In the PC sector it has been a much discussed controversy in recent months and years: the exclusive deals from Epic Games to compete with the top dog Steam as much as possible with the in-house store. Epic Games is currently spending a hefty million dollars, which the company is happy to accept.
For around 28 months, Epic Games has been preparing to compete with Steam in the PC sector with its in-house Epic Games Store. In addition, you want to attract as many PC games as possible exclusively to your own platform in order to make them even more interesting for players – and such deals cost money, a lot of money to be precise.
The exclusivity agreements, which were particularly controversial in the early days, cost Epic Games 202 a staggering 444 million US dollars in the past year alone. In fact, these are the “minimum warranties” developers and publishers have been given, even if their titles don’t turn out to be absolute hits. In the individual case of Remedy’s top hit Control, such an agreement with the Epic Games Store means, for example, 10.45 million US dollars in cash in the till.
The colleagues from IGN revealed as a result of the disclosure of the figures that Epic Games has fabricated a loss of 330 million dollars also due to the exclusivity deals. But that’s not a problem for the company for a long time and is actually okay. At least that’s what founder and CEO Tim Sweeney says in a comment on the report via Twitter.
“That’s right! And it has proven to be a fantastic achievement in reaching players with great games and a fantastic investment in growing the user base,” said Sweeney. In an infographic, Sweeney states that the Epic Games Store has now won over 160 million PC users. They have already invested over $ 700 million in the store.
In short: Epic Games is terribly happy to accept short-term losses in the form of exclusivity deals if they can build a larger, loyal and robust user base and offer players a serious alternative to Steam on the PC. In the long term, this user base should not only ensure sales, but also corresponding profits. Will this plan work in the fight against top dog Steam?