The Problems With The Epic Store (The Jimqisition)
28 replies, posted
https://youtu.be/foeYsvbOxJ0
A follow up for his pro-Epic video.
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the duality of man
It's kinda dumb to insinuate that he must LOVE the EGS because he has problems with Steam.
This video shouldn't be surprising.
Inb4 people in this thread say this is because he's probably responding to the negative backlash his "pro Epic" video got.
Youtubers do this all the time. One week they'll put out a list of pros regarding a thing, and the next, the cons.
I don't even like Jim all that much, but there's nothing wrong with listing out pros and cons on a hot opinionated topic. Not everything is great about the Epic Store, just as not everything is bad about the Epic Store.
I was wondering when Jim was going to release the other side of the coin.
The Apolitical Games video last week had me worried that he wouldn't do one of these. I guess he wanted to do that one first.
I don't even think that giving them a pass on their current atrocities just so they can get a footing on the market is a good idea because they are just going to be encouraged to do more exclusives. They said they aren't going to do exclusives at the same rate, but admitted that exclusives is thing they will keep doing. Their recent views on "store matter less, developers will decide" doesn't give me confident on actual competition on behalf of providing better service.
As Jim did say in the video, exclusives are a sure fire way of getting people to use your platform. If you offer up something of interest and value that can only be had on your platform, consumers will go to your platform to get it. And given how relatively well Metro Exodus did on the Epic Store despite the MASSIVE amounts of backlash the move got, it shows that the approach they're taking is working to some degree. It's even worked for companies like Bethesda, with millions of sales of Fallout 76 on PC exclusively through their launcher (despite the game being a trash fire).
Now of course, there are some discrepancies here. Would the game have sold better if it was on Steam and Epic? Of course it would've. Does them clawing up exclusives excuse the bare bones state of their storefront? Not at all. Is Epic doing a terrible job at PR? Fucking obviously.
I'd say the real problem here isn't so much the concept of exclusives, but rather, how Epic is handling getting its exclusives in tandem with the current state of the storefront. If Epic was getting exclusives well before they had confirmed Steam pages, instead of their current approach of getting some games that were long confirmed for Steam, there wouldn't be as much of an outcry. There still would be, but it would be more of a cry of annoyance of having to install another launcher instead of the current cries of being anti competitive. You pair these actions with a bare bones store front and a combative PR approach, and Epic is really only hurting their potential here.
These moves Epic is making also baffles me as someone who has followed them rather closely due to my interest in UE4. As I've said to others based on past experiences I've seen, if you told me Epic was going to be running a storefront, I would've been super happy about it. In my mind, I was thinking if the Epic that gave previous UE4 subscribers a month sub paid back after the engine went free, and giving EVERYONE who bought Paragon a FULL REFUND after cancelling were to run a storefront, I would've fully welcomed the move. Seeing what Epic's doing now though, I have to wonder what the fuck happened? Did all that Fortnite money go to Epic's head? Are the gamedev and engine parts of Epic vastly different on an ethical level than the parts running the store? Why isn't that Epic the ones running the store?
Just to make it clear, I don't support Epic's moves here, and I don't see how anyone would. It's just, I'm trying to look at this from as neutral as a perspective as I possibly can, because getting emotional over something like a store front run by a company that doesn't really know or care about you (also applies to Valve and Steam) is just ridiculous, and the more you perpetuate the same stance over and over again, the more people become tired of hearing it to the point where doing so does more harm than good to your point.
Epic is pro-business. Their store helps developers, by offering better revenue share and alleviating (more like absent of) "problems" coming from Steam, such as oversaturation and community damage-control. They also just recently announce that huge MegaGrants, which says that they still pretty much want the development side of things to bloom.
I don't think advocating for consumerism is an awful thing. Games are a luxury, the more reason you give someone to not bother, they won't. Putting up with downgrades for the same price? No thanks.
Also because Epic doesn't have regional pricing it's often a worse service for a higher price.
Thanks for reminding me. Steam's regional pricing often gives me up to -50% off.
However, there are some very odd pricing inconsistencies in Epic, for example, Bloodlines 2 goes for cheap in Epic, and many of their exclusive sits on odd price points such as $31.99.
People think that because in his "Screw Steam" video, he explicitly recommends the EGS over Steam.
It's had it for months though?
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I'm sorry what other digital distribution method on the pc other then steam existed back then? The shortlived gamestop direct download system that was only was around for a select number of titles? I'm seriously confused on how creating a new paridigm for distribution is the same as marketing scheme for an alternative platform. Was there a secret platform I was unaware of that valve stole titles from? Or did you make that up?
I'm not sure if this is directly related, but reading this reminds me of the days when people didn't like Steam. When people got upset that Half Life 2 required Steam to be running in the background in order to play it. The days a bit later when physical copies would require you to install Steam because of Steamworks DRM, and a little bit of outcropping when physical copies didn't even ship with discs but just Steam keys. Some people even were upset over PC games not even having physical copies, but only being available as a download on Steam.
Back in the day, Steam was in the same situation as all these other launchers are today. People didn't want to install "another launcher" just to play a Valve game, or later, to play a non Valve game. Valve resorted to some of the same tactics as Epic is now to get games on their platform, albeit in not such a strong-armed and dickish way. It also helps that Steam was truly the pioneer of online distribution for games, and so for the longest time, they had no challengers or alternatives. There was nowhere else to go, so people just latched onto the platform, and the social features kept them on board as they made finding new friends and staying in touch with them seamless.
I think what we're seeing now with Epic is sort of the same thing we saw with Steam in its early days. People are initially upset and outraged because they don't like change, but overtime, they adapt and realize what they were complaining over isn't as bad as it seemed. Of course, the difference here is how Epic chooses to approach its potential audience, and this is where the obviously stumbled out of the gate. Exclusives are again fine, in concept. What's not fine is taking games away from a platform they were already confirmed for, and then being aggressive towards your potential audience with a snide "you just don't get it" response.
Epic said they regret making Metro Exodus an exclusive, but words without actions don't ever help matters. If I was in their shoes, I'd take a page out of the old Epic I mentioned earlier in this thread and would step up and say "You know what, we regret this decision and you guys are right. As of today, Metro Exodus's exclusivity period is over, and you can buy it on our storefront or Steam if you wish." An action like that would be a brilliant PR move, and would bring more people over to your side and platform. It would send a message of "Epic really does care about consumers", no matter how true or false that statement is. Yeah, there would be people who still would bawk at the message and proudly proclaim "Even Epic knows it can't challenge Steam!", but some positive action is better than none at all.
I thought Jim was gonna be completely disagreable and go down with a sinking ship of a bad opinion about the EGS, but he actually made plenty of sense.
The EGS did put Valve to work, finally.
He could've meantioned a few other store, but went only with Epic, that was the problem. It just looks bad when someone does that. Glad he made this video. Yeah, doesn't state my issue with Epic, but, as I gather, 99% of everyone doesn't give a fuck about that.
They don't have a list, I still have to pay in USD, so I assume that their regional pricing is incomplete despite claiming to have support for over 230 countries.
No it didn't. Valve hasn't done anything they weren't already working on.
This. People have done Valve's work for them. We go one week from how Valve is the worst fucking thing in the industry why haven't you made half life 3 Steam sucks reeee to Well actually, I guess they aren't that bad simply because Epic did some scummy shit that pissed people off more. Valve aren't going to change if that's how quickly people give up the ghost.
I think the thing is it gave people a greater appreciation for what Steam has and has done, and even hasn't done. It's also reframed certain issues like Steam's lack of curation, where people are now seeing it against curation that is so aggressive it has turned in to manually poaching games for an exclusivity catalog.
In essence Epic and the EGS turned in to a dark mirror of Valve and Steam and it scared the shit out of a lot of people
Then it put it into high gear, instead of "we're working on this simple thing, that will only be released next year"
Mind you, I never really complained about Valve and Steam, outside of Artifact being imo a complete ez cash grab attempt, and the support system not being on EA's level, which is AMAZING.
I'd argue that egs' way of buying up exclusives is not curation, I do see how people react to it as an opposite of steams lack of curation but it really isn't and I am still of the opinion that valve's almost completely hands off approach is flawed and that they can certainly do a lot better.
How exactly? The library changes have been in the works for months, the client updates were announced over a year ago.
Hey just want to update on this. Recently I used VPN to check the store and it turns out Epic Store does have regional pricing! Just that the store does not support many types of currency.
Although, their prices still kinda sucks. There's nothing like steamdb to do comparisons, however.
Factually wrong.
Not surprised. It's weird that people assume you need to take a side between massive faceless corporations and their products, and if you criticise one you must be pledging fealty to the other.
I agree with most of Jim's criticism of steam, but out of Epic's launcher and Steam, I would prefer to use steam because Epic's launcher isn't as good, and their exclusivity deals are very anti-consumer.
Being critical of anti-consumer practices is a big part of Jim's whole brand, so I'd be kinda surprised if anyone who is trying to insinuate that he's only calling Epic out to save face is doing so in good faith.
Why people does not understand that saying EGS is shit does not mean Steam is not bad, but rather Steam is still be best platform we've got despite all the flaws it have.
Recommending EGS over Steam is literally the most anti-consumer path you can go, and shows how much of a hypocrite he is.
Making a video after ignoring it's flaw for the majority of its lifetime does not change the fact that he actually recommended EGS over Steam, while EGS have all the issues he had shat on Steam plus more.
Not to mention even in this video he does not explicitly go against EGS but rather commends it as "competition" that encourage improvement, which it isn't in any way possible.
Imagine being a game collector but your favourite game series gets cut in half between steam and epic.
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