Epic Games Store - Free game every two weeks !

[DeathJester76]

Wow that's amazing, always wanted to try Subnautica...looks like a good game...more competition in the market is paying off for us gamer already it seems!

[Lennac]

I sympathize with the multiple launchers being annoying. However, to ensure a competitive market (which is almost always good for the consumer), I hope the Epic Games store succeeds and (importantly) doesn't put Steam out of business, but just provides a competitive alternative.

This isn't like the console wars where there's a big investment to play all the titles and get all the games, the cost is simply time and a small amount of space on your hard drive.

Also, there's always hope that someone can come along and create some kind of open source piece of software that amalgamates your two libraries together so you can launch all games from one location. I doubt you'd be able to integrate multiple storefronts (due to the security required for processing purchases).

[Tom]

Well, i feel like this is a good motivator for Steam to start caring about and giving small devs some benefits for choosing it.

[Doctor_Diddler]

I think I'll take their shit and never use their platform.

[Yoshi]

And as pointed out above, Tencent have a stake, albeit small in Epic Games.

It's 40%. That's not small, though not controlling.

[Teratus]

I am pretty much torn like many others here.

The competition will be good for steam and will hopefully force them to improve their services.
But on the other hand I simply have no interest in investing in another launcher.

I have Battle and Origin already out of necessity and I still never use them nor do I feel like playing the games on them that often because I cannot be bothered to swap launchers.
I've invested a lot of time and money into my Steam account and that alone is going to keep me and I expect many others on that platform.

Free games are just not an enticement to me for 2 simple reasons.
If the free game is a game i'm interested in then there's a 99% chance I already own it..
Likewise if the free game is a game i'm not actively interested in then there is a 100% chance I am not going to take it anyway.

I'm not the kind of person who will play games that don't interest me just because they are free.. if i'm not interested, i'm never going to play it so free or not the game has no appeal to me.
If anything when games I do like.. if not love become free then it just comes across as I supported the developers of this great game and others didn't.

I don't mean that in a negative way on gamers though.. Just that too many great games don't attract the sales they truly deserve were as a lot of bad games bring in billions.

[Morgana]

On one hand, i like the idea of Valve having some competition. But on the other, i do not like Epic Games, because they gave us Fortnite.

And as pointed out above, Tencent have a stake, albeit small in Epic Games.

[Murray]

Yeah, while it's annoying to have to deal with multiple launchers, I believe that it is a net positive because competition is good.

[🦊🦊🦊]

Dude, I'd love to get free licenses for games I own on different platforms at this rate.

[MadMummy76]

The competition is usually good for the consumers. - It would be if it were not for the fact that Epic's approach is to moneyhat games and hive them off as exclusives.

Epic is trying to pull a Discord and cause more fragmentation by causing users to have to hunt around more stores for "store exclusives". As much as I hate to quote Polygon Epic *are* trying to bring the Console Wars to the PC and it has no place here.

Not to mention that Epic's "No questions asked" refund policy has it asking you more questions than most government agencies, they're not GDPR compliant at all (that data has to go to Tencent after all) and most of their features are developer friendly, -not- consumer friendly.

If you think about it steam and epic and gog and whatever "launcher" is replacing the installshield wizard of old times, nothing else. This isn't fragmenting the market, you're still running games from your desktop, from the same os, you don't need an additional investment to be able to get exclusives. And they allow you to put icons for games directly on your desktop. You don't even have to have the launcher in startup.

It seems some gamers really did become whiny.

[Black Lotus]

Meh seeing a Epic is partly owned by Tencent... i'm staying as far away as I can from epic game store.

[Dustalvion]

I'm alright with the free games and I'll just leech off their system without putting a dime back into it since I already have the Epic Games launcher back from when I gave Fortnite a trial run. After dropping League, I'm done with supporting TenCent.

While the developers get more of a percentage for games sold on Epic Games than Steam...I'm skeptical that the promising cuts will last. Hopefully Steam will respond and slap down Epic Games. At least that's my hopes. I want to see a competitive market longterm, but Epic taking a slice of the pie isn't what I'd call competition. If it wasn't for Fortnite I don't think Epic would have ever had the opportunity to even pull this scheme off in the first place. They'll continue to make mad money off of Vbucks, but I don't see the Launcher Store paying out like they feel it might.

[Yeshu]

Epic is trying to pull a Discord and cause more fragmentation by causing users to have to hunt around more stores for "store exclusives". As much as I hate to quote Polygon Epic *are* trying to bring the Console Wars to the PC and it has no place here.
.

Funny isn't it? Back in the day you would buy a PC game. Now you buy Steam, Origin, Uplay games... it's seriously like a console war on a single platform.

Only GOG and Humble Store to a certain extent allows you to buy games without any client restrictions.

[Hobbes]

The competition is usually good for the consumers. - It would be if it were not for the fact that Epic's approach is to moneyhat games and hive them off as exclusives.

Epic is trying to pull a Discord and cause more fragmentation by causing users to have to hunt around more stores for "store exclusives". As much as I hate to quote Polygon Epic *are* trying to bring the Console Wars to the PC and it has no place here.

Not to mention that Epic's "No questions asked" refund policy has it asking you more questions than most government agencies, they're not GDPR compliant at all (that data has to go to Tencent after all) and most of their features are developer friendly, -not- consumer friendly.

[Tom]

I have a couple of opinions about this:

1. The competition is usually good for the consumers.

2. Having multiple store launchers is cumbersome.

3. Linux support or GTFO. Right now Steam is the only storefront (sans Itch.io, also R.I.P. Desura) that gives Linux some love and care.

Good point on Linux tho, but i don't mind having second launcher like that one from epic. Though i absolutely would hate the one from Ubi or EA.
It would be nice if they keep their launcher soft, without all that heavy community/marketplace/media BS, or atleast give an option to have it the soft way or something.
Like if we don't use friendlist then just don't bother us with it etc, just the game folder and that's it.