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hariseldon
Unconfirmed Member
It'd be cheaper on Steam because you'd buy it from cdkeys.com.
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"Do we have the right to buy a Toyota at a Ford dealer?" Epic’s Tim Sweeney Defends Epic Games Store Exclusives Politic
- Thread starter KyoZz
- Start date
It'd be cheaper on Steam because you'd buy it from cdkeys.com.
No he is not. They knew about this exclusiv deal sometime after E3 2018. So at that point they should have pulled it from the store and everything would have been ok. This however was 14 days before the release to have as much free advertising on another platform as possible. It was absolutene shitty move. Legal? Yeah sure but that does not mean it is ok.
Fuck Epic and Deep Silver for pulling this stand with the promise hey the game will be cheaper. No it is not. In fact it is more expensive in Germany.
CuNi
Member
That was just to dismiss his point entirely because epic and steam are on parity in their own stores. I didn't want to drag third party sellers into this because he argued with epic store being cheaper.
Mojoraisin
Member
Although I don't think his anology is perfect, I have never understood the gamer community's resistance to challengers of steam. At that time, Valve was the shit and had given us a technical platform that was WAY ahead of the competition. Same with their games. Looking at this decades later it turned out just like a few brave ones predicted with such a dominant player. Valve barely produces memorable games and steam as a platform has stagnated.
More competition is always better for the consumer in the long term.
More competition is always better for the consumer in the long term.
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H
hariseldon
Unconfirmed Member
*Sigh* this again, and I have to explain AGAIN. I am in favour of competition. Most of us are. Gog do it right by offering something to the consumer, DRM-free games.
A game being on Epic reduces competition. A game on Steam can release anywhere it likes. It can be sold cheaper elsewhere and Steam will even fulfill that order.
A game tied exclusively to Epic is one price, Epic's price. A game on Steam is usually on green man gaming, cdkeys, etc and thus available at many competing prices, ergo more competition, and that's before you even factor in the likes of gog and itch.
CuNi
Member
We already have competition like humble and GOG. What epic does is trying to become a monopoly themselves by moneyhatting titles into exclusivity. If this continues, all that will happen is that Valve will buy exclusive deals themselves with more and better devs as they have the higher user numbers and better service.
Ixiah
Banned
The "Right" ?
Consumers have every right to be annoyed, imagine shopping in 4 different Supermarkets because each one of them has an exlusive Item you need for cooking.
Whats even the Point of Sweeny, aside from the Topic, this might as well be an SJW post, telling us how we should behave, think or feel, how bout fuck you Swiney and im going to be angry that i have to use 5 fucking different Gamestore Apps on my PC, that always need updates when i start them up.
Consumers have every right to be annoyed, imagine shopping in 4 different Supermarkets because each one of them has an exlusive Item you need for cooking.
Whats even the Point of Sweeny, aside from the Topic, this might as well be an SJW post, telling us how we should behave, think or feel, how bout fuck you Swiney and im going to be angry that i have to use 5 fucking different Gamestore Apps on my PC, that always need updates when i start them up.
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Kadayi
Banned
I'm not so convinced that that will be the case as Valve aren't raking in mad cash like Epic at present. Sure I dare say the Studio itself makes some income from TF2, Dota 2 & CS:GO, but I would imagine Valves main source of income is Steam. I suspect it's steady, but with a few of the big AAA departures, I doubt they're in a position to start front loading exclusivity deals of their own.
kaczmar
Member
You don't think sales projections influence pricing? Steams' user base is only what it is because they were first to market and offer cheap games.
This isn't a compelling argument in favor of Steam.
I said in simple terms to illustrate a point. Yes. Publishers get the money which then "trickle down" to developers.
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SkinnerSw33t
Member
Epic is not trying to become a monopoly. It is buying market share in a market where there is a dominant presence.
My guess is that Valve doesn't buy exclusives because it doesn't have to. I do think it'll lower prices sooner than later.
Pachter (P.A. #131) made some interesting points about how it may introduce breakpoints, which can entice larger publishers without cutting its margin across the board.
There was also talk about Discord soon offering 8%, and how Amazon is going to be involved in this sooner or later.
My guess is that Valve doesn't buy exclusives because it doesn't have to. I do think it'll lower prices sooner than later.
Pachter (P.A. #131) made some interesting points about how it may introduce breakpoints, which can entice larger publishers without cutting its margin across the board.
There was also talk about Discord soon offering 8%, and how Amazon is going to be involved in this sooner or later.
RedVIper
Banned
Of course they can make their game exclusive to whomever they like. Thats not the point, we as consumers don't have to like their choices.
Also claiming the reason they did it was because they wanted to sell the game at 50$ is absurd, the game still costs the same outside the US. They did it because Epic threw money at them.
sol_bad
Member
I doubt it trickles down, the development team would be on a salary contract no doubt. They might get a better bonus, might.
kaczmar
Member
Fair point.
kaczmar
Member
The exclusivity isn't the point I'm trying to make either. Yes. In this one case, Epic mostly likely influenced the content to be only the Epic store.
Moving forward, the point I'm trying to convey is that the bean-counters want the most money for their titles. Epic (and soon be others) give those bean-counters more money from each and every sale. The bean-counters are going to get real use to having more money in their pockets. Expect more and more titles to ditch Steam during the initial launch window.
Look I get it. There is a ton of gamers with deep ties to Steam. But that is changing. There are simply too many "big dogs" wanting in on the action. Can you imagine if Twitch or Google announced a PC gaming store with zero fees? It could happen.
PC gaming has always been fairly decentralized (outside of Windows). People buy hardware components from a ton of different vendors. This is a good thing for the industry. It is also a good thing that the industry is finally moving to a decentralized software model as well.
In fact, if you look up titles on https://isthereanydeal.com, you will already see most game titles aren't available on all stores.
RedVIper
Banned
You keep missing why people dislike Epic store in general. But it's getting boring explaining it over and over again so you do you.
IbizaPocholo
NeoGAFs Kent Brockman
DeliciousDoc
Member
I didn't really care that yet another store was opening. I didn't care too much when pheonix point was money hatted other than no steam workshop. However, he is really poor at public speaking or he has a lot of shaddy stuff planned. He us trying to create a console like environment on a singular device. That's just annoying.
I buy gog (for future proofing) unless I need steam's service (multiplayer, workshop or good "complete your collection" deals). I would buy from epic because I have no choice? Real compelling argument you got there.
I buy gog (for future proofing) unless I need steam's service (multiplayer, workshop or good "complete your collection" deals). I would buy from epic because I have no choice? Real compelling argument you got there.
DeepEnigma
Gold Member
I love how Sweeney is acting naive, yet he was so technically critical of MS and their UWP moves (which I saw reason). He is no moron, and very intelligent. My oh my, you created one engine I used to be a huge fan of, made maps for UT with, and supported your "open platform PC renegade old school stance", but it is amazing seeing what 40% shares and a billion dollar influence can do to someone and their OG visions/mission statements.
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Panajev2001a
GAF's Pleasant Genius
Unless you are an old school pure laissez faire capitalism, free market capitalism has rules and oversight (you do expect your morning breakfast not to contain poisonous materials right
?). Oh well... getting off topic...
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Angry_Megalodon
Member
Their exclusivity politic is a fucking shit. Buying exclusivities do harm the market, is not any good for users.
Being legit would have been funding projects BEFORE they got funded by someone else and making new games happen. Delaying games on Steam is extremely wicked. For the time being, their contribution to the PC market amounts to minus one, considering that we are worse off now than before.
Being legit would have been funding projects BEFORE they got funded by someone else and making new games happen. Delaying games on Steam is extremely wicked. For the time being, their contribution to the PC market amounts to minus one, considering that we are worse off now than before.
Lupingosei
Banned
Has the games media already explained why this is a good thing? RPS, kotaku, Polygon or Jim Sterling?
FeldMonster
Member
Ah, but they did for the new Supra (BMW) and the FRS (Subaru).
Kenpachii
Member
Who cares about toyota. Tim needs to move forwards and he knows it. Fortnite isn't going to last. Making a new game and again a hit is going to be incredible hard and not realistic even remotely. in 2 years from now fortnite could be replaced by the next big thing and the company funds will go down rapidly which result in the free fall of it. Enough examples of company's where this happened with.
Now is the time to push forwards, what's better to parasite on other's work and do nothing? gaben knows everything about this. He does exactly this. Yet people praise him for it and even worship him for it. It's laughable.
With china investors, lots of money and china market + eastern market opening. PC gaming is moving in a fast pace forwards and this is the time to move in on it on a hard way.
How your feelings are hurt because epic isn't going to route of useless GOG ( half of the games they sell don't even work ) is something they honestly don't care about. He will make any dumb statement to whatever he wants because honestly it's his only route to success after fortnite.
Everybody all likes to complain but at the end of the day they still buy the game and play it. Look at the steam sales before it was pulled ( metro ). It actually increased massively. Why where people not mass refunding it? yea there you go.
You can buy the game still and play it without issue's without additional fee's etc. Hell you should be happy the game was even released for PC to start with, its a console through its roots, the nich sales on PC probably won't even effect them if they would drop it.
I agree with tim completely. only a fool would not do what he does. If i had his funds i would do the exactly the same.
Or what else would you guys advice tim to do? launch a store with "please buy games on here". Yea that sure is going to work.
Now is the time to push forwards, what's better to parasite on other's work and do nothing? gaben knows everything about this. He does exactly this. Yet people praise him for it and even worship him for it. It's laughable.
With china investors, lots of money and china market + eastern market opening. PC gaming is moving in a fast pace forwards and this is the time to move in on it on a hard way.
How your feelings are hurt because epic isn't going to route of useless GOG ( half of the games they sell don't even work ) is something they honestly don't care about. He will make any dumb statement to whatever he wants because honestly it's his only route to success after fortnite.
Everybody all likes to complain but at the end of the day they still buy the game and play it. Look at the steam sales before it was pulled ( metro ). It actually increased massively. Why where people not mass refunding it? yea there you go.
You can buy the game still and play it without issue's without additional fee's etc. Hell you should be happy the game was even released for PC to start with, its a console through its roots, the nich sales on PC probably won't even effect them if they would drop it.
I agree with tim completely. only a fool would not do what he does. If i had his funds i would do the exactly the same.
Or what else would you guys advice tim to do? launch a store with "please buy games on here". Yea that sure is going to work.
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johntown
Banned
Glad to see Epic has to defend itself. That just shows they know they are doing something controversial.
To the car dealship thing you can also buy new Toyota’s from more than one dealership.
I have no issue with Epic bringing games to their store or offering devs better deals. That is great and fine.
What I and most ppl take issue with is the exclusivity and how it was implemented last minute. It’s a hit below the belt.
To the car dealship thing you can also buy new Toyota’s from more than one dealership.
I have no issue with Epic bringing games to their store or offering devs better deals. That is great and fine.
What I and most ppl take issue with is the exclusivity and how it was implemented last minute. It’s a hit below the belt.
Solomeena
Banned
He is full of shit. It is up to game developers to lower the price and i damn well guarantee they will not.
Ban Puncher
Member
Trickle Down Gameonomics
Breakfast at Noon
Member
For some odd reason I cant capture any game window that's off the epic store (streaming) and have to monitor capture.
That alone.. not using it.
That alone.. not using it.
SonGoku
Member
Imagine unironically buying $800 nikes
YIKES
crowbrow
Banned
I dont support free market ideologically, i guess i can support it when it benefits me as a consumer. But free market can be a nice way of saying the big fish abusing its power and influence and fucking up the consumer and i dont support that.
1) This is more "Do you have the right to buy a Citreon at any place other than Johny's discount shit heap and thumbtacks in seats emporeom?"
2) If said emporeom is a shit heap, yes, I'd argue at that point you have, failing all things, to say "No, I am angry at this, this is a shitheap store".
2) If said emporeom is a shit heap, yes, I'd argue at that point you have, failing all things, to say "No, I am angry at this, this is a shitheap store".
Plague Doctor
Member
Tim, I beg you.
Keep on talking. Just talk to any interviewer. Please.
Don't worry. Those unwashed masses of PC game consumers will come around so long as you just keep on talking.
Keep on talking. Just talk to any interviewer. Please.
Don't worry. Those unwashed masses of PC game consumers will come around so long as you just keep on talking.
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mcz117chief
Member
At first, when I heard the news about EPIC getting games to launch exclusively on their store front I didn't see it as trouble, but the more I see of this shit, data mining, "Tencent is definitely not in control, guys" talk and just weird answers to simple questions, I am getting more and more wary and starting to contemplate whether I should request a re-fund on my pre-order of Phoenix Point (or just wait 1 more year).
In a vacuum it reduces competition. IF you're only talking about that game for that period of time.
But that's a narrow short term point of view.
IN the long run the buying of exclusives helps build a competitor to STeam.
CuNi
Member
I also fail to see how it builds a competitor to steam. Big games like the division 2 are available through Ubisofts Uplay, and since I already have games like R6 siege on there I don't have any issue at all getting it from Uplay rather than using epics store to get a Uplay game and all the other games are timed exclusives of which neither seems like a one hit wonder or anything that I can't wait a year for so I'm not missing out on anything. If anything I even gain from it. Metro will come out a year later to steam and by then probably a new GPU generation with improved RTX performance so I can play that game with its supposed good RTX features for cheaper money and still get the full experience and satisfactory launched ad early access so after a year I can buy the finished product and don't have to alpha test ist.
I actually don't see any draw back for me. They can keep on shelving money out if they want to. Devs like Microsofts game Studios, From Software, Capcom and many more don't see any reason for even co releasing on epic and stick to steam, so what exactly should I fear from missing out?
klosos
Member
Honestly fair enough,its competition in the end. i couldnt care less about Steam/Valve as a company , I am not a share holder so why do i care about there finances. I've used Steam for it must be a decade or more since football manager 07 i think and never had a problem with Steam. I only look to buy games from Steam or GOG ( GOG preferably) for convenience and DRM reasons.
However if EPIC want me to jump across , they better have a game i really really want , unfortunate for EPIC the games that are exclusive are all games i am not desperate to play and i will wait a year or two or justnot play them at all. IF EPIC secure an exclustvity deal for Cyberpunk or the PC version of Red Dead 2 ( if it comes) then i will reconsider , but i doubt that will happen.
Honestly if i was Valve the games which sign this exclusivity deals for a year with EPIC , i wouldn't allow them to release there games later on , on steam. Just to prove the point. if EPIC can use anti consumer practices why cant Valve ? also am spiteful and i will cut my own nose of to spite my face.
However if EPIC want me to jump across , they better have a game i really really want , unfortunate for EPIC the games that are exclusive are all games i am not desperate to play and i will wait a year or two or justnot play them at all. IF EPIC secure an exclustvity deal for Cyberpunk or the PC version of Red Dead 2 ( if it comes) then i will reconsider , but i doubt that will happen.
Honestly if i was Valve the games which sign this exclusivity deals for a year with EPIC , i wouldn't allow them to release there games later on , on steam. Just to prove the point. if EPIC can use anti consumer practices why cant Valve ? also am spiteful and i will cut my own nose of to spite my face.
Kadayi
Banned
Pretty much my view as well. I was a bit put out that Outer worlds is heading to EGS, especially given Obsidian themselves said it was coming to Steam in their game informer media blitz, though it ultimately appears to be a publisher decision at the end of the day (much like with Metro). However as a long term gamer, I'm not so beholden to the new release zeitgeist these days that I feel I have to leap on a title straight away, and I'm not opposed to waiting until a game has been patched a bit (as they invariably are). This will merely be a longer wait (more time to tackle my backlog tbh). Given that Epic has basically said that the exclusives won't last forever, it's clearly a strategy rather than a long term policy and I wouldn't have thought it was sustainable beyond a year to eighteen months in terms of capital outlay. The more exclusives they sign, the greater the impact on their bottom line. Moneyhatting some indie releases probably isn't too much of a burden, but I would have thought that moneyhatting a guaranteed return on games like the Outer Worlds is another matter entirely.
A big part of the reason for attempting to turn EGS into a viable store beyond Fortnite is because Fortnite's popularity won't last forever, and Epic knows it. Eventually, public ennui will set in and their audience will drop off (if it hasn't started already). The hope is clearly to try to build out the existing audience they have with card-carrying gamers who will happily spend hundreds of dollars on games every year. The problem is, they fixated on the idea of trying to lure said gamers to their platform, solely on the basis of exclusivity, without understanding why it is Steam has remained so dominant all these years. The smart move would have been to build out the EGS feature set to make it comparable to Steam from the off.
Yeah these things work at scale. Not on a personal level. When someone puts out an ad to increase sales it doesn't mean any one person is going to go out and buy their product or shop their store. The ad isn't ineffective just because you personally aren't buying or because you personally can get the product somewhere else. An effective ad, in this example, means more people buy their product or shop their store.
IT's the same thing with the buying of exclusives. IT's effective if it gets more people in the door. And getting more people in the door is how you build a competing store.
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LordRaptor
Member
Protectionism is the literal opposite of free market breh
Horatius
Member
i get a weird feeling of confusion with this entire discussion because no one ever mentions the gigantic elephant in the room, which is that steam has always had massive competition in the pc gaming space, and that that competition is fucking piracy.
epic's actions are vaguely logical for epic themselves i suppose (i imagine that the exclusivity concept is operating for them entirely as a loss leader, but without seeing the scale of the loss it's hard to gauge whether it's a good idea), but long term i think it's a disaster for publishers and devs. they're acting like exclusivity in this case means absolutely anything in a real sense, when clearly it doesn't. yes the epic store can be the only place where you are allowed to spend money on a game, but there is an obvious alternative to that, which is pirating the game so that you can both play it and not spend any damn money.
the miracle of steam was never just pioneering digital delivery, getting rid of box sales, etc. it was getting people to bother buying games at all. valve created enough of a value proposition for the consumer that it was able to get people to actually buy games. between the community features, store front, easy patching and downloads, and, almost certainly most importantly, massive regular sales, buying a game on steam was easy, convenient, and cheap enough to overcome the gigantic, blaring, neon-covered, incontrovertible fact that you can always play all this shit for fucking free anyway.
one of the other major reasons this worked was precisely the psychological effect of having all your stuff in one convenient location, and the increasing attachment felt to your ever growing library. if a game series that you've bought on steam for years is suddenly only available on the epic store, why bother buying it at all unless you have a keen sense of morality? you might have bothered paying on steam for the community tools, continuity with achievements, friends list etc., but when that stuff is no longer there, setting up an account on a new online store and losing all those bells and whistles is suddenly a comparative amount of hassle to just pirating the damn thing, and piracy is free. something like the walking dead: the final season being only on the epic store is so jarring because of this.
people bandy about the notion that "competition is good, what's wrong with another store" etc., but i think that entirely misunderstands the pc gaming industry. yes on the surface it's arbitrary that valve should be the chosen middle man who gets to reap the benefits of what appears to be a monopoly, but in this case said monopoly directly benefits the entire industry and the consumer because the monopoly exists only as a fiction anyway. there is an ever-present competitor here, and it can always undercut you in price, because without actively paying me to play your game you can't go lower than $0.
the fact remains that the only two successful anti-piracy methods ever devised are having a popular multiplayer component and having your game on steam. it's not steam's drm that did this, but the value proposition valve created, and it has directly benefited the entire industry, developers and publishers alike. the pc gaming renaissance that has occurred in the past decade rests entirely on the back of valve. there's a reason the market is basically steam, a few successful publisher owned stores like origin, battle.net and uplay which are mostly carried by exclusives made by those companies, and gog which does it's own little thing to the side. there isn't room for another big dog, because another big dog will break the fiction entirely.
if consumers are telling you hey, i don't want another store, this feels bad, i don't care if it's also free, stop, the industry's reaction shouldn't be gee whizz, they're so irrational. it should be hey, maybe we shouldn't upset this delicate balance, because it might shatter the illusion that anyone has to buy our games to play them.
epic's actions are vaguely logical for epic themselves i suppose (i imagine that the exclusivity concept is operating for them entirely as a loss leader, but without seeing the scale of the loss it's hard to gauge whether it's a good idea), but long term i think it's a disaster for publishers and devs. they're acting like exclusivity in this case means absolutely anything in a real sense, when clearly it doesn't. yes the epic store can be the only place where you are allowed to spend money on a game, but there is an obvious alternative to that, which is pirating the game so that you can both play it and not spend any damn money.
the miracle of steam was never just pioneering digital delivery, getting rid of box sales, etc. it was getting people to bother buying games at all. valve created enough of a value proposition for the consumer that it was able to get people to actually buy games. between the community features, store front, easy patching and downloads, and, almost certainly most importantly, massive regular sales, buying a game on steam was easy, convenient, and cheap enough to overcome the gigantic, blaring, neon-covered, incontrovertible fact that you can always play all this shit for fucking free anyway.
one of the other major reasons this worked was precisely the psychological effect of having all your stuff in one convenient location, and the increasing attachment felt to your ever growing library. if a game series that you've bought on steam for years is suddenly only available on the epic store, why bother buying it at all unless you have a keen sense of morality? you might have bothered paying on steam for the community tools, continuity with achievements, friends list etc., but when that stuff is no longer there, setting up an account on a new online store and losing all those bells and whistles is suddenly a comparative amount of hassle to just pirating the damn thing, and piracy is free. something like the walking dead: the final season being only on the epic store is so jarring because of this.
people bandy about the notion that "competition is good, what's wrong with another store" etc., but i think that entirely misunderstands the pc gaming industry. yes on the surface it's arbitrary that valve should be the chosen middle man who gets to reap the benefits of what appears to be a monopoly, but in this case said monopoly directly benefits the entire industry and the consumer because the monopoly exists only as a fiction anyway. there is an ever-present competitor here, and it can always undercut you in price, because without actively paying me to play your game you can't go lower than $0.
the fact remains that the only two successful anti-piracy methods ever devised are having a popular multiplayer component and having your game on steam. it's not steam's drm that did this, but the value proposition valve created, and it has directly benefited the entire industry, developers and publishers alike. the pc gaming renaissance that has occurred in the past decade rests entirely on the back of valve. there's a reason the market is basically steam, a few successful publisher owned stores like origin, battle.net and uplay which are mostly carried by exclusives made by those companies, and gog which does it's own little thing to the side. there isn't room for another big dog, because another big dog will break the fiction entirely.
if consumers are telling you hey, i don't want another store, this feels bad, i don't care if it's also free, stop, the industry's reaction shouldn't be gee whizz, they're so irrational. it should be hey, maybe we shouldn't upset this delicate balance, because it might shatter the illusion that anyone has to buy our games to play them.
Roni
Gold Member
But of course Epic is making these developers some money in the back end.
Either by securing a value worth in copies as a retainer to sweeten the deal or by giving some other incentive, that's buying into the game's risk by adding to the project's budget.
Bringing any new product exclusively to your store by adding value for the producer of that new product is not anything new.
There's no way those publishers or devs didn't get something out of opting OUT of the largest PC retailer. You don't force people to do that.
Companies only make that decision when it's worth it for them... And if it's worth it for them, that's helping them keep their doors open and their lights on.
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daveonezero
Banned
No the original post was right. Exclusives are in the free market.
The problem I see with he EGS is these "knowing better than the consumer" mindset in all of these quote. Its not up to him if the consumer wants what they have or not and its quite obvious he doesn't care. He thinks he knows best and I just don't see that going well in the future.
Especially if the application they are pimping is also data mining.
I really don't blame these developers making deals. It seems like a good thing for them right now but it may backfire. Consumers like feeling smart and with GOG selling games having no DRM yet epic is doubling down on DRM. I don't see a place for them.
CuNi
Member
But the issue is the press is mostly negative, recently we're having talks about the store acting like Spyware etc and at the same time their only arguments that it is running great are statements like "2.5x more than on Steam" with no time periode, numbers or anything. Thats nothing a healthy store should have problems with disclosing. Also they are shelving money out left and right and hope that people will spend money on their store because of free games or a few exclusives. I would argue differently if their exclusives would be huge, widely known and popular AAA games, but besides metro, there is nothing on that store that is truly exclusive to them. Like I said with the Division 2, the only thing even remotely of quality there, most people will get that on Uplay. Many players won't have issues passing on early access games because of all the negative experience most people have with such games and streamers are adding to that problem for epic. Just recently watched Giant Waffle play Satisfactory and talk about how much he hates the epic store and wants to avoid it. That's a influencer with a few thousand subs watching openly saying how much he dislikes the store, and I bet he isn't the only one. I'm not saying that there is literally no one buying on it, I don't think so at all. They surely have a good number of costumers, but I just don't see them gain mainstream traction if for most popular games on the store, you can just use Uplay too. Because if we're honest, games like Satisfactory aren't really catered for the mainstream player.