more I think about this, the more it makes sense.

What Epic should have done is branded their store as the place for "cutting edge games". As a gamer, you come to Epic for the newest stuff. We'll give you a free Steam key after a year, but for the first year you play at Epic. This would have given the Epic Games Store an organic, intuitive reason to exist within the gaming ecology instead of just being a Steam usurper. Just like how GOG is the store for DRM-concerned gamers, Epic would be the store for cutting edge hardcore Day 1 Purchase gamers.

Basically, instead of the exclusivity deals being merely a means to an end, they could have made them an integral part of their marketing pitch. And maybe eventually, if the sales are good enough, developers might even independently choose not to release their games on Steam.

 

[passerby]

You can't distribute steam keys without having them for sale on Steam and only like 10 - 20% of digital Steam games revenue comes from resellers and even that happens only if it's actually cheaper, or in bundle.

So, it would defeat the whole point of Epic Store which is the higher cut at the same price.

 

[Black Angel]

Please tell me you're not seriously suggesting that you think the reason most games appear just on Steam but not GOG, is that GOG refused to release them?

Then give me the name of one game not appearing on GOG for reasons other than it being rejected by GOG or because the devs/publishers is not confident in being able to pass GOG's curation system.
We already have examples like Grimoire, Vigilantes, Das Geisterschiff, and recently Wizardry: Labyrinth of Lost Souls all rejected by GOG, and I'd say that their reason are highly likely some bullshit because these games would fit right in their catalog. And it's not difficult to imagine if there's many similar games getting rejected by GOG.

Just to be clear, I want to know what games not appearing on GOG because of the devs/publishers decision, and also:
1) Not from devs/publishers who has signed exclusivity deals with Epic, because it's clear their sole motivation is money and thus not worth the attention
2) Not high-profile games developed and/or published by AAA companies like Bethsoft, Ubisoft, EA, etc
3) Not having huge multiplayer components, like Age of Empires HD Edition and Souls games, since they most likely relied on Steamworks to sustain their huge multiplayer aspect.
4) Not scam and shovelwares that flooded Steam since they opened their floodgate.

 

[Cromwell]

What Epic should have done is branded their store as the place for "cutting edge games". As a gamer, you come to Epic for the newest stuff. We'll give you a free Steam key after a year, but for the first year you play at Epic. This would have given the Epic Games Store an organic, intuitive reason to exist within the gaming ecology instead of just being a Steam usurper. Just like how GOG is the store for DRM-concerned gamers, Epic would be the store for cutting edge hardcore Day 1 Purchase gamers.

There is no reason for a "cutting edge games" store to exist because it already does. You cant compare that to GOG because DRM Free and old games was a niche that did not exist. GOG for DRM Free for everything else theres steam, for cheaper than steam on steam there are resellers. You either find a new niche that gives you an edge over steam or you arent needed. What you proposed would be the same they already did just with added insult to injury by calling yourself "cutting edge game store" as if being named todd sweeny wasn laughable enough already.

 

[Ismaul]

Dude in 2004 the DRM and required client they were forcing on people with Half-Life 2 was the cause of infinite anger. Just as much anger as Epic's shit today, if not even more. It wasn't altruism either, Valve knew what they were doing and were rewarded massively as a result.

It's entirely different.

Half-Life 2 is Valve's own game. I didn't like it being exclusive to Steam, just as I still dislike other publishers making their in-house developed games exclusive to their store, but it's a far cry from paying other publishers/devs to have them release an exclusive on your store. Valve never did that, AFAIK.

 

[Dexter]

For comparison, nobody blamed Epic for offering Fortnite only through the Epic Launcher on PC. Nor Unreal Tournament, Paragon, or when they gave away Shadow Complex.

If you look at the first few pages of this thread you could also see that most people were more curious than annoyed about what they're going to do with their game Store before both their philosophy towards consumers (they are scum, have to be put in their place and forced to use something they don't like and should have no input or voice into what they like or dislike by being disallowed to rate, review or in any other way provide feedback to games released on their store) and their business practices (bribes for Exclusivity) became clear.

 

[passerby]

Publisher starts a new platform and goes exclusive there to not pay revenue cut for digital distribution, or publisher goes Epic exclusive because of much smaller cut and/or short term credit secured by future sales.
How is one worse, or even any different then the other ? Same motivation, same result. Would you seriously prefer every single publisher capable of going on their own, to start their own store, rather then join Epic ?

The most important issue here is, the only thing that would stop any of this exclusive bussiness from happening, or even revert it, is lower cut becoming a standard and Steam won't comply without being forced to.
This is the only reason for Epic Store existence and its exclusive strategy. If nothing else, Epic Store surviving, while keeping the deal it offers to the game industry currently, will prevent even more exclusive platforms from emerging.

 

[Grauken]

Lower cut won't happen

 

[passerby]

Yes, I know it won't happen.

What remains to be seen, is whether at least for big publishers that rely on marketing, not on word of mouth to sell their games, lost sales will be small enough to not outweight smaller cut.
Big publishers know exactly how the sales curve is affected by time and price reductions. So when they release on Steam after a year, they'll be able to estimate with high accuracy whether it was worth it, or not.
Then we will either see more exclusives, or it'll be another Origin, where no one buy third party games.

Another issue are indies, especially the ones with unreal engine license and in need of cash to finish the game.
For them the difference in the cut is highest and as I broke it down few pages earlier, due to taxes and other factors they can afford to sell 30-40% less than on Steam and be no worse financially in the long run.
And if they need money to finish the game, advance payment is better then early access:
1) Advance payment are full price sales.
2) If early access is not fleshed out vertical slice, it may fail to gain attention and dillute word of mouth, causing an impossible to recover from loss in sales, or even fail to generate enough funds to finish the game properly.
So, indies that really need this money to release the game at all, may consider it worth at 50%, or even slightly more lost sales.

Epic estimates the cost of running the service and processing sales at 7%, so with only 5% cut above costs, as long as it exists, it's almost guaranteed that no other big publisher will bother with another platform of their own, this is one positive that no one can argue with.

 

[Metro]

The more I think about this, the more it makes sense.

What Epic should have done is branded their store as the place for "cutting edge games". As a gamer, you come to Epic for the newest stuff. We'll give you a free Steam key after a year, but for the first year you play at Epic. This would have given the Epic Games Store an organic, intuitive reason to exist within the gaming ecology instead of just being a Steam usurper. Just like how GOG is the store for DRM-concerned gamers, Epic would be the store for cutting edge hardcore Day 1 Purchase gamers.

Basically, instead of the exclusivity deals being merely a means to an end, they could have made them an integral part of their marketing pitch. And maybe eventually, if the sales are good enough, developers might even independently choose not to release their games on Steam.

I like how Infi only has conversations with himself.

 

[Vault Dweller]

The most important issue here is, the only thing that would stop any of this exclusive bussiness from happening, or even revert it, is lower cut becoming a standard and Steam won't comply without being forced to. This is the only reason for Epic Store existence and its exclusive strategy.

The reason for Epic Store's existence is that digital gaming market is a very lucrative business and Epic wants a slice, which is as good reason as any. If Steam's cut was 10%, Epic would still want a slice. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Holy fucking shit, are you legit retarded? Epic exclusives are proven to have only a period of 1 year (6 months in case of Borderlands 3) so it's not just 'very likely', so I'm not sure why you brought it up. But the most retarded shit I read in this quote is how you proclaimed that there are (((((Steamtard))))) developers who literally 'don't want' to release their games on GOG. Just so you know, it's been thrown around for a while now that some games like the aforementioned Grimoire, Vigilantes, and Das Geisterschiff didn't get a GOG release BECAUSE THEY'RE REJECTED BY GOG. So now, name me one developers who proclaimed they don't want to release their games on GOG for whatever reasons other than GOG rejecting them or because they're not confident in being able to pass through GOG's questionable curation system.

Please tell me you're not seriously suggesting that you think the reason most games appear just on Steam but not GOG, is that GOG refused to release them?

Some publishers might be reluctant to release on GOG due to the no DRM thing, but I don't know any indie developer who wouldn't want to be on GOG. It's the second biggest market and it doesn't overlap with Steam, so it's a guaranteed increase in sales.

 

[RolePlayer]

Am I the only person convinced that PC gamers are going to say "screw it" and borderlands 3 sales are going to take a significant hit on PC?
Everybody just assumes that PC gamers are like console gamers and the PC gaming community is going to support this epic/borderlands 3 exclusivity BS.
I think this is a huge assumption and I think it's going to back-fire on them with limited sales on PC that will impact their bottom line and result in brand/IP backlash.

 

[DalekFlay]

What was the state of online DRM/authentication before Steam? I don't remember, if Steam was on the forefront of online side of DRM.

People only care about DRM when it directly effects them in some way, and at the time Starforce was breaking disc drives supposedly and SecuROM was doing limited activations. There were other wacky activation DRMs too, I remember getting that shite sci-fi RPG Precursors and it having a 5 machine limit that didn't even give you one back when you uninstalled. If you wanted 5 more machines you had to email them and beg for it. Steam was annoying at launch, but it wooed a lot of people by being the least bad DRM out there in an age of everything becoming DRM'd.

It's entirely different.

Half-Life 2 is Valve's own game. I didn't like it being exclusive to Steam, just as I still dislike other publishers making their in-house developed games exclusive to their store, but it's a far cry from paying other publishers/devs to have them release an exclusive on your store. Valve never did that, AFAIK.

Putting aside our feelings on these things for a minute... do you think "other people" really care about this? When they have to use Steam for X number of games (many) or Origin for others, and now Epic, do you really think the average Joe PC gamer cares whether the exclusives were bought by the company or developed internally? People in this thread keep focusing on this as being a massive difference, but I don't think people care. If you want to play Borderlands 2 you HAVE to use Steam. If you want to play Borderlands 3 you HAVE to use Epic (for a while). I know you care, I get that, but does the average consumer care about the why? I doubt it.

 

[passerby]

The most important issue here is, the only thing that would stop any of this exclusive bussiness from happening, or even revert it, is lower cut becoming a standard and Steam won't comply without being forced to. This is the only reason for Epic Store existence and its exclusive strategy.

The reason for Epic Store's existence is that digital gaming market is a very lucrative business and Epic wants a slice, which is as good reason as any. If Steam's cut was 10%, Epic would still want a slice. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

If Steam cut was 10% Epic wouldn't have anything to offer and would never be able to even try to compete and what it would want, would be irrelevant. No one would have an incentive to try to break from Steam, too little to gain, too much to risk.

 

[RolePlayer]

I used to be one of those people that didn't like the steam/drm issue, but once steam started cranking out tons of really cool features, and once i learned that i could find steam keys for 80% off the retail price through 3rd party vendors and could load up old classic games with tons of mods easily through steam workshop, and i could get tons of free games through giveaways and promotions, they earned my trust by providing tons of really pro consumer features and solving problems i had as a pc gamer with a lot of 1 click solutions within the steam platform. They earned my loyalty/trust/benefit of the doubt/etc.

It isn't blind loyalty, they earned it by investing a lot of resources into their product to solve my problems as a PC gamer.

The moment they stop doing those things and some competitor comes along and solves my problems better, is the moment I'll consider an alternative. Right now one doesn't exist though. And its not even close.

 

[passerby]

GOG is the second biggest market and it doesn't overlap with Steam, so it's a guaranteed increase in sales.

GoG has a small minority of users that don't overleap with Steam, so it's guaranteed increase in sales, but it's something like 0,5 - 2% depending on the genre.

I don't know any indie developer who wouldn't want to be on GOG

Team meat, Edmund McMillen come to mind, I remember there are being a few, just can't recall them from memory.

 

[Silentstorm]

Some publishers might be reluctant to release on GOG due to the no DRM thing, but I don't know any indie developer who wouldn't want to be on GOG. It's the second biggest market and it doesn't overlap with Steam, so it's a guaranteed increase in sales.

That, and GOG has genuinely refused to put some games on the store that are generally liked, even when they are free like Heroine's Quest, and some niche genres were treated pretty badly like shumps, okay, yeah, Tyrian is awesome but CAVE games aren't good enough?

Or Kamui, or Eschatos or quite a few others.

Hell, look at Grimoire and Wizardry:Labyrinth Of Lost Souls, Grimoire at worst has a developer whose comments don't make everyone happy(insert rant about SJWS here) but Wizardry!?

I mean, yeah, it has an anime style, but it's not as if other games on GOG don't have one as well and from less established publishers at that.

Oh, and let's not forget one game worked on by someone that participates on this forum, Das Geisterschiff, that game was also just rejected.

With all of that, i can believe some developers just don't trust that their game will be accepted to begin with.

 

[Vault Dweller]

The most important issue here is, the only thing that would stop any of this exclusive bussiness from happening, or even revert it, is lower cut becoming a standard and Steam won't comply without being forced to. This is the only reason for Epic Store existence and its exclusive strategy.

The reason for Epic Store's existence is that digital gaming market is a very lucrative business and Epic wants a slice, which is as good reason as any. If Steam's cut was 10%, Epic would still want a slice. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

If Steam cut was 10% Epic wouldn't have anything to offer and would never be able to even try to compete and what it would want, would be irrelevant. No one would have an incentive to try to break from it, too little to gain, too much to risk.

The lower cut is irrelevant to the most important party here - the players. You can't have a successful store without millions of players buying new games every day.

GOG is the second biggest market and it doesn't overlap with Steam, so it's a guaranteed increase in sales.

GoG has small minority of users that don't overleap with Steam, so it's guaranteed increase in sales, but it's something like 0,5 - 2% depending on the genre.

How about 15-20%?

 

[passerby]

I thought we are talking about people that would refuse to buy a game if it was only on Steam, not about oldskool rpg players that prefer GoG over Steam when given a choice.

 

[Vault Dweller]

You can't say with certainty that if a game were available only on Steam, 98% of people who'd buy it on GOG would have no choice but to buy it on Steam instead. Same goes for Epic.

 

[RickOmbo]

EGS is superb, without them me from an alternate timeline would never touched his steam backlog. Wish I was as determined to it as he is.