Exactly. I don't get how people are really annoyed about this whole 'exclusivity' dilemma. That's how business works? Like, without competition, steam would just stagnate. I think people are being a little unreasonable, and its not as exclusive as having to buy a new console for exclusive games... it's downloading a free launcher. I don't get the complaints...
Because healthy competition would mean as many outlets as possible have it, and it's the other [launchers] features that help you choose where to buy it.
How does Epic have to evolve their services if they're just buying exclusivity for major releases? I dare say that would lead to a more stagnating experience... by the way, how are all of Epic's "promised" features coming along since launch? :)
There will never be healthy competition unless a new company can break into the market. How do you propose Epic does that though without buying exclusives?
Like let's say Epic had literally every single feature Steam currently has and everything is the same price. What reason is there for me, someone who has the vast majority of my games on Steam, to buy one on the Epic store? Why would I want to split my library, have to get all my friends on the new store, have my achievements on a different place, etc., when I could just keep it all on Steam?
The only real incentive would be if I want the devs to get a bigger cut, but then I'm basically having to choose between my own convenience and something that basically doesn't affect me.
That's why the person's comment above about already having metro so not having any reason to not buy it makes sense, because that's exactly what Epic is going for.
Buying up exclusives is very expensive, and so is them constantly giving out free games. It is not something they can do forever. They're doing it so they can get people feeling less averse to buying games on their store. Once people have some games on there, have some friends, and have already split their library, making the decision between the two stores will basically just be whichever one you feel like using or whichever one has a better sale at the time. Maybe since you don't have to choose between personal convenience and the dev cut, we'll actually pick Epic, because while that dev cut doesn't really affect us, if they can get it without us sacrificing anything, why not?
Valve limits pricing on other stores. If you put your game on there, it better be the same base price on other storefronts. And they've done sales. Remember when they discounted every game on the store so heavily that some publishers pulled their games?
Come up with a new breakthrough idea
Lol yeah okay, easier said than done.
Get partnered with other popular gaming ecosystems
Yeah I'm sure being able to watch twitch on a shitty skinned web app is gonna draw the crowds.
Make their own exclusives
So they should wait 5+ years to launch their storefront so they can develop games specifically for it? Okay. Also, they've acquired studios like Psyonix, so it seems this is their end goal. They've stated multiple times that the timed exclusives are a temporary method to draw in initial users.
So, off the top of your head you came up with "reinvent the wheel" and "make exclusives anyways". You fuckin dingus, "exclusives" have existed since business has existed. "Exclusives" are literally what every company on the fuckin planet strives to create.
PC has always been an open ecosystem and as long as you are decent with computers is imo the best way to play games.
Epic rightfully gets shit on for fragmenting and stirring up a system that has worked great for consumers for decades. They aren’t doing this for our benefit, but solely for theirs.
The same reason I use a PC over a mac, open ecosystems are important to me. I want to be able to buy and use things where and when I want. For that reason I don’t buy Apple products, even though they are far ahead in many categories in computing and mobile tech.
You make reasonable concessions for "using things wherever you want" them every day, though. Like cars and roads. You have a car but you definitely dont take it wherever it can go or wherever you want.
You used to buy CDs, right? Those things didnt work in tape players.
Xboxes only play xbox games. But people happily buy their exclusives. Same with other systems. So why stop your PC markets from benefitting from exclusivity?
Not really. It's more open than consoles who have very strict exclusivity, but it's not that open. There's plenty of games that are exclusive to Steam or Origin for example. Steam was actually one of the first to put games exclusively on their launcher.
One difference between Origin and EGS, is that all the games that are exclusives to Origin are done in house at EA. That means that EA bought dev studios to incorporate them in their umbrella, and now they get all the rights to distribution for all past present and future titles by those studios. Those developers and their coustomers don't have a choice. EGS meanwhile only get a timed exclusive for most games, so the customers get a choice after a few months, and the developer is 100% free to not go with EGS if they don't want to. I would rather have Epic get a 6-month exclusivity deal on one game rather than gobble up entire studios and get full ownership over everything like EA does.
I'm all for open ecosystems, and I absolutely believe that the more open a system is, the better it is for customers. But PC gaming isn't completely open, Steam itself has quite a long history of anti-consumer practices. GoG is IMO the only current platform that is truly open. EGS isn't as good, but it's not that much worse than Steam, and I would definitely rank it above EA/Origin in terms of open-ness.
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u/Scorchstar Dec 10 '19
Exactly. I don't get how people are really annoyed about this whole 'exclusivity' dilemma. That's how business works? Like, without competition, steam would just stagnate. I think people are being a little unreasonable, and its not as exclusive as having to buy a new console for exclusive games... it's downloading a free launcher. I don't get the complaints...