Bear with me here.
So we got plenty of threads about how shitty Epic is, and how insufferable Sweeney, and how unfair their buyouts are, and all that stuff. Besides all of that, I can't help but genuinely like the EGS so far.
When it started, I figured it'd be something like the beginnings of Humble Store or GOG after they went past retro games. A few somewhat good games for worse pricing, along with about 90% of indie games you can literally get anywhere for a better deal. The dev percentage split seemed like a scam and of course I, along with others, snickered about the once legendary Epic Games, now known only for Fortnite and other, more forgettable stuff, opening up a game store of all things.
But by now, I'm super surprised how this venture turned out.
Despite lacking some basic options like a cart (how!) the actual content really is hot. There's not a single filler game on there, the curation seems to be really good, and you can blind-buy almost every game without making a huge mistake.
This should probably have been the first point - I really do appreciate how they don't just throw their money at the biggest stars on the market aimlessly, but seem to care about finding a good exclusive or semi-exclusive basis of well-regarded or anticipated AAA games and many, many really cool but small-ish AA-/Indie games that simply would be forgotten days after release on Steam.
You can literally see this, for example, with the fantastic Operencia, which was on Steam's main page for about its release day and then never was seen again, while on EGS it's still just a tiny bit of scrolling away from any new customer, complete with its flashy big teaser image and all. Which I also like, by the way, no incredibly off-putting text list with tiny icons, surrounded by a jizillion "community" features and other lists and whatever the fuck, the games are front and center and get all the attention. GOG did this a while ago, which sadly didn't last too long, and I really liked their launcher back then as well (it's way better again in Galaxy 2.0, which fucking owns, btw).
Despite everyone throwing fits whenever it happens, I'm super happy for all smaller devs getting a shot on EGS exclusivity, I have a feeling they're not exactly paying change for the deals, and whenever devs get more (be it money, prominence or advertisement) out of their work, that's alright with me I guess. I also obviously very much appreciate the free games and Epics handling of this in paying the devs for every sold copy. (At least that's how I understood it works). In fact, Alan Wake being scheduled for next week's freebie, after I literally just thought about how it was basically erased from Steam after it was discounted to hell and back pretty much made me think about creating this thread.
I really hope this whole thing is working as a more profitable alternative for small and medium-sized game studios and single devs, and will find a solid stone to stand on its own (and maybe with less exclusivity deals as well). Personally, I also would like the bickering in every single EGS related thread to tone down a little bit -since this probably won't happen though: If there's any dev on Era who can share experiences with this storefront, or others who don't hate it and want to discuss it apart from its games' threads, that would be good too, I guess.
anyway, enough ramblings.
So we got plenty of threads about how shitty Epic is, and how insufferable Sweeney, and how unfair their buyouts are, and all that stuff. Besides all of that, I can't help but genuinely like the EGS so far.
When it started, I figured it'd be something like the beginnings of Humble Store or GOG after they went past retro games. A few somewhat good games for worse pricing, along with about 90% of indie games you can literally get anywhere for a better deal. The dev percentage split seemed like a scam and of course I, along with others, snickered about the once legendary Epic Games, now known only for Fortnite and other, more forgettable stuff, opening up a game store of all things.
But by now, I'm super surprised how this venture turned out.
Despite lacking some basic options like a cart (how!) the actual content really is hot. There's not a single filler game on there, the curation seems to be really good, and you can blind-buy almost every game without making a huge mistake.
This should probably have been the first point - I really do appreciate how they don't just throw their money at the biggest stars on the market aimlessly, but seem to care about finding a good exclusive or semi-exclusive basis of well-regarded or anticipated AAA games and many, many really cool but small-ish AA-/Indie games that simply would be forgotten days after release on Steam.
You can literally see this, for example, with the fantastic Operencia, which was on Steam's main page for about its release day and then never was seen again, while on EGS it's still just a tiny bit of scrolling away from any new customer, complete with its flashy big teaser image and all. Which I also like, by the way, no incredibly off-putting text list with tiny icons, surrounded by a jizillion "community" features and other lists and whatever the fuck, the games are front and center and get all the attention. GOG did this a while ago, which sadly didn't last too long, and I really liked their launcher back then as well (it's way better again in Galaxy 2.0, which fucking owns, btw).
Despite everyone throwing fits whenever it happens, I'm super happy for all smaller devs getting a shot on EGS exclusivity, I have a feeling they're not exactly paying change for the deals, and whenever devs get more (be it money, prominence or advertisement) out of their work, that's alright with me I guess. I also obviously very much appreciate the free games and Epics handling of this in paying the devs for every sold copy. (At least that's how I understood it works). In fact, Alan Wake being scheduled for next week's freebie, after I literally just thought about how it was basically erased from Steam after it was discounted to hell and back pretty much made me think about creating this thread.
I really hope this whole thing is working as a more profitable alternative for small and medium-sized game studios and single devs, and will find a solid stone to stand on its own (and maybe with less exclusivity deals as well). Personally, I also would like the bickering in every single EGS related thread to tone down a little bit -since this probably won't happen though: If there's any dev on Era who can share experiences with this storefront, or others who don't hate it and want to discuss it apart from its games' threads, that would be good too, I guess.
anyway, enough ramblings.
