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It's a tweet from user PC_Focus_ that states:
The next Epic Store FREE games has been leaked:
13th game: Ghostrunner
14th game: Escape Academy
15th game: 20 minutes till dawn
16th game: A plague tale innocence
17th game: Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy
Yeah, but what EGS is doing isn't competition.
If they had stuck with being a cheaper alternativ for Indie Devs and maybe followed it up with even more favorable deals for using their Engine and being on their platform, I wouldn't have had a problem with them. It would have been a good strategy to compete with Valve.
Like GOG did with retro games. Tapping into something Valve didn't focus on.
But they didn't. It all came down to a shitty attempt at Storefront Exclusivity. And that isn't competition, that is just removing customer choice.
Yeah I sort of get what you are saying. But I see it as less of an issue. The Devs take a pay for timed exclusivity and this helps development. But in the end the exclusivity will go away as devs will in no way keep part of 5heir consumerbase from their product. And I can wait... But I see your point fo sho!
This is only in the case of Indie Devs. And again, only if the deal is struck before the game is done. For any studio tied to a publisher, it's just money up front for the publisher.
Plus, I remember the stories some Devs told of how egs tried to strong-arm them into going exclusive. Didn't score them any bonus points in my book.
But as I said, everyone has they're own principles.
We agree in the most part, and I'm happy the dev they tried to strongarm had a spine and called them out. That put a stop to that pretty quick.
Any monopolist behavior is bad imho, but I can see room for limited exclusivity. But not copyright, 100 years after the authors death limited... 6 months maybe 12.. that's it.
I'm pretty much against exclusivity as a whole.
I'd prefer if corporations competed with better tech and services.
Instead they divide the playerbase, the game dies quietly (at worst) or slowly cooks until it's released on Steam and then it either does the same there or maybe they get the hoped explosion if it wasnt already on EGS.
Edit: Best case would be platforms dealing in feature exclusivity like SteamOS, Steam Deck, forums, mod integrations, groups, friends, achievememts, rewards (u points/steam points) for cosmetics etc. instead of dividing player bases.