Yep. Gamers can definitely only have an interest in one genre. I only play Zaxxon clones as that was my first (not Pong) game.
If Epic can develop a diverse enough library, I think you will very likely find that a portion of their Fortnite players will happily try out some other game they have seen streamed or which has popped up on the store front page and caught their attention.
There is very little friction since they are already on the store and likely already have payment info on file from back when they bought their first battle pass or skin.
Bateau
2714
Yeah, a small portion. One look at my friends list that I’ve developed over the last 15 years, and looking at the friends of friends profiles and I can tell you that the pattern is very clear - those of us who have broader genre interests and frequently check out new hot things are in minority. Most just move from one big thing to the next, with games like WoW, Dota 2, Pubg and Apex dominating the played time charts.
Occasionally I’ll get whispers from people who see me playing a new game, asking me if it’s cool and then checking it out in the store, followed by weeks of them doing nothing but playing the games they’ve already been playing for the past few months.
Once Fortnite well dries up it’s game over for Epic and their store. They’ll go back to living off engine licenses and Steam will roll them over.
I had a gaming conversation at work once.
-Do you game?
-Yes
-What console?
-I play on PC
-Oh! I guess you play… WoW
-Nope.
-Counter Strike?
-No
-League of Legends?
-Not my coup of tea.
-O_O (looks at me as if there are no more games on the entire planet) What games do you play then?
-Uhh… stuff? (Names 3 or 4 games I played that month, which surprise surprise, they haven’t heard of).
It’s weird, because for example if I mention I watched X or Y film, and they haven’t heard of it, it’s ok, everyone knows there are thousands of movies and no one expects to watch all of them and it’s normal if someone happen to watch one you didn’t. But with games lots of people only know the 8-9 big perennial games/series and 2-3 new AAA games per year, and that’s it.
kerzain
2717
$500 million in Fortnite transactions?
rho21
2718
Wow, has discourse messed the formatting up there for me. I see the picture with the headline two or three characters per line down the side of it and “ying a game” left over to fit under the picture.
Ying: A Game. Latest EGS exclusive confirmed!
Heh.
“We’ve brought in close to half a billion dollars so far in gross, and out of that half a billion dollars of gross, 88% of that has gone back to developers,” Stelzer said.
It doesn’t seem so.
And this is what I ventured to guess time ago
Galyonkin also suggested that the PC exclusivity strategy is a temporary one Epic will back away from once its PC storefront is properly established.
kerzain
2721
But if 88% went back to Epic they’d still be telling the truth. They develop Fortnite.
Yeah I really wouldn’t put it past them to be including Fortnite battlepasses and such in that figure. Most of their numbers are without context.
Wouldn’t be in that case 100%? Precisely because they develop it? /shrug
kerzain
2724
Nah, 12% goes to lawyers defending dancing lawsuits.
So Epic keeps throwing out that Metro Exodus sales ‘more than doubled’ (or 2.5 X) the initial sales of Last Light on Steam.
Last Light had a concurrent player peak of 16,650 players on Steam. Is the total sales of Exodus 2.5 times that number (with a margin of error of course)? I know this lacks accuracy, but it’t something of a starting point for context.
stusser
2726
Is that right? General rule of thumb back from MMO days is total sales=5*concurrent. Only like 100k sales on PC is pretty grim.
The developer of Assault Android Cactus publicly noted that Epic denied their studio’s application to be on the Epic Game Store.
Bateau
2728
So they do a reverse 1 year exclusivity too? Huh, interesting.
Yep, there’s only so many snowflakes that fit on a curated store, who could guess, and wasn’t this what everyone wanted?
That reminds me of the time I threw a board game from our local Gaming Goat into our white elephant exchange at work.
“Oh, it’s a…game!” (Yes.)
confused look “Have you played it?” (No.)
“It looks…British or something!” (???)
LockerK
2731
It was pretty clear that Epic was only recruiting developers who already “won” and had plenty of mind share and name recognition - they minimize potential payout on a guaranteed sales agreement. Picking up a smaller indie with a passionate core of fans that might be turned off by exclusivity, leading to poor sales? Not a good look for a new store.
Really? Just because you want something to be true doesn’t make it so. This comment seems to forget or be ignorant of the fact Epic has been around a long time and were very profitable well before Fortnite (Unreal, Gears of War, etc.)
Assuming you’re right regarding the store’s dependency on Fortnite, when do you expect your timeline of the “Fortnite well dries up” event to occur? I propose it’s many years from now. I have been amazed at the longevity of online games; I stopped playing Everquest and World of Warcraft years ago but they’re still running and likely still churning a profit. Declaring predictions of the store’s demise also doesn’t seem to consider how much money Fortnite has made for Epic’s bankroll. Given the mountain of money they have, why do you believe they’ll abandon their store just because Fortnite is no longer the flavor of the month? You realize it only takes one more solid game for them to fatten their coffers some more (especially if it was built on their engine)?
Although I agree the Epic Games Store longevity and overall success is still an unknown, comments declaring it as dead once Fortnite declines shows a general lack of understanding around business and Epic’s place in the gaming industry.
