AKA The Steam Release.

The fact that my Y1 gear (Ego Tallon IV, Wraps of the Fulminator, Philomath Robes, Lunafaction Boots, Ego Tallon Bond) is STILL IN MY INVENTORY is telling on how godawful Y2 Gear looks on a Warlock. It took until Season of Opulance to find gear I decently liked.

One of their latest releases was FFXIV: Shadowbringers. It has an amazing story, but unfortunately wont be seen by the majority due to it being an MMORPG expansion.

Spoilers:

It’s certainly worth talking about the Epic store’s missing features, the impact of Epic chasing exclusives, anxieties people have about Epic’s previous data breaches and other things people bring up. Having played only one game via the EGS, I can’t say the store is all that impressive, but I didn’t hate it either.…

First: I really appreciate you guys. Kotaku gets a bad rap, even with my friends that are largely progressive (and I can’t figure out why tbh), but y’all balance news and analysis while usually avoiding the sort of exaggeration I see in gaming spaces so often. I also appreciate your commitment to diversity and…

I definitely heard from some readers this week that they thought we were not taking complaints about the Epic Games Store seriously enough. I don’t agree, but enough people said it that I’ve given it some thought. It was actually helpful for some readers to bring up the situation regarding the developer of Darq…

Yeah I can echo that, I’m in Canada so its EB Games here but same thing, shelves that used to be full of game boxes are now board games puzzles and statues. There are racks of shirts and hats and scarves, wallets etc. The games are all crammed in a corner with the newest games getting focus and older games being in…

That is, I think, the most damning aspect of it all. We know they allow multiple storefonts because EGS exclusive Outer Worlds isn’t EGS exclusive, it’s just delayed on Steam.

Copy and pasting this from an earlier article

“I felt going for an exclusivity deal would show that my word means nothing (as I just had promised the game would launch on Steam),” wrote Marhulets on Reddit. The positive response from fans was huge.

It’s pretty telling that Epic wouldn’t even *offer* the guy any other terms than sole exclusivity. If the game were on their store as well as Steam, they’d make money, he’d make money, Steam would lose future money compared to the status quo where that’s where everyone buys it now. But that’s not good enough for them.…

Is the Epic Store hugely popular aside from Fortnite-related stuff?

A common business strategy is to be a loss leader - see Uber, MoviePass. It doesn’t matter if you burn through cash like hell in your first few years - as long as you have an external source to keep you afloat, any marketshare you gain in the following years should more than make up for it.

Harassing developers for going exclusive on Epic Store is bad. That said, this shit is more complex then what people like to focus on. I listened to Jim Sterling’s episode this week covering the topic to, I’ll link for those interested:

Except many times they used language like “You’ll get a steam key” or a “key delivered via steam”. Yes, they couldn’t have seen the EGS coming and planned for it, but those devs that used that language definitely made promises of one thing...

Here’s the monopolistic part of it... The DARQ dev was offered an Epic deal, They basically said “Nah, I don’t want to do that after I told my fans that it was coming to Steam. I’d love to also have it on Epic Store however in addition to the others so people can choose where they get it.” What was Epic’s totally not…

I’m not sure whether Epic’s paying you guys off, or if you guys just have a chip on your shoulders against PC gamers because of Gamersgate or whatever, but what on earth is going on with your Epic Games articles? You turned a story about a dev approaching a sensitive subject the right way into a condemnation for PC…

r/hailcorporate is leaking. More seriously, the Ooblets thing—the harrassment is inexcusable of course—but can he really be all that surprised? His original statement is dripping with condescension and every point against the EGS he brings up (to argue against) is such a lame straw man that I can’t even begin to take…

I’m getting older and I’m busy a lot and there is a lot of games out there. If you don’t make it easy for me to buy your game, I won’t bother. If you try to sell me a 60$ game for 100$ by having crap dlc? You’re out. Gameplay focused around lootboxes and microtransaction? out. I’m not boycoting stuff that comes out…