this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2024
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I'm genuinely shocked how much Epic poured into the store and it still lacks so much basic features. Sorting games is still extremely barebones, store is filled with NFT/crypto garbage, the store still looks like a college student's first front-end project, and last time I used the launcher to pick up free games (last year), it was still slow as hell. What were they doing in the past 5 years aside from dropping millions on exclusivity deals?

Epic is going to have to prioritize the store and try some new initiatives while also doubling down on earning pivotal exclusives if it is going to have a chance. I also hope other viable competitors arrive.

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[–] [email protected] 34 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (3 children)

I'm far from being a business savvy person, but honestly, from business perspective what exactly is Epic offering that sets them apart from other competitors? Even if Epic fixed their launcher issues, how would they be different to Steam that is already well established for 20 years? That's why I like GOG as Steam's competitor. GOG focuses on selling DRM-free and retro games. If a game also happens to be available in GOG, I would prefer to buy it from there than Steam. Moreover, GOG keep old games well maintained and updated to run in modern computers; something that Steam is very poor at doing. What does Epic even do differently, apart from doing exclusives which any companies could do?

[–] [email protected] 29 points 2 months ago (4 children)

It's slightly cheaper for developers to put their games on there. But that sucks as a business model, because game prices aren't any lower so for the end user it doesn't matter. And on features, Epic just loses every matchup against Steam.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 months ago (1 children)

If Borderlands 3 had released on Steam, I'd have probably bought it when it came out because I still had a lot of goodwill for the series at that time. Instead, I had to wait until the Steam release when the game already had loads of negative press. Exclusive deals are idiotic

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[–] [email protected] 44 points 2 months ago (3 children)

I am always suprised that people expected anything differently.

Epic was from the start doing things the wrong way, and I will not support any store that has exclusives.

Making a good gaming platform that could rival Steam would take A LOT of time and money and dare I say - no company is willing to lose that for a chance of one day perhaps being only slightly worse competitor that still can't convince people to migrate.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago (1 children)

There are only a few companies that could even hope to take on Valve, at this stage. The likes of EA and others. But by definition, their company culture means they'll never be able to take on Valve.

Someone else made a comment about what will happen when Gabe steps down and I suddenly realize what a short-term golden age we're likely living in, even with all the bullshit.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago

I can support a store if they keep their own games exclusive. Completely fair game. But fuck the gobble up companies.

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 2 months ago (3 children)

This CEO may think it's developer-friendly, but I highly doubt if Epic will keep such developer-friendly stance if Epic becomes a giant in this industry.

Epic burnt so much money on Epic store these years. If it succeeds, it's very likely Epic will try to earn it back. From player? Will players willing to pay more in Epic store than the others? If the answer is no.. Sometimes it really makes me wonder if these CEOs are really that stupid..

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Epic burnt so much money on Epic store these years

It burned money on exclusives. The free games are a much cheaper marketing tool than advertising.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago (2 children)

They burn a ton of money on free games too. They're only free to us. Epic pays for them at wholesale rates.

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I've said it before, but until Epic adds some way to provide feedback to others, I won't spend any money on it. Being able to read if a game is buggy, runs on my hardware, etc, is too essential to the experience to not have.

Epic wants to be the pro-developer storefront, but since that seems to involve being anti-consumer, I as the consumer have no interest.

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[–] [email protected] 107 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Fuck Epic. I will never forgive them for buying Rocket League and ripping it away from my Linux library on steam. I will never do business with them, never play any of their games, never give them a dime, never even sign up to claim their free slop of the week. Fuck Epic with a cactus.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I own the original CD release of Unreal Tournament 2004, made by Epic, it includes a native Linux installer on disc, you get the full game, and it worked fine.

It makes me so sad that they did a complete 180 on this.

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[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Tbh without epic I doubt the game would've survived 2020. If you recall, the whole fanbase was unhappy with how things were stale. Epic didn't improve anything obviously but the free to play did boost it's active nunber of players. Nevertheless fuck epic.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago

Wasnt it already a PS+ game years before epic? It literally had millions of players on day one.

I dropped it after my steam copy first time asked me to register an epic account, but till then I didn't see huge issues with the game apart from the DLC milking.

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[–] [email protected] 35 points 2 months ago

To be fair, Rocket League runs fine in Proton.

Also, to be fair.....agreed. Fuck Epic.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Using Junk Store on my Steam Deck (and redeeming free games on the mobile website) to completely avoid the Epic Launcher 😎

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Please tell me more about this Junk Store, I'd been using Heroic for Epic games but it's been a bit dodgy recently

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