News Epic reveals a strong year for the Epic Games Store

I honestly have to agree with you there. I never use the "social features" on Steam, all those cards I get I just sell for almost nothing because I don't care. Achievements? Whoop-di-bloody-doop! If they're not in-game achievements like Risk of Rain 2 has them where I actually unlock content, I just don't care.

 

There is, but you have to pay upfront cash to every streaming service just to access them, whereas Steam/Epic/etc are free to install.

 

Yeah...it's still an unethical tactic, though. Freedom fighters use terrorism to achieve dialogue. Sometimes it's their only effective option, and sometimes it even works. Doesn't make it okay.

And yep, Netflix and the like are valid comparisons. I'm stuck in a no-man's-land with media at the moment: I don't want to fill my house with DVDs, I don't want to support any sides in the exclusivity platform wars, and I don't want to pirate shows. Basically my only ethically consistent option is to not watch exclusive shows.

I hear your points about launchers being free software. And I appreciate that they're the least of all the evils when talking about exclusivity, especially compared to console developers forcing you to buy an entire gaming system just to play a franchise instalment. You're right: Epic's launcher is free software. Free online platforms are harmless, right?

But...in another sense, they're the worst of the evils when talking about exclusivity, because it's online DRM. Being forever dependent on third-party software and servers makes me cagey in a way that only people who lived through SecuROM will understand. Servers, one day, sooner or later, all get turned off. All of them. It's just a question of how long market forces allow their parent companies to exist, and how long it remains economical to keep the servers on.

I don't want to see Steam competitors in the free-software-tie-in-service mould. Because every lesser competitor to Steam is far more likely to turn off its servers sooner than Steam. I liked the Steam monopoly. Steam, at least, while they have huge market dominance, are pretty much guaranteed to not go anywhere: it's as likely as Apple, Google or Microsoft going bankrupt. THOSE servers are safe bets. It's morally fashionable to sneer at big business market dominance, but there are benefits to it. Stability is the main one. Steam's servers will last longer than I do, in all likelihood.

Epic's servers, though? Bigger studios than Epic have folded. And when they do, you won't own those games you bought through their exclusive platform.

And because it was an exclusive, you don't have any other ways to get it again. You don't have a DVD of it sat on the shelf. It won't be on GOG.

 

No, just no.

If you as a consumer do not have a choice what shop to give your money to then it is exclusive.

 

You mean the studio that made 3bn USD on Fortnite might go bankrupt over night? I honestly don't think that's still a real risk. It was when they first released their launcher/store, though.

I wish we could just have one way of installing games: offline. But that ship has sailed eons ago and won't come back. And before we have Gabe in sole charge I'd rather have competitors being naughty for a bit. And yes, I think Epic will not keep up the exclusive game strategy forever, naive as that may be.

 

Fair point.

As @perplekks45 says though I also don't think this will be a long term strategy. I could very well be wrong but I think it's a way to get a toe in the market and get people used to their store, after that no more millions in exclusive deals.

I can't say I agree with it or not but I can see the logic.

Who knows, by the time I buy one of their exclusives their exclusivity period will probably be over, as too perhaps the Epic Store itself. Perhaps not.

Perhaps then competition on price instead may work in their favour.

 

Actually...I like the sound of this, and I hope it goes that way. And it might.

It probably does us good to fact-check our habitual pessimism now and then. Pessimism is fashionable - I'm terribly guilty of it myself - but there is abundant evidence of big companies actively working to be more ethical and customer-friendly. (It's not magic benevolence, either - some of them have just worked out that it's good business for people to like and trust you.) So yeah, it's possible Epic will turn into one of the good guys in the long run. Given that hypothetical, their current strategy, dirty though I consider it, won't have been the worst thing in retrospect.

If. It's a big if. Sean Murray turned out to be a good and customer-loyal developer. Bethesda turned out to be an evil monstrosity. Doom was the most innovative FPS of 2016. Santander no longer launder billions for drug cartels. Anything can happen, nothing stays the same.

 

@boiled_elephant yeah, true, i shouldn't rely on guessing what may happen in this day and age.

'Reality' in every walk of life seems to be somewhat, err, fluid.

 

I honestly don't know if it's pessimism, negativity or life experience. But I definitely understand what you mean, @boiled_elephant .

In the meantime I'll enjoy my free games on the epic launcher and keep my main game hub with Steam.

 

And I shall remain a tight git behind the release of games and probably just buy on Steam

Edit: Re Epic exclusives. It just occurs to me that I got a free xbox pass for pc to use sometime this year. Both The Outer Worlds and Metro Exodus are on there - two Epic 'exclusives' available via MS.

How does that work?

 

And you can buy a key for Exodus from lots of different places, people just like to moan maybe?

 

It used to be incredibly easy and quick to organise a good session of PC multiplayer gaming ...

Before Steams’ competitors arrived that is.

Back in the good old days it was mainly just Steam and World of Warcraft and maybe GFWL. Organising a friendly clan match, or a friends get together on Left 4 Dead or whatever multiplayer game was in at the time was perfect.

Now it’s all over so many launchers - it feels perfectly anti-social. Back in the old days meeting new gamers through one game on Steam would invariably lead to discussing playing other games, those days are dead.

Now the way it works is - new game on new launcher hits the press. Everyone gets excited for a few months. Then a new game on a new launcher appears ... ok maybe not that bad, but ya know.

 

I can't believe you just cited GFWL in a positive/nostalgic context. I feel sick.

But yeah, that's one of those side benefits to monopoly - everyone ends up on the same page. Whether it's worth the price is debatable. You get easy matchmaking with all your friends, but that's because you're all beholden to the same single giant faceless company that holds all the keys to your hobby.

Swings & roundabouts.

edit -

I'd better move along, they're figuring me out!

 

I'm still curious, anybody know how Epic can claim 'exclusivity' on games you can also get via MS?

Is it just because via MS and xbox pass for pc you never actually buy them?

Still, not really exclusive.

 

Before Steam, you could organise game however you wanted. IRC, MSN, web voice (e.g. Skype), regular old telephone calls... Didn't matter where you bought the game, mostly didn't matter what format it was on.
With Steam chat you end up with vendor lock-in, forced to open up some company's shop for something that should be independent of where you bought the game. That's a net loss, not a net gain, and representative of the general shift from standards (messaging using IRC, downloads using HTTP or FTP, etc) for which you have a choice of interoperable clients and providers available, to services where a single vendor controls all.

 

Yeah ... before Steam it was harder to organise matches. You mentioning those non gaming related clients made me cringe. It was easy for geeks and hard for non-geeks to get their heads around.

Steam came along with a friend list and a better way of launching the game with chat features and an easy way of befriending newly met gamers by simply showing the list of newly met gamers - click to add to friends.

Vendor lock-in ..... yeah and?! Electronics Boutique never offered friends’ lists and easy multiplayer gaming.

What I’ve gathered from this thread is:

- that some people want as cheap a game as possible from I-dont-care-as-long-as-it’s-cheap

- anti the monopoly

- anti the features that Steam offers which includes social gaming

 

I use discord for all my gaming session organisation needs, very rarely teamspeak with some old friends from the last century.

In my eyes you don't need Steam to get matches, it just makes it easier for Joe Average.

 

So this entire thread of complaints about games on the Epic store being 'exclusive' is a similarly "yeah and?!" then? Most of this boils down to "all these things are awful, but Steam already did it so it's fine and everyone should just use Steam because they're the good guys".

 

Further to my earlier post, Epic's boss has said they don't think they'll do exclusives forever, just wait until their 'ecosystem' is up and running.

Who knew I had a mind for business?

But, yeah, still - how are they exclusive when you can get at least some of them via MS?!?!??

 

I honestly can’t remember a time when Valve ripped us off, or over-charged us, or has generally been the evil monopoly that people suggest.

I remember the days when we could pick up a lot more games at cheaper prices but that was before the financial melt down when the pound was worth 2 dollars.

Agreed!