Epic Games Store: exclusive keys The outer worlds Shenmue 3 control Journey to the savage planet Subway Exodus Borderlands 3 Anno 1800 Phoenix Point Hades (early access) Telltale & # 39; s The Walking Dead Watchdogs: Legion Division 2 When the Epic Games Store was announced in December 2018, it seemed to come out of nowhere with big plans and bigger ambitions. Since then, it has become a staple showcase and a target of controversy. While Epic Games has a long and illustrious history of making games, especially shooters: Unreal Tournament and the free game Fortnite, to name just two, the Epic Games Online Store. It is the result of various developments for society. Fortnite has proven to be a huge moneymaker for Epic, as a gigantic, technically free online game, but it comes with plenty of cosmetic items and skins that you can pay to upgrade your character, and has become a global phenomenon in Back From over there. Epic had to install a vast infrastructure to manage these transactions, allowing it to open its own store for PC and Mac titles. But why open your own marketplace? Can't have everything on the Steam Store anyway? Read below for everything you need to know about the Epic Games Store. (Update: Epic Games continues to win some major exclusives despite the critics. Since its first E3 in June, it confirmed that Shenmue 3, Borderlands 3, and Watch Dogs: Legion will all be store exclusives.)
What is the Epic Games Store?
The Epic Games Store is a marketplace for video games that you can play on your PC or Mac. It has a website where you can browse and download individual games, some of which are exclusive to the store, but for the dedicated app, you'll download an installation file. from the Epic Games Store website. Create a free Epic account that you can link to a PlayStation, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, or even Nintendo account for your login information. However, if you play something like Fortnite, you'll already have an Epic account. The service currently offers a "hand-picked" selection of titles for PC and Mac, with plans to expand to "Android and other platforms throughout 2019," so you can buy some mobile games here instead of in the store. Apple or Google apps. Play.
Fortnite of Epic Game has been a worldwide success (Image credit: Epic Games)
The plot of the Epic Games Store.
S & # 39; reeling Steam is the elephant in the room: the massive PC gaming marketplace launched by Valve in 2003. The Steam Store has grown to enormous proportions, with tens of thousands of titles available and a monopoly on handheld devices where most gamers of PC are buying their games today. However, not everyone is happy with Steam. The platform is overburdened, and Steam has little interest in cleaning it up, as long as the money comes through. His decision to allow "controversial" content on his platform, as long as it was technically legal, also resulted in a series of bad publicity. Small developers have railed against the way Steam's algorithms favor big AAA names like Fallout 4 and Far Cry 5, making it harder to discover indie titles they don't already have. A significant marketing budget. Not to mention the 30% reduction that Steam takes on everything published on its platform, which, while an industry standard, seems increasingly difficult to justify. Developers whose games just don't get seen.
Valve's multiplayer shooter Team Fortress 2. Image Credit: Valve Real Community Epic Games Store draws attention above all for its "developer first" goal. Here, developers will only pay a 12% discount at Epic, while games built on Epic's Unreal engine will drop the usual 5% upcharge. "As developers, we wanted two things: a store that offered a fair economy and a direct relationship with players," Epic said in a blog post. Developers will control their own game pages, with no external ads distracting from their titles. They will also be able to reach players who have purchased their games, with "game updates and news" delivered directly through the Epic Games Store news feed or via email. The Epic Games Store is also connected to Epic's "Support-A-Creator" program, which allows you to send a portion of game revenue to the YouTube or Twitch streamers you were first interested in. This is a community-based approach, which might interest many gamers and developers tired of fighting Steam's algorithms to get the service they want.
Hades (Early Access). Image Credit: Supergiant Games.
Epic Games Store Exclusives
Part of what draws attention lies in the platform exclusives Epic Game Store: when the platform launched, it announced that it would have exclusives, such as the sci-fi paper game The Outer Worlds (Obsidian) and the supernatural action game Check (Remedy). Despite some backlash from players, Epic continues to focus on exclusives and has now managed big titles like Shenmue 3, Borderlands 3, and Watch Dogs: Legion as exclusives for their store. Of course, all of these titles are not permanent exclusivities. Shenmue 3 and Borderlands 3, for example, will be coming to Steam after a specific period. Other confirmed exclusions on PC include Afterparty (night school), Journey to the Savage Planet, Ashen, Darksiders III, Phoenix Point, Journey, The Telltale (The Walking Dead: The Final Season) and Supergiant Games' upcoming title Hades (now available in Early Access). The Division 2 Tom Clancy will not be released on Steam as publisher Ubisoft decided to make the PC version of the title a semi-exclusive release on the Epic Games Store. According to a report from Polygon, Ubisoft and Epic Games have also teamed up to offer a selection of upcoming PC titles from Ubisoft to the Epic Games Store. Watch Dogs: Legion and Anno 1800 are already confirmed. Additionally, Epic Games and Deep Silver have announced a partnership for the release of Metro Exodus for PC, a timed exclusive on the Epic Games Store. This means that Metro Exodus will not arrive on the Steam store until February 14, 2020.
Metro Exodus (Image credit: 4A Games) In response, Valve issued the following statement: "Note: Metro Exodus sales have been halted on Steam due to the publisher's decision to make the game exclusive to another PC store." The developer and publisher have assured us that all previous Steam game sales will take place on Steam and that Steam owners will be able to access the game and any future updates or downloadable content through Steam. "We believe that the decision to remove the game is unfair to Steam customers, especially after a long pre-sale period, and we apologize to Steam customers who expect it to be available for sale before February 15, but We were recently informed of the decision and had little time to let everyone know." Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games, said that he believes that, in the end, the disruptive strategy of obtaining exclusives would benefit gamers. Sweeney said it was the only way to end the 70/30 revenue split imposed on developers. When the developers win, the players will see the benefits.
This problem is at the heart of Epic's strategy to compete with conventional showcases. We believe that exclusives are the only strategy that will change the 70/30 status quo on a large enough scale to have a lasting impact on the entire gaming industry. June 25, 2019 That doesn't convince everyone, though. The announcement that Shenmue 3 would be a timed Epic Games Store exclusive upset many Kickstarter customers, because they were forced to use a store they don't want to support to play the game from the start. . set free. Epic Games has confirmed that they will refund these players.
Travel (2012). Image Credit: Thatgamecompany
Epic Games Store free games
You read that right. Although players can sign up to use the store for free, you'll also receive free games every week or two, in the vein of PlayStation Plus or Games with Xbox Gold. If you get the game during your spare time, it's up to you to keep it forever, so it's worth popping into the store from time to time to see what's on offer. Previous titles include Oxenfree, The Witness, City of Brass, and Rime.- Free Online Game on the Epic Games Store: Too Hot (July 4 - July 11)
- The next free game on the Epic Games Store: Torchlight (July 11 - July 18)