Epic Games Will Stop Exclusives if Valve Price Matches Them
Mike Sanders / 6 years ago
Epic Games
Since the release of the Epic Games Store last November, the PC gaming platform has proven to be remarkably popular. This is, in no small part, due to two major factors. Firstly, the clear tie-in with the highly popular Fortnite and secondly their already pretty strong catalogue of exclusive game releases.
World War Z, for example, just released as an Epic Games Store exclusive with many more on the way.
It hasn’t, however, been without its critics. Many have expressed serious concerns over how the website operates. Specifically, that it may be monitoring the use of its customers.
In a report via DSOGaming, however, Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney has made it pretty clear, they’ll stop hunting exclusives when Valve start pricing matching them!
Commission Rate
Epic Games has already managed to tempt many major developers to go exclusive with them by simply offering them better commission rates. While Valve (and by proxy Steam) charges around 25-30% on any game sale, Epic Games goes for a far more modest 10-12%.
If Steam committed to a permanent 88% revenue share for all developers and publishers without major strings attached, Epic would hastily organize a retreat from exclusives (while honoring our partner commitments) and consider putting our own games on Steam.
— Tim Sweeney (@TimSweeneyEpic) April 25, 2019
What Do We Think?
Personally, I rather like what Epic Games is trying to do. I am, however, definitely not ignorant about how much some people dislike their practices. This, incidentally, being as far as I can ascertain largely based on theory rather than fact.
I also fully remember just how much people hated Steam when it was originally released. I know, I was one of them!
It is, however, all boiling up to something of a price war between the platforms and for us consumers, that can surely only be good news.
Valve will have to react to this at some point. Given that they only changed their commission policy around 6 months ago, they might simply be waiting for some water to pass under the bridge before acting. They will, however, have to act sooner or later!
What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!