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Epic Games store will be giving away a free game every two weeks, Subnautica and Supermeat Boy first to be featured starting Dec 14
- Thread starter sambills
- Start date
Man. At this point there are free games given away regularly pretty much on every store.
Humble Store, GoG, Origin, Uplay, Steam... and now this.
It's starting to feel like you could keep some decently busy gaming habits just getting freebies, honestly.
No complaints here. I'll take them.
Still not buying anything from their store if I can help it.
Humble Store, GoG, Origin, Uplay, Steam... and now this.
It's starting to feel like you could keep some decently busy gaming habits just getting freebies, honestly.
No complaints here. I'll take them.
Still not buying anything from their store if I can help it.
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Steam only holds their own games exclusive. While that can be viewed as a bad thing too it's certainly not as bad as bribing games away from other clients, especially when they were already on there. Which is what Epic is doing.
That's fine, but Steam would probably not give you these games specifically for free.
Furthermore, as far as I can recall has Steam never given out games for free. So I think it's fair to say that this is the result of competition.
Had me at free. Got tied into Steam anyway due to a shitton of free games, might as well get roped into another.
I'm like 95% sure I got L4D free from Steam during some promo.
But yeah, I get that, More free games, yay. It's just that from the two gratis games announced so far we can guess at the type of free titles Epic is going to offer (unless they massively frontloaded it), that is older, critically acclaimed ones. And due to my purchasing habits, I generally either already own them (Subnautica) or never really wanted them (SMB, I cannot into these extreme platformers). So sure, I'll take Super Meat Boy and anything else that Epic throws my way, it's just I don't think they are gonna be much happy with me just cherry picking their free offerings and never spending a dime in their store (I have a lot of free games on Twitch too, due to Prime, for example)
You can also not be that salty and relax a bit. Maybe take a walk outside to get some fresh air?
Oh yeah, you could be right regarding Left4Dead actually! Although for this specific context I think it's more apt to compare 3rd party titles, since that's what Epic is offering here.
And I don't think you have to worry about just taking free games and not purchasing anything. ;) It's a marketing strategy at the end of the day and it'll probably be profitable for them.
I'm not getting another client. I avoided Galaxy, I'll avoid this. I also will not support console exclusivity practices on PC, storefronts within one platform should compete on features, not content.
But I'm going to sign up and see if the free games can run without the client. I mean. Potentially free Subnautica! :D
If they don't run without the client though, I'm just going to forget this thing exists. Their 'higher profit margin for developers' will not result in lower prices across the board, at least not to any degree that Steam can't counter with one of its frequent massive sales. And since Epic said they don't believe in sales' effectiveness, it's a fair assumption they won't be likely to run them all too often, either. The very slight potential benefit in cost on a non-discounted game between Steam and the Epic store, will not offset the inconvenience of having to have another game library client.
But I'm going to sign up and see if the free games can run without the client. I mean. Potentially free Subnautica! :D
If they don't run without the client though, I'm just going to forget this thing exists. Their 'higher profit margin for developers' will not result in lower prices across the board, at least not to any degree that Steam can't counter with one of its frequent massive sales. And since Epic said they don't believe in sales' effectiveness, it's a fair assumption they won't be likely to run them all too often, either. The very slight potential benefit in cost on a non-discounted game between Steam and the Epic store, will not offset the inconvenience of having to have another game library client.
Nice as a way to test a service, but definitely doesn't work to support an ecosystem.
Twitch is a great example. I amassed a lot of free* (*with Prime) games. Tried 1 for 10 minutes, found the service and its features / ability, barebones. Didn't use it again but kept collecting the games.
When will these companies learn to actually compete with Steam. Get better features and usability. Support the PC ecosystem in interesting ways. Prove your thought process, reliability and support of users is going to be better. Make my time playing games easier and more fun. Steam is still completely unchallenged and unbeatable right now
Twitch is a great example. I amassed a lot of free* (*with Prime) games. Tried 1 for 10 minutes, found the service and its features / ability, barebones. Didn't use it again but kept collecting the games.
When will these companies learn to actually compete with Steam. Get better features and usability. Support the PC ecosystem in interesting ways. Prove your thought process, reliability and support of users is going to be better. Make my time playing games easier and more fun. Steam is still completely unchallenged and unbeatable right now
Third party games are offered for free (to keep) on Steam at all times. What are you talking about?
And it's not even something particularly unique, since other stores (GoG, Humble Store, Twitch) do the same, while others (Origin, Uplay) did it in the past.
I will wishlist it (on steam lol). I've looked at it briefly and it seemed cool.
You're absolutely right in that they enable publishers to do so, but Steam is not responsible for these giveaways. That's SEGA giving away Company of Heroes 2.
But I just realized that they actually have been given away 3rd party games (although in limited quantities) during certain sales/events. So there's that!
I never claimed Valve was giving away these from their pockets. I wouldn't expect them to, either.
Valved did it too, in past. Portal was a freebie for a month a couple of years ago, for instance. But that's beside the point.
What? No. Not limited quantities. Where are you getting this from? These free games are periodically available for everyone on the store for a limited time window, exactly as others are doing.
It's nothing new, EA have been giving away free games "on the house" for a long time to promote their Origin store. Then they eventually stopped this year (probably because they ran out of games that could be feasibly given away without throwing out their 1st party AAA output).
In the same vein, Origin also already features PC storefront exclusivity for EA first-party titles. And, well, if Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Battlefield, Battlefront and FIFA did not succeed in making Origin a Steam-killer, then I somehow doubt that Ashen and Satisfactory will do that for Epic store.
Just look at Origin today, and most likely you're also looking at the limit of what Epic store can realistically pan out to be in foreseeable future.
In the same vein, Origin also already features PC storefront exclusivity for EA first-party titles. And, well, if Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Battlefield, Battlefront and FIFA did not succeed in making Origin a Steam-killer, then I somehow doubt that Ashen and Satisfactory will do that for Epic store.
Just look at Origin today, and most likely you're also looking at the limit of what Epic store can realistically pan out to be in foreseeable future.
Yeah, I have so many EA Origin games, and I like their storefront/game collection app. I organize everything in windows start. A box for individual games, a box for storefronts, and so many other boxes. This stuff is super easy to manage as a PC user anyway, I don't see the big deal with having different launcher. It's not a console, computer programs taught me to use things in windows, and to learn how to get around and find things as if it was second nature.
Oh, I was referring more to the part of 'try to bribe people over with cheap games ', not the 'free games' part. :P
With that I was arguing that Steam is in the position it is right now because the game sales with big discounts. Because I don't know about you, but close to 90% of my steam games were bought on Steam sales.
Oh, I think you misunderstand me.
I'm exclusively referring to a scenario where the store offers a free game at their own expense, as that is the case with the Epic Games Store.
Regarding the limited quantities, this is referring to sale events where you had a chance to win certain games by partaking in the mini-game they introduced.
So how do i pick up my free Subnautica? I've created a new hotmail and signed up for Epic store but Subnautica just says "Coming Soon" for me.
I've got nearly 1,000 games on Steam, 100+ on GoG and a ton of codes on Fanatical, Humble, Groupees but only 1 or 2 on EA & Ubi stores. By the end of the year i'll have at least 50 free games from Epic.
Picked up CoH2 for free on Steam too. Steam will always be my main store but more places to pick up sales and free stuff are always welcome :)
I've got nearly 1,000 games on Steam, 100+ on GoG and a ton of codes on Fanatical, Humble, Groupees but only 1 or 2 on EA & Ubi stores. By the end of the year i'll have at least 50 free games from Epic.
Picked up CoH2 for free on Steam too. Steam will always be my main store but more places to pick up sales and free stuff are always welcome :)
Mate you won't even buy that shit, stop pretending you care and lower the amount of salt. It's just another launcher, not PC.
We are whining about free games now boys.
I've had my fill of Super Meat Boy (though I don't say no to free) but I never got around to getting Subnautica, so that's cool.
I don't like Epic's practices of buying up exclusives, but free games are good.
It's not the 14th yet.
nice move. I think taking away already announced games from Steam is a shitty move, but Epic Store getting some traction would be great in the long term.
I seriously wonder if people believe Steam with all of it's features were developed over the space of a few months because it honestly sounds like that with the all the expectations of a new storefront matching or beating steams at launch.
Gita Jackson and co are gonna have to choose between capitalism being horrific or being awesome because Epic have Fortnite+Tencent money to throw around undercutting and buying everyone out.
People like them don't have the spine to stop using affiliate links or AdSense, wave a free copy of Hades in front of them and they'll be in Tencent's pocket until the day they die.
People like them don't have the spine to stop using affiliate links or AdSense, wave a free copy of Hades in front of them and they'll be in Tencent's pocket until the day they die.
I wasn't aware Epic came up with the idea of having their own storefront yesterday. This changes everything!