Lady Insane
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METRO: Exodus - "Nuclear Winter makes you wish for the Caspian Desert"
- Thread starter Mechasaurian
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Hykal94
Orange Estus Kitteh
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- Firelink Shrine
Whoever the developer was being angry at gamers, THQ Nordic is gonna investigate it and slap some sense into him. I feel more sorry for THQ Nordic than anyone else.
Also, you do realise that all this bruhaha over Exodus isn't about just the exclusivity, but over the fact of "gotcha it's at the Epic Store screw you!" right? Because we've had this game on Steam on our wishlist for over a year and Deep Silver went "lol no" and changed it like last minute? I only literally discovered it when it was brought up on this thread and I wasn't able to buy it on Steam due to my financial situation. A lot of those angry review bombers, while I believe act out of line, I wouldn't be surprised was in a similar case.
And while Steam isn't innocent, you know what else they don't do? Demand exclusivity. Steam advises devs to go on as many platforms as they possibly can. It's why Exodus can still be on Steam in 2020. It's why Rimworld can be bought from Ludeon AND Steam.
"But Hykal Epic is gonna have region pricing!" Yeah okay, but it's still 50 US Dollars in Kittehstan that's for sure. Even if it was 50 Kitteh Dollars, who knows when's that gonna be? Here's some other reasons why Steam is still better than Epic:
- Online requirement? What is this, 2010?
- The UI is utter garbage.
- It's also anti consumer because no user reviews either.
-No refunds? Also anti-consumer. Nevermind, it has refunds.
Consider this, what if this game you were waiting for on Steam this year, Cyberpunk, DMC V, Outer Worlds, you've been waiting to get on Steam, but they get pulled out last minute and you don't have the funds to purchase it at launch or preorder it? How would you feel? Oh, and the other store is worse than Steam, has no refund policy, and doesn't view its pricing in your region.
You'd feel pretty crappy like me, that's for sure.
Also, you do realise that all this bruhaha over Exodus isn't about just the exclusivity, but over the fact of "gotcha it's at the Epic Store screw you!" right? Because we've had this game on Steam on our wishlist for over a year and Deep Silver went "lol no" and changed it like last minute? I only literally discovered it when it was brought up on this thread and I wasn't able to buy it on Steam due to my financial situation. A lot of those angry review bombers, while I believe act out of line, I wouldn't be surprised was in a similar case.
And while Steam isn't innocent, you know what else they don't do? Demand exclusivity. Steam advises devs to go on as many platforms as they possibly can. It's why Exodus can still be on Steam in 2020. It's why Rimworld can be bought from Ludeon AND Steam.
"But Hykal Epic is gonna have region pricing!" Yeah okay, but it's still 50 US Dollars in Kittehstan that's for sure. Even if it was 50 Kitteh Dollars, who knows when's that gonna be? Here's some other reasons why Steam is still better than Epic:
- Online requirement? What is this, 2010?
- The UI is utter garbage.
- It's also anti consumer because no user reviews either.
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Consider this, what if this game you were waiting for on Steam this year, Cyberpunk, DMC V, Outer Worlds, you've been waiting to get on Steam, but they get pulled out last minute and you don't have the funds to purchase it at launch or preorder it? How would you feel? Oh, and the other store is worse than Steam, has no refund policy, and doesn't view its pricing in your region.
You'd feel pretty crappy like me, that's for sure.
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hellgodsrus
Actual Real Game Dev!
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Actually, Epic has literally the same refund policy as Steam.
Hykal94
Orange Estus Kitteh
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Updated my post then.
That's what happens when you recall old news but not researching it.
hellgodsrus
Actual Real Game Dev!
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If anything it's actually a bit better than steam's - when you buy something it flat out reminds you of their refund policy, and specifies that the refund policy is technically different from EU law and are you actually okay with that.
Hykal94
Orange Estus Kitteh
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Exclusivity arrangements generally involve the platform paying the game developers some money for timed or permanent exclusivity, set at greater than the estimated lost sales on the dev's part from purchases on another platform. The goal is to attract people to your platform so that they go on and buy other stuff. For physical consoles it also potentially gets you a sale of hardware, further encouraging future purchased.
Steam is the default platform nowadays. Anyone who plays games online and isn't actively opposed to Steam (in which case they're probably not going to buy any games other than your exclusive) has Steam. Why would they spend money securing exclusives? It burns goodwill and costs money for incredibly marginal benefits. And if you aren't going to secure exclusives, why would you discourage people from hosting games on your platform? Hosting costs are low and you're making a giant margin on each sale.
Like, the core problem here is that digital markets are subject to network effects: the more stuff you have on them the better they are, but you need to have lots of customers using your platform before it's worthwhile to put stuff on there, etc. Getting desirably exclusives is a key way you can get that initial customer base. Valve did it by making all of their games Steam-only (hey, remember how shitty that was)?
Epic Games decided that, given how nowadays the market is so heavily Steam-controlled and observing that other storefronts that tried to copy that initial launch model pretty much all failed, they needed to have a ton of desirable exclusives on their new platform to drive that critical mass, most of which appear tailored to a more hardcore/indie crowd (as Hades, Ashen, and now the new Metro taken together seems to suggest).
Is this inconvenient? Definitely, needing to use 2+ platforms to play games is always inconvenient. But I have a hard time believing that there's any way of breaking Steam's virtual monopoly without inconveniencing players at least a little, and that end seems desirable enough to justify the hassle of needing to download a second free digital storefront.
Always online does suck though and if that's a real issue for you I can respect that.
I'd rather back a convenient monopoly than shit competition for its own sake. If you can't do it as good and convenient as steam, don't insult me by expecting me to give you the time of day. Demanding I drink lakewater you mixed some sugar into isn't the same as offering me a coke, is roughly how I see Epics attempt to "compete" with Steam.It's a free service that offers competition to Steam and options to developers. It ain't like they're charging you $15 a month to access the store, mate.
Edit: Like, you know what's even less pro-consumer than devs going to a platform that's better for them? Ensuring that a single multi-billion dollar corporation controls the market, especially when said corporation will arbitrarily declare certain types of games --such as ones featuring LGBT* themes-- unacceptable.
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The Epic Game Store is hardly that much worse. I don't like always online requirements, but if you are using a digital distributor for high end games in 2019 you are very likely to be able to manage that. The UI is also irrelevant, and talking about a lack of game reviews in this context is a bit weird. Like, @Hykal94, you're talking about how you were definitely going to get it on Steam, so ...
Epic offers a much better return to developers, and frankly I can't blame them for not wanting to give Valve a 30% cut for basically nothing.
Epic offers a much better return to developers, and frankly I can't blame them for not wanting to give Valve a 30% cut for basically nothing.
Hykal94
Orange Estus Kitteh
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- Firelink Shrine
Except it wasn't 4A's decision to make this exclusivity, it was Deep Silver's. If it was 4A games who made this decision I may be a bit more sympathethic but this was a publisher's decision, made by big execs and not the people who toiled on the game.
Also I don't get why "bad UI and no user reviews" is irrelevant when Epic Store doesn't nearly have all the shinies of Steam. Their launcher is worse than Steam is a completely valid thing to complain about. I've said before that I'd be willing to see Steam's monopoly break but not like this. No one complains about Zeus because Zeus wasn't advertised for an entire year on Steam.
It's anti-consumer, a last minute pull of the rug that's motivated entirely by greed. If Epic really wanted to go up against Steam, they'd make Exodus ten bucks cheaper and sell it on Epic but keep the original price on Steam.
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Greed by whom?
Hykal94
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Are you really gonna pull a Squishy on me Ford? For God's sake. I literally mentioned Deep Silver in the first paragraph.
Mechasaurian
Big Bossu
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Well, it seems this thread is going places, though not for the reasons I envisioned.
As to the topic at hand...why should I give a damn about the Epic Store being marginally worse than Steam? Why should anyone?* Maybe this has something to do with the fact that I already have my games spread out across three different distribution platforms (Steam, GoG, the Blizzard client) but I really don't see the big deal about spending a couple of minutes to set up a new platform on my computer.
Is it really such a burden on people that they have to throw a hissy fit and review bomb the other two Metro games? I sincerely doubt it.
*"It makes the game more expensive for some people thanks to region pricing complications" is a good answer to this, but for some damn reason it seems to be the last thing anyone brings up wrt this topic. Which makes me think it's not a problem at all for the assholes being the most vocal about this.
As to the topic at hand...why should I give a damn about the Epic Store being marginally worse than Steam? Why should anyone?* Maybe this has something to do with the fact that I already have my games spread out across three different distribution platforms (Steam, GoG, the Blizzard client) but I really don't see the big deal about spending a couple of minutes to set up a new platform on my computer.
Is it really such a burden on people that they have to throw a hissy fit and review bomb the other two Metro games? I sincerely doubt it.
*"It makes the game more expensive for some people thanks to region pricing complications" is a good answer to this, but for some damn reason it seems to be the last thing anyone brings up wrt this topic. Which makes me think it's not a problem at all for the assholes being the most vocal about this.
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@Hykal94 you do realize that Steam has a bad reputation amongst Devs for stuff like forcing sales (and forcing sales on its timetable rather than yours, where there's way more competition), having terrible game discovery options (and thereby doing little to actually promote indies, especially in the sea of garbage and art swaps that they're still doing little to check), having a terrible review system that can punish games, etc.?
Like, your complaints seem, by and large, totally and of scope compared to the complaints Devs have about putting games on Steam. Is it that implausible that, in addition to the money, they want to have more control over their product and its pricing and be less subject to the arbitrary whims of Valve, who regularly make and then abandon features after encouraging Devs to spend time trying to optimize for them (see: Steam Curators).
Edit: I get that having to boot up a second storefront is marginally inconvenient, and I get that you might like to be able to engage in Steam's social functionality while playing the game, but the cost on your end seems to trivial based on what you're describing—especially where a lot of the missing functionality only matters for game discovery or management and the store is so small? Even if this is over money, it's probably a pretty huge amount of money over the lifetime of the game. Is it wrong for the developers to prioritize getting paid for their work over some marginal increase in the convenience of their playerbase?
Like, your complaints seem, by and large, totally and of scope compared to the complaints Devs have about putting games on Steam. Is it that implausible that, in addition to the money, they want to have more control over their product and its pricing and be less subject to the arbitrary whims of Valve, who regularly make and then abandon features after encouraging Devs to spend time trying to optimize for them (see: Steam Curators).
Edit: I get that having to boot up a second storefront is marginally inconvenient, and I get that you might like to be able to engage in Steam's social functionality while playing the game, but the cost on your end seems to trivial based on what you're describing—especially where a lot of the missing functionality only matters for game discovery or management and the store is so small? Even if this is over money, it's probably a pretty huge amount of money over the lifetime of the game. Is it wrong for the developers to prioritize getting paid for their work over some marginal increase in the convenience of their playerbase?
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Hykal94
Orange Estus Kitteh
- Location
- Firelink Shrine
Except me, I've brought this up. Constantly. Here, and in the controversial gaming opinions thread. This last minute pull out serves to hurt gamers in third world countries who are big Metro fans, screwing over players not in the financial position to preorder it.
If it was region priced, Exodus would be 50 kitteh dollars. But because it's in US Dollars, it's more like 140 kitteh dollars. That's more than half twice the price.
It's not about putting in more launchers. I can bare putting more of that if it was as good as Steam. But Epic store isn't doing that. Epic is also owned by TenCent, and I trust TenCent lest than I do EA. It's also always online, which really fucking sucks for my other family members who don't have the best Internet connection.
It wasn't 4A's decision. It was Deep Silver. If it was 4A, I would be sympathetic. But it's not. Steam isn't perfect, but I'd take it over Epic Game Store.
Also this is the first time I've heard Steam forcing sales on developers. Can I get a source on that? Rimworld has never been on sale and it's infamous for that despite being on Steam for years.
Hykal94
Orange Estus Kitteh
- Location
- Firelink Shrine
In related news, Sterling's take on the subject matter.
Also Deep Silver's response on TwitLonger:
TwitLonger — When you talk too much for Twitter
Article: The recent decision to move Metro Exodus from Steam to the Epic Game Store was made by Koch Media / Deep Silver alone.
The recent comments made by a member of the 4A Games development team do not reflect Deep Silver's or 4A Games' view on the future of the franchise. They do reflect the hurt and disappointment of a passionate individual who has seen what was previously nothing but positive goodwill towards his work turn to controversy due to a business decision he had no control over. We respectfully ask that any and all valid feedback over this decision is directed at Koch Media / Deep Silver, and not the developers at 4A Games.
The future release strategy of the Metro series lies with Koch Media / Deep Silver. Our decision to partner with Epic Games was based on the goal of investing in the future of the series and our development partner at 4A Games. We have every intention of continuing this franchise, and a PC version will always be at the heart of our plans.
Because I shouldn't have to? Because they're not trying to make a serious attempt to offer a competing service, just holding a game hostage to force us to use a crappy product that gives them more money? Why should I not be annoyed? If they gave a damn about competing with Steam, they should make a service as good or better than Steam. If they're not willing to put in that minimum of effort, they can eat the 30% tax or not get sales.Well, it seems this thread is going places, though not for the reasons I envisioned.
As to the topic at hand...why should I give a damn about the Epic Store being marginally worse than Steam? Why should anyone?* Maybe this has something to do with the fact that I already have my games spread out across three different distribution platforms (Steam, GoG, the Blizzard client) but I really don't see the big deal about spending a couple of minutes to set up a new platform on my computer.
Is it really such a burden on people that they have to throw a hissy fit and review bomb the other two Metro games? I sincerely doubt it.
*"It makes the game more expensive for some people thanks to region pricing complications" is a good answer to this, but for some damn reason it seems to be the last thing anyone brings up wrt this topic. Which makes me think it's not a problem at all for the assholes being the most vocal about this.
- Location
- NYC
My impression has been that Deep Silver is giving (some) of that extra money to 4A though, no? If no than this is pretty undeniably a really shitty move on 4A's part.
I think I misremembered the region pricing as a sale—Valve does automatically discount your price in certain regions without your permission or notifying you, but I don't think they do force user sales. Source (scroll down).
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Don't get antsy with me. It's a valid question: Steam's cut of sales is massive, and that cut meaningfully effects the capacity of a publisher to keep a studio's lights on, or allow a franchise to to continue. One in three sales on Steam is basically lost to the ether.
This is what really confuses me. Steam is being a dick about it. We know it, these companies know it. A competitor to Steam would be good for everyone but Steam, we know it, they know it. We know what we like about steam, generally. It's widely know what is hated at the very least about platforms (always online, annoying DRM hoops, being hard to search through, having poor social stuff/friend connection).
So...why in the world would Epic make a Steam competitor that completely fails to compete at all. Like, this is the core of why I'm so unsympathetic to the game companies here. If Epic wasn't doing the always online thing, if it was doing roughly as good as Steam does in what it's convenient, or if it, IDK, took some pains to find what people bitch about with Steam and go "HEY OUR PLATFORM LACKS THAT ANNOYING THING" I'd be here with you defending the move.
but...they didn't. They just...tied themselves to a super insulting version of Steam and decided "We'll do that, surely this won't enrage our fickle, convenience obsessed, change hating and frankly childish audience" (and I totally include myself on at least two of those insults). So all I can think is "No duh they're review bombing you, no duh they're threatening a boycott. This is just insulting, they've done this shit for less."
Like, is it that hard to go "We won't do always online, and we'll fix it so it's easier to browse for games than on Steam"? Like, is the gains for them that extreme? Because I just cannot sympathize with people whose attempt to bypass the consequence of someone getting there first and being the only game in town is to hitch to some hyper incompetent competitor. It's just...why would you ever.
Hykal94
Orange Estus Kitteh
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- Firelink Shrine
You asked "whose greed" which I already said was Deep Silver's. How about you try reading the post in the first place instead of trying to do a gotcha?
It's Metro. It's one of the cult classics of gaming. It's got a big enough fanbase in Russia and abroad, with a lot of people going to the books via the games. It's a cynical move to pull off such bullshit in the first place. They would have gotten a ton of sales on Steam alone. If anything, it'd probably hurt their profits with the controversy surrounding it atm.
And saying "well Steam's cut is massive" except I've also explained that Steam allows devs to publish their games elsewhere. I used Rimworld for example, twice. The Metro games have suffered this kind of nonsense before, with developers hiding the Ranger mode behind a price tag. So sorry if I'm not keen with game studios trying to pull off this crap again.
tbh it should hurt their profits, they need the kick in the ass. Or, well. "Rap on the knuckles" morelike. It's gonna make everyone who matters in the industry millions (and no, I am not suggesting game devs are millionaires, but rather than they're basically powerless), so making less is really more of an ego bruise than anything.
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No new platform is ever actually that good when it launches. Like, the Steam of today is the end result of literally years of incremental changes. I don't know if you remember what it was like when it was new, but I do and it was garbage. Steam relied a lot on Valve's reputation, and still relies on that reputation to some degree whenever a change is made which is genuinely bad (which is often).
Like there was a competitor to Steam in Origin, and I'm going to advance the controversial opinion that Origin's at launch functionality was not actually that much different from Steam's at launch functionality, but Valve got away with it because they developed Half-Life.
Describing it as greed suggests there's no valid reason why someone would decided not to publish on the platform, when in fact there actually is a valid reason, even beyond 'we don't want Valve to get a cut' which is itself a valid reason.
Oh, I loathed Steam for years, it was awful, and I never liked Valve to begin with, so I ignored it for like a decade. I got into it like...2014 I think? My gripe is that people can look at Steam's version history. Can go "Okay, what was this like, what did people hate, how can we avoid this." But they never do. It's maddening to me. Like, god, at this point, all I want is the attempt. I wanna see a company actually go in and visibly address "You hated this, so we didn't do it, we heard you disliked this on rival platforms, so we did our best to improve it". Even if they kinda suck at it, I'll throw money just to encourage the behavior. I want them to just try. For their mistakes to not be glaring obvious nonsense like forcing me to always me online. Try to improve the search engine, but screw it up and make it unworkable because it's a thing Steam never even tried and you couldn't see how it went wrong, sort of thing. I'll forgive that failure in a heartbeat, but not this. Not something vocally hated for near a decade now.
Hykal94
Orange Estus Kitteh
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- Firelink Shrine
Deep Silver wanted to make more money at the cost of forcing fans to wait an entire year but my making it a timely exclusive. That sounds like greed to me. Sorry Ford, but I don't want to pay for a 140 dollar game when it was originally 50 dollars a week ago.
Also, 4A games could have also sold it on their website and Steam. If they put it up on their website, they'd get 100% of the profits and with it being both on Steam and their own website, they'd also get to give Steam players Steam keys just like Rimworld has done.
We can argue all day whether 30% cut is valid (I personally don't, I think they could do with 8% like the guy behind Epic Store has suggested), but they also provide user reviews, cloud storage, forums, advertisements, ease of updates, screenshot libraries and the mod workshop. But every other publisher does 30%, Steam just happens to be the one providing all these extra bits. Epic has not done so. When Subnautica came out on Epic, people went to Steam forums to troubleshoot bugs.
I don't give it a shit how bad Steam was 10 years ago. It's better now, and as a consumer that's all that matters to me. Is Epic better at Steam atm? No, and I don't care about the future, what matters to me is the present.