Realistically, how do you see this whole Epic Games Store thing ending? (Read OP)

[Shadout]

Competition is good. Sure, the methods might seem a bit aggressive, but I don't see how you could break the Steam monopoly any way else. Also, devs have some financial security siding with EGS. Why not?

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It doesn't seem that difficult (to figure out. Likely quite difficult to pull off). Sell games cheaper than Steam. And/or have features people want.
Personally I very rarely buy games directly from Steam. Why would I, when the third party stores (the legal ones) are consistently cheaper. The lack of features is a problem for Epic, but show up with better prices and I will pay attention.

 

[z1ggy]

People will calm down eventually.
The hate EGS gets is blown way out of proportion.
I remember when Steam launched and people despised it.
Today, people are begging for Steam Releases.

Competition is good. Sure, the methods might seem a bit aggressive, but I don't see how you could break the Steam monopoly any way else. Also, devs have some financial security siding with EGS. Why not?

Click to shrink...

Steam is not a monopoly or a de facto monopoly.

 

[Tbm24]

It's gonna end with EGS just being another storefront and me with a healthy library of free games. It's honestly hard to lose in this scenario if you're not that concerned with the PC gaming landscape. I just roll with whatever direction it takes and I've been that way since need multiple floppy disks to install games to cd keys to digital distribution.

 

[rumbling]

What monopolistic tactics does Steam employ?

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I see this deflection a lot. If you dont agree with it being a monopoly just think of it as "break Steam's dominance". That is what people mean when they write monopoly in these threads - no semantic discussion is needed.

 

[LewieP]

I see this deflection a lot. If you dont agree with it being a monopoly just think of it as "break Steam's dominance". That is what people mean when they write monopoly in these threads - no semantic discussion is needed.

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Or perhaps people inaccurately saying Steam have a monopoly could stop using inaccurate language?

Edit: and it's not just semantics. It's a noteworthy part of the discussion that Valve have not engaged in any monopolistic tactics (unless anyone can tell me of an example of them doing this I'm unaware of), whereas Epic are clearly seeking to employ these kind of tactics, hence Epic paying to get games removed from competing stores.

 

[z1ggy]

I see this deflection a lot. If you dont agree with it being a monopoly just think of it as "break Steam's dominance". That is what people mean when they write monopoly in these threads - no semantic discussion is needed.

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It is not about semantics, it´s about meaning.

 

[.exe]

Steam will always be the "dominant" platform because Epic's is a wallet garden.

 

[inpHilltr8r]

Knife fight between Gabe and Tim on the deck of a submarine server farm. That's the only way this ends.

 

[Metroidvania]

I see this deflection a lot. If you dont agree with it being a monopoly just think of it as "break Steam's dominance". That is what people mean when they write monopoly in these threads - no semantic discussion is needed.

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....What?

'Monopoly' definitely has a strong inference with a lot of history in said word - saying it's 'semantics' is absolutely incorrect.

Monopoly (in the context people are using it to levy against Steam) has a strong correlation with pushing others actively out of the market and keeping themselves as the only purveyor/supplier - which, if anything, Epic is trying to currently accomplish with its (timed) exclusives.

There's an argument to be possibly made regarding Valve's dominance in the space as becoming a 'de-facto' standard of sorts, but Valve allows things like key-generation, re-sellers, etc....not to mention Origin, Uplay, Battle.net, GoG, Itch.io, discord....However successful those other storefronts may or may not be, it's proof that Steam isn't a monopoly.

Saying it's a 'deflection' is just.....wat. You can't claim it's 'no semantics needed' by entirely throwing out the context of the word in question....and then just saying it's a 'deflection'.

Saying 'break up Steam's dominance and get them to be more proactive and make more updates' is not at all the same as saying 'break up Steam's monopoly'

 

[Deleted member 15440]

It is not about semantics, it´s about meaning.

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https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/semantics

 

[Queen Of Hunting]

epic will continue doing deals but as they are already doing they are looking more at crowdfunded games and stuff not just straight up aaa titles. partly i believe thats due to aaa publishers knowing the backlash, 2 poor sales (not in epic best interest to spend so much money for a deal when the sales havent been warranted in return ) *borderlands 3 is most likely an outlier in this case where it isnt a niche aaa game like exodus was/is

 

[Plum]

This thread ain't about whether Steam is a monopoly or not.

 

[rumbling]

....What?

'Monopoly' definitely has a strong inference with a lot of history in said word - saying it's 'semantics' is absolutely incorrect.

Monopoly (in the context people are using it to levy against Steam) has a strong correlation with pushing others actively out of the market and keeping themselves as the only purveyor/supplier - which, if anything, Epic is trying to currently accomplish with its (timed) exclusives.

There's an argument to be possibly made regarding Valve's dominance in the space as becoming a 'de-facto' standard of sorts, but Valve allows things like key-generation, re-sellers, etc....not to mention Origin, Uplay, Battle.net, GoG, Itch.io, discord....However successful those other storefronts may or may not be, it's proof that Steam isn't a monopoly.

Saying it's a 'deflection' is just.....wat. You can't claim it's 'no semantics needed' by entirely throwing out the context of the word in question....and then just saying it's a 'deflection'.

Saying 'break up Steam's dominance and get them to be more proactive and make more updates' is not at all the same as saying 'break up Steam's monopoly'

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Discussing over if Steam has a monopoly or not is a meaningless discussion. It doesnt matter if you think it is a monopoly or not. They have a super dominant position. What Epic is doing or what you think Epic should be doing to break Steams dominance is the exact same as if you think it is a monopoly. We could be discussing that instead of dismissing posts because you disagree with wording.


EDIT: Sorry OP. I'm out - no more monopoly discussion.

 

[Delroy]

I'm surprised I haven't seen Epic expand their "exclusive" offerings but not in the sense of buying more games for their platform. Rather, I would have or do expect them to start offering exclusive DLC/access/micro transactions for Fortnite to help encourage more people to get on-board with the store.
Edit: example would be buy x game, get access to the latest patch early (or dance or whatever you buy in Fortnite).

 

[Metroidvania]

This thread ain't about whether Steam is a monopoly or not.

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Ah - apologies. I'll let it lie.

epic will continue doing deals but as they are already doing they are looking more at crowdfunded games and stuff not just straight up aaa titles. partly i believe thats due to aaa publishers knowing the backlash, 2 poor sales (not in epic best interest to spend so much money for a deal when the sales havent been warranted in return ) *borderlands 3 is most likely an outlier in this case where it isnt a niche aaa game like exodus was/is

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Yeah, BL3 is an interesting note in that it's the first 'huge' AAA game to make the jump - but even then, it's 6 months of exclusivity, not a year - and as such, I'm super curious as to the numbers we'll (likely) eventually get from Epic.

It'll be high, no doubt, but I wonder how high.

As has been said before, the real test for Epic will be to see if they can get 'no-steam' clauses for something like RDR2 - that would be MASSIVE, but I don't know if rockstar will play ball at losing out on that audience given the GAAS-style revenue they want to make.


As for the crowdfunded stuff....honestly that's been the biggest 'poison' pill for Epic in terms of generating ill will/negativity - so while I understand the 'why' of them doing it up to this point, I honestly wonder if it will continue, as most Kickstarters, once released, haven't lit the world on fire unless they're coming from a huge name/company, such as Pillars or, more recently, Bloodstained - and even then, the well was kind of soured by Inafune and Mighty No. 9.

But to be honest, Kickstarter/crowdfunding seems like it's dying off (to an extent), and as such, I'm guessing Epic will eventually pivot to either acquiring studios and/or permanent exclusives from the formerly-crowdfunding devs.

Rather, I would have or do expect them to start offering exclusive DLC/access/micro transactions for Fortnite

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I'm a little surprised they haven't (seriously) started to try enticing people (especially their younger, less-likely-to-be-using-steam audience) to check out other games on their launcher via Fortnite tie-ins, to be honest. Something like a weapon from Hades as a skin would be easy to insert given Fortnite's update pace - albeit perhaps not the biggest 'draw' to actually check out said game, going off of Sergey's post about f2p users not transitioning to other games.

honestly, they'd be smart to do this with BL3 - give one of the Fortnite mechs the skin that the new hero uses in her ultimate ability, for example, or the 'super punch' of the new siren, something like that.

 

[Don Fluffles]

NOTE: THIS IS NOT A THREAD TO DISCUSS THE MERITS OR DOWNSIDES OF THE EPIC GAME STORE, STEAM, OR OTHER STOREFRONTS UNLESS IT IS DIRECTLY USED TO BETTER EXPLAIN YOUR OWN PREDICTION. PLEASE AT LEAST ATTEMPT TO NOT GET INTO MASSIVE PAGES-LONG ARGUMENTS UNRELATED TO THE THREAD'S ACTUAL TOPIC.

With the whole EGS debate still raging on I feel that the long term is generally something that isn't discussed as much as it really should be; as in, what do people think will happen 1, 2 or more years from now when the 'dust has settled' and a new status quo has formed. The focus has very much been on the positives and negatives to various storefronts, including the Epic Games Store, at the moment, which is fine (if done in a non-antagonistic, adult manner), but it often fails to include what the 'endgame' of each storefront is, so to speak. This thread aims to see where people believe this whole thing 'ends.'

Below are a three questions that I feel need to be answered to come to a good prediction regarding this. However there are bound to be many more questions so please bring those up if you so desire.

Question 1: Will Epic stop buying exclusives and, if not, to what extent will they keep doing it?
This has, so far, been the main way that Epic has managed to grow its own platform, with it purchasing full or limited exclusivity from developers/publishers big and small, and there is currently no signs of it stopping. However, one needs to ask themselves whether this is something that will, or can, keep happening long into the future. If you do not believe that it'll stop then the question of how much impact that will have on the PC gaming scene at large.

Question 2: Will Steam decide to lower its percentage and, if so, what will happen afterwards?
One of the main reasons for people being 'for' the EGS is that Steam is currently not as good for developers as it supposedly 'should' be. Whilst some of this is due to a belief in Steam as a Monopoly, a lot is due to the fact that Steam charges 30% for its services whereas Epic charges a considerably lower percentage. The question then, is whether Steam will match or beat Epic on this front and, if they do so, what will happen regarding things such as exclusivity, developers moving over, etc.

Question 3: Will Epic improve its service and, if so, what will the reaction be?
Whilst many of Steam's criticisms stem from a developer-focused perspective, the vast majority of Epic's criticisms come from a consumer-focused perspective. Right now the EGS lacks many features that have long since been a part of Steam and, on a more cost-based level, the inability for developers/publishers to determine their own sales or create their own keys has shown a sharp decrease in the variability of prices. So do you think Epic will change this and, if so, how will the gaming community react?

Question 4: Will Epic even be around in the long-term?
This is a question necessitated by an old dead thing called Games for Windows Live. That was created by a similarly huge company with similar growth practices (purchasing games for exclusivity on the service) but it ended up failing for a multitude of reasons. Do you think the same thing will happen to Epic's storefront?

Spoiler: Question 5

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1. They likely will when they have a high enough userbase to keep paying for their games. However, that's more likely going to happen when they make the store more user-friendly.
2. It depends on how much EGS becomes a threat to Steam's bottom line. That's likely gonna be a few more years.
3. They have dev support. If they want the revenue, however, they MUST prioritize services to the end users. All the dev support is useless if nobody will buy their games on the storefront. I repeat, a user-friendly store is Priority One. They should have had more features from Day 1 in the first place. GOG Galaxy and itch.io don't have this problem and have almost zero negative scrutiny for it.
4. As I stated, this depends on making a user-friendly store that on the level of Steam, if not better.

 

[hanshen]

People will stop caring eventually just like Uplay, Origin, Microsoft store.

 

[Alexandros]

Eventually it will reach an acceptable level of feature parity and most people won't care.

Personally, I feel like Steam needs to go in the opposite direction. For my needs, Steam feels like bloatware. So many things included I never use, feels like there's an update everyday that really does nothing to improve it, has had the same design for years etc. I don't know why people love it so much.

Click to shrink...

It's not really a mystery. The things you consider bloatware, others find useful and desirable. This is particularly relevant to OP's third question. We'll have to see if Epic will try and close the gap with Steam's feature set or if they'll prefer a thin client approach, so to speak. The problem with the second approach is that it pretty much rules out vendor lock-in. If Steam keeps adding to its feature set, which it most likely will, then this practically means that Epic will have to rely on price or on the continuing stream of exclusives to compete. Unless of course they come up with their own unique selling point.

 

[LewieP]

People will stop caring eventually just like Uplay, Origin, Microsoft store.

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Why do you think Microsoft are releasing Halo MCC on Steam rather than just on Microsoft Store?

If a game were on Uplay/Origin/Microsoft store, but also on Steam, which store do you think would represent the larger volume of sales?

I think that it would be correct to say that people tolerate those stores for exclusive games, but the majority of people would not choose to use those stores unless Steam is not an option. In cases where people would chose to use those stores, it would likely be for specific features of those stores (for example using uPlay rewards to get discounts, buying games on the Microsoft store for Play Anywhere if they also play on Xbox), or because they've been a cheaper option (as was often the case for uPlay codes vs buying from Steam for Ubisoft games where that was an option).

EGS doesn't currently have any kind of features that would make it more attractive than Steam, they just have a big bag of money with which they are able to get people to tolerate their inferior store. This doesn't in any way create a scenario where people would choose to use it if the alternative of Steam exists.

 

[Alexandros]

Knife fight between Gabe and Tim on the deck of a submarine server farm. That's the only way this ends.

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A knife fight with Gabe is something Tim should try to avoid.

https://kotaku.com/gabe-newells-knife-collection-is-terrifyingly-impressiv-5982715

 

[Jebusman]

People will calm down eventually.
The hate EGS gets is blown way out of proportion.
I remember when Steam launched and people despised it.
Today, people are begging for Steam Releases.

Competition is good. Sure, the methods might seem a bit aggressive, but I don't see how you could break the Steam monopoly any way else. Also, devs have some financial security siding with EGS. Why not?

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This post feels like its ignoring the OP's one request.

I can see Epic continuing to buy exclusives right up until Tim loses interest, because Steam has no reason to change how they operate and given the history of both companies, Epic looks like the company who'll blink first if Fortnite ever starts to fade away.

 

[Phellps]

I think people will grow tired of being so outraged about exclusivity deals, the backlash will get smaller and smaller and eventually reach "console exclusivity" levels where people hate it but ultimately just "live with it".
I think they store will also increase their ta to 30% again once they realize that running all of the features Steam has actually costs a lot.
It will become just another part of the PC gaming ecosystem.

 

[Acidote]

It will just become another storefront reasonably within standards. And I'll always refuse to purchase anything from it while they keep buying third party exclusives. No fuzz, outrage or anything. I just won't buy.

I have not bought a uPlay game for different (and app ancient) reasons yet, but I'm fine with every other store app.

 

[MegaXZero]

1. No, because it's clear from Tim's statements that he wants to hurt steam. His store is inferior, and he has made it clear he is fine if it stays that way because it's not about giving the customer a better experience. It's just going to create more and more console warring on PC, but worse since his model is to pay for games already promised on steam.
2. No. It's just not sustainable. I could see a few % points, but it will never reach epic's because that is not sustainable and is held up with fortnite money.
3. Yes but it will be long time for it to reach a level comparable to Steam. What is a long time? Anything between months and infinity. And that's a problem, especially when their roadmap is for show. But if it did, I definitely see people cooling down on the store. I know I would.
4. As long as they have big money, right now from fortnite, then Tim will continue his crusade against steam. But that money is essential, as with minimum guerrentees on games for devs, Epic would plunge if their wellspring stops providing.

This thread ain't about whether Steam is a monopoly or not.

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I agree OP, but you did bring it up in your opening post. Perhaps you want to edit that out? I think the question stands without it.

 

[kung-fu-owl]

I'm leaning to: they're here to say and I might as well get used to it.

But it's still a bit early. Who knows if EGS is worth the expenditure. Tencent and Epic got deep pockets, but they're also trying to make money. How much longer are they willing to keep pouring money into the storefront? I'm just keeping an eye on the situation.

Honestly, I wish MS would step it up with their storefront. I'm likely to keep my PC Game Pass sub going for years, I've bought some games on their storefront at a discounted rate. I'd like to be able to buy more games that way.

 

[Plum]

I agree OP, but you did bring it up in your opening post. Perhaps you want to edit that out? I think the question stands without it.

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I added it in there to give some perspective as to why people believe EGS is a good thing for the improvement of Steam. Whether or not it's true doesn't matter in this case because people are gonna believe it either way.

 

[Deleted member 56752]

I think there'll be a point in a year or two where people see how EGS benefits developers, just like Apple Arcade and Stadia. These publishers are pouring money into these devs to secure content for their platforms and that money secured their ability to sustain their company. I think if Amazon, Apple, Google, Valve, Epic, Sony, and MS all end up happy, we could potentially end up in a golden age where there are more companies than ever and jobs become more stable for the standard developer.

That's what I want. I want their stability. Because if they're stable, developers will take risks. And when risks are taken, some of the best games ever are made. Like I cannot wait to see what crazy sh double fine makes. Or obsidian, or The Initiative.

 

[ShinUltramanJ]

Worst case scenario:There's no stopping. Epic wants Steam to drop to a lower cut because they know it's not sustainable, and would hurt them. They want to take over PC gaming and with Fortnite, Rocket League, and any future microtransaction filled games they acquire - they're not going to stop short of their goal. Exclusives won't stop until they've got the lion's share of the market on PC.

Once they control the PC game market, they'll come out about how unsustainable the developer cut is, and how there's a need for an online paywall. It will be the next big war on Era and other message boards, and people who don't play on PC will appear in droves to praise Epic.

With PC conquered and piracy at an all time high, Epic will hopefully turn their sights to the console market.

Best case scenario: Epic drops the third party exclusivity nonsense and focuses on funding the development of games from the ground up. They mimic Steam by allowing more third party sites and small retailers like Amazon to actually sell Epic keys. Epic releases Epic cards that function like Steam cards, PSN, eShop, etc.
Epic introduces some new features to their store, perhaps ones we've never thought of. At that point they're a welcome competitor.

 

[Deleted member 20831]

Predictions about the store will be inaccurate until Epic Games Store publishes its income from the store and the publishers/developers who took exclusivity are able to talk about the positive financial trail of having their game on the store.

I was waiting for one year anniversary of the store front, so that the Annapurna Interactive will reveal some numbers about Ashen (Release Date Dec 07, 2018). but I realized that publisher is still active in queue for game releases on Epic Game Store and might not actually release this information.

 

[HotHamBoy]

Like ao many things it will slowly just blow over and people with accept the new status quo

 

[LewieP]

Like ao many things it will slowly just blow over and people with accept the new status quo

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Like GFWL?

 

[Metroidvania]

Predictions about the store will be inaccurate until Epic Games Store publishes its income from the store and the publishers/developers who took exclusivity are able to talk about the positive financial trail of having their game on the store.

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Honest question: If things were going well....don't you think we'd have already heard more about sales/revenue by now?

Unless part of the 'guaranteed pre-sales' has a 'no talking about how many actual sales you do until you clear it with Epic' clause (which seems quite foolish, albeit something the insanely-secrecy-prone tendency of the games industry has had in the past), if things were going 'well' in terms of actual sales, I imagine we'd have heard more devs (or Epic) praising it from the rooftops.

I don't see how 'holding back' on success stories makes EGS look attractive to a dev - unless they're 'only' after the guaranteed sales.

 

[LewieP]

Honest question: If things were going well....don't you think we'd have already heard more about sales/revenue by now?

Unless part of the 'guaranteed pre-sales' has a 'no talking about how many actual sales you do until you clear it with Epic' clause (which seems quite foolish, albeit something the insanely-secrecy-prone tendency of the games industry has had in the past), if things were going 'well' in terms of actual sales, I imagine we'd have heard more devs (or Epic) praising it from the rooftops.

I don't see how 'holding back' on success stories makes EGS look attractive to a dev - unless they're 'only' after the guaranteed sales.

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My guess would be that there is almost certainly some kind of NDA on a bunch of information related to games that have gone Epic exclusive, including things like sales figures, the exact sum being paid upfront, and other details.

 

[AcademicSaucer]

rebel galaxy outlaw is exclusive to their store and that game looks amazing, if they can get people in their ecosystem buying those games they are gonna be around for a long time

 

[Arklite]

We've already seen what happens to half-assed store fronts imposing limits on PC. They get a big 'fuck you' for many years until the stores change or fizzle out.

But for Epic, the only thing that matters is the sustainability of the Fortnite money machine. So long as that works, they'll continue their console style exclusives, but who knows to what end. Setting a precedent that long exclusive deals are normal on PC isn't to the benefit of consumer, at least.

 

[Metroidvania]

My guess would be that there is almost certainly some kind of NDA on a bunch of information related to games that have gone Epic exclusive, including things like sales figures, the exact sum being paid upfront, and other details.

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On the dev's part, I'd agree its likely, but considering Epic is the one shelling out the cash, I can't see how they would allow themselves to be also bound by said NDA if it prevented 'good' news about the EGS from getting out - at least, unless the devs are offered a 'mutual' silence clause to prevent more negative attention or something?

So either they are also bound by said NDAs (which, while possible, to me doesn't feel likely), or things aren't particularly rosy in terms of actual sales.

 

[Cecil]

Not sure how valid this "it will blow over" theory is.

I mean a lot of people still dislike Steam now as much as they did 10-15 years ago.

A lot of people still remembers Peter Molyneux talking about acorns in Fable. :) Gamers online very often just don't drop a subject or opinion.

Steam grew into a service many people wanted to use, rather then that it wore people out. While Epic talks about their client as a store client only.

If they want to appeal to people, and stop the negative taint around it, they most likely need to start selling it to customers, instead it just being something you have to use for certain games.

 

[LewieP]

On the dev's part, I'd agree its likely, but considering Epic is the one shelling out the cash, I can't see how they would allow themselves to be also bound by said NDA if it prevented 'good' news about the EGS from getting out - at least, unless the devs are offered a 'mutual' silence clause to prevent more negative attention or something?

So either they are also bound by said NDAs (which, while possible, to me doesn't feel likely), or things aren't particularly rosy in terms of actual sales.

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Oh right, yeah I was talking about devs, not Epic themselves. I agree with you.

 

[Zelda]

EGS have really got me with their free games. I now have over 20 free games in my EGS library and most of them are good. I don't see myself abandoning that. Combined with Fortnite, EGS is going to continue being successful.

 

[JoeInky]

I think if Amazon, Apple, Google, Valve, Epic, Sony, and MS all end up happy, we could potentially end up in a golden age where there are more companies than ever and jobs become more stable for the standard developer.

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I don't get this reasoning because developers already hate the fact that there are more companies than ever, there's already a load of people complaining that there are too many games on steam as it is, they don't care about a sustainable industry, they're just there to collect the easy paycheck from epic.

 

[Lothars]

I see either three possible scenarios to me the most likely is epic give up on egs when it doesn't continues to not get much traction and very few devs finding it worthwhile to sign exclusively with the long term issues with lack of sales and negatives that come along with it.


The second is Epic keeps buying exclusives and their continues to be a negative reaction but egs store barely improves and continues to just go along how it is.

The third is epic improves the store to a reasonable degree and allows for less curation but also stops buying as many exclusives because they are at the point they are hoping, I also see them raising the percentage they are getting.

I have a feeling that epic will give up eventually if they don't get the traction because they want the easy path and don't want to put the effort.

So either they are also bound by said NDAs (which, while possible, to me doesn't feel likely), or things aren't particularly rosy in terms of actual sales.

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That's where I sit and i still believe that if sales were amazing epic would be saying it every second they could.

I think there'll be a point in a year or two where people see how EGS benefits developers, just like Apple Arcade and Stadia. These publishers are pouring money into these devs to secure content for their platforms and that money secured their ability to sustain their company. I think if Amazon, Apple, Google, Valve, Epic, Sony, and MS all end up happy, we could potentially end up in a golden age where there are more companies than ever and jobs become more stable for the standard developer.



That's what I want. I want their stability. Because if they're stable, developers will take risks. And when risks are taken, some of the best games ever are made. Like I cannot wait to see what crazy sh double fine makes. Or obsidian, or The Initiative.

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I'm curious if it will give the stability to the devs long term because if they majority of the sales is the epic payment and they flounder on other storefronts than will that discourage or encourage devs to sign agreements? It's going to be interesting to see

 

[Deleted member 56752]

I don't get this reasoning because developers already hate the fact that there are more companies than ever, there's already a load of people complaining that there are to many games on steam as it is, they don't care about a sustainable industry, they're just there to collect the easy paycheck from epic.

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I don't understand why getting an "easy" paycheck is a bad thing though. The fact that the paycheck is hard kills game companies

 

[Bricktop]

Right now people are in the Anger and Denial stages, eventually they will realize that it's here to stay and Acceptance will follow. These people will be dragged along, kicking and screaming, just like I was when Steam released.

 

[Tovarisc]

EGS have really got me with their free games. I now have over 20 free games in my EGS library and most of them are good. I don't see myself abandoning that. Combined with Fortnite, EGS is going to continue being successful.

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Have you or want to invest actual € into EGS?

 

[Deleted member 22405]

They'll stop buying exclusives and be in the corner with the other launchers that aren't Steam.

 

[JoeInky]

I don't understand why getting an "easy" paycheck is a bad thing though. The fact that the paycheck is hard kills game companies

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It isn't necessarily a bad thing, I just wanted to specifically address the idea that developers would be happy with "more companies than ever", point is that when the goldrush of the EGS ends when they inevitably have to open up the store or stop buying exclusives, we'll once again start hearing stories about how hard it is to sell games on PC because of competition until some other new heavily platform appears, they don't want more companies than ever because more consumer choice hurts their bottom line.

 

[Tovarisc]

I don't understand why getting an "easy" paycheck is a bad thing though. The fact that the paycheck is hard kills game companies

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Doesn't many anything will improve. EGS is exclusive club for already very, very highly wanted titles and studios. People getting that "easy paycheck" are very carefully selected and very few get in.

If EGS ever stop this level of extreme curation then those "easy paychecks" stop existing.

So what has really changed? Already successful studios are just getting more success through Epic payoffs and struggling indie still struggles.

 

[Deleted member 22405]

I don't understand why getting an "easy" paycheck is a bad thing though. The fact that the paycheck is hard kills game companies

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This is entirely dependent on context. Buying up a game while its being crowdfunded, for example, hurts the reputation of crowdfunding.

 

[Lothars]

Right now people are in the Anger and Denial stages, eventually they will realize that it's here to stay and Acceptance will follow. These people will be dragged along, kicking and screaming, just like I was when Steam released.

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I doubt that, the situation right now is gfw and we all know how that turned out.

 

[skeezx]

They'll stop buying exclusives and be in the corner with the other launchers that aren't Steam.

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this, more or less. i mean they'll still nab exclusives and be fairly prominent but ultimately it'll be another thing that isn't steam