News Epic Games Store

[Vantr]

Also doesn't help that EGS have gotten their users accustomed to using coupons so once those go there's no incentive to spend. But I think the biggest fuck up for EGS is the community and lack of community features.

Community features let me know what games my friends own/wishlisted/playing so I can take a look at the store page to see if it interests me. The Steam community can see what the rest of the community is playing with CCU numbers. You also get to know when a game gets big and to jump on the hype train based on CCU as well. We've seen that with Valhiem, Loop Hero and Outriders. I can honestly say that I wasn't interested in buying Valhiem and Outriders at first but once I heard they hit 300k and 100k CCU I was thinking I should check them out.

As for the community it doesn't help that EGS soured their reputation with a chunk of the PC Gaming community with their aggressive exclusive deals. It will be hard to build that community because of that. There might be a group of friends and while one of them might be okay with purchasing on EGS because they provide good deals but there would likely be another friend in that group that disagrees with EGS exclusivity and in that situation they would probably end up staying on Steam. The only people I can see using EGS regularly are those that are hunting for a bargin.

Typing this up I've started to think that maybe EGS should have became a 3rd party key reseller instead. They can have a 12/88 cut so developers are happy. Valve gets 0% of the money so Timmy is happy. Epic actually makes money and doesn't have to develop features so Epic is happy. Games stay on Steam so consumers are happy.

 

[ExistentialThought]

Hahah, I had a similar thought about Epic making more sense as a third party reseller. It would have kept them shielded if they wanted to exit the market at any time while still leverging their purported goals for a better split towards developers. In all likelihood, it would have been profitable shortly out the gate and not taking nearly 9 years to see any cumulative profit in any forecast.

I think they only opted as a game store since they felt it made sense as an extension of their game engine services and would tie into their future plans as a publisher (i.e. Become a one stop shop for all things gaming). Now I also think they are really trying to lean into it as a talking point in their legal cases, so much so, that I have to at least wonder if the operate in a particular way to use as evidence for those cases. Truthfully, I wonder what happens if the legal cases go south and/or the publishing fails to be profitable. Though they may also be trying to spin into a publicly traded company, so who knows.

If they ever did go public, the market has proven speculation based only on user counts is enough to drive valuation to high numbers, actual profits can follow later so maybe that is in their cards to keep things floating along. Then they could always pull the ultimate tech move and be acquired by a larger tech company if profits fail to be meaningful. Maybe Apple will be in that market by then

 

[yuraya]

I don't see how they ever make their store profitable with the 12% cut. They are basically trying to run a non profit business in an industry where there is so much money to be made and everyone is so greedy. Everything is designed to squeeze every last penny from every party. Epic is getting worked by left n right by pubs/devs.

They would have probably been good at 20 or 25% cut from the beginning. Maybe incentivize their employees to build a better store with that extra revenue. When you are losing as much money as they are now its no wonder the store is still a pile of trash. No one is probably even allowed to waste time/resources on making it better.

Its also funny how so many want Valve to do the same and lower the cut. If Steam was losing 300 million every year I bet Gabe would have shut every thing down and sold the company off years ago.

 

[Alextended]

Wow. I honestly expected Epic to be making bank (not as much as Steam or anything of course, just a nice sum at least) despite everything.

It always seemed like a bad deal for the developers and as if Epic get exclusives for FREE since I assumed they set semi-realistic pre-paid sales goals that most decent games will at least eventually reach. So that the same funds would then go on to acquire another exclusive, and another, and another, as they eventually sell more than the pre-paid sales and then it's like they never paid any extra, they just paid part of their actual sales earlier and still got an exclusive period for it.

Yet from this it seems that they more often than not don't ever reach those targets or even close to them so Epic takes a loss.

For a small statement like that, it's a lot of condemning information for their practices and expectations for others to follow them as better, or at all viable.

 

[Dandy]

I can't imagine them ever being profitable when their only draw is free games, or selling games at a loss. If they stop doing that, the userbase they trained to never spend money will disappear.

 

[moemoneyb1]

I wonder if Epic is actually gonna stick with the store until 2027 or if they will just give up half way.

 

[Joe Spangle]

The huge money loss was always apparent but more so when Epic willingly gave out numbers and showed flat numbers in 2020 vs 2019, in a year where literally everyone else had explosive growth due to the pandemic. But what it really shows is the key problem Epic had from day 1: What's the reason to use EGS over Steam? The only logical answer was always disruptive things like paid moneyhats. Even EGS defenders would admit that was the only way they could compete with Steam.

So this brings me to the question I asked people in 2018 but for some reason it's treated as some kind of taboo in many places: Why does Steam need competition? Everyone always uses the tired adage of competition is always good but no one wants to really examine what that statement means. The implication of competition being good is that it will spur a war between companies to benefit consumers. But in reality this only really happens when the industry in question is largely stagnant, as in one or a couple of companies control it but don't really do anything with that power and usually make the user experience frustrating (like american ISPs for example, or Intel in the CPU market).

Was this happening to PC gaming? Think back to late 2018, were people going around saying "man I like PC gaming but steam just makes it too much of a pain in the ass"? No, people were happy and generally only concerned with late ports arriving or possibly never arriving. Was Valve doing nothing with their so-called monopoly? No, as has been proven constantly they bring out many new features every single year...it's just that they don't communicate that well and sometimes it's features you may not care about (so naturally that means they don't count).

So why did PC gaming need a massively disruptive and aggravating force? If the only way EGS or anyone can compete is by doing moves that aggravate consumers, that tells me that the industry was already in an extremely healthy place prior to their arrival. It was the answer to a non existent problem. I'm sure all of you have seen defenders say "well they can never compete or catch up with steam on features so they have to do this". That's not a clear sign that EGS is unnecessary?

Too often the online dialog (not here, in general I mean) gets emotional and hostile and you get accusations of being a fanboy or whatever, but for me the EGS thing was always a question of "what can you do for me" and their answer was "uhh idk take away your purchasing options I guess?" And that's all the answer could ever be, because their existence was never needed in the first place.

Totally agree.

 

[Gengis Khan]

Another aspect about the EGS that annoys the hell out of me is that its entire business strategy is basically built over straight-up anti-competitive practices.

We can sort of laugh about it only because Steam is around being the "bigger fish in the pond" (at least in terms of digital market share), but without it what we'd be witnessing is a billionaire company trying to bully any other small competitor out of the market with predatory pricing, exclusivity deals and other unsustainable practices.

 

[Routa]

Another aspect about the EGS that annoys the hell out of me is that its entire business strategy is basically built over straight-up anti-competitive practices.

We can sort of laugh about it only because Steam is around being the "bigger fish in the pond" (at least in terms of digital market share), but without it what we'd be witnessing is a billionaire company trying to bully any other small competitor out of the market with predatory pricing, exclusivity deals and other unsustainable practices.

I know these conversations everywhere always come back to Steam and Valve, but, this is why I'm more worried about smaller stores that aren't Steam like GOG. They don't have the ability to match Epic's spending.

 

[Ge0force]

Our dearest Mor is now famous on my favorite sub on Reddit

 

[Mor]

Our dearest Mor is now famous on my favorite sub on Reddit

Not this kind of community U_U

 

[m_dorian]

How on earth EGS will be profitable in 2023 escapes me. I don't think their strategy works as well as they think it does but then again they have access to info I don't so I can't form a solid judgement.

Apart from the fact that Sweeney is an a hole and hasn't seen my money, of course.

 

[Ge0force]

How on earth EGS will be profitable in 2023 escapes me

Unless Epic stops with moneyhatting and free games that year - which is rather unlikely - the only way I see this happening is if their own published games are lifetime EGS exclusive and sell REALLY well.

Epic probably also bets on more revenue when there are more games on their store, which is what they seem to focus on right now.

 

[Shahem]

The EGS was never designed to be profitable short term and it won't be for a while at this rate. I don't think Epic cares as long as they have other actually profitable businesses.

 

[Derrick01]

The EGS was never designed to be profitable short term and it won't be for a while at this rate. I don't think Epic cares as long as they have other actually profitable businesses.

I also wonder if the point was ever to become profitable or this whole experiment is just Tim Sweeney with a grudge. His twitter has shown he's very Trumpian at times and he's already proven he's willing to sabotage a massive chunk of his golden goose by taking Apple to court. He can afford to do all this since they're a private company, he'd have been booted by shareholders a while ago if they were public and tried half of this nonsense.

 

[Myradeer]

Well, three to seven years is a pretty long time. There's no assurances that current users only who visit to get free games won't stay so forever (the fact that they use Epic launcher itself suggests they have potential to be won over, at least compared to those who outright boycott the client).
So maybe Epic hopes to establish some sort of brand royalty in their current userbase; Apple vs Epic debacle revealed that these two companies are similar in their scumminess (they just behave different due to having different amount of strength), so wouldn't surprise me if Epic is looking to replicate the success of the former.

 

[Deku]

[UWSL]Epic probably also bets on more revenue when there are more games on their store, which is what they seem to focus on right now.[/UWSL]

Despite more games on the store, most of them have been given for free. How do they gain more revenue when the games have been free?

 

[TioChuck]

EGS already failed, the only thing that can save it now is if Timmy manages to moneyhat all the games without paying big bucks.

Question now is, if they keep it running(UT4) or if they shut it down(Paragon).

 

[Ge0force]

Despite more games on the store, most of them have been given for free. How do they gain more revenue when the games have been free?

I assume Epic meant they want more games on their store to sell, not only to give away for free

 

[gabbo]

Well, three to seven years is a pretty long time. There's no assurances that current users only who visit to get free games won't stay so forever (the fact that they use Epic launcher itself suggests they have potential to be won over, at least compared to those who outright boycott the client).
So maybe Epic hopes to establish some sort of brand royalty in their current userbase; Apple vs Epic debacle revealed that these two companies are similar in their scumminess (they just behave different due to having different amount of strength), so wouldn't surprise me if Epic is looking to replicate the success of the former.

You have to remember that the numbers don't take into account anyone using the client (and thus an active user) for engine/development purposes and, never touch the store. At least I've never seen this mentioned anywhere

 

[toxicitizen]

I also wonder if the point was ever to become profitable or this whole experiment is just Tim Sweeney with a grudge.

Honestly, I always got the sense that a lot of this was (at least partially) motivated by a grudge or an axe to grind with Valve. I don't really have any evidence to believe this, though, it's really more of a hunch. It's also pretty funny to imagine Sweeney seeing all the memes about Lord Gaben and just seething and thinking "That should be me!!!" He comes off as enough of an egotistical weirdo that I have a pretty easy time picturing it lol.

 

[Doctor Ironic]

Honestly, I always got the sense that a lot of this was (at least partially) motivated by a grudge or an axe to grind with Valve. I don't really have any evidence to believe this, though, it's really more of a hunch. It's also pretty funny to imagine Sweeney seeing all the memes about Lord Gaben and just seething and thinking "That should be me!!!" He comes off as enough of an egotistical weirdo that I have a pretty easy time picturing it lol.

Even if Sweeney doesn't have an axe to grind, we know for a fact several developers who have taken EGS deals have. Randy Pitchford has had an irrational hatred for Valve across all his social media accounts ever since Gaben stepped in to say his bizarre story about the origin of Gearbox's name was false.

 

[moemoneyb1]

I knew he was going to say something eventually.

 

[Paul]

So why did PC gaming need a massively disruptive and aggravating force? If the only way EGS or anyone can compete is by doing moves that aggravate consumers, that tells me that the industry was already in an extremely healthy place prior to their arrival. It was the answer to a non existent problem. I'm sure all of you have seen defenders say "well they can never compete or catch up with steam on features so they have to do this". That's not a clear sign that EGS is unnecessary?

I mean, your post is correct from end user (gamer) perspective - Steam is awesome, everyone loves it, and the few people who don't, love GOG instead.

But Sweeney has always been about the developer perspective. "We developers are the ones who invest and spend years of our lives to make games. We should therefore make lot more than 70% from our games when we do all the work and stores can operate with significantly lower cut while still being profitable."

That is the issue he wants to change. And I do not begrudge him for it; if he had chosen better approach, such as making EGS:

• functionally better than steam, perhaps also offering Epic's version of GOG connect
• offered better prices on most games due to Epic's voucher
• offered free games
• offered exclusive games fully funded by Epic (and thus zero moneyhatted away third parties)
• was much better marketed

I would applaud him for it.

Sadly, he had chosen the antagonizing way. We will see if it will be successful, but I doubt it. Carrot would work better than the stick.

 

[Doctor Ironic]

I knew he was going to say something eventually.

I love that he keeps reposting this infographic like it doesn't show that the average EGS user spends $1.60 in the store.

 

[madjoki]

Bad Valve cuz you can't use Steam friends on Playstation, Xbox, Epic, Windows Store or GoG.

 

[Alexandros]

I mean, your post is correct from end user (gamer) perspective - Steam is awesome, everyone loves it, and the few people who don't, love GOG instead.

But Sweeney has always been about the developer perspective. "We developers are the ones who invest and spend years of our lives to make games. We should therefore make lot more than 70% from our games when we do all the work and stores can operate with significantly lower cut while still being profitable."

That is the issue he wants to change. And I do not begrudge him for it; if he had chosen better approach, such as making EGS:

• functionally better than steam, perhaps also offering Epic's version of GOG connect
• offered better prices on most games due to Epic's voucher
• offered free games
• offered exclusive games fully funded by Epic (and thus zero moneyhatted away third parties)
• was much better marketed

I would applaud him for it.

Sadly, he had chosen the antagonizing way. We will see if it will be successful, but I doubt it. Carrot would work better than the stick.

The main problem with his approach is not the strategy itself; it is the attitude behind it. His main way of attracting developers is by providing monetary incentives. His main way of attracting customers is by removing every other option. It is indicative of a sense of entitlement that a few developers have regarding customer purchasing behavior, fueled by decades of exclusivity shenanigans on console. Some of them find the idea of a customer not buying a game almost offensive. You as a gamer are expected to support developers at all costs while they retain the privilege of fucking you over if business reasons call for it.

I love games and the people who make them as much as everyone else here but I don't like it when the industry tries to exploit that love and manipulate me. That's why my advice has always been, treat games as a product. You don't owe anyone a purchase if you are not satisfied with the terms offered.

 

[Swenhir]

Bad Valve cuz you can't use Steam friends on Playstation, Xbox, Epic, Windows Store or GoG.

Pretty much. Cross-platform is fantastic, but asking a distribution platform to share its competitive, hard-earned advantage with you and pouting when they don't is a little... Sweeney. Also, exclusives, why can't you use Epic games on Steam? Bad cross-platform

 

[sk2k]

Among Trees
The game is in Early Access on EGS since June 2020. The price was lowered to 12,99 Euro from 15,99 Euro. The last update was in November 2020. The link to the official forum was removed from the official website.

I think the game is dead.

 

[prudis]

thx timm for saving them devs

 

[bobnowhere]

Among Trees
The game is in Early Access on EGS since June 2020. The price was lowered to 12,99 Euro from 15,99 Euro. The last update was in November 2020. The link to the official forum was removed from the official website.

I think the game is dead.

 

[C-Dub]

Among Trees
The game is in Early Access on EGS since June 2020. The price was lowered to 12,99 Euro from 15,99 Euro. The last update was in November 2020. The link to the official forum was removed from the official website.

I think the game is dead.

They either took the money and ran, or they released something just to get the clock ticking on exclusivity and had no real intention of doing an Early Access period.

We'll see in June.

 

[Arsene]

They either took the money and ran, or they released something just to get the clock ticking on exclusivity and had no real intention of doing an Early Access period.

We'll see in June.

The exclusivity deal is 15 months for some reason. So we wont see until September.

 

[fantomena]

Among Trees is 15 month exclusive btw.

 

[Mor]

Among Trees
The game is in Early Access on EGS since June 2020. The price was lowered to 12,99 Euro from 15,99 Euro. The last update was in November 2020. The link to the official forum was removed from the official website.

I think the game is dead.

It is not(?) as they keep talking on Twitter and a few days ago confirmed the game is coming to other PC platforms in 6 months.

Among Trees is 15 month exclusive btw.

This is correct, the only one that has been over 12 months officially (in terms of timing, not when it stopped being exclusive per say)

 

[Mor]

With 800 permanent employees Creative Assembly (CA) represents the largest UK games developer.

The studio has grown by over 20% in the last year and continues to grow its community of fans including the 7.5 million players who rushed to claim A Total War Saga: TROY in a single day in August 2020. The 20-year-old Total War series has sold more than 36 million standalone games and sees over 1.5million players each month.

New UK studio and Motion Capture facility | Creative Assembly

Creative Assembly announces studio expansion with new UK studio and Motion Capture facility

www.creative-assembly.com

Unfortunately no data about sales after free giveaway, which is sad because it doesn't help build a general picture (well, or maybe it does in a very negative way)

Also, in case you still thought the top is not manual, Troy just popped up today after all this months. No sale, no update just an external article [UWSL][/UWSL]

 

[curi0usBystander]

We already knew about Troy. 7.5m people claimed a free copy of A Total War Saga: Troy from the Epic Games Store (this is from august).

And I find hard to believe that the game has sold much since then. There's always new people but you can't beat free.

 

[Mor]

We already knew about Troy. 7.5m people claimed a free copy of A Total War Saga: Troy from the Epic Games Store (this is from august).

And I find hard to believe that the game has sold much since then. There's always new people but you can't beat free.

Yes, it not new data, my post was more about how we don't have any other data point but that specific one.

 

[fantomena]

The EGS top seller list is whatever Epic wants it to be. If Epic wants Horizon Zero Dawn to appear on 4th place tommorrow, it will appear on 4th place tommorrow.

 

[Joe Spangle]

It is really weird that the Steam Spy guy, the guy who wanted to get the actual numbers and stats for Steam sales is happy to have a Top Sellers list on his store that seems to be just made up.

 

[bobnowhere]

It is really weird that the Steam Spy guy, the guy who wanted to get the actual numbers and stats for Steam sales is happy to have a Top Sellers list on his store that seems to be just made up.

Steam Spy benefits his job at epic, obfuscating Epic's numbers also benefits Epic

 

[Arc]

As far as I can tell, EGS top sellers are updated once a day at 11 PM EST. I don't think there's any grand conspiracy, just the fact EGS sales figures are not that great.

It is really weird that the Steam Spy guy, the guy who wanted to get the actual numbers and stats for Steam sales is happy to have a Top Sellers list on his store that seems to be just made up.

Gonna go on a tangent here but I cannot stand that guy. He spent years writing FUD articles about the death of indie games on Steam all while using Steam's data to help launch EGS and poach the first wave of exclusives. It just feels skeezy.

 

[Mor]

As far as I can tell, EGS top sellers are updated once a day at 11 PM EST. I don't think there's any grand conspiracy, just the fact EGS sales figures are not that great.

THANK YOU, I was wondering at what time it updated daily and I thought it was 8am haha
Much appreciated

 

[fantomena]

I wonder how awful Horizon is selling on EGS. It didn't even appear on the best selling titles on that 2020 graph they published.

Actually since Blands 3 and Hitman 3 is currently on top row I wonder how badly everything else is selling, if the list is actually accurate that is and not made up (which I still think it is until I get proof that says it's not made up).

 

[lashman]

Gonna go on a tangent here but I cannot stand that guy. He spent years writing FUD articles about the death of indie games on Steam all while using Steam's data to help launch EGS and poach the first wave of exclusives. It just feels skeezy.

yup, this ... all of this ... 100%

 

[Arc]

Announcing a New Funding Round of $1 Billion to Support Epic’s Long-Term Vision for the Metaverse

Epic Games announces a new round of $1 billion in funding to help develop the long-term vision for the Metaverse. Sony Group Corporation and a host of investment partners are supporting Epic’s growth.

www.epicgames.com

Sony dumped another $200 million into Epic. I remember a lot of concerns about future PS ports being EGS exclusive after their first round of funding last year and it hasn't materialized yet so it's probably nothing to get too worried about yet.

 

[Mor]

Announcing a New Funding Round of $1 Billion to Support Epic’s Long-Term Vision for the Metaverse

Epic Games announces a new round of $1 billion in funding to help develop the long-term vision for the Metaverse. Sony Group Corporation and a host of investment partners are supporting Epic’s growth.

www.epicgames.com

Sony dumped another $200 million into Epic. I remember a lot of concerns about future PS ports being EGS exclusive after their first round of funding last year and it hasn't materialized yet so it's probably nothing to get too worried about yet.

It's not always related to games but technology, in the same way that the other holders are not videogame companies but monetary entities, so yeah, it's not always about making this or that exclusive but more about what they can get with that investment with technology and some other contractual obligations.

This is more about Epic Games and less about Epic Games Store

 

[prudis]

Announcing a New Funding Round of $1 Billion to Support Epic’s Long-Term Vision for the Metaverse

Epic Games announces a new round of $1 billion in funding to help develop the long-term vision for the Metaverse. Sony Group Corporation and a host of investment partners are supporting Epic’s growth.

www.epicgames.com

Sony dumped another $200 million into Epic. I remember a lot of concerns about future PS ports being EGS exclusive after their first round of funding last year and it hasn't materialized yet so it's probably nothing to get too worried about yet.

reading up ... its apparently for the Fortnite Metaverse idea

so yay for more branding and ads in online games

 

[Wildebeet]

So this brings me to the question I asked people in 2018 but for some reason it's treated as some kind of taboo in many places: Why does Steam need competition? Everyone always uses the tired adage of competition is always good but no one wants to really examine what that statement means. The implication of competition being good is that it will spur a war between companies to benefit consumers. But in reality this only really happens when the industry in question is largely stagnant, as in one or a couple of companies control it but don't really do anything with that power and usually make the user experience frustrating (like american ISPs for example, or Intel in the CPU market).

Was this happening to PC gaming? Think back to late 2018, were people going around saying "man I like PC gaming but steam just makes it too much of a pain in the ass"? No, people were happy and generally only concerned with late ports arriving or possibly never arriving. Was Valve doing nothing with their so-called monopoly? No, as has been proven constantly they bring out many new features every single year...it's just that they don't communicate that well and sometimes it's features you may not care about (so naturally that means they don't count).

So why did PC gaming need a massively disruptive and aggravating force? If the only way EGS or anyone can compete is by doing moves that aggravate consumers, that tells me that the industry was already in an extremely healthy place prior to their arrival. It was the answer to a non existent problem. I'm sure all of you have seen defenders say "well they can never compete or catch up with steam on features so they have to do this". That's not a clear sign that EGS is unnecessary?

Too often the online dialog (not here, in general I mean) gets emotional and hostile and you get accusations of being a fanboy or whatever, but for me the EGS thing was always a question of "what can you do for me" and their answer was "uhh idk take away your purchasing options I guess?" And that's all the answer could ever be, because their existence was never needed in the first place.

These are really good points, particularly about competition. Competition isn't a good in and of itself, it's only useful when it improves conditions for consumers. Otherwise we don't care. EGS just isn't doing that. What they are doing is really weird and whether it succeeds or fails it won't ever achieve anything good. EGS is openly anti-consumer and some seem to prefer that we welcome the competition regardless of our preferences. It's completely bizarre.

 

[madjoki]

Be Epic Games Store

Invite DJ Powers from Valve to hear about Epic Games Store, who emails about event to "Steam SWAT Release" (team at Valve)

(Exhibit list of Epic vs Apple lawsuit)

(Epic opposed inclusion of email)

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/152884184065507328/831926444136857651/unknown.png

https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.364265/gov.uscourts.cand.364265.453.0.pdf

https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.364265/gov.uscourts.cand.364265.448.0.pdf