What made you buy games from Epic?

[Aya]

While we all know that Epic Games is universally loathed, I don't think i'm the only one who bought games from it (especially knowing Chivalry 2's pre-Steam success). But even as much as people dislike the platform, I imagine some people here have a really, really good reason to be disloyal to Steam over a game or three.

What game or games did you end up buying (purchases must be above one US dollar), and what drove you to buy it?

I guess to start off the thread, I am guilty of three acquisitions:

Crysis Remastered
At the time that game was new, games that supported real-time raytracing would use nVidia's RTX API over solutions that can be used on any form of RT-compatible hardware. As a tech demo, Crysis Remastered was actually breaking new ground in that you didn't need an nVidia RTX series or even an RT-compatible GPU. What ultimately convinced me to buy it on Epic was a combination of a store coupon that brought the total price down to $7.44 Canadian, and misplaced confidence that i'd beat the scalper bots to an AMD RX 6800 Surprising no one, i lost to the scalpers, but I did get an RTX 3070 out of frustration towards GPU scalping. Even if i didn't get to enjoy AMD-powered raytracing, real-time RT still felt like the cool new toy that a child would feel excited to play with during the end of 2020

Kingdom Hearts III
I've never really hid the fact that the Japanese PC gaming scene was a major source of annoyance for me. Hell, I was ready to believe that Trials of Mana's failure on Steam would mark the last time Square-Enix would make a PC game ever again. After a series of burnouts with several Japanese games only releasing on consoles that i wish would get PC ports, I ended up pre-ordering that bugger out of the principle of "I trust Japanese game developers with making decisions about PC gaming a lot less than I trust Epic making those decisions for them". Two years after said purchase, I'm confident that my decision has aged well considering PlatinumGames, Mobile Suit Gundam, and YoshiP's response to people wanting FFXVI to be on PC being "just buy a ps5 lol".

Chivalry II
Because the steam counterpart to that game involves one-sided curbstomp battles resulting from a lack of faction balance on a good day, or repeatedly dying to all-archer teams on a bad day. I'm talking about Bannerlord's multiplayer BTW. Like, it's "actually worse than installing the Epic Launcher" levels of bad. then again, my skill in Chiv2 can best be described as "wait for Bannerlord's multiplayer to be good"

[Babi Gendut]

Originally posted by Nx Machina:

Originally posted by Pierce Dalton:

It's funny that you think Steam doesn't have exclusives :WH3_greasus_rofl:

Where else can I buy Tekken 7, for example?

Valve does NOT have exclusives on Steam because they do NOT PAY for games to come to their platform. I can of course list the games Epic PAID for to be exclusives. Here are a couple of examples, Metro Exodus, The Outer Worlds, Kingdom Hearts, Phoenix Point.

Of course if you want an up to date list of Epic paid for exclusives, plus those still to come to Epic as exclusives.

https://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/every-exclusive-game-in-the-epic-games-store/

Secondly ask Bandai Namco (developer, publisher) why it is NOT on other PC platforms as they are the ones who CHOSE to put it on Steam of their own freewill.

And finally you can buy Tekken 7 on Xbox or Playstation.


As a sidenote you can ask Swen Vincke why Baldur's Gate 3 was not on Epic in Early Access nor as a Release Title on Epic. You can also ask him if Valve (Steam), CDPR (GOG), Apple (Mac) and Sony (PS5) paid him to have it on their platforms.

Still doesn't change the fact that steam has exclusives.

Which is one of the reason (probably the biggest reason) why most people are forced (voluntary or involuntary) to use steam instead of epic, gog, origin, etc..

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by Pierce Dalton:

Originally posted by Nx Machina:

None as the only games i had on there was two games my daughter paid for. Birthday and Xmas.

Secondly i deleted my Epic account due to their anti-consumer practice of exclusives.

It's funny that you think Steam doesn't have exclusives :WH3_greasus_rofl:

No one said Steam doesn't have exclusives, but they aren't anti-consumer. Steam doesn't coordinate with dev's to limit where their games are sold. Epic makes deals that a developer is legally bound to ONLY sell their game on EPIC.

Steam says your free to sell your game anywhere you wish. That is the difference.

Originally posted by Pierce Dalton:

Where else can I buy Tekken 7, for example?

Greenmangaming, enba, Gamivo, etc.

Now if you mean where can you play it, well the answer is anywhere the developer wants to release it because they aren't constrained like EPIC dev's are on where they can offer their game.

Originally posted by Babi Gendut:

Still doesn't change the fact that steam has exclusives.

There is a big difference in a game being exclusive because the developer doesn't see the value of selling it elsewhere, and a developer being bribed by a company to not offer it anywhere else. I don' like supporting the practice of a company that pays developers to restrict my choices on where I can buy a game....

[Chika Ogiue]

Originally posted by brian9824:

No one said Steam doesn't have exclusives, but they aren't anti-consumer.

Not anti-consumer? Hah! The main reason Japanese PC gamers -- yes, despite what western press gas lights you into thinking, we've existed for longer than Steam has been a thing -- were forced into using Steam was because Valve aggressively killed the huge import market Japan had for PC gaming.

Even today, Valve still stifle third-party store competition with their forced IP activation blocks. Not to mention all the jerking around Valve did years back that drove Spike Chunsoft Japan into ceasing their entire Japan-focused localisation programme. Valve are not the heroes many of you think they are. But as I said before, if we want to game on PC, we're left very little other choice than to put up with the platform.

[Odra]

Other than Steam the only other place that managed to entice me is Gog with their fantastic selection.

Epic doesn't have anything that compels me to make a purchase, same with Origin.

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by Chika Ogiue:

Not anti-consumer? Hah! The main reason Japanese PC gamers -- yes, despite what western press gas lights you into thinking, we've existed for longer than Steam has been a thing -- were forced into using Steam was because Valve aggressively killed the huge import market Japan had for PC gaming.

Even today, Valve still stifle third-party store competition with their forced IP activation blocks. Not to mention all the jerking around Valve did years back that drove Spike Chunsoft Japan into ceasing their entire Japan-focused localisation programme. Valve are not the heroes many of you think they are. But as I said before, if we want to game on PC, we're left very little other choice than to put up with the platform.

Valve has no blocks on anything related to an IP, the most they have is regional blocks that DEVELOPERS set up which have absolutely nothing to do with your IP address. You;d have to actually cite a source or something that actually exists instead of throwing around nonsensical statements like IP activation blocks that aren't even a thing....

[kolumuani12]

Never bought a single thing from them, I think I have an unreal account tho but not even sure. I might use it if a game I am looking for is free there but that is all, too much game apps otherwise, don't wanna have another one.

[T9]

No North-American agenda is a plus

[crunchyfrog]

I haven't. I got a handful of free games out of curiosity and testing purposes (to see if their operation works reasonably well).

I am always careful about spedning on anything, and often a cheap arse.

When I've bought ANY digitally distributed game I always wait until they're on sale as part of the decrease in price is down to the fact you don't have a phjysical backup.

You have to offset that.

And for Epic, with their platform not having certain features it just doesn't remain attractive to me to warrant going over there for anything.

It's a bit like going to town to do shopping. If there's a new store that does the same as one of your favourite stores, but not quite as good and is further off the beaten track, you're just not going to bother.

[Haruspex]

I've never bought a game on Epic. I've never even signed up for an account to claim free games. Based on Epic's own stats, most Epic users are there to play Fortnite and collect free games. Not that there are zero people buying things on Epic, but I'm sure that number just isn't as high as Epic would like it to be. They're basically cultivating a userbase of freeloaders and not enough paying customers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMEGZH1MSqM
The Bellular guys, makers of "The Pale Beyond" which was released on both Steam and Epic are in a a unique position to make a direct comparison. Epic doesn't allow them to share actual numbers, but they did say that in spite of the 88/12 split at Epic, probably the best way to support them as developers is still on Steam. That's very telling.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1266030/The_Pale_Beyond/

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by Harusp3x:

I've never bought a game on Epic. I've never even signed up for an account to claim free games. Based on Epic's own stats, most Epic users are there to play Fortnite and collect free games. Not that there are zero people buying things on Epic, but I'm sure that number just isn't as high as Epic would like it to be. They're basically cultivating a userbase of freeloaders and not enough paying customers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMEGZH1MSqM
The Bellular guys, makers of "The Pale Beyond" which was released on both Steam and Epic are in a a unique position to make a direct comparison. Epic doesn't allow them to share actual numbers, but they did say that in spite of the 88/12 split at Epic, probably the best way to support them as developers is still on Steam. That's very telling.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1266030/The_Pale_Beyond/

Good mention there.

The Bellular guys have been an invaluable and honest source of information on so many things, especially this matter.

[muffins]

Originally posted by Babi Gendut:

Still doesn't change the fact that steam has exclusives.

Which is one of the reason (probably the biggest reason) why most people are forced (voluntary or involuntary) to use steam instead of epic, gog, origin, etc..

Also, any game released on Steam is forbidden from being sold at a cheaper price anywhere else (so no one can have a competitive advantage over Steam by selling at a better price). That's a major anti-competitive clause that might get them attention from national regulators if any of them decided to get off their behinds.

[Haruspex]

Originally posted by muffins:

Originally posted by Babi Gendut:

Still doesn't change the fact that steam has exclusives.

Which is one of the reason (probably the biggest reason) why most people are forced (voluntary or involuntary) to use steam instead of epic, gog, origin, etc..

Also, any game released on Steam is forbidden from being sold at a cheaper price anywhere else (so no one can have a competitive advantage over Steam by selling at a better price). That's a major anti-competitive clause that might get them attention from national regulators if any of them decided to get off their behinds.

They're forbidden from selling Steam keys outside of Steam at a lower price than the game is sold on Steam. Valve has a very generous policy of giving developers Steam keys they can hand out or sell elsewhere, but they don't want people to use this as a way to take advantage of Steam services while completely cutting Valve out of the revenue stream. There's nothing in the agreement preventing developers from selling their game elsewhere, outside of the Steam ecosystem at a lower price. It's just Steam keys specifically.

Also Valve's exclusives are not forced. Valve didn't pay anyone to be exclusive to their store. Some games are exclusive completely at the choice of the developers who released the game. They could have released the game on other store fronts. They just didn't.

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by Harusp3x:

Originally posted by muffins:

Also, any game released on Steam is forbidden from being sold at a cheaper price anywhere else (so no one can have a competitive advantage over Steam by selling at a better price). That's a major anti-competitive clause that might get them attention from national regulators if any of them decided to get off their behinds.

They're forbidden from selling Steam keys outside of Steam at a lower price than the game is sold on Steam. Valve has a very generous policy of giving developers Steam keys they can hand out or sell elsewhere, but they don't want people to use this as a way to take advantage of Steam services while completely cutting Valve out of the revenue stream. There's nothing in the agreement preventing developers from selling their game elsewhere, outside of the Steam ecosystem at a lower price. It's just Steam keys specifically.

Also Valve's exclusives are not forced. Valve didn't pay anyone to be exclusive to their store. Some games are exclusive completely at the choice of the developers who released the game. They could have released the game on other store fronts. They just didn't.

Yes, this.

It's another of those chinese whispers that people have got round their neck (it's almost always misreading of legal terms isn't it?)

STEAM KEYS are what are naturally protected by Steam and they are not allowed to sell them cheaper outside for some pretty obvious reasons.

Well said, and frankly it can't be said enough.

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by muffins:

Originally posted by Babi Gendut:

Still doesn't change the fact that steam has exclusives.

Which is one of the reason (probably the biggest reason) why most people are forced (voluntary or involuntary) to use steam instead of epic, gog, origin, etc..

Also, any game released on Steam is forbidden from being sold at a cheaper price anywhere else (so no one can have a competitive advantage over Steam by selling at a better price). That's a major anti-competitive clause that might get them attention from national regulators if any of them decided to get off their behinds.

Not really ,its called a MFN clause which is standard and really common clause in business contracts. Otherwise without it someone could list a game for $100 on steam and sell it for $30 on other sites. Since steam doesn't get a penny of the sale when its sold on another site they'd be screwing steam over without it.

Every sale a developer does outside of steam that then uses steam to download and play the game results in no money going to steam at all.

There is some debate over the clause and in the future the laws about it might change, but for now its fully legal.

[Babi Gendut]

Originally posted by brian9824:

Originally posted by Babi Gendut:

Still doesn't change the fact that steam has exclusives.

There is a big difference in a game being exclusive because the developer doesn't see the value of selling it elsewhere, and a developer being bribed by a company to not offer it anywhere else. I don' like supporting the practice of a company that pays developers to restrict my choices on where I can buy a game....

Big difference if you're valve employee whose raise and bonus depends on steam performance.

But for customers like me, there's no difference whether valve "bribe" fromsoftware $1 billion or $0 to make elden ring steam exclusive. I'm still being forced to use steam.

All that "anti-consumer practice" or "developers doesn't see the value of non steam release" are nothing but coping theory you made, to convince yourself that you're not a hypocrite steam fanboy.