Epic Games Store - Free game every two weeks !

[Tom]

You can share your general concerns about the Epic Games store here:
https://www.exclusivelygames.com/for...oly-exclusives

---

Since the 7th of december The Epic Games store is now open.
"The first games on the store are Hades by Supergiant Games, Ashen by Annapurna/A44, and Hello Neighbor: Hide and Seek by tinyBuild, available now";

-------------------------------------------------
And according to their announcement:

"The store will also feature one free game every two weeks throughout 2019. Epic is funding these free releases so you always have something new to come and check out.
The first free game will be Subnautica, available from Dec 14th to Dec 27th, followed by Super Meat Boy from Dec 28th to Jan 10th."

-------------------------------------------------
There are heavier and heavier shots at steam every new week.
Looks like Epic is no joke.


What do you guys think about this offer?

[monnef]

Nice to see (off)topic splitting here is a thing. On a small local tech forum I always got infuriated when mods locked whole thread because people started talking about something a bit different, but often very interesting. I suggested thread splitting multiple times, but I guess locking was easier...

[Eno]

There are heavier and heavier shots at steam every new week.
Looks like Epic is no joke.


What do you guys think about this offer?[/CENTER]

If EPIC pays a full price to developers, for every copy claimed, It can be a lot of money.
Subnautica was on 25% sale on Steam recently and they got 7300 reviews.
Maybe they have an agreement to pay only 70-80% which the developer would get on Steam, from that reduced by 25% price.

Usually only 1% to 2% of players write a review.
One can estimate how much money Unknown Worlds Entertainment got.

At the next sale we can check how the trend on Steam for this game is.
If people still buy the game, they either don't know about Epic or just want to stay on Steam.

But the beginning is good. Starting with Subnautica was a definitely a good investment, to attract potential customers.
Satisfactory will come to Epic only in the first year and those customers might buy that game too, at full price.
If more medium sized developers move to the Epic store in such an exclusive way, the sales might cover some of the initial investment to attract players.

I would say, Epic will not have profits from the store in 2019 if a player will get 25 games for free in 2019.

[Tom]

Post your comments about the free games from EGs here,
or join the new thread and have a good talk.
Peace!

[Tom]

Please keep in mind that the orignal discussion here is about Epic Games' free games offering

Since the discussion is leaning towards discussing the concerns:
Here is a thread to discuss the concerns about the Epic Games Store

https://www.exclusivelygames.com/for...oly-exclusives

[Hobbes]

Pointing out the inherent cost of your wants is not strawmanning. You can't have one without the other. If you're against multiple launchers you're campaigning for having a monopoly. Is there a middle ground I'm not seeing?

False dilemma. (I'm not even bothering with your take on attempting to compare "Origin.exe" to "Setup.exe" because the two are so far removed from each other it's an apples to oranges comparison)

Nobody is arguing against multiple launchers provided they are a voluntary element. Epic is making them _mandatory_ by moneyhatting games so you are forced to install the said launcher to get a hold of game X, Discord is doing the same for game Y, and given this appears to be the tactic to get a foothold against steam, the next launcher will do the same. This is creating fragmentation of the market through the effective equivalent of "Console wars" on the PC, it's not creating more choice for the consumer because the consumer can't choose where to buy the game. Instead, the consumer is forced into installing lots of storefronts in order to access the same choice of games, but now they're divided over multiple launchers.

This is explicitly anti-consumer and only benefits the storefront holders in the long run.

If this really was about the cut, you'd see games like Hades also appear on itch.io which offer a 100% or near as cut to the developer, so it's not about that, it's about the bag of cash Epic plunked down to make sure a game stays exclusive to their platform.

[Jack-Garcia]

Yeah but you failed to mention, that the option to this monopoly is not a free market, because there's no competition. Let say i like WOW, Half life and Fortnite, meaning i have to get all 3 launchers, where's the competition there?, and you might say, "well they have the right cause they made the games", but still, i have to get 3 different services that do the same just cause exclusivity, they don't compete in anyway. The problem is exclusivity, if you tell me that the 2 different launchers are gonna have the same games, then it wouldn't be an issue.

Competition like this is beneficial for the developers and publishers, they would get better deals and more exposure; and that might translate to more games for gamers, eventually; but i don't see how this type of competition is beneficial for customer.

And also, it's annoying to have different launchers running at the same time, it consumes CPU and RAM. But also all the launcher update the games, meaning if i only run them when i want to play a game, there's a chance i wont be able to play the game, and i'll have to wait until it finish, and if there's something like a 14GB update, that's it i cant play that game for that day. In my case i have steam always open, and if there's a update in one of the games taht im playing, i let it update, if im not doing something else, but i also have blizzard, and there's always an update in that, so i started to open both when i boot my pc. But imagine having to do that for every single launcher, and all the band that it would consume if you just let it be.

What am saying is, i think rather deal with a monopoly, than having to deal with 6 different monopolies.

When mention competition what i mean was that there's not competition for giving a better service, just to see who get more exclusives.

[Jack-Garcia]

You failed to mention a single inaccuracy. I didn't mean launchers were exactly the same as an installshield wizard, I meant they cause no more inconvenience than them. I hate to break it to you, but you can quit from all the launchers after you installed a game. You don't play more than one game simultaneously, so you only ever have to have one launcher in memory at any time. So yeah, having a single launcher vs many makes absolutely no difference in that regard.

Yes you have to manually quit the launcher after playing a game. Such first world problems, that you'd rather campaign for a full monopoly than right click on the tray icon and then left click quit. As opposed to having to eject the game disc after playing, before the era of launchers. Or have we forgotten that already?

Yeah but you failed to mention, that the option to this monopoly is not a free market, because there's no competition. Let say i like WOW, Half life and Fortnite, meaning i have to get all 3 launchers, where's the competition there?, and you might say, "well they have the right cause they made the games", but still, i have to get 3 different services that do the same just cause exclusivity, they don't compete in anyway. The problem is exclusivity, if you tell me that the 2 different launchers are gonna have the same games, then it wouldn't be an issue.



Competition like this is beneficial for the developers and publishers, they would get better deals and more exposure; and that might translate to more games for gamers, eventually; but i don't see how this type of competition is beneficial for customer.


And also, it's annoying to have different launchers running at the same time, it consumes CPU and RAM. But also all the launcher update the games, meaning if i only run them when i want to play a game, there's a chance i wont be able to play the game, and i'll have to wait until it finish, and if there's something like a 14GB update, that's it i cant play that game for that day. In my case i have steam always open, and if there's a update in one of the games taht im playing, i let it update, if im not doing something else, but i also have blizzard, and there's always an update in that, so i started to open both when i boot my pc. But imagine having to do that for every single launcher, and all the band that it would consume if you just let it be.




What am saying is, i think rather deal with a monopoly, than having to deal with 6 different monopolies.

[MadMummy76]

straw man
/ˌstrô ˈman/
noun

1. 1.
   an intentionally misrepresented proposition that is set up because it is easier to defeat than an opponent's real argument.
   "her familiar procedure of creating a straw man by exaggerating their approach"
2. 2.
   a person regarded as having no substance or integrity.
   "a photogenic straw man gets inserted into office and advisers dictate policy"

Pointing out the inherent cost of your wants is not strawmanning. You can't have one without the other. If you're against multiple launchers you're campaigning for having a monopoly. Is there a middle ground I'm not seeing?

[EngulfingDarkness]

Do we sell our souls to Fortnite for a free game every 2 weeks that we probably wont even play?
Hell yeah we do.
edit:
Steam masterace

[Lord Nikon]

"We want a monopoly because we find more than one launcher an inconvenience". Convince me how is that a good stance to hold.

straw man
/ˌstrô ˈman/
noun

1. 1.
   an intentionally misrepresented proposition that is set up because it is easier to defeat than an opponent's real argument.
   "her familiar procedure of creating a straw man by exaggerating their approach"
2. 2.
   a person regarded as having no substance or integrity.
   "a photogenic straw man gets inserted into office and advisers dictate policy"

[MadMummy76]

They're not InstallShield wizards. Those clean up after themselves once they are done. Store launchers are effectively Terminate, Stay Resident programs. So! When you load up Origin, Uplay, Steam, GOG, Epic, etc to run all the games you've got installed because in most cases those things need to be active (with the exception being GOG and to a lesser extent Epic if the developer opts for no DRM) what you're doing is clogging up your system with lots of apps that eat memory and sit in the background. You DO need to have those launchers present in many cases which means you're wasting CPU and RAM because those launchers insist on being around to mind your game (I dare you to run most Ubi games without Uplay these days as an example).

Now, this is me being polite in correcting your inaccuracies. You posted the same nonsense twice, if I have to correct you again, it won't be pretty

You failed to mention a single inaccuracy. I didn't mean launchers were exactly the same as an installshield wizard, I meant they cause no more inconvenience than them. I hate to break it to you, but you can quit from all the launchers after you installed a game. You don't play more than one game simultaneously, so you only ever have to have one launcher in memory at any time. So yeah, having a single launcher vs many makes absolutely no difference in that regard.

Yes you have to manually quit the launcher after playing a game. Such first world problems, that you'd rather campaign for a full monopoly than right click on the tray icon and then left click quit. As opposed to having to eject the game disc after playing, before the era of launchers. Or have we forgotten that already?

[MadMummy76]

yea i can really care less if it sounds whiny, but i DO NOT LIKE having multiple launchers. I like JUST having steam and I will stick to Steam. You white knighting for them won't change anyone's mind and you being rude to people especially won't help Epic Game launcher store.

"We want a monopoly because we find more than one launcher an inconvenience". Convince me how is that a good stance to hold.

[Eno]

I was skeptical about Steam at first but I'm fairly comfortable with it now, I think their status as a "monopoly" has been beneficial for the customers and I'd rather it stays that way. We have free online, cloud saves for nearly every game, unlimited downloads at great speeds, almost no downtime ever, almost impeccable security and privacy standards so far and reliably decent sales (They used to be great, I'll admit they've declined in recent years). We have it good, and I don't want that threatened by a company with more money than sense such as Tencent.

Microsoft had monopoly with Windows too. But still there was Linux all the time for users who wanted an alternative.
I think it was better this way than having 5-6 operating systems and games made for only one or two of them.
I wonder why the XBOX and PS stores are not extended to support PC games too.

I like the steam due to the open way we can write reviews. I learned meanwhile that mixed rated games with 150000 reviews can be better than very positive games with 2000 reviews.
I am fine with the Steam but I would like also to be able to save in their cloud, notes why I ignore some games. It takes sometime 1-2 hours to analyze enough reviews and discussions of forums to find out if the game is going to be what I seek.

On epic store I will have no such reviews and forums where I can go to find out the truth. It will be funny if their lack of forum will drive people to the Steam forum to discuss the games.
In this world where AAA publishers want to take my money for low quality games and Indie developers want to acquire the experience to create PC games by doing their first Early Access, also on my money, I simply cannot trust a site like Epic where rating and discussions are suppressed.

But if Epic will accept only developers who have a reputation and if those developers do not come to Steam I have no choice.
If the sequel of Subnautica will come on Epic only, what should I do?
For sure I will come to this forum or a similar one, to read reviews first.

In the end if developers trust Epic... it just a store. I will buy the good games from whichever store offers them. It is not about helping Epic, Steam or the developers. I want their game.
Also I blame Steam for advertising me so many games and now I have many I played less than 2 hours, or even not started.
I often filter and read only the negative reviews to be able to suppress the urge of buying one more nice looking game which looks like something I used to play 10 years ago.

On steam it takes a few clicks to navigate to this list.
https://store.steampowered.com/searc...ed_DESC&os=win
10-20 games are released every day.
Who has time to check the list, to buy and to review them?

It feels like every programmer who doesn't have a job tries to put a game on Steam. Epic could take them, but they don't want them.

[Zenryu]

Since I already have the Epic Games launcher installed, it's existence wont bother me as much. I'll mainly be using it for the free games for now. If they start to get more on Steam's level, I may consider them as a second platform for my games. I agree that I wouldn't want them to have exclusivity, mainly on larger games. Won't mind as much if they take exclusivity on smaller ones though.

Definitely happy to see Subnautica for free though. It's been on my plan to buy list for a while now.