PC Epic CEO Tim Sweeney says exclusives “ultimately benefit gamers”

[Keyser_Soze]

Quote

Despite the ongoing unpopularity of Epic Games store exclusives within some corners of the internet, the company’s CEO is standing up to defend them. In a lengthy Twitter post last night, Tim Sweeney says that he believes that exclusives work, and have the power to change the industry for the better.

During a discussion beneath a tweet about GOG Galaxy 2.0, Sweeney was asked why Epic resorted to paid exclusives. In response, he said that Epic “believes exclusives are the only strategy that will change the 70/30 status quo at a large enough scale to permanently affect the whole game industry.”

Sweeney says that while independent storefront have been doing “great work” for years, “none seem to have reached 5% of Steam’s scale.” He goes on to say that “this leads to the strategy of exclusives which, though unpopular with dedicated Steam gamers, do work, as established by the major publisher storefronts and by the key Epic Games store releases compared to their former Steam revenue projections and their actual console sales.”

 

The Epic CEO also points out that Steam’s 70/30% revenue split “is a disastrous situation for developers and publishers alike.” As a result, “if the Epic strategy either succeeds in building a second major storefront for PC games with an 88/12 revenue split, or even just leads other stores to significantly improve their terms, the result will be a major wave of reinvestment in game development and a lowering of costs.”

 

At the end of the thread, Sweeney says that “I believe this approach passes the test of ultimately benefiting gamers,” but that we’ll need to wait for major storefronts to rebalance, and for developers to “reinvest more of [the] fruits of their labour into creation rather than taxation.”

 

https://www.pcgamesn.com/epic-store-tim-sweeney

 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Quote

“if the Epic strategy either succeeds in building a second major storefront for PC games with an 88/12 revenue split, or even just leads other stores to significantly improve their terms, the result will be a major wave of reinvestment in game development and a lowering of costs.”

Quote

“I believe this approach passes the test of ultimately benefiting  gamers,” but that we’ll need to wait for major storefronts to  rebalance, and for developers to “reinvest more of [ the] fruits of their labour into creation rather than taxation.”

 

OLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLO

 

Really bought into that trickle-down Reaganomics, didn't ya Tim?!?

[Keyser_Soze]

But it's just a launcher right?

[Brian]

What happened to lowering those game prices?  Dropped that point quickly I see.

[JPDunks4]

Major Publishers reinvesting the extra split into development, probably not.  

But if smaller studios are getting additional revenue, I'd fully expect it to help them grow and expand projects.  18% is a significant amount.  

 

The main issue really still is, does the loss of sales of not being on Steam initially justify the extra 12% cut from being exclusive on Epic.  

[crispy4000]

In general, I actually do think he’s right.  An 88/12 split is a huge boon. Even if some publishers could get greedy with the added revenue with extra board member bonuses and the like, it’s still likely that more money would go back into investments.  It’s 18% extra back.  It’s safe to assume at least some of that will be put to good use.

 

Know what a better split is?  100/0.  That’s what Ubisoft, EA, etc, want, which is why they have their own launchers.  Epic isn’t really much of an enabler for them.  Mainly the publishers and little guys who can’t invest in their own platforms.

 

Storefront exclusives are still a pretty worrisome way for Epic to achieve its goals.  If they do push the industry towards a better revenue sharing model, I don’t trust them to stop.  They’ll keep doing it to remain competitive.

 

[crispy4000]

1 hour ago, ManUtdRedDevils said:

What happened to lowering those game prices?  Dropped that point quickly I see.

 

If consumers are willing to pay it, prices won’t be any lower on EGS.

[TwinIon]

I think the current 70/30 split is ridiculous and is a standard that needs to change, I think that having multiple, competing storefronts is an absolute benefit to the customer, and I think that exclusivity agreements can be beneficial in allowing some games to exist or otherwise allow devs to recover their investments. I also think that Sweeney is full of it. He's doing it for business reasons and that's fine, no need to try and butter it up in some kind of transparent moral argument.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

As a customer, I already benefit from the roughly a dozen PC gaming storefronts not called Steam/Origin/Uplay/GOG/etc. for which I have established accounts.  What value proposition does Epic and its third-party exclusivity-based business paractices provide to me at this point?

 

If I don't see tangible benefits -- in other words, a lower retail price point -- of this 88/12 split, then there is no value proposition to me.

[AshsToAshs]

Just to be the odd man out, I'll go ahead and argue that what Epic is doing does benefit us as consumers:

 

The dozen or so other PC Gaming storefronts (Uplay, Origin, GoG, etc) haven't really put a dent in Steams overall complete control of the PC Gaming marketplace. 
Having one platform that controls 90+% of the market is bad for pricing, and bad for consumers.

 

Driving more and more users towards another platform, like Epic, creates competition. 
If Epic gets large enough for Steam to actually view it as competition, it'll be forced to react and adjust.

These types of adjustments are almost always better for the consumer. 

[Rodimus]

I haven't read his argument. I can only think he is saying that exclusives that may not exist otherwise benefit the gamer. Any other reason is bullshit.

[Xbob42]

5 hours ago, AshsToAshs said:

Just to be the odd man out, I'll go ahead and argue that what Epic is doing does benefit us as consumers:

 

The dozen or so other PC Gaming storefronts (Uplay, Origin, GoG, etc) haven't really put a dent in Steams overall complete control of the PC Gaming marketplace. 
Having one platform that controls 90+% of the market is bad for pricing, and bad for consumers.

 

Driving more and more users towards another platform, like Epic, creates competition. 
If Epic gets large enough for Steam to actually view it as competition, it'll be forced to react and adjust.

These types of adjustments are almost always better for the consumer. 

I see you still live in the fantasy universe where "competition is always good" still makes some sort of sense, instead of the the shitty reality we live in where competition winks at each other with price fixing or by countering with their own shitty anti-consumer bullshit, like in this case, Valve could just gobble up exclusives too, and then both services become shitty for the consumer. Epic sure as shit hasn't brought lower prices or new games to the table, and nothing that's even being fucking argued over is in relation to consumers at all. This entire debacle is about game developers getting a fatter cut, nothing more. Nothing for us. At all.

Valve's reaction so far has been almost exactly nothing, and probably won't have to be anything except changing some language where you're not allowed to pull your game off the storefront after you've submitted an application to have it put up or something. EGS is not a threat, and if it was, I don't see the competition being "better prices," because it already has that, I see it being "buy our own goddamn exclusives." And then we all lose.

[Xbob42]

Also, since Jim's always pretty good at getting points across, he provides additional arguments, like how it makes no fucking sense for a for-profit business to be spending a bunch of money and building a platform to make a different platform better (???) and how that's patently absurd.

 

 

[SimpleG]

7 hours ago, AshsToAshs said:

The dozen or so other PC Gaming storefronts (Uplay, Origin, GoG, etc) haven't really put a dent in Steams overall complete control of the PC Gaming marketplace.

Because they arent offering something that consumers prefer over Steam

 

7 hours ago, AshsToAshs said:

Having one platform that controls 90+% of the market is bad for pricing, and bad for consumers.

 

Steam doesnt control the market, the market heads to Steam.

 

7 hours ago, AshsToAshs said:

Driving more and more users towards another platform, like Epic, creates competition

It does the exact opposite , if I can only buy something from 1 store its not much of a competition. Epic doesnt want to compete because they know they cant. 

[AshsToAshs]

2 hours ago, Xbob42 said:

I see you still live in the fantasy universe where "competition is always good" still makes some sort of sense

You're right, markets where monopolies thrive are great. Just look at how many people enjoy Comcast!

 

6 minutes ago, SimpleG said:

7 hours ago, AshsToAshs said:

Driving more and more users towards another platform, like Epic, creates competition

It does the exact opposite , if I can only buy something from 1 store its not much of a competition.

???
If you can only buy something from one marketplace, then that is competition for all other marketplaces. 

Exclusivity to Epic may not be something that you personally enjoy, but by doing that it does drive users towards it.

 

10 minutes ago, SimpleG said:

Epic doesnt want to compete because they know they cant. 

I truely don't understand this statement. 

You might be saying "Epic can't currently compete with steam in terms of extra features", which would be true.

But Epics users don't care. At least right now they don't.
Epics active user base is larger than steams active user base.
This is overwhelmingly because of Fortnite.

These users are very young, and will be growing up with the Epic Launcher being the main game launcher that they know.

In 5 to 10 years, as that user group matures, the Epic Store will continue to stay relevant if it can continue to cater to them. 

Which means offering more than just Fortnite.

[SimpleG]

3 minutes ago, AshsToAshs said:

If you can only buy something from one marketplace, then that is competition for all other marketplaces

 

3 minutes ago, AshsToAshs said:

You're right, markets where monopolies thrive are great. Just look at how many people enjoy Comcast!

Pick one

 

 

 

[Xbob42]

Valve has never had a monopoly and in fact allows developers to generate and resell Steam keys which Valve gets $0 from, which actually loses them money, since they still have to host the game.

Steam does not keep any exclusives aside from first-party stuff (which still makes its way to consoles at the very least) and games found on Steam are also found elsewhere.

 

People CHOOSE to use Steam. There is no fucking requirement. People HAVE to use Comcast because there is no other option. Jesus.

[Brian]

Valve has 90+% of the PC market and yet I buy 90+% of my games from other store fronts. Weird. Valve needs to monopoly better. 

[JPDunks4]

What are MS, Sony, and Nintendo’s cut on sales on their consoles?  Is it 70/30? 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

5 minutes ago, JPDunks4 said:

What are MS, Sony, and Nintendo’s cut on sales on their consoles?  Is it 70/30? 

To the best of my knowledge that's correct.

[Dexterryu]

I like steam, but if they don't have the best price or the games I want I just get them from the place that does. 

 

I don't understand why people are so upset about a store that anyone can use having exclusive rights to sell a game is a big deal. The games are the same either way.

[CastlevaniaNut18]

2 hours ago, Dexterryu said:

I like steam, but if they don't have the best price or the games I want I just get them from the place that does. 

 

I don't understand why people are so upset about a store that anyone can use having exclusive rights to sell a game is a big deal. The games are the same either way.

As has been said repeatedly in other threads, Epic offers no features. Their store doesn't even have a shopping cart. People who have been on Steam for years appreciate the robust stable of features like achievements, big picture mode, cloud saving, user reviews, community forums, the list goes on and on. Why be forced into using a service that has no features at all?

[Xbob42]

3 hours ago, Dexterryu said:

I like steam, but if they don't have the best price or the games I want I just get them from the place that does. 

 

I don't understand why people are so upset about a store that anyone can use having exclusive rights to sell a game is a big deal. The games are the same either way.

Hmm, based on your very first sentence, it sounds like you already have reason to dislike the EGS.

If you dislike the price of an EGS exclusive, you don't get them from a place that has a better price, you sit on Epic's middle finger and open that wallet like a bitch.

[Raggit]

I don't mind having some of my titles on EGS, as I already had an account from when I tried Unreal Tournament. And so far all the games I have on it were free, so that's a plus. Not a fan of the exclusive nonsense, though.

 

 I'm also not a fan of their email authentication system. I didn't sign into my account for a while so after updating to the latest version and logging in, they sent me an authentication code. This wouldn't normally be a problem, except that they sent the code 20 mins later.  By the time I noticed it, it fucking expired. Long story short, I ended up trying three times. At some point after the 3rd attempt, the 2nd code came through and worked... and later on, the 3rd code was eventually sent after I already signed in. Fun times.

[Dexterryu]

14 hours ago, Xbob42 said:

Hmm, based on your very first sentence, it sounds like you already have reason to dislike the EGS.

If you dislike the price of an EGS exclusive, you don't get them from a place that has a better price, you sit on Epic's middle finger and open that wallet like a bitch.

I may look at games & prices a little differently than most people. When I see previews/reviews of a game I sort of decide if I want the game at all and how much I'd pay for it. The vast majority of the time I won't play full price regardless of platform or store. So I put them on a wishlist or on a list I maintain myself (which covers PS4/Xbox stuff too) and I wait until they are the price I'd want.

 

16 hours ago, CastlevaniaNut18 said:

As has been said repeatedly in other threads, Epic offers no features. Their store doesn't even have a shopping cart. People who have been on Steam for years appreciate the robust stable of features like achievements, big picture mode, cloud saving, user reviews, community forums, the list goes on and on. Why be forced into using a service that has no features at all?

 

Another area or group of areas that I really don't care that much about. I definitely think they're valid for those that do but I'm just not one of them. To me, steam is a store, a downloader, and a friends list. Due to poorly policed review bombs, I don't put a lot of stock in steams user reviews. So I go to reddit for those (and forums). Again, not saying these things aren't valuable features just not something that I use much so they don't sway me in where I decide to purchase games. 

 

All things being equal I default to buying on steam unless there is a vendor that benefits the developer most. So when CDPR releases a game I want I get it on GOG.

[AbsolutSurgen]

I really don't value most of the features that Steam offers.  The Windows 10 Store has exclusives, Steam has exclusives, Origin has exclusives, Battle.net has exclusives -- and I own games on all of them (plus Uplay and the Bethesda storefront).  So buying games on EGS doesn't really bug me.  Personally, I'm looking forward to trying out the new GOG Galaxy launcher...

 

Similar to others, I decide what price I want the game at, and given my backlog, I only buy about 1/3 of my games near launch -- and most on GMG or CDKEYSs.

 

If people don't want to support EGS, don't.  Just don't buy games there, and wait for them to come elsewhere.  If that is the consensus among gamers, then EGS will stop getting exclusives, as game makers can make more money on Steam.  

[Xbob42]

7 hours ago, Dexterryu said:

The vast majority of the time I won't play full price regardless of platform or store. So I put them on a wishlist or on a list I maintain myself

It's a good thing you're willing to put them on a list you maintain yourself, as EGS also doesn't have a wishlist.

[Firewithin]

1 minute ago, Xbob42 said:

It's a good thing you're willing to put them on a list you maintain yourself, as EGS also doesn't have a wishlist.

 

[SimpleG]

Captain Dipshit  is really doubling down

 

 

Hes upset Steam wont generate Steam Keys for EGS exclusive games

 

[Xbob42]

Weird. Did anyone ask him if EGS generates EGS keys for Steam exclusive games?

[AbsolutSurgen]

[CastlevaniaNut18]

Lol these people defending shitty practices. 

[Keyser_Soze]

1 hour ago, CastlevaniaNut18 said:

Lol these people defending shitty practices. 

 

I buy games at a price where they are available and nothing else matters!

[Keyser_Soze]

Quote

Zombie Army 4 devs on Epic exclusivity: “upsetting a few people isn’t necessarily bad”

 

PC Gamer spoke to Rebellion CEO and creative director Jason Kingsley and asked that very question. While he acknowledges that many PC owners dislike Epic’s store, he believes Zombie Army 4’s exclusivity deal has worked out well for them – and that the outrage is actually a good thing.

 

“Some people don’t like what Epic are doing, and I understand why,” says Kingsley, “but it’s been very good for the project. It’s been very good for us… They offered us a ton more support than we were going to be able to give the game ourselves in terms of marketing, so it’s been a very good experience.” He also confirms that Zombie Army 4 will be exclusive to Epic for a year, much like Epic’s deals with other games.

 

While the choice to take games as Epic exclusives has consistently proven to be upsetting to people who prefer to see PC games on platforms such as Steam, Kingsley suggests that this may actually be a good thing. “Maybe upsetting a few people isn’t necessarily bad,” he says, “because it gets you attention as well. And one of the challenges for us making games, and a challenge for any indie studio, anybody that doesn’t have a huge amount of money to spend on marketing, is discovery.” He also says that one of the best ways for Epic to counter the dominance of Steam “is by offering something exclusive.”

 

“I’m not really a big believer in exclusives,” he said at the time. “It’s not just compensating us for lost sales on platform X or Y. Fine, that might de-risk the project, but you also have to factor in the cost of the negative reaction from people who are upset by that decision. I want to be fair to the fans who want to buy it on the platform they want.” He also added that he might change his mind, but “there would have to be a bloody good reason.” It looks like Epic found one.

 

https://www.pcgamesn.com/zombie-army-dead-war-4/zombie-army-4-epic-exclusivity

 

[SimpleG]

24 minutes ago, Keyser_Soze said:

but “there would have to be a bloody good reason.” It looks like Epic found one.

 

$$$$$$

 

25 minutes ago, Keyser_Soze said:

He also says that one of the best ways for Epic to counter the dominance of Steam “is by offering something exclusive.”

Dont make excuses for your shitty practices, I can aleast respect someone if they say " yup we did it,sorry but we wanted or needed more money".