Tim Sweeney, Epic CEO, remains relentless and seems to be not backing down on the challenge to made to Steam. Here’s the deal.
The Epic Games Store will stop forging exclusivity contracts with developers if Steam commits to equal Epic’s revenue share scheme. If Valve agrees to this proposal, it will no longer need to worry about games being pulled out from Steam.
Sweeney said that if Steam promised to provide developers with an 88 percent revenue share, Epic will stop making exclusives.
And if Steam agrees, Epic might even consider putting its own games on Steam, he wrote in a recent tweet. If this materializes, the company CEO said it will be a defining moment in PC gaming history.
The Epic Games Store has been known to snatch away highly-anticipated indie titles from Steam.
For instance, Ashen, game similar to Souls, was the first to drop from Steam and become an Epic exclusive. It was then followed by other prominent games such as Borderlands 3 and Metro Exodus, according to GameSpot.
In fact, Epic scored another win when it was able to forge a partnership with Ubisoft. After sealing the deal, the developer moved a majority of its releases from Steam to The Epic Games Store.
The switch began with The Division 2 followed by Ano 1800. This situation has resulted in a major tug-of-war between the two digital game storefronts.
Epic’s willy business strategy, however, has somewhat given it an undesirable image in the gaming community. This has been aggravated by instances wherein a title already pre-sold on Steam is suddenly pulled out.
Soon after, it appears as an exclusive on The Epic Games Store. As a result, users have vented their ire on Twitter and Reddit, bombarding Epic with scathing messages.
Steam users have also been unforgiving in their review of Epic game titles. For example, Metro: Last Night and Metro 2033 were heavily criticized by Steam reviewers.
Both games made the drastic jump from Steam to The Epic Games Store. This is also the same fate that met the Borderlands franchise.
In the meantime, Sweeney also dished out other caveats. This included his proposal that games should also utilize online systems such as friends and accounts.
Moreover, he said that titles should not have onerous certification requirements. The purpose of this suggestion, he said, is to be able to directly go to Steam, find games and purchase them, according to PC Gamer.
After receiving flak for cornering the exclusive deal for Metro Exodus, Epic had promised not to repeat this approach. But it happened again with Ano 1800.
The good thing was that the game could still be pre-purchased on Steam it was launched on The Epic Games Store. However, virtual gaming stores still haven’t found a way to resolve this problem.
