I put more emphasis into actions vs words, Epic has put more action into PC gaming in recent years than Valve. And if some marketing guy said they were shifting to focus on consoles for a period. So what? That doesn’t mean they abandoned PC gaming.
Regardless of perspective and opinions, use whatever reasons (or not) to avoid a store. That is your choice to self-impose a wait, while the rest of us play the games we want, when we want (hello day one purchase of Rebel Galaxy Outlaw!)
Clearly Epic has always had a presence in the PC sphere via licensing their engine.
That said, in the marketplace or selling front that isn’t the case. Epic supporters are arguing that the only way Epic can break into the entrenched PC store space and get their foot in the door is by taking extreme measures such as securing exclusives and paying devs to pull their exclusives from another store. If Epic had been present the whole time they wouldn’t need to ‘break into’ an entrenched market or use exclusive tactics.
The ideas of absolutely needing exclusives and anti-competitive measures NOW is at tension with the idea that Epic has always lovingly embraced the PC store space.
Alstein
3567
I’d argue that was Epic is doing is the only way any company could make serious headway into eating some of Valve’s market share.
The only thing most consumers seem to truly care about are pricing and exclusives. They’ll put up with just about everything else. Folks here are just a lot more particular and fussy than the average game consumer (and I am too, and that’s a good thing!).
I do distrust Epic, but my distrust is more from the Tencent involvement and privacy issues than it is from their temporary “abandonment”.
Hey, that’s awesome. I hope you and everyone here enjoy the game!
I still need to play the original Rebel Galaxy (though I hope to get to it soon). I have such an immense backlog and little time to play nowadays. I mean I am living in the year 2011 since I just finished the Witcher 2, lol.
While I am not thrilled that Rebel Galaxy Outlaw is an Epic exclusive I actually hope it does really well and Double Damage sees the success they are hoping for and are able to keep making great games. Same for all the developers going the Epic route. I don’t want any developers to feel strained, especially smaller studios.
I take issue with the claim that it’s extreme to have exclusives at a store. That’s not a extreme position at all. It’s a very mundane position. You need to have a reason to exist, and selling something no one else is capitalism 101, especially if you want to break into an entrenched market.
Why are you so dismissive of the idea that breaking into a new market practically demands some sort of exclusives to set you apart?
That’s fine, ‘extreme’ might not have been the best word choice.
The main thrust of my point is that Epic would not need exclusives had they played ball in the PC store space all along, or before the year 2019 at least. Of course the Unreal engine is omnipresent but Epic certainly abandoned selling on the PC or even considering a store for well over a decade. When the market got risky they took their ball and went to consoles. Now, some may care about that while others don’t, which is fine. That’s up to each individual.
I’m just saying that Epic wouldn’t be in the position of breaking into an entrenched market space had they been more invested here at an earlier stage. I mean GOG opened in 2008.
Alstein
3571
I don’t think it’s extreme, it’s a rational decision for a business to make. It’s just a shitty decision for PC consumers. They like Steam, they don’t like Epic. PC gamers are ok with Steam’s market position, even if it’s bad for competition.
and GOG despite 10 years and a competitive set of features, has less than 1/10th of Steam’s market share. Epic is aiming for higher than that.
I was thinking about this earlier today. Why hasn’t EPIC tried to tie their timed exclusive games in with Fortnite in some way?
Buy Metro 2033 and get an exclusive skin for Fortnite.
Buy Borderlands 3 and get an exclusive set of gun skins for Fortnite. So on and so forth.
They have one of the most popular games in the world at the moment, so why aren’t they trying cross promotions with other games that they have on their store?
Are the Fortnite players not interested in any other games?
Then again do they want Fortnite players playing other games, thus reducing the money they spend buying skins and season passes in Fortnite?
Saying there’s piracy in PC gaming isn’t calling PC gamers pirates. Let’s check the hyperbole.
I would suspect that is the case.
Fortnite is a lifestyle kids live, breathe, and eat. Kids are growing up in a world where the most important resource in a game is attention and Battle Royale games (or generally GaaS) want all of it.
It remains to be seen if kids playing Fortnite today will transition into the widely sampling dilettantes that most here at QT3 are purchasing lots of games across genres or if they just move on to the next hot F2P Games-as-a-Service game and play that exclusively.
Alstein
3575
I think there’s a parabola.
You start off with one game you love , then you become the sampler, and then eventually you end up going back to just 1-2 games.
When they cite it as a reason for not releasing their games on PC at all, it kinda implies that. Tomayto, tomahto.
Again, dumb semantics. They abandoned PC as a platform for releasing their games for some time. Indisputably.
Valve have actually been doing a lot for PC gaming though. Just not releasing many games. But Steam is getting more robust all the time.
That’s cute and good for you! I will gladly play Outer Worlds and Control when they are cheaper, have all DLC available and are on a platform I prefer. And maybe in few years, that platform will be Epic instead of Steam, if Epic actually does anything worthwhile for me as a potential customer. So far I am not impressed.
Indisputably? Then prove it. While you’re demonstrating your indisputable evidence, please explain how numerous recent PC games (Paragon, Robo Rally, and Fortnite) constitutes abandonment of the platform.
I’ll wait.
Did you miss the link above? Gears 2 and 3 being console only? I am talking about that time. Not the present.
Oh? So you’re holding console games launched years ago as evidence to support abandonment of an entire platform and impact your decisions to avoid everything on a given storefront. Got it.
I expected nothing less from a Steam fanboi!
I suspect this plays a part - why share if you don’t have to?
Why do you have to act like such an arrogant asshole?
I said they abandoned PC as a platform for releasing games for some time. That is a fact. No, I do not “boycott” Epic store because of that. But at the same time, it is not meaningless either. Valve stuck it out and supported PC. CD Projekt as well. Many other did. Epic didn’t. Their choice, business decision, yadda yadda. But excuse me if I do not see them as savior of the platform.
Consider turning your “arrogant asshole” radar on yourself. You seem to like sarcasm and strong adjectives which are frequently employed in playgrounds and not common to reasonable discourse. Here are some snippets of your recent posts to assist.
LockerK
3583
Oh boy, another go around on “well they didn’t abandon PC gaming because they’re here now” argument! Just what this thread needed!
More like “never left” but people are quick to sneer and dismiss that statement and then throw a few insults in for good measure.
