this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2025
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Epic kinda tried that by giving away tons of free games in the Epic Games Store. It didn't work.
If I want Steam games cheaper, I go buy a Steam key for that game from a separate retailer and activate it on Steam. Save like 50-70% irrespective of Steam sales. It's remarkable that Steam allows us to even do that in the first place.
Epic also generated a lot of bad blood by scooping up Kickstarter projects and ordering the devs to cancel the Steam releases, releases that had already been paid for by backers. A bunch of potential customers refused to buy from Epic on principle after that.
The timed exclusivity deals are what did it for me
Bringing that bullshit to the PC gaming market guaranteed I'll never spend a penny on their storefront.
If the carrot they're leading with is limiting choice, I'm not going to hang around waiting to find out what the stick might be if they get successful
Epic is doing me a favor, I get to keep my money while I play my backlog, then I buy the game on Steam / GOG for cheaper later on.
I'm one of them. For all their trash talk about Steam being a monopoly, Epic Games sure pulled some hypocritical, anticompetitive shit in their attempt to replace one monopoly with an objectively worse, consumer-hostile one.
Epic Games is creating a monopoly in PC gaming - they keep making bad decisions and leaving Steam as the only good option
Look at market shares, Steam is in a monopolistic position, they can turn around and fuck up the whole market whenever they want, and people like you are encouraging it.
You realize that they're anti DEI over there? I don't think drag would ever be hired by Valve!
Source?
https://youtu.be/s9aCwCKgkLo
They wouldn't even release a statement about George Floyd because it was too divisive for them, they instead gave 10k to each employee to spend on whatever they wanted, which might just as well have been BLM or a white supremacist group, they didn't check!
That's not a proper citation. The video is 47 minutes long. Provide a timestamp or a quote.
You should watch the whole thing, it would be very eye opening
Considering the amount of time you spend on here I'm sure you've got the time to spare anyway.
Drag is willing to watch one minute if you provide a timestamp, and 0 minutes if you don't. It's your decision.
“Do your own research”
I provided the source, the whole thing is relevant.
Valve is managed by “everyone” (not all people are good at managing), everyone can choose what they want to work on being exiting projects or new ones, the company only hires senior people and anyone in the company can be part of the hiring process, they use their version of stack ranking where your peers rank your performance, the top of Valve does not want to be political even if the employees want to.
This causes Valve to mostly hire the kind of people already employed there (white men). High pressure on performance has become more of a turn down for especially women.
They probably run the company the way Elon Musk would run it - on paper it’s cool, but humans being humans with biases makes it not so cool.
And the boss doesn't care that it's a white sausage party in there and that employees who don't fit are discriminated against even if it's unconscious bias.
Yeah that one rubbed me particularly wrong. Valve can be a bit hit and miss sometimes, but they've not actively monopolized games from other devs.
Yup, that and pushing "exclusive" bs in general made sure I will never use Epic.
So you want all devs to just play the lottery and hope that some Twitch star picks up their game to make it popular?
He wants games to release on all platforms. Where is the 'lottery' rhetoric coming from?
The Epic bros think that businesses shouldn't have to compete on the market to sell their product, they should just get a big grant from Epic Games for making their game exclusive.
That's some pretty communist rhetoric coming from a group worshipping a corporation. Epic Games are not your communist revolutionaries.
No, I believe that devs should have the choice to take a chance and just hope their game sells OR sign and exclusivity contract in exchange for money that guarantees then they won't have worked for nothing if the game is a flop.
Releasing a game these days is a gamble because there's so many being released every day, you can make an awesome game and it just won't sell while an average game gets picked up by a couple of Twitch streamers and the dev becomes a multi millionaire.
The rights of the consumer are more important. Monopolies are too high a price to pay.
Only the very wealthy should make games is what you're saying.
I'm sure that will be good for the consumers!
I'm sure you don't mind the monopoly as long as it's only on Steam that the games are released though :)
Do you also expect everyone to be freelance in their job because "it's better for the consumers"? Do YOU work freelance or you have a single employer paying you because you want a steady income you want to be able to rely on?
If you can’t afford game making as a job it’s called a hobby
I too wish to make millions doing my hobbies
That's a completely ridiculous take if I've ever seen one...
far better to expect the market to bend over backwards to support your inability to make a profit
The exclusivity contract comes with guaranteed funds for the devs. That's like choosing between a job where you work 100% for commission or one where you're salaried + bonus, not everyone wants their income to be 100% dependent on sales, especially if those sales will probably be based on the luck of the draw rather than the quality of the product they're selling.
You can make an awesome game, if no streamer picks it up it will all be for nothing. Last year 18935 games released on Steam, that's 52 games a day, being successful in that space isn't just about making a quality product.
Also, you can have the greatest idea for a game but not have the budget to just drop everything and start working on it for the years to come.
I don’t care about the devs profits. I’m not fucking myself over so you can stay in business.
Another ridiculous take, you're very good at that aren't you?
lmao again fucking consumers so you can profit
not really seeing why I should care what you think my ‘takes’ are like
like most creative endeavors in life most games on steam are complete shit
make a better product, stop fucking with steam and consumers to support shit games and game companies
Yep. Best example I can think of is Among Us: 2018 release that got massively popular due to content creators during the covid-19 pandemic in 2020.
I do not blame developers for accepting funds to carry out their dreams instead of being thrown into the ocean of "let's see if our years-long investment will pay itself back". Epic grants guarantee that the game gets made.
If you want to play a game only on Steam, you'll just have to wait. Can't have it both ways.
I sure blame them. Multiple games have lost sales from me, only they know if it’s worth it long term.
Exclusivity is cancer, fuck right off back to consoles, please take loot boxes with you.
I'm still gaining more and more games in my epic library I'll never use but love wasting Tim Sweeneys money. Lmao
That reminds me, let me see what’s free today.
Edit: nothing good
I just don't know how to claim those via web only. I think you have to install the store on Android.
Yeah I only used the web only. I’ll double check to make sure I didn’t miss this game.
I pirate so a free game isn’t worth it for me if it means I have to get their store app or whatever.
I've counted 38 games in Epic Games. I've played a couple. I've spend $0.
I wouldn't be surprised if they require a game to be downloaded and played to count. I know on PS , if you have already downloaded, after purchase, a refund is less likely, so downloading likely triggers the sale to be complete, with payment to the seller. It could be similar for free games.
Me too. I'm not even a gamer, the only game I've played is Civilization. And maybe one day I'll sell my account for sweet sweet money.
Yep. I have a bunch of Epic’s free games. Never bought a single game from them and probably never will.
The experience on Steam is just better. And Epics lawsuits look less like they’re fighting for the little guy and more that they are envious of the market that other companies have.
of course they are, Epic is a shit company
Maybe if they had done that with brand new games and not just a few good but old games and tons of games nobody has even heard of before. It's not really even in the same league as just genuinely being cheaper than the competition. It's a gimmick. Steam also sometimes gives games away for free, while still having tons of deep discounts all year long.
I'm the same. I'll look on Steam first just because I would prefer to keep all my shit in one place, but if it's not the cheapest price I'll get it somewhere else. Although 90% of the time, the cheapest price is just a steam key being sold by a 3rd party (I like Eneba, personally).
The one time Epic was cheaper, was when they gave out Civ6 for free. I bought the two major DLC expansions through Epic instead of buying everything on Steam just because I didn't have to buy the base game and the DLCs were $10 cheaper anyway.
I am an extremely cheap and patient gamer. This is how I look at both the stores.
If I want free games, I'll go to Epic.
If I want good deals, I'll go to Steam.
Why would I go to Epic for good deals when it'll either have a good deal on Steam OR be free on Epic after a few months or a year?
And their $5 off coupons during numerous sales