The Epic First Run programme allows developers of any size to claim 100% of revenue if they agree to make their game exclusive on the Epic Games Store for six months.
After the six months are up, the game will revert to the standard Epic Games Store revenue split of 88% for the developer and 12% for Epic Games.
I’ve never understand why, as a consumer, I would care why something is exclusive. Is that game exclusive to PS5 because Sony owns the studio? Did Sony bankroll the development? Did Sony bribe them? Why would I care? The problem with exclusivity is that it’s anti-competitive and limits consumer choice. It doesn’t do that any less whether it’s exclusive because the developer was too lazy to offer the game somewhere else or because they were contractually obligated to be exclusive.
Also, we don’t know if Valve paid for it to be exclusive. Everyone assumes they didn’t, which is probably correct, but, as far as I know, we have absolutely no way of verifying why it was exclusive. Maybe Gabe called up and asked nicely? Maybe someone at 2K used to work with Gabe when he was at Microsoft and thought they’d do him a favor? Maybe Valve paid? Does it matter why? Exclusives suck. It sucks BL2 was exclusive. It sucks BL3 was exclusive. I don’t think any reasonable consumer is ever happier that a game is an exclusive, regardless of why it’s exclusive.
Difference between knowing a game isn’t being prevented from coming to the PC like Yakuza and Persona 5 before they got PC ports versus knowing it will never happen, so not even entertaining the possibility like Zelda. Even with Epic exclusives its the difference between knowing that eventually the game will be available outside Epic versus being locked there forever. And it’s why I’ve decided to wait patiently for a Ghost of Tsushima release on the PC versus getting a PS5 or getting it for my PS4. Maybe you are a day 1 purchaser, but I am willing to wait if there is a chance of a game being released on my preferred platform. So its pretty important. Otherwise, I’d get a PS5 if I knew that no amount of waiting would result in PC ports.
Like I said before. You are so much better off saying you don’t care about exclusives if you are going to be an Epic apologist.
You just seem to be falling back to hypotheticals to try to downplay third party exclusives. You say exclusives suck but then don’t bother putting in half the effort of actually calling out a verifiable recent actions of paying to remove the game from other platforms. Like the most infamous example being Metro Exodus that was set to release on Steam getting paid to pull it by Epic, and being the most lasting impression Epic left on consumers. It’s instead hypothetical 2k exclusives that bother you more than actual concrete current events.
The leaps in logic you take to try and downplay paid third party exclusives as being as egregious as a dev or publisher not bothering to release on multiple platforms is an interesting one… But, I guess you have to do that if you are both claiming you hate exclusives, but then also trying to defend Epic and having to resort to hypotheticals.
Honestly, if you want to downplay criticisms towards Epic you are much better off saying you aren’t bothered by exclusives. I’m not sure why you are going through such a round about approach when you end up coming off as a fanboy with the leaps in logic and reliance on constant hypotheticals while downplaying or ignoring actual events that could hurt Epic.
Trust me. It’s way better to just say I like the Epic launcher being bare bones and I don’t care about exclusives. It’s just a launcher. This is by far the worst attempt to defend Epic I’ve seen. Bravo.
Any exclusive clearly is bad for consumers. If you want to tell yourself that Steam exclusives are better than EGS ones, Origin ones, or UPlay ones for some bizarre reason, do it. But that doesn’t make it true, sensible, or sane.
I don’t want games to be exclusive to any launcher. In fact, I have never purchased a game that is exclusive to one launcher. I have always either waited until the game was available multiple places (ideally somewhere like GOG that doesn’t require a launcher at all), or just never bought it. This includes Steam exclusives. But, sure, I’m just an EGS apologist.
But, sure, all of you guys who waited until publishers were being paid to use shitty launchers before you cared about consumer options have the moral high ground over those of us who realized it was shitty to require a launcher and started caring 20 years ago (and have been fighting it ever since).
As far as I’m concerned, consumers lost as soon as launchers were required. I don’t care why they’re required. To me, feeling better about it just because no one got paid to require the launcher makes no damn sense. It makes about as much sense as getting shot and then saying, “You know what? I feel better knowing that nobody got paid to shoot me. I’d feel a whole lot worse if someone got paid.” The problem isn’t that someone got paid! The problem is that you got fucking shot! You’re missing the point if you make that statement.
Launcher exclusivity is bad. Full stop. EGS isn’t worse. Steam isn’t worse. They’re all fucking bad.