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Businesses Games

Epic Games is Now a Third-Party Multi-Plat Publisher, Secures Three Big Studios (arstechnica.com) 29

Posted by msmash from the moving-forward dept.
Epic Games: The engine maker, the game maker, the storefront handler... and now the games publisher. DarkRookie2 shares a report: Epic Games Publishing came into formal existence on Wednesday by announcing plans to fund, launch, and promote new multi-platform video games. The announcement hinged on two key points: which studios had already signed to EGP and what financial terms EGP games developers can expect. While most game publishing deals aren't typically laid bare for the public, Epic has already chosen to confirm some of EGP's financial nitty-gritty. In addition to letting studios retain "100%" control of their intellectual property (an increasingly popular term for game-publishing contracts), EGP also promises to fund "up to 100%" of all game development costs. "Once costs are recouped," Epic says, developers will earn "at least 50% of profits." (That mix of "up to" and "at least" in the last two points may imply that those figures vary as a pair -- meaning, if a developer pays for more of its dev costs, it might stand to claim more profit-sharing in the long term. Epic has not clarified that point.)

Unsurprisingly, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney described these terms as "the publishing model we always wanted for ourselves when we worked with publishers [as an independent game studio]," but we're still left with some questions, all of which Epic has declined to answer as of press time. EGP is touted as a "multi-platform" effort, but will EGP games ever be available outside of Epic Games Store on PC, and/or will those games' console versions launch later than their PC versions to give Epic Games Store any form of timed exclusivity? Can EGP partners develop separate games as indie efforts or for other publishers while they're part of an EGP deal? And will each game include a Fortnite outfit-and-dance tie-in? (The last question is a joke, but considering that Epic made a Fortnite skin for the Mixer game-streamer Ninja, anything's possible at this point.)
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Epic Games is Now a Third-Party Multi-Plat Publisher, Secures Three Big Studios More

Epic Games is Now a Third-Party Multi-Plat Publisher, Secures Three Big Studios

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  • While it's nice to have a major competitor for Steam to encourage innovation, I haven't had any major gripe with Steam up to this point, and I'm wary of any company that is 40% owned by Tencent, not to mention the stories some developers have had of their contractual term with Epic Game Store ending, and the games just disappearing from the store into a black hole.

    • While it's nice to have a major competitor for Steam to encourage innovation

      In what way has Epic games, a store which is lacking basic features and nearly all the features of Steam as well as many features of competitors literally attempting to buy its way into relevance, even remotely encouraged innovation?

      Please don't repeat Epic's bullshit talking points. Steam has been a platform under continuous development since it's inception. While it was the only store. While it was a monopoly. While other platforms like GoG joined the market. And nothing at all has changed since EGS attem

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Thursday March 26, 2020 @11:29AM (#59873690)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Nidi62 ( 1525137 )

      there is also the massive glaring issue this article fails to note when championing Epic as a "third party multi platform publisher." No one likes the epic store, partly because of its buggy security flawed client, and partly because Epic has tarnished their name by sniping triple A titles from Steam, a system most gamers are not only familiar with but have come to enjoy. Epic hasnt come to be a player by using the carrot, only the stick.....Its fairly transparent that Epic doesnt care about gamers, just about winning Steam marketshare without understanding how Valves platform became so popular.

      As a person with almost 150 games in their Steam library (but who uses other libraries/launchers such as Uplay and Origin so I'm not die hard Steam only), after what Epic did with Metro:Exodus? Fuck 'em. They burned what good will/benefit of the doubt I would have given them when they pulled that crap, and it's going to take a lot of work to earn some good will back. Right now, "epic exclusive" doesn't mean I'm rushing to download their store, it means one more game I'm skipping whether I was interested

      • I don't use Steam or the Epic store, because I don't tolerate DRM, and I think the Epic store is great. It's just as bad as Steam, in all the same ways, but it takes a much smaller cut of the proceeds. That's a big deal, and I'm really hopeful that the Epic store will succeed and this change will propagate out to good DRM-free stores eventually. (itch.io already sorta has that, but they're special and even itch's default cut is larger than Epic's)

        As for Metro: Exodus: reading at the wiki page on the topi

    • Its fairly transparent that Epic doesnt care about gamers, just about winning Steam marketshare without understanding how Valves platform became so popular.

      Valve became the "dominant platform" by simply the internet reaching the computer illiterate masses, for those of us who were hardcore gamers during the heyday of dedicated server executables, and the days where we owned our own games before they were stolen and made client server because of the gullible mmo and steam loving masses.

      Here's what really went down in the mid 90's: As internet penetration reached the public the original computer nerds and slashdotters who knew full well of microsofts and silico

      • Valve became the "dominant platform" by simply the internet reaching the computer illiterate masses, for those of us who were hardcore gamers during the heyday of dedicated server executables, and the days where we owned our own games before they were stolen and made client server because of the gullible mmo and steam loving masses.

        That's how you become dominant. It's not how you stay dominant, especially when you have no exclusive offers and charge a high price. Steam is dominant because it's a huge incredibly feature rich platform with real benefits to both publishers and players alike. Ironically from your irrelevant rant:

        To watch PC gaming go from open modding

        Steam provides a complete integrated modding platform and many high profile games on that platform make use of such modding.

    • EGS is just another icon. It's just another store. That ironically is their own defense and Tim Sweeney's own talking point when comparing himself to Steam... a huge platform, not a store, but a feature rich platform that benefits publishers who chose to use it.

      I'm sick of Tim Sweeney trying to buy his way into the industry instead of producing an actual good piece of software. Hilariously because Metro Exodus actually had a Steam entry before Tim handed over his exclusivity money to become relevant, proble

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

        EGS is just another icon. It's just another store. That ironically is their own defense and Tim Sweeney's own talking point when comparing himself to Steam... a huge platform, not a store, but a feature rich platform that benefits publishers who chose to use it.

        I'm sick of Tim Sweeney trying to buy his way into the industry instead of producing an actual good piece of software. Hilariously because Metro Exodus actually had a Steam entry before Tim handed over his exclusivity money to become relevant, proble

  • "Publisher" ... The part of the "supply" chain that lost its purpose since the Internet, and now does have absolutly no work, adds zero value whatsoever, and only exists to leech off money and make things more expensive in the process.

    Like the guy taking the boxes of the neighboring stands, and wrapping them in his boxes, to sell them more expensively.
    Except there are no boxes, it's just copies, and he lets the user make those, while the original stand owner supplies the marketing material, and he leans bac

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by JMZero ( 449047 )

      I've bought a lot of games in my life, in a variety of different ways: console games going back to the Atari 2600, boxed PC games, console downloads, boxed Commodore 64 games back in the day.

      The only games more than 5 years old that I can still play "because I own them" are the ones I own on Steam. Everything else is lost, sold, decluttered, or only works with hardware I don't have anymore (I even have a few old C64 disks, but the disk drive failed in 1989).

      Now, you're right - at any time Steam could screw

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Quirkz ( 1206400 )

        I've got some games on Steam but prefer GOG, but your point about their service keeping old games usable holds true for both. Many old games that I lost or which decayed or somehow became nonfunctional from my original physical purchase, I now own on GOG and expect to be able to use perpetually. I can point to a few games, like The Bard's Tale, that I've bought at least 4 times in my life, but I think my GOG copy is finally the last one.

        Just wish I could find a working version of Lemmings somewhere.

    • Publishers have a meaningful role, if they're bankrolling the development process. Most people don't want to fund Kickstarter campaigns and take the risk of never getting what they paid for.

  • Devs, please save me from myself. Sign more exclusivity deals with Epic failure and I'll get to keep more money for myself.

  • Pouring more money into trying to be relevant is naturally the only option for someone who thinks that launchers and game stores (especially his own) is just another icon. [twitter.com]

    And yet he continues to be confused as to why publishers are happy to pay Steam 30% when EGS only charges 18%. I'm sure it's got nothing to do with 3rd party keys, Account sharing, Achievements, TV Mode, Broadcasting, Cloud Saves which don't brick your game, Curation, Forums, you know what I'm bored, there's a whole list you can read yours

  • again with this multi platform bs, while you can only have epic game store on windows.

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