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Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

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Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#451

Post by simion314 »

pjmlp wrote: post #429
harpratap wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In developed countries there are laws preventing sale of properties where noise may be so high that it's detrimental to one's health. So if the competition in market is hurting the merchants or consumers, it should be rightfully outlawed.

The market is mobile phones, get a device not produced by Apple and be done with it.

But if the judge decides that Apple abuses are legal the Google will do it too, then the you will say "Buy a FSF phone if you don't want Silicon Valley abuses, nobody is forcing you to have a phone or Internet"

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#452

Post by gigatexal »

krtkush wrote: post #417
tasssko wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A better analogy is the game is like a ride at a theme park. The theme park was built by Apple. Many companies can make games/rides for the theme park but must pay a share of revenue from each customer going on rides. You can go on a ride at the theme park but you pay an entrance fee for the theme park and you pay to go on the rides.

But what if there are only 2 theme parks in the world and ride makers have no option but to comply with whatever rules these 2 theme parks come up with?

In this world, yes. There are only two that have risen to the top because the market (you and me and everyone else) voted with our wallets to create them.

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#453

Post by Fnoord »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #403
tasssko wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the commenter is right and you have missed the point. There is no competition in this space. You can only get Fortnite from the Epic Games Launcher.

But the Epic Games Launcher is free and doesn't preclude you from using any other launcher/store for anything else, so how does that harm competition? By contrast, if I want iMessage on my phone, Epic has to distribute Fortnight to me though Apple.

The irony is that Epic pays companies a sack of money to have exclusive right for a title, to have it temporarily only available on EGS. I don't like to be bound to any launcher or store. Apple doesn't force you to only use their own launcher; only on their own platform, or if you use their platform to complete the sale (which sounds as odd as it is).

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#454

Post by Fnoord »

jfim wrote: post #366
Lev1a wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not so simple with the hypocrite named Epic who preach about competition being better for all while buying exclusive distribution rights from devs/publishers on PC, sometimes even for games that had been long announced to be coming out on Steam and/or were crowdfunded on that and other premises. Case in point: "Satisfactory". I was pretty excited about the game when it was first shown, then found later * it wo…

You can buy it on Steam now: https://store.steampowered.com/app/526870/Satisfactory/

Sure, years later.

Compare to Iron Harvest, for example.

You could invest in the development via Kickstarter. Which boils down to making the project happen (due to lack of otherwise investors aka due to crowdfunding). Now, basically right after release, you can buy the game from Steam, too, but you pay full price for it (in contrast to the crowdfunders).

Contrast this to EGS. Stuff gets released on Steam many months later, say 6 months or a year, due to EGS getting the sack of money for being the sole distributor. Then, they release for full price on Steam. Why would I pay full price for a 6-12 month old game? I won't.

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#455

Post by simion314 »

Fnoord wrote: post #453
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the Epic Games Launcher is free and doesn't preclude you from using any other launcher/store for anything else, so how does that harm competition? By contrast, if I want iMessage on my phone, Epic has to distribute Fortnight to me though Apple.

The irony is that Epic pays companies a sack of money to have exclusive right for a title, to have it temporarily only available on EGS. I don't like to be bound to any launcher or store. Apple doesn't force you to only use their own launcher; only on their own platform, or if you use their platform to complete the sale (which sounds as odd as it is).

Apple is even worse:

- as a developer you don't get "a sack of money" but you get a 30% tax (larger then Epic

- as a user you don't get free games, discounts or the option to wait for the exclusivity to expire. On top of that you will never(probably) have the option to touch the game files and mod it.

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#456

Post by rektide »

pjmlp wrote: post #333
mcphage wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> to compensate for how difficult it is to ship games on Apple's platforms (along with others) instead of building for Apple's SDK. Apple's SDK doesn't contain a game engine.

Right, it actually contains two game engines: 2D => https://developer.apple.com/spritekit/ 3D => https://developer.apple.com/scenekit/ Alongside lots of other game related goodies, https://developer.apple.com/games/

Some seriously willful ignorance to pretend that a scriptable scenegraph is the same as a game engine. Netcode, entity systems, loading/streaming systems, matchmaking, achievements, level editors, material/shader editors, model editors, physics, particle systems, lighting, sounds, voice chat, plugin libraries/mods,... the game engine of today is a big thing, & well integrated.

Second, who would adopt a platform specific "game engine" like scenekit? Are you going to rebuild your whole game to port it, is that the plan here? Apple is categorically unable to compete with actual game engines exactly because they dig their own hole, invent their own proprietary closed technologies (metal, scenekit) up & down the stack. They aren't playing keep up with the real tools, a game of "me too": they can't begin to compete with the real deal even if they tried.

Surely you must be joking?

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#457

Post by AnthonyMouse »

Fnoord wrote: post #453
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the Epic Games Launcher is free and doesn't preclude you from using any other launcher/store for anything else, so how does that harm competition? By contrast, if I want iMessage on my phone, Epic has to distribute Fortnight to me though Apple.

The irony is that Epic pays companies a sack of money to have exclusive right for a title, to have it temporarily only available on EGS. I don't like to be bound to any launcher or store. Apple doesn't force you to only use their own launcher; only on their own platform, or if you use their platform to complete the sale (which sounds as odd as it is).

> The irony is that Epic pays companies a sack of money to have exclusive right for a title, to have it temporarily only available on EGS.

But that doesn't require you to use EGS for anything else, and the cost of using multiple game stores is minor, because installing them is free.

And how do you mean that Apple doesn't force you to use only their own launcher and platform? If I want iMessage, I not only have to buy their phone hardware, and their platform, and get it from their store, I also have to get everything else from their store even if I don't want to. To avoid this I would have to buy two separate phones at a cost of hundreds of dollars, with two separate phone contracts and phone numbers, and then carry them both around. Nobody is going to do that, whereas installing multiple game stores on your PC is the rule rather than the exception, exactly because you can easily have more than one on the same device.

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#458

Post by je42 »

coldtea wrote: post #395
dr_dshiv wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also have the choice to avoid smartphones altogether. What they want, though, is the ability to use apple hardware and non-apple software. The only reason they can't is because Apple won't let them, unless they pay a 30% commission

The only reason the want to use the Apple hardware is because Apple makes it and comes with Apple software and Apple roadmaps. If being more open magically offered the same quality all kind of third party open platforms would have flourished. But even in the semi-closed Android you have 95% of mobile malware according to surveys, devices abandoned without updates after 1-2 releases, tons of crap trojan apps, widespre…

I wish I could up vote your comment more than once.

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#459

Post by thaumasiotes »

speeder wrote: post #420
thaumasiotes wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, GoG Galaxy is not entirely optional. It is required to run many newer games, and can be required even if you're not trying to play multiplayer . I don't understand how this is supposed to be compatible with GoG's marketing as "the DRM-free home for games".

What game requires GoG Galaxy? EDIT: even googled it, found out Darkest Dungeon by default install a version that does need GoG Galaxy, but the DRM-free version is available on GoG site too, just need to choose that downloader instead. But that was it. Didn't found any other obvious complaints of GoG Galaxy being required.

Northgard requires Galaxy for single-player content. It's not subtle about it.

Your response says more about what you can tell with a quick google search than anything else.

I'm fascinated that I've been complaining about this here on HN for months, and the only response I ever get -- which comes up every time -- is "what are you talking about, that's not true". This isn't a matter of opinion. It's not even difficult to check. And yet, there are so many people whose worldview apparently rests on the opposite of the facts.

Re: Apple countersues Epic, seeks punitive damages

#460

Post by pjmlp »

rektide wrote: post #456
pjmlp wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, it actually contains two game engines: 2D => https://developer.apple.com/spritekit/ 3D => https://developer.apple.com/scenekit/ Alongside lots of other game related goodies, https://developer.apple.com/games/

Some seriously willful ignorance to pretend that a scriptable scenegraph is the same as a game engine. Netcode, entity systems, loading/streaming systems, matchmaking, achievements, level editors, material/shader editors, model editors, physics, particle systems, lighting, sounds, voice chat, plugin libraries/mods,... the game engine of today is a big thing, & well integrated. Second, who would adopt a platform speci…

The same kind of people that adopt platform specific game engines like PhyreEngine, and sign console exclusives.

Apple engines are so bad that Cocos2D-x is basically a copy of their features, using C++ instead of Objective-C/Swift, one of the engines that Google and Microsoft give first class on their platform SDKs.

Not every game engine needs to be a bullet point list copy of Unreal capabilities.

And no I am not joking, contrary to many here, I had a past life in demoscene, been a former IGDA member, previous GDCE attendee (London and Cologne), have been inside a couple of known AAA publishers and have kept my contacts from them.

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