this post was submitted on 18 Oct 2023
186 points (96.5% liked)
PC Gaming
10874 readers
441 users here now
For PC gaming news and discussion. PCGamingWiki
Rules:
- Be Respectful.
- No Spam or Porn.
- No Advertising.
- No Memes.
- No Tech Support.
- No questions about buying/building computers.
- No game suggestions, friend requests, surveys, or begging.
- No Let's Plays, streams, highlight reels/montages, random videos or shorts.
- No off-topic posts/comments, within reason.
- Use the original source, no clickbait titles, no duplicates. (Submissions should be from the original source if possible, unless from paywalled or non-english sources. If the title is clickbait or lacks context you may lightly edit the title.)
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
If a game I'm interested in does this it'd be a deal breaker. Not because of the extra login but because I absolutely hate Epic's MO in running their store. I can get behind EA, Activision & co. making their own stores and deciding to not sell the games their studios develop on Steam. Fair enough, they make it so they can choose where to distribute. But Epic forcing exclusivity through monetary payments is introducing a cancer I will never support.
I'm very confused by what problem you're describing.
Epic is paying devs to only distribute on their Store, they are not competing with a better product, they're trying to compete with deeper wallets. Because of this I try to boycot as many games as I can that have even the resemblance of a connection to their store.
Beyond that I don't trust Epic, their store practice has shown them to be plenty untrustworthy and so I see their "free" Epic Online Service and instead of being happy about a good cross-platform online service I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I'm not really paying attention, is it more than games that are using unreal engine?
Their store? I dunno but a lot of games on their got a upfront payment to only be on that store. If the devs choose to limit themselves to one store, fair enough. But I have a very deep problem with them receiving payment for it. Because suddenly the game isn't "who can attract the most customers/devs via the best platform" but instead "who can pay the devs the most". Doesn't take a rocket scientist to see which of the two leads to better store fronts (case in point: even EA, etc. abandon their store exclusivity regularly because customers refuse to use inferior stores/launchers and want to stay on steam)
I'm mostly asking because they originally attracted devs using Unreal by waiving the license fee for the engine if they sold the game on their store.
I honestly just don't pay that close of attention to release dates for most games anymore, so I just end up buying on steam when I see it anyway.
Valve did it before with Darwinian: https://forums.introversion.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=40203 when they were relatively new to launchers.
You... You know developers and publishers aren't being forced to accept payment in return for exclusivity, right?
Yeah, so? Do you think that changes anything? "Oh yeah, wow. Nevermind if they are volunatrily doing this thing I absolutely disagree with and consider harmful to the market"? The devs accepting the money doesn't change a thing.
So, it makes this a bizarre statement:
And it makes you sound like a ridiculous child.
How? Epic is using money to force exclusivity, it's only natural that the devs accept if they throw enough money at them, can't fault them too much for accepting. Point is the exclusivity is not a natural market effect, it's artificially forced into existence by means of burning piles of money. If Epic stopped paying devs for exclusives tommorrow, I can guarantee you would not see a single 3rd party dev going Epic exclusive. If they bound their Online Services to their Store then maybe some would take the offer. But the vast majority of devs would go back to Steam, even if it meant retooling the game for Steam's Online Service.
If a supermarket chain comes into a city and starts to undercut the competition by subsidising the losses from other stores, that is not a natural monopoly forming. It's a company forcing out the competition. Now Steam is by no means in such a position but it does not change Epic's actions. They are acting in a manner where it is clear they care little for a better developer experience, nor for a better customer experience. They want marketshare. Should Epic manage to snatch the monopoly crown from Steam before they run out of money to throw at exclusives I guarantee you they will start hiking up their revenue cut as mich as possible and lock down their services to be store bound. It's the same old playbook that has been ruled illegal in every other industry but because the gaming industry is currently a natural monopoly no laws against the rpactice exist.
You are a moron