Nothing more disappointing to me than seeing a game I might enjoy... and then it's only available on PC on Epic Games store. Why can't it be available on Epic, Xbox game store and Steam? It's so annoying, like you have no choice but to use Epic... which I would literally do ANYTHING not to use.
Welcome to the largest gaming community on Lemmy! Discussion for all kinds of games. Video games, tabletop games, card games etc.
Submissions have to be related to games
No bigotry or harassment, be civil
No excessive self-promotion
Stay on-topic; no memes, funny videos, giveaways, reposts, or low-effort posts
Mark Spoilers and NSFW
No linking to piracy
More information about the community rules can be found here.
I'm annoyed when a game isn't on GOG. Epic's issue is that I use it the least and so I'm less likely to boot up a game on it unless I'm actively seeking it out.
One of the annoying thing about epic exclusives is that the focus is on steam, but GOG is affected too and loses out on games too until the deal expires.
Steam is their scapegoat, they want a Monopoly without having to say they have a Monopoly.
Wait, who want a monopoly? Epic? The Epic store is like a tenth of Steam's size, and most of that is down to Fortnite alone. Hard to have a monopoly when you're struggling to break double digit share.
... right, which is why I said they want a monopoly, not that they have a monopoly.
Well, yeah, presumably they all do. I'm sure the kebab place next door would love to have a monopoly, it just doesn't look like it's in the cards, you know?
Yes, and if the kebab store pitched a fit every time someone provided a better product than them, calling that competition a monopolist, I'd have the same criticism of that kebab shop.
If they're just doing their best to provide a quality product... I wouldn't like that they have a monopoly, but if they're not in any way abusing it... that sounds like they've earned their place. The problem lies in the people not putting forth enough effort (despite have the resources to do so) to match.
Kebab store if they were epic like in their strategy would not be throwing a fit, but making exclusivity deals with suppliers so that their competitors in the area lose access to them. So trying to increase consumers having to go to their kebab store to get specific meals due to inability of other stores to offer it or not retain the same quality anymore. Also look into regulations to try and prevent potential competitors from opening up next to them or at least delay when they can open.
And don't forget that they refuse to take credit card (ie not having a shopping cart in this example) for 2 fucking years
They give out free samples though once a week to try to get people to buy their food. People prefer the other kebab store down the block though when it comes to spending on meals.
I adore this back-and-forth, but is the metaphor here doing anything any more?
Does there ever need to be a reason to pivot a discussion into one that includes delicious kebabs?
No, that's not how that works at all. Monopolies are bad (and indeed unlawful) even if people think you got them by being super cool.
Google didn't get a monopoly on advertising and search by sucking at it. They had the best search engine and design in a crowded market and that's why you don't say you "Altavista'd" something. But that's still a bad thing and they still should get broken up into manageable chunks, as current regulators are trying to do. Ditto for Apple and all these other oligopolistic online companies.
And... you know, Valve. Maybe. At some point. Not quite there yet. But that's bad even if you like Steam or if they have the better feature set. Which they do. Especially if they have the better feature set, in fact, because like all these other oligopolistic companies, the more time they have to establish dominance and get people to sink further into their ecosystem the harder it is to break it up later. That's true of kebabs AND software platforms.
The company providing an actual alternative to steam's real monopoly is not the one to be complaining about
Are they providing an actual alternative, or just creating a pseudo alternative then bitching about how someone else gets more attention?
It is, in fact, an alternative to steam. What a stupid thing to say
Epic is nowhere near as good as steam. Steam I can open, leave open and ignore. Epic force refreshes pages like the fucking library and then my internet cracks a fit at the sudden large data draw.
Shop wise both are equal, epic now has reviews on the bottom of games so you don't buy some 1 star trash without warning, but they are both more than just a shop.
I'm not sure what you're responding to, but it wasn't anyone I said
It's not really an alternative to steam because it can't be used the same way. If epic is left open in the background online games randomly lag out due to epic, making it not a viable alternative.
It sounds like slime you're blaming your shitty internet on epic instead of providing an actual argument for why epic isn't actually an alternative (it is). You want to suck up to a monopoly, just be honest about it.
Anyone believing Steam isn't a monopoly is seriously uninformed on the topic or letting their enjoy enjoyment of the platform cloud their view of reality.
While it sucks to have games get exclusivity agreements with EGS when EGS sucks compared to Steam, it doesn't suddenly mean that Steam isn't a monopoly.
Except they're trying to strongarm people into using it by using huge amounts of money to buy exclusivity rights.
People don't want monopolies because companies can abuse their position to hurt consumers. But steam provides a very user friendly experience with lots of benefits and features like mod hosting, remote play together, etc. Epic provides a store that people hate using, and people only put up with because epic abused fortnite's success to buy exclusivity deals*. Despite being the much smaller storefront, Epic already feels like the abusive monopoly in the PC gaming space.
*Many people also play on Epic because of free games, which is a valid and pro-consumer way to attract users. I'm 100% cool with this strategy, although giving away merchandise at a loss is also a common monopoly strategy.
With regards to
It's important to remember that it's not only buyers, but developers that use Steam. Steam is currently involved in a lawsuit with developers.
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/the-antitrust-lawsuit-against-steam-is-now-a-class-action-and-that-could-have-big-repercussions-for-valve/
Also relevant, from 2021 but the same lawsuit,
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/04/humble-bundle-creator-brings-antitrust-lawsuit-against-valve-over-steam/
I like Steam, I'm not hating on Steam, but rushing to defend it from people saying it's a monopoly (or calling Epic Games Store a monopoly) is very much denying reality.
That 30% is standard for most storefronts. Just look at Google Play and Apple's App Store.
If you're that put off by 30% cuts then don't look into retail stores because their markups make that look like chump change.
Actually, it's generally publishers, not developers that end up paying the 30% cut. For most games the developer gets paid upfront by the publisher, and the publisher pockets the difference between development costs and sales. I'd also like to point out that prices between EGS and Steam are generally the same, so instead of getting lower priced games as promised, the publishers are just pocketing the larger profits.
Repeat Tim Swiney's fake talking points all you want, the fact of the matter is that Valve isn't behaving like a monopoly, even if they command a huge portion of the market. The reason they're so big in the first place is specifically because they're very pro-consumer
Epic is running a loss leader at this point so it's not an business model to point to, since it's subsidized by unreal and fortnite.
Microsoft on Xbox is taking a 30% cut so it wouldn't be farfetched to assume cut is more a strategy to try to expand market share and are willing to increase down the line if they got market share. And Microsoft is Microsoft so has lot of other profitable divisions to be able to run things at a loss.
One actually better to point to might be GOG which is also taking 30%, but in 2021 had a 1 million dollar loss. https://www.pcgamer.com/gog-looks-like-its-in-a-much-healthier-spot-after-a-hairy-2021/
Which raises the question. What is actually sustainable? Especially the lower cut offered have other much more profitable divisions that are covering potential losses and not being the main source of revenue.
All retail establishments utilize loss leaders. It's not some underhanded duplicitous tactic, it's just a common business strategy
That's the same as app stores/etc, and is still a common cut to take. I'm not convinced the cuts that Epic is taking are actually sustainable for offering downloads/updates/etc for a game indefinitely, but it's hard to tell since the Epic store is already bleeding money.
I'll also mention that Audible (which has a monopoly in the audiobook space) reportably takes a 60-75% cut of audiobooks sold on their platform (they take only 60% if you agree to sell exclusively on audible, but they take the full 75% if you want to sell the book somewhere else as well). Monopolies abusing their position is really common, but I haven't seen anything similar from Steam that makes me think they're abusing their position. I suspect PC gaming would be in a far worse state if another company controlled the popular storefront.
Well, yeah, but if I was going to get pissed about that, then Epic would be way low in my list of priorities. It's Steam sucking up all the oxygen in that particular room. I own every Yakuza game they made available on GOG and they've stopped doing that. That wasn't Epic.
Sounds like that was Sega.
Oh, it was Sega. That's the thing about having an entrenched dominant position, you don't need to invest money to get exclusives, even when you are paying out a smaller share.
Gaben may be a libertarian, but I'm not. If you set up systemic reasons why I'm getting boned it's still your fault.
So the systemic reason of... providing a quality storefront? Are you demanding that they just make things shittier so that other people have a chance?
This has got to be the most twisted criticism of Steam I've ever heard...
I... wait, what?
So are you okay with exclusives but only when the developer is not getting paid for it? Or only when it's on Steam because you just happen to like Steam?
That's such a weird take. It owns the inconsistency so thoroughly I have trouble navigating it.
Since apparently I have to explain this for some reason, I don't particularly like exclusives in general and prefer platform-agnostic games so I can pick where to get them. but if you're only going to support a store, I'm perfectly fine with developers getting paid by Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, Valve, Epic or whever else. You do you and keep your workers employed any way you see fit.
And when I get a choice I tend to pick GOG because... well, they don't need a little reminder that you're not buying the game you're buying in the payment page, so I get to back up my installers and keep them forever.
Now, THAT is a criticsm of Steam that I'm actually making here.
I generally am less bothered by exclusives that are a result of a company deciding to not release at a certain storefront as opposed to being bribed and contractually prevented from releasing elsewhere after signing. Those at least have a chance of being released somewhere else if they change their mind.
Like Yakuza was a console exclusive for a long time but not because Sony forced them to. So when they decided PC games was worth venturing into they ended up doing so as opposed to being contractually prevented. Same goes for Persona.
That's the difference from contract based exclusives.
GOG is called Good Old Games for a reason. They aren’t losing out by having to wait. I always buy games there first, then Epic (if it’s an exclusive), then Steam.
Nothing beats GOG for preservation and gamers rights to actually own their games.
https://medium.com/@unfoldgames/why-i-turned-down-exclusivity-deal-from-the-epic-store-developer-of-darq-7ee834ed0ac7
The fact that gog.com let me forego launchers all together as well as letting me download the game installers and put them on my NAS means a lot to me. I don't remember the last time I had GOG Galaxy installed, I just download, install and play the games and then call it a day.
If you use GOG Galaxy it has Epic store intergration to launch games, and then closes the app when you quit too. Never have to see the Epic launcher.
Yeah, there are a bunch of third party launchers with integrations. Launchbox will do most PC storefronts.
I wish Galaxy was a bit lighter, though, because once I plug in everything it supports we start getting into five digit counts and the whole thing slows to a crawl. It's a bit better now, but it was borderline unusable at some points.
Yeah it's a bit of a slog with too many but I find it's perfect for Epic and Microsoft games.