We need to talk about how toxic discussing the Epic Games Store is when it comes to accusations and insults (Read OP and Threadmarks Before Posting)

[Fadewise]

It's just an example. The point I'm making is that sometimes you can only get a specific product at a specific store. Is it dumb? Maybe. But unless a product was promised to be available at one place before turning around and going "nah never mind" I don't really see what's the point of getting so upset.

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The metaphor to purchasing physical goods from one particular store breaks down as soon as you dig a little deeper into whats' actually involved in purchasing a digital license from a particular storefront though. Sure, I can only get those tacos from Taco Bell, but once I have them I'm not restricted to only eating them with on Taco Bell produced plates and then crapping them out on a Taco Bell sanctioned toilet. If I want to eat Taco Bell soft tacos with special sauce from McDonalds and a Wendy's Frosty to drink, i can mix and match them and do whatever I want with them once I get them home. Not so with a digital game, as the ongoing process of playing it is tied to the storefront that it was purchased on. Modern storefront/launchers represent an entire ecosystem, and it's the fragmentation of that ecosystem that a lot of people are upset at.

 

[Conkerkid11]

Why do people care about EGS so damn mic

whats the debate? What are we ever debating?

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Is this post satire?

 

[Border]

Modern storefront/launchers represent an entire ecosystem, and it's the fragmentation of that ecosystem that a lot of people are upset at.

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The ecosystem was already fragmented before Epic arrived though. It seems like people were largely okay with Origin, UPlay, Battle.Net, League of Legends launcher, etc but for whatever reason EGS is untenable -- even though the EGS has predominatly timed exclusives, while titles like Diablo and Battlefield are permanent and forever exclusive.

 

[Pixieking]

The ecosystem was already fragmented before Epic arrived though. It seems like people were largely okay with Origin, UPlay, Battle.Net, League of Legends launcher, etc but for whatever reason EGS is untenable -- even though the EGS has predominatly timed exclusives, while titles like Diablo and Battlefield are permanent and forever exclusive.

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Because first-party titles are different to third party titles.

 

[Lothars]

The ecosystem was already fragmented before Epic arrived though. It seems like people were largely okay with Origin, UPlay, Battle.Net, League of Legends launcher, etc but for whatever reason EGS is untenable -- even though the EGS has predominatly timed exclusives, while titles like Diablo and Battlefield are permanent and forever exclusive.

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there's a difference and it's not hard to see what that is hmm maybe it's the games you listed are first party games that those devs make themselves. Nobody has an issue with Fortnite on EGS but we certainly do when epic buys exclusivity to keep it off steam. I swear arguments like you are making don't make any sense.

 

[True Prophecy]

The ecosystem was already fragmented before Epic arrived though. It seems like people were largely okay with Origin, UPlay, Battle.Net, League of Legends launcher, etc but for whatever reason EGS is untenable -- even though the EGS has predominatly timed exclusives, while titles like Diablo and Battlefield are permanent and forever exclusive.

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Blizzard made Diablo and is well within their rights to keep it on their store if they want. Same with EA and battlefield it's their own studio made for them.

3rd party exclusives are shit imo on consoles PC's and whatever else.

Unless they (like Spiderman ps4) are co developed from the start.

Also none of those storefronts are imposing themselves as the "saviour" of PC gaming

 

[Jobbs]

People talk past eachother so much. I think when Schreier or anyone else says some version of "it's just a launcher" they're not saying you're obligated to use it. They don't care if you use it or not. They're just asking for a sense of perspective and proportionality when we consider people are using this topic as a reason to harrass, insult, and belittle, and even threaten eachother.

When a game takes a publishing deal with EGS your two choices are be mildly inconvenienced by installing a different launcher with less features, or pass on that game initially. You may not ultimately love either of those options, but those are your options, and all things considered it's not worth calling devs "trash" over. It's not worth editing images of discord messages to make devs look bad. It's not worth threatening and harrassing. It's also not a sign that PC gaming is dying. Did you know that there didn't used to be any launchers at all? So you didn't just have less features than steam, you had no features. You had c:\starcontrol2\melee.exe. That's what you had. Gaming is in the best place it's ever been -- we're in a golden age of gaming, with more choice and value than ever before, and even if somehow EGS took every game from steam and steam died and we entered this post-steam hellscape that some people seem to be fearing things would still be better than they were in the past.

So no one is saying you have to use a launcher or are obligated to use a launcher. You can buy or not buy any product you want for any reason and I won't care one way or another. My reason for being flustered with all of this is because it's such a shitty reason to become toxic.

 

[Dog of Bork]

Did you know that there didn't used to be any launchers at all? So you didn't just have less features than steam, you had no features. You had c:\starcontrol2\melee.exe. That's what you had. Gaming is in the best place it's ever been -- we're in a golden age of gaming, with more choice and value than ever before, and even if somehow EGS took every game from steam and steam died and we entered this post-steam hellscape that some people seem to be fearing things would still be better than they were in the past.

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Lmao this has to be satire.

"It could be worse" is such a weak response to the concern that EGS is a step backwards. Just because Epic isn't going to replace all of our computers with Pentium 4 monstrosities, we should just keep quiet.

Regression is still regression. Better than 20 years ago is still worse.

 

[True Prophecy]

People talk past eachother so much. I think when Schreier or anyone else says some version of "it's just a launcher" they're not saying you're obligated to use it. They don't care if you use it or not. They're just asking for a sense of perspective and proportionality when we consider people are using this topic as a reason to harrass, insult, and belittle, and even threaten eachother.

When a game takes a publishing deal with EGS your two choices are be mildly inconvenienced by installing a different launcher with less features, or pass on that game initially. You may not ultimately love either of those options, but those are your options, and all things considered it's not worth calling devs "trash" over. It's not worth editing images of discord messages to make devs look bad. It's not worth threatening and harrassing. It's also not a sign that PC gaming is dying. Did you know that there didn't used to be any launchers at all? So you didn't just have less features than steam, you had no features. You had c:\starcontrol2\melee.exe. That's what you had. Gaming is in the best place it's ever been -- we're in a golden age of gaming, with more choice and value than ever before, and even if somehow EGS took every game from steam and steam died and we entered this post-steam hellscape that some people seem to be fearing things would still be better than they were in the past.

So no one is saying you have to use a launcher or are obligated to use a launcher. You can buy or not buy any product you want for any reason and I won't care one way or another. My reason for being flustered with all of this is because it's such a shitty reason to become toxic.

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Your right about not being toxic about it. But some seem to conflate toxic with disagreement.

I don't think people should harass anyone but EPIC as a company isn't a real person it's a corporation so that's free game to call it trash imo.

Developers that treat people like trash should be called out for doing the wrong thing as much as posters doing it imo.

Being a small Indy team does not mean you get to start fights surely?

I personally would take nothing over EGS because for me it's not about the stores I use all other ones even the terrible Bethesda Store app for me it's fundemantally how epic conducts business how they strong arm the industry how they operate and how they then talk down to us consumers like it's all one big favour.

The Devs are free to take all of epics money they want I'm ok to wait even if its sad I want to wait longer or I sometimes will straight up buy it on console if that's an option.

I have less opinions of publishers that take the deals because it's usually done to line the publisher pocket and the developers get little choice in the matter.

We will always have people that go too far on any disagreement and it sucks and we as a forum here should try to do better even if the larger internet doesn't.

Gamergate really fucked everything for nuance discussions about topics that people don't agree with and the back and forth prodding over the years has festered in people's minds.

 

[Jobbs]

Lmao this has to be satire.

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Did you have some particular reason for disliking this passage? Thank you for the well reasoned response.

 

[Woodbeam]

What about people who simply don't care if a game is exclusive or not. People who assign 0 value to a game being exclusive, and don't understand why someone else would care so much over a disposable form of entertainment because it matters absolutely not at all to them? Are they trolling because they find no inherent value in a game being on a specific platform or not?

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Are you describing yourself here?

 

[Dog of Bork]

Did you have some particular reason for disliking this passage? Thank you for the well reasoned response.

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See my edit.

 

[Jobbs]

Your right about not being toxic about it. But some seem to conflate toxic with disagreement.

I don't think people should harass anyone but EPIC as a company isn't a real person it's a corporation so that's free game to call it trash imo.

Developers that treat people like trash should be called out for doing the wrong thing as much as posters doing it imo.

Being a small Indy team does not mean you get to start fights surely?

I personally would take nothing over EGS because for me it's not about the stores I use all other ones even the terrible Bethesda Store app for me it's fundemantally how epic conducts business how they strong arm the industry how they operate and how they then talk down to us consumers like it's all one big favour.

The Devs are free to take all of epics money they want I'm ok to wait even if its sad I want to wait longer or I sometimes will straight up buy it on console if that's an option.

I have less opinions of publishers that take the deals because it's usually done to line the publisher pocket and the developers get little choice in the matter.

We will always have people that go too far on any disagreement and it sucks and we as a forum here should try to do better even if the larger internet doesn't.

Gamergate really fucked everything for nuance discussions about topics that people don't agree with and the back and forth prodding over the years has festered in people's minds.

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If you're not being toxic then I'm not talking to you. I'm talking about the people who are doing these things. If you never threatened or harassed or insulted anyone over this, then I'm not talking about you.

Lmao this has to be satire.

"It could be worse" is such a weak response to the concern that EGS is a step backwards. Just because Epic isn't going to replace all of our computers with Pentium 4 monstrosities, we should just keep quiet.

Regression is still regression. Better than 20 years ago is still worse.

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I didn't say be quiet. I said it's not a good reason to become toxic and threaten people or harrass them. If you aren't doing those things, then carry on.

 

[mutantmagnet]

I'm not entirely sure the PDF is that useful. If someone is generally uninterested in a topic, they likely aren't going to want to read a PDF on it, much less one that is 10 pages. It's just the nature of things.

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The nature of things is that we all usually suck at communication.

I haven't seen this 10 page document but I imagine it is better usage of my time than the 60 some odd pages over 8 EGS threads I have read.

We as people desiring to talk about different topics in a day simply rarely care to provide nuance or deep insight.

At some point social media like Twitter, reddit and message boards need a massive rethink where our useless repetition is consolidated with AI bots so threads are much smaller to more accurately reflect the general sentiments we feel as a group.


Our individual input is only important if we add something new that is relevant to a discussion. If AI could rewrite our statements to create an organically updated document that amounts to that 10 page pdf we would be better off as a society and individually because we couldn't target each other for harassment.

 

[True Prophecy]

If you're not being toxic then I'm not talking to you. I'm talking about the people who are doing these things. If you never threatened or harassed or insulted anyone over this, then I'm not talking about you.

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I know I know but the point stands that a lot of people see any disagreement or people caring about something they don't like as "toxic" because it's "just a launcher".

I guess I'm trying to say nuance feels like it's dying in favour of trolling on one side and violent attack on the other.

I would hate to see discussions shit down simply because the extremes exist.

Developers prodding a already touchy subject and journalists trolling and generalising everyone just makes it worse.

Jason waa right that the poster he called was rightfully toxic but don't include that in a list of reasons why EGS is fine.

Address it separately for what it is toxic behaviour as a whole that goes well beyond EGS.

 

[Border]

Because first-party titles are different to third party titles.

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there's a difference and it's not hard to see what that is hmm maybe it's the games you listed are first party games that those devs make themselves.

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Blizzard made Diablo and is well within their rights to keep it on their store if they want. Same with EA and battlefield it's their own studio made for them.
3rd party exclusives are shit imo on consoles PC's and whatever else.

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If the argument is against fragmentation and against having to use stores with a less desirable feature set, then there really is no distinction between 1st and 3rd party games. Your willingness to excuse those titles is kinda arbitrary, especially for the developers like Activision/Ubisoft/EA that used to put their games on Steam and have now yanked them. Whether they are 1st party or 3rd party the net effect is the same for the consumer -- they end up using a client they don't want to play the games they do want. People want to argue on principle, but at the same time they carve out nonsensical exceptions to the rules where suddenly the principle doesn't matter because "Oh if you made or paid for the game then you can do whatever you want."

I don't know why people say something like "Blizzard made Diablo and is within their rights to distribute it how they see fit". TakeTwo/Gearbox made Borderlands 3 - why can't the distribute it how they see fit? If they made some janky-ass no-frills launcher and forced you to download it why would that be any better than having it on EGS?

The only reason that EA/Ubi/Activision abandoned Steam was because they wanted a bigger cut of sales and thought Valve's cut was eating into their profit too much. They had the infrastructure, talent, technology, and money to build a completely separate platform. But what about the hundreds of developers who don't have the money & talent to develop their own distribution platform? Why should they be obligated to use Steam? If somebody with a huge userbase is offering a much more attractive deal, why shouldn't they take it?

 

[Jobbs]

I know I know but the point stands that slot of people see any disagreement or people caring about something they don't like as "toxic" because it's "just a launcher".

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I never once said disagreement is toxic. I said toxic is toxic, and I gave specific examples of toxic behavior that I've been observing and that schreier also observed. I'm literally being talked past in a post where the basis of my post was people talking past eachother.

I have zero problems with people discussing things and trying to sway others to their point of view. I have zero problems with healthy discourse, and I have zero problem with you feeling strongly about EGS even though I don't. I have a problem with how juvenile and toxic and aggressive the tone is around this debate.

 

[True Prophecy]

I never once said disagreement is toxic. I said toxic is toxic, and I gave specific examples of toxic behavior that I've been observing and that schreier also observed. I'm literally being talked past in a post where the basis of my post was people talking past eachother.

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I'm not seeing past you I agreed with you!

I was simply stating that it gets conflated together all the time and there are better ways and times to address it.

Toxic behaviour occurs all the time in all industries for all sorts of reasons and I would hope we all can be more empathetic and understanding.

 

[Conkerkid11]

If the argument is against fragmentation and against having to use stores with a less desirable feature set, then there really is no distinction between 1st and 3rd party games. Your willingness to excuse those titles is kinda arbitrary, especially for the developers like Activision/Ubisoft/EA that used to put their games on Steam and have now yanked them. Whether they are 1st party or 3rd party the net effect is the same for the consumer -- they end up using a client they don't want to play the games they do want. People want to argue on principle, but at the same time they carve out nonsensical exceptions to the rules where suddenly the principle doesn't matter because "Oh if you made or paid for the game then you can do whatever you want."

I don't know why people say something like "Blizzard made Diablo and is within their rights to distribute it how they see fit". TakeTwo/Gearbox made Borderlands 3 - why can't the distribute it how they see fit? If they made some janky-ass no-frills launcher and forced you to download it why would that be any better than having it on EGS?

The only reason that EA/Ubi/Activision abandoned Steam was because they wanted a bigger cut of sales and thought Valve's cut was eating into their profit too much. They had the infrastructure, talent, technology, and money to build a completely separate platform. But what about the hundreds of developers who don't have the money & talent to develop their own distribution platform? Why should they be obligated to use Steam? If somebody with a huge userbase is offering a much more attractive deal, why shouldn't they take it?

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Yes, it would actually be better if Take Two made a launcher for their own games. Because then I would know that their reasoning would be to get a 100% cut for each sale rather than getting a fat paycheck from Epic.

I'm fine with Uplay. I was fine with Bethesda's launcher. I'm fine with Battle.net. I'm fine with Origin. And I'm fine with Epic's own games being exclusive to EGS.

 

[True Prophecy]

If the argument is against fragmentation and against having to use stores with a less desirable feature set, then there really is no distinction between 1st and 3rd party games. Your willingness to excuse those titles is kinda arbitrary, especially for the developers like Activision/Ubisoft/EA that used to put their games on Steam and have now yanked them. Whether they are 1st party or 3rd party the net effect is the same for the consumer -- they end up using a client they don't want to play the games they do want. People want to argue on principle, but at the same time they carve out nonsensical exceptions to the rules where suddenly the principle doesn't matter because "Oh if you made or paid for the game then you can do whatever you want."

I don't know why people say something like "Blizzard made Diablo and is within their rights to distribute it how they see fit". TakeTwo/Gearbox made Borderlands 3 - why can't the distribute it how they see fit? If they made some janky-ass no-frills launcher and forced you to download it why would that be any better than having it on EGS?

The only reason that EA/Ubi/Activision abandoned Steam was because they wanted a bigger cut of sales and thought Valve's cut was eating into their profit too much. They had the infrastructure, talent, technology, and money to build a completely separate platform. But what about the hundreds of developers who don't have the money & talent to develop their own distribution platform? Why should they be obligated to use Steam? If somebody with a huge userbase is offering a much more attractive deal, why shouldn't they take it?

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I don't know if you misunderstood me. I said they are free to do whatever they want... Does not mean I have to just sit and enjoy it?

I don't care about steam like some people's position is, I have games on all platforms and stores (other than EGS). I have never been one that's "steam or no buy" I've always thought that was short sighted even if I get why some feel that way it's a market leader for a reason.

They can take whatever money they are given and I think most would but they does not mean it's going to lead to a better industry or that EPIC are a good company.

I think giving customers a choice of where to buy stuff is ultimately best but I also understand that's not always possible in a free market.

Until this point no one else be it origin, Bethesda, steam, got etc where taking 3rd party developed games that were already selling on other stores or promising keys for other stores and saying you take this money and you then only exist here now.

Epic are doing it in some cases the final hours, they are only taking what they consider "hot" titles and they don't seem to care if some of these EGS "exclusives" are also on PC Gamepass.

Can you really not see why that rubs some people the wrong way?

 

[Sean Mirrsen]

I have zero problems with people discussing things and trying to sway others to their point of view. I have zero problems with healthy discourse, and I have zero problem with you feeling strongly about EGS even though I don't. I have a problem with how juvenile and toxic and aggressive the tone is around this debate.

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And yet sometimes - a lot of times, with this topic - sane, well-reasoned words are not enough. When you're lining up your arguments and presenting your opinion only to be met with a wall of dismissive responses, and then get people who sincerely say something like "it's just another launcher" or "it's better for competition", or "Valve does nothing", there is this overwhelming urge to just reach through the monitor and slap the person responsible. Lacking that technology - which would revolutionize the internet, I think - a lot of people choose to just use stronger words.

 

[Stop It]

I speak for myself, but I never got the hate. I can understand no liking how something turned out but at the end of the day it's a store selling recrational goods. Nothing on there is needed, and damn sure nothing on there is worth raising your blood pressure over and going insane

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As someone with an interest in economics from the business side, and a witness to the *intense* backlash against Valve because of the creation of Steam, it's saddening to see but completely expected.

Partisanship is a default nowadays. You're either For or Against.

When you have developers stating openly that if you disagree with their decision to partner with a certain Store that "you probably wouldn't like our games anyway", you know that discourse is screwed up.

Another thing is that there are legitimate, proven reasons why the practices of Epic regarding the EGS are detrimental to the market and to consumers. The fact is that Valve have also done similarly anti consumer things too, but trying to discuss this is shut down by those who either do not understand, or think that doing so is some sort of pro EGS plot rather than pro consumer people trying to point out that none of these companies are our friends and you only align with companies than align with our interests and no further.

Steam has now curated a following that like the following of Consoles, goes beyond self interest and into the realms of fandom. This makes discussion harder and leads to the sort of treatment the OP has dealt with.

Nobody here deserves personal abuse for their views on this situation. Even if you can show their view is counter to yours, or even detrimental to your and even their interests. At the end of the day, while the issues of competition and markets raised are *important*, they still must be discussed in a consistent, respectful and non abusive manner. If you feel like going ad hominem, or sending abusive messages because someone disagrees with you, no matter the "justification", don't.

Similarly, because you don't care about something, doesn't mean others have your set of priorities. If you want to dismiss something because of ignorance or apathy? Fine, don't tell others that they're not justified with their concerns, especially when they're able to convey that concern properly and your retort reaches no further than "why you mad you baby".

 

[Jobbs]

And yet sometimes - a lot of times, with this topic - sane, well-reasoned words are not enough. When you're lining up your arguments and presenting your opinion only to be met with a wall of dismissive responses, and then get people who sincerely say something like "it's just another launcher" or "it's better for competition", or "Valve does nothing", there is this overwhelming urge to just reach through the monitor and slap the person responsible. Lacking that technology - which would revolutionize the internet, I think - a lot of people choose to just use stronger words.

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So.. The only option at that point is to call devs trash? Say "fuck you"? What are you saying, here? Some people are just never going to see this as a big deal and your only option is to agree to disagree. If they're being rude to you, depending on the severity they may need to be warned/banned, but other than that you just need to move on.

 

[Stop It]

And yet sometimes - a lot of times, with this topic - sane, well-reasoned words are not enough. When you're lining up your arguments and presenting your opinion only to be met with a wall of dismissive responses, and then get people who sincerely say something like "it's just another launcher" or "it's better for competition", or "Valve does nothing", there is this overwhelming urge to just reach through the monitor and slap the person responsible. Lacking that technology - which would revolutionize the internet, I think - a lot of people choose to just use stronger words.

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If you lack that much self control that you're provoked into shitposting and escalation of threads into slanging matches because of idiotic posts, then I'm afraid I gots no time for you.

You can't beat an idiot by going to their level, they'll win because of their experience.

And no, hitting people who disagree with you isn't the answer here, tempting as it may be.

 

[Border]

Yes, it would actually be better if Take Two made a launcher for their own games. Because then I would know that their reasoning would be to get a 100% cut for each sale rather than getting a fat paycheck from Epic.

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The reasoning for a TakeTwo Launcher would be "TakeTwo wants more money from their sales." The reasoning for a TakeTwo game on EGS would be "TakeTwo wants more money from their sales." I don't see why there is some huge difference. The reasoning is pretty obvious and transparent either way.

Someone can't argue that they are trying to fight against fragmention and simultaneously claim that every developer who wants to avoid the Steam tax has to develop their own launcher. If there was a TakeTwo launcher, a Square-Enix launcher, a Microsoft launcher, a Bandai-Namco launcher, a TenCent launcher, and a launcher for every indie developer then the market would be infinitely more fractured and fragmented than it already is. People would still be forced to use feature-bare launchers. EGS ultimately prevents fragmentation by allowing devs to release their games on a platform with substantially better terms, without having to spend money developing their own platform.

I don't know if you misunderstood me. I said they are free to do whatever they want... Does not mean I have to just sit and enjoy it?

I think giving customers a choice of where to buy stuff is ultimately best but I also understand that's not always possible in a free market.

Epic are doing it in some cases the final hours, they are only taking what they consider "hot" titles and they don't seem to care if some of these EGS "exclusives" are also on PC Gamepass.

Can you really not see why that rubs some people the wrong way?

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I don't think you have to sit back and enjoy it, no. And I understand why Epic's 11th hour exclusives upset people. I just think that people's reasoning on this is not logically consistent (see my response to Conkerkid11 above). If your complaint about EGS is "I want all my games in one place" or "I want a single unified ecosystem for my games" then that makes sense. The appeals against fragmention or threadbare launchers just don't hold up because everything is already fragmented, and people are already willingly using threadbare launchers. Whether the games are 1st or 3rd party is kinda irrelevant if those are your main points of contention.

 

[Deleted member 13077]

And yet sometimes - a lot of times, with this topic - sane, well-reasoned words are not enough. When you're lining up your arguments and presenting your opinion only to be met with a wall of dismissive responses, and then get people who sincerely say something like "it's just another launcher" or "it's better for competition", or "Valve does nothing", there is this overwhelming urge to just reach through the monitor and slap the person responsible. Lacking that technology - which would revolutionize the internet, I think - a lot of people choose to just use stronger words.

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And herein lies the problem. The toxicity referred to is born from a complete lack of self controls. Ultimately, it doesn't matter what some stranger 1000 miles away thinks about something, and if you genuinely think they aren't engaging in good faith, then discourse is pointless.

 

[Jarhab]

If the argument is against fragmentation and against having to use stores with a less desirable feature set, then there really is no distinction between 1st and 3rd party games. Your willingness to excuse those titles is kinda arbitrary, especially for the developers like Activision/Ubisoft/EA that used to put their games on Steam and have now yanked them. Whether they are 1st party or 3rd party the net effect is the same for the consumer -- they end up using a client they don't want to play the games they do want. People want to argue on principle, but at the same time they carve out nonsensical exceptions to the rules where suddenly the principle doesn't matter because "Oh if you made or paid for the game then you can do whatever you want."

I don't know why people say something like "Blizzard made Diablo and is within their rights to distribute it how they see fit". TakeTwo/Gearbox made Borderlands 3 - why can't the distribute it how they see fit? If they made some janky-ass no-frills launcher and forced you to download it why would that be any better than having it on EGS?

The only reason that EA/Ubi/Activision abandoned Steam was because they wanted a bigger cut of sales and thought Valve's cut was eating into their profit too much. They had the infrastructure, talent, technology, and money to build a completely separate platform. But what about the hundreds of developers who don't have the money & talent to develop their own distribution platform? Why should they be obligated to use Steam? If somebody with a huge userbase is offering a much more attractive deal, why shouldn't they take it?

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The fundamental difference is that games like Diablo, Fortnite, WoW, etc, were never going to be on Steam in the first place. Don't get me wrong, if a publisher decides to make their own games exclusive to their own platform, that's still shitty for customers, especially if that platform sucks. It's just not as shitty as paying devs/pubs to remove their games from other platforms. In one case, publishers are creating content to increase the value of their platform. In the other case, a platform is paying developers and publishers to reduce the value of other platforms. 2K would have never made Borderlands 3 an EGS (timed) exclusive had Epic not paid them to do so. As a consumer, that's not a good deal for me because Steam is better than EGS and games have more value on Steam. On Steam, I get achievements, cloud saves, user reviews, user forums, trading cards, badges, broadcasts, library sharing, universal controller support, Big Screen mode, Linux support, etc. On EGS, I get... cloud saves? Maybe? I think there are only two games on EGS that actually support cloud saves.

As for developers unable to create their own platforms, there's nothing stopping them from putting their games on Steam, GOG, Itch.io and EGS. In fact, that would be the ideal outcome for customers as it would let them enjoy games on their preferred platform. It would also encourage legitimate, pro-consumer competition. Unlike Epic, Valve has no issue with developers supporting other platforms.

The reasoning for a TakeTwo Launcher would be "TakeTwo wants more money from their sales." The reasoning for a TakeTwo game on EGS would be "TakeTwo wants more money from their sales." I don't see why there is some huge difference. The reasoning is pretty obvious and transparent either way.

Someone can't argue that they are trying to fight against fragmention and simultaneously claim that every developer who wants to avoid the Steam tax has to develop their own launcher. If there was a TakeTwo launcher, a Square-Enix launcher, a Microsoft launcher, a Bandai-Namco launcher, a TenCent launcher, and a launcher for every indie developer then the market would be infinitely more fractured and fragmented than it already is. People would still be forced to use feature-bare launchers. EGS ultimately prevents fragmentation by allowing devs to release their games on a platform with substantially better terms, without having to spend money developing their own platform.

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Oh dear. Please don't use the term "Steam tax." It makes you sound like Tim Sweeney. Every distribution platform takes a cut. 30% is the standard cut used by Steam, GOG, Apple, Google, Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft. EGS takes a cut too. Epic monetizes Fortnite on most of those platforms so their talk of changing the industry standard rings a bit hollow. Speaking of cuts, I'm sure you're aware that the 12% cut isn't the reason why EGS exclusives exist. EGS exclusives exist solely because Epic gives devs/pubs an immediate amount of cash for timed exclusivity. Let's not pretend otherwise.

 

[Fadewise]

If the argument is against fragmentation and against having to use stores with a less desirable feature set, then there really is no distinction between 1st and 3rd party games. Your willingness to excuse those titles is kinda arbitrary, especially for the developers like Activision/Ubisoft/EA that used to put their games on Steam and have now yanked them. Whether they are 1st party or 3rd party the net effect is the same for the consumer -- they end up using a client they don't want to play the games they do want. People want to argue on principle, but at the same time they carve out nonsensical exceptions to the rules where suddenly the principle doesn't matter because "Oh if you made or paid for the game then you can do whatever you want."

I don't know why people say something like "Blizzard made Diablo and is within their rights to distribute it how they see fit". TakeTwo/Gearbox made Borderlands 3 - why can't the distribute it how they see fit? If they made some janky-ass no-frills launcher and forced you to download it why would that be any better than having it on EGS?

The only reason that EA/Ubi/Activision abandoned Steam was because they wanted a bigger cut of sales and thought Valve's cut was eating into their profit too much. They had the infrastructure, talent, technology, and money to build a completely separate platform. But what about the hundreds of developers who don't have the money & talent to develop their own distribution platform? Why should they be obligated to use Steam? If somebody with a huge userbase is offering a much more attractive deal, why shouldn't they take it?

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I don't like Origin, uPlay, or Battle.net any more than I do EGS, but I begrudgingly use them because in those cases I know that there is a 0% chance of those games being available on my preferred platform, to the same extent that I begrudgingly buy a Playstation and Nintendo console every generation, because I want to play those exclusive games. Doesn't mean I'm happy about doing so though. As somebody who makes heavy use of Steam's value-added convenience features, and who attempts to do so with non-Steam games as well (to varying degrees of success), the best thing an alternative storefront can do to win me over is get the fuck out of the way of me just launching an EXE without wading through splash screens and mouse-driven launchers that get in the way of me using things like Big Picture Mode and Steam Input. It's unfortunate that the state of Windows-based gaming is such that the best tools for engaging with the games I own are intrinsically tied to a storefront; i've said it in other threads, but I do feel like a lot of the current reliance on Steam as a platform is entirely due to Microsoft utterly dropping the ball on adding those types of features to Windows at an OS level, which is why we're stuck with these ecosystems-within-an-ecosystem in the first place.

 

[Roshin]

This is possibly part of a bigger problem. There seems to be a group of people who just want to stir up conflict on Era, ie the "Grabs popcorn", "Dis gonna be gud" crowd. They used to derail every thread about Steam in the past (and still do) and they used to be in the earlier EGS threads. I don't know about the recent ones, because I try to stay out of them.

Era tries to be a little bit different from other gaming communities and that makes us stand out. The community absolutely needs to do their part and not take the bait all the time. The mods also need to be very clear about what is okay and what is not.

 

[Sean Mirrsen]

So.. The only option at that point is to call devs trash? Say "fuck you"? What are you saying, here? Some people are just never going to see this as a big deal and your only option is to agree to disagree. If they're being rude to you, depending on the severity they may need to be warned/banned, but other than that you just need to move on.

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So, because all ways of effecting a change are denied to me, I should simply move on? This is the same argument as it was with review-bombs. Lacking a way to effect a change, people will seek to at least lash out and do damage, just to make a loud enough noise. And if someone is seeing so much of it that it inconveniences them, perhaps it's a clue that it's not as small of a deal as they think it is. Sure there are trolls, on either side of the argument, who just do it to stir people up. But there are also people who are just too tired of reasoned discourse that gets them nowhere.

And herein lies the problem. The toxicity referred to is born from a complete lack of self controls. Ultimately, it doesn't matter what some stranger 1000 miles away thinks about something, and if you genuinely think they aren't engaging in good faith, then discourse is pointless.

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Toxicity is born from the lack of repercussions.
People are told that the EGS situation is just how capitalism works, there's nothing wrong with it.
Well this is how the internet works. Just because something works the way it does, doesn't make it not wrong.

 

[Niosai]

This is a problem I've had in general recently. Say there's a big game announcement, but it's EGS exclusive? It seems like 80% of the posts are "What a shame. Guess I'll skip this game." And then the thread is no longer about the game, but about its storefront.

I'm not advocating for censorship or suppressing opinion, but why can't that kind of discussion be relegated to dedicated EGS threads? If a cool new game comes into my radar, I'd love to discuss the game and see opinions, rather than having to wade through hundreds of "fuck EGS" comments.

 

[Jobbs]

So, because all ways of effecting a change are denied to me, I should simply move on? This is the same argument as it was with review-bombs. Lacking a way to effect a change, people will seek to at least lash out and do damage, just to make a loud enough noise. And if someone is seeing so much of it that it inconveniences them, perhaps it's a clue that it's not as small of a deal as they think it is. Sure there are trolls, on either side of the argument, who just do it to stir people up. But there are also people who are just too tired of reasoned discourse that gets them nowhere.

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What are you suggesting doing? Reasoned discourse is all you should have. It's not acceptable to harass and namecall over this. Period.

 

[Border]

The fundamental difference is that games like Diablo, Fortnite, WoW, etc, were never going to be on Steam in the first place.

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It really wasn't that long ago that EA, Ubisoft, and Activision published their games on Steam. Your perception that they were "never going to going to be on Steam in the first place" is really only due to the fact that they abandoned Steam a couple years back and developed their own platform. I am kinda curious if people will give TakeTwo the same credit once their Steam releases are a distant memory. "Oh it's okay that GTA6 is only on EGS/TakeTwo Launcher, there was never any chance that it would have been on Steam anyway."

Speaking of cuts, I'm sure you're aware that the 12% cut isn't the reason why EGS exclusives exist. EGS exclusives exist solely because Epic gives devs/pubs an immediate amount of cash for timed exclusivity. Let's not pretend otherwise.

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I certainly know that Epic's lump-sum payments and sales guarantees have attracted exclusivity agreements. I just don't see why that needs to be held as morally distinct and different from the more expensive alternative of developing a new and different platform. They're both decisions that are rooted in the pursuit of More Money.

 

[TaySan]

Man, i remember when everyone hated GFWL and that seemed much worse than EGS.

 

[Jarhab]

It really wasn't that long ago that EA, Ubisoft, and Activision published their games on Steam. Your perception that they were "never going to going to be on Steam in the first place" is really only due to the fact that they abandoned Steam a couple years back and developed their own platform. I am kinda curious if people will give TakeTwo the same credit once their Steam releases are a distant memory. "Oh it's okay that GTA6 is only on EGS/TakeTwo Launcher, there was never any chance that it would have been on Steam anyway."
I certainly know that Epic's lump-sum payments and sales guarantees have attracted exclusivity agreements. I just don't see why that needs to be held as morally distinct and different from the more expensive alternative of developing a new and different platform. They're both decisions that are rooted in the pursuit of More Money.

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EA hasn't released anything on Steam since Dragon Age 2 (about 8 years ago). Activision still releases games on Steam (see Sekiro and Spyro Trilogy). Ubisoft stopped releasing new games on Steam because Epic paid them to. Take-Two already has their own platform (Rockstar Social Club) which is required for all of Rockstar's games. That's the default version of the game that's sold everywhere other than Steam (and even the Steam version still requires RSC). Take-Two leaving Steam and going RSC-only would be controversial because RSC is pretty worthless and a definite step down from Steam's feature set. However, it wouldn't be as controversial as Take-Two leaving Steam because Epic paid them to.

It all boils down to why a publisher or developer decides to go exclusive. Did they do it because they want to increase the value of their own platform? Or did they do it because Epic paid them to? Timed exclusives have never been well-received. Remember the shitstorm surrounding RoTR's timed Xbox exclusivity? Tomb Raider was always a multiplatform series. RoTR was always going to be multiplatform too... until MS paid them to shaft the other platforms for a year. Customers don't like it when they get screwed because a company paid for that screwing.

 

[Border]

I do feel like a lot of the current reliance on Steam as a platform is entirely due to Microsoft utterly dropping the ball on adding those types of features to Windows at an OS level, which is why we're stuck with these ecosystems-within-an-ecosystem in the first place.

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Yeah, I am completely unable to explain why Microsoft has failed to gain a foothold in this arena. Plenty of developers with less talent and less money have been able to develop their own stores. Microsoft completely controls their own platform, so it is inexplicable why they have not developed a robust competitor to Steam.

 

[Jarhab]

Yeah, I am completely unable to explain why Microsoft has failed to gain a foothold in this arena. Plenty of developers with less talent and less money have been able to develop their own stores. Microsoft completely controls their own platform, so it is inexplicable why they have not developed a robust competitor to Steam.

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It's because they didn't care about PC gaming until recently. When they created the Xbox, they went all-in on console gaming. GFWL was a half-assed attempt to bring the Xbox ecosystem to PC. They even tried to charge for multiplayer at first. When they realized that PC gamers weren't going to embrace GFWL, they just returned their focus to Xbox instead of trying to improve it.

 

[Sean Mirrsen]

Yeah, I am completely unable to explain why Microsoft has failed to gain a foothold in this arena. Plenty of developers with less talent and less money have been able to develop their own stores. Microsoft completely controls their own platform, so it is inexplicable why they have not developed a robust competitor to Steam.

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Well they're trying now, I think. Sort of. I think the problem they have with setting up a true competitor this way, is the same that Steam has. They end up in the unenviable position of a de-facto market leader with way too much market presence to actually do anything because of competition laws.

 

[Imran]

It's not a thing I even tweet about the business of anymore. The last time I did, my tweet got pulled into a Steam thread here where people used it to complain that I don't debate them on Twitter. And those were some of the nicer responses.

The industry effects of multiple launchers and the questions of how exactly you might challenge an entrenched competitor aren't even fun to discuss because it is literally life and death for some people.

 

[Professor Beef]

I haven't gotten the same hate Bronson has, but I've seen enough that it makes me never want to participate in threads even tangentially related to PC gaming ever again.

 

[Wanderer5]

Man, i remember when everyone hated GFWL and that seemed much worse than EGS.

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GFWL, oh jeez lol. I still have a physical copy of Arkham Asylum that I don't think I can play again thanks to that shit, unless there was some workaround that I missed.

 

[Border]

It all boils down to why a publisher or developer decides to go exclusive. Did they do it because they want to increase the value of their own platform? Or did they do it because Epic paid them to? Timed exclusives have never been well-received. Remember the shitstorm surrounding RoTR's timed Xbox exclusivity? Tomb Raider was always a multiplatform series. RoTR was always going to be multiplatform too... until MS paid them to shaft the other platforms for a year. Customers don't like it when they get screwed because a company paid for that screwing.

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It's a mixed bag. Final Fantasy 7 Remake is easily the biggest moneyhat exclusive of this entire generation, and nobody gives a fuck that Sony is paying Square-Enix to keep the game off of PC and Xbox. There are similar issues with Street Fighter V. People were okay with No Man's Sky as a Playstation exclusive because it was being made by a small developer, but even tiny devs that go EGS-exclusive have to bear a massive PR backlash. There are really no rules and no consistency applied to paid exclusives. Sometimes it's okay, sometimes it is not. It ultimately depends on the popularity of the platform that is paying for exclusivity. Epic pays for an exclusive? This is anti-consumer bullshit. Microsoft pays for an exclusive? Fuck Tomb Raider! Sony pays for an exclusive? Whatever. This "increase the value of their platform" nonsense really just sounds like a way to excuse exclusivity agreements from publishers that gamers already like.

 

[Alexandros]

In my opinion, a problem in these discussions is caused by a lack of understanding, chief among them the lack of understanding that this issue is a really important one for (much of) the PC gaming community. Freedom of choice and customer options are a core foundation of the PC platform and a big reason for why people prefer it to other platforms. It's fundamentally not about the launcher itself or any single game. It is about a company adopting practices that affect the nature of the platform itself. Understanding this is essential in determining why this has become such a huge issue.

Furthermore, opposing a developer's decision to accept an exclusivity deal doesn't imply a lack of understanding for the developer's motives. As I wrote in another thread, understanding isn't the same as acceptance or endorsement. If the developer makes a decision that goes against my interests I will criticize it and oppose it, even if I do understand why they were led to it.

So this leads us to the point that I believe causes the most amount of friction in these discussions: Prioritizing games versus prioritizing the platform. Some people very clearly feel that the needs of developers trump everything else because the end result is what we are all here for: the games. Others, among them myself, believe that preserving the core foundation of the platform is vastly more important than any single game.

The only way to combat toxicity is through understanding and respect. Understanding that this is a huge issue for a lot of people and respecting them enough to not immediately dismiss their concerns as trivial or unimportant. Understanding that others have a different, more developer-centric perspective on this and respecting them enough to not immediately condemn them as shills or trolls. Understanding that both developers and customers have the right to make business decisions based on their own interests and respecting that right.

 

[Jarhab]

It's a mixed bag. Final Fantasy 7 Remake is easily the biggest moneyhat exclusive of this entire generation, and nobody gives a fuck that Sony is paying Square-Enix to keep the game off of PC and Xbox. There are similar issues with Street Fighter V. People were okay with No Man's Sky as a Playstation exclusive because it was being made by a small developer, but even tiny devs that go EGS-exclusive have to bear a massive PR backlash. There are really no rules and no consistency applied to paid exclusives. Sometimes it's okay, sometimes it is not. It ultimately depends on the popularity of the platform that is paying for exclusivity. Epic pays for an exclusive? This is anti-consumer bullshit. Microsoft pays for an exclusive? Fuck Tomb Raider! Sony pays for an exclusive? Whatever.

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The original FF7 was a PS exclusive back in the day so there's probably less expectation that its remake be multiplatform. Some people were pissed that SFV wasn't on Xbox but fighting games are niche and the Xbox FGC is pretty small so any outcry would have been pretty subdued. Also, I don't think Sony paid Capcom to make the game exclusive to PS4 and PC. I think Capcom just didn't think the Xbox was worth releasing the game on. Maybe the Xbox One FGC in Japan is non-existent? NMS wasn't a Playstation exclusive. It was also on PC. Did Sony pay for console exclusivity? If so, why not just make it completely exclusive?

There's ambiguity regarding Sony's third-party console exclusives. There's zero ambiguity about EGS exclusives. If a game is exclusive to EGS, it's because Epic paid the developer or publisher to remove it from other platforms. It doesn't help that most of the exclusives were already announced for Steam and had Steam store pages. Some games were even available for pre-order before Epic snatched them up. There's a pretty clear difference between Epic and Sony when it comes to exclusives, though Sony has done some timed exclusive bullshit like the Destiny 2 DLC. Unsurprisingly, people were upset about that.

To put it in perspective, imagine if FF7R was announced for PS4, Xbox One and PC. Then a month before launch, Square announces that it's a PS4 exclusive. People would be pretty pissed. Epic does that shit on a weekly basis.

 

[TaySan]

GFWL, oh jeez lol. I still have a physical copy of Arkham Asylum that I don't think I can play again thanks to that shit, unless there was some workaround that I missed.

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I believed they patched it out on steam. You can unlock keys from the retail versions on steam. :D

Trying to force us to pay for online gaming....imagine the backlash today if EGS attempted that lol

 

[Lentic]

I feel like a lot of what you see is the product of online gaming culture. More specifically, it's the whole "angry gamer" schtick that took off. In the PC community you saw it with ZeroPunctuation, then it was TotalBiscuit, and now you have people like Jim Sterling.

One one hand, I understand. Consumers need a collective voice to stand up for themselves. At the same time, the way I've seen people express themselves is pure toxicity. It's not healthy to make things so personal. Express your opinion, but the personal insults and threats have to go.

You can disagree with Tim Sweeney or the devs that come to EGS, but I've seen so many insults and hate thrown their way. It happens a lot with gaming in general and I wish this forum would push back against that kind of stuff going forward.

 

[Hucast]

I wish the gaming community as a whole would direct all that rage and anger towards exploitative microtransactions and gambling mechanics in games instead of the EGS. Compare to this, the EGS isn't that big of a deal. It's not like EGS can exploit the vulnerable and potentially ruin a person's financial wellbeing.

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Guess where all that money to fund EGS moneyhats is coming from....

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Lol.

 

[mutantmagnet]

Did you know that there didn't used to be any launchers at all? So you didn't just have less features than steam, you had no features. You had c:\starcontrol2\melee.exe. That's what you had. Gaming is in the best place it's ever been --
[/QUOTE]


Are you a cord cutter? If so, do you think streaming is in a better place with the trend of new streaming services creating exclusives?

Man, i remember when everyone hated GFWL and that seemed much worse than EGS.

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People still hate GFWL.

The difference is that GFWL was incompetent in execution while EGS has been very successful at impacting PC gaming.

That success deserves more attention.

 

[Sean Mirrsen]

You can disagree with Tim Sweeney or the devs that come to EGS, but I've seen so many insults and hate thrown their way. It happens a lot with gaming in general and I wish this forum would push back against that kind of stuff going forward.

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Is there any other way to discourage things from going in that direction? Especially given that the only 'normal' way, just deciding not to buy the game, is rendered absolutely ineffective by Epic forepaying the publishers for missed sales?

It's not impossible to see how some developers may be discouraged to go for the deals, knowing how much toxicity can be thrown their way should they do it. Epic Games provides insurance against the passive and morally correct "will not buy your game" protests, and they deny users the ability to voice displeasure on their store, but they can't shield the devs and publishers from backlash outside of their platform. Just like with user reviews and review bombs, if you leave them no other choice people will go for it, and they'll do it because it works.

 

[Border]

NMS wasn't a Playstation exclusive. It was also on PC. Did Sony pay for console exclusivity? If so, why not just make it completely exclusive?

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Rise of the Tomb Raider wasn't an Xbox One exclusive either. It also got released on Xbox 360 and PC.....but that did not abate a constant and unrelenting cry about how unfair it was for Square-Enix to ignore the PS4 as a platform. Microsoft clearly paid to keep Tomb Raider off of Playstations, just as Sony clearly paid to keep No Man's Sky and Street Fighter V off of Xbox.

There's ambiguity regarding Sony's third-party console exclusives. There's zero ambiguity about EGS exclusives.

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You are absolutely kidding yourself if you think there's some kind of "ambiguity" about the exclusivity of Final Fantasy 7 Remake. There's really no reason for Square to ignore both PC and Xbox for what is easily their biggest game in a decade. The only explanation for why they can't launch on other platforms is because they were paid to keep it Playstation-exclusive. This isn't some indie-developer that maybe can't afford to make simultaneous ports of a game for multiple consoles.