Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue • Hacker News Board

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#151

Post by EamonnMR » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:08 PM UTC

georgeecollins wrote: post #125

EamonnMR wrote: post #48

I wish Valve had pushed harder to compete with Origin, but this looks like the end of its complete dominance. Once EA demonstrated that anybody could hack together a launcher, it's become a free for all. As a consumer it's been a worse and worse experience since increasingly small companies felt the need to replace steam with technically inferior solutions. But this is different-now we get a competitor which is willi…

I like Steam, but I have no problem using other game stores such as Origin as well. If others stores want to co-exist with Steam, why not? Many people have Netflix, HBO Go, Amazon Prime, Hulu..

On my Roku I can fairly seemlessly switch between Netflix, HBO, Hulu, etc. I hate that they don't just expose shows to a common list I can browse through, but whatever. The UX is generally uniform and I can find the things I want no problem. On PC, despite the fact that I'm running a much more powerful machine, they all have a laggy start up because they need to make sure they're up to date, they all have radically different UX, etc. I need to maintain friends lists separately on all of them. My friends need to learn how to invite people to a group and such on all of them.

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#152

Post by tapoxi » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:09 PM UTC

Brockenstein wrote: post #147

belltaco wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is the Epic launcher 'a random third party site' ? Especially someone that already has Fortnite or has heard of it enough to know its maker is not going to be a credit card skimmer.

Way more people use Steam than Epic Launcher. The oldest Steam accounts are 15 years old now, people have been using it for a long time when it was largely the only game in town. People may use another company's platform because they have to to play a certain game. But a lot of times it's just that other platform trying to be Steam, but not in the same league.

Are we sure that's true? Fortnite is the most popular game in the world right now.

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#153

Post by Brockenstein » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:24 PM UTC

kgwxd wrote: post #33

I'd be more excited for this much needed competition if it weren't a company that survives by taking advantage of children's naivety of money and natural impulses to sell virtual outfits and animations at sickening prices. App store cuts are ridiculously high, but at least they're not taking candy directly from babies.

I'd agree, except that Fortnite is hardly the originator of this sort of model. Blizzard has been doing similar things for years. And once upon a time Team Fortress 2 being dubbed a hat simulator comes to mind. And then there was Counter-Strike.

I don't buy into the "please, won't someone think of the children", type arguments like this is a new problem or that this game is specifically for kids. Or that Epic should change their business model when it turns out lots of children end up playing their wildly popular game.

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#154

Post by laythea » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:24 PM UTC

ido wrote: post #123

laythea wrote: post #121

Once upon a time, valve used to develop games. Then it became big and realised where the money is, and stopped developing games. Epic is currently developing games. Will they get big and stop? If they did, they still have Unreal. Steam has nothing other than the store.

Valve has several extremely profitable games, such as DotA2.

Good point. Insert "just a " next to games developer :)

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#155

Post by Brockenstein » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:25 PM UTC

kgwxd wrote: post #137

my_usernam3 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to add to that, as a fortnite player, I don't see any glaring psychological attempt to make purchases addicting. Buy shit and you unlock cool outfits, thats it.

Popular YouTuber has a skin that's no longer available. Epic brings it back for an arbitrary limited time. It cost more v-bucks than could realistically be earned in-game. Every kid wants it.

"Hey kid, how does it feel to want?"

If they want it that bad, let them go mow lawns or shovel driveways or whatever. You know, like kids have often had to do when there was something they wanted, no matter how silly it seems to adults.

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#156

Post by thaumasiotes » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:26 PM UTC

laythea wrote: post #116

Reedx wrote: post #34

Official announcement - https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/blog/announcing-the-epic-... "Developers receive 88% of revenue. There are no tiers or thresholds. Epic takes 12%. And if you’re using Unreal Engine, Epic will cover the 5% engine royalty for sales on the Epic Games store, out of Epic’s 12%." "From Epic’s 12% store fee, we’ll have a profitable business we’ll grow and reinvest in for years to come!" This is gr…

"...if you’re using Unreal Engine, Epic will cover the 5% engine royalty for sales on the Epic Games store, out of Epic’s 12%." So there is a bias in the Epic store towards Unreal titles then, contrary to what I just read.

Only in the same sense that there's a bias in the Epic store towards listing your game in the Epic store rather than somewhere else with higher fees.

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#157

Post by munchbunny » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:35 PM UTC

ilaksh wrote: post #124

all2 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> theoretically the cut that the distribution platform takes could be zero. Then there is no reason for a distributed system to remain cohesive. Each node in the system takes some responsibilities for hosting, bandwidth, etc. Without giving the distributors a cut, no one will want to distribute. Likewise, not everyone who buys your game on the network will want to use there space and bandwidth for distribution. For a…

You're basically arguing that the concept of torrents isn't workable. It's been proven. To me the tricky part is licensing but I think technologies like Ethereum could handle that.

Licensing is the easy part.

The hard part is discovery (there is always money for someone who can do a marginally better job matching games to gamers), marketing, financial infrastructure (dealing with returns, credit card fraud, beta keys, review keys, DLC, crowdfunding campaigns, microtransactions), social matchmaking, mod management, etc.

Those are mostly not distributed problems. They are services problems. Steam is all of those things. The core licensing component is only the most obvious part.

Torrents only cover distribution. Ethereum only covers cash exchange.

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#158

Post by Brockenstein » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:36 PM UTC

cma wrote: post #97

simongr3dal wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think if one of your classmates has a lot of different skins and plays the game for a long time most days you would likely be inclined to try and match what they have and do in the game if you want to continue to be part of this social circle. This is probably even more pronounced today than it was 5-10 years ago, because now there are youtubers and twitch streamers who can spend 4-12 hours every day playing the ga…

The same thing happens with real clothes, and those get made often by child labor. If some of that status signaling can be diverted to digital goods instead of contributing to child labor and deforestation from cotton farming it seems like a net win.

Lawyer'd.

Or at least let's not pretend that this 21st century version of status symbol nonsense is really any different than what kids have always been doing. Some kid has a SNES and you only have a NES... Who's got Air Jordans? Who's got the best lunch? The best toys. Whatever. It's all the same. It's always been the same.

Hell I remember 1990 my elementary school installed a pencil machine. And you got like two random pencils with whatever graphics on them for a quarter (or maybe two quarters) and people were dumping money into that thing like they were going to hit the jackpot and become pencil barons of the midwest.

It's always been the same song and dance, kids are morons, and they are subject to the whims of whatever fad.

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#159

Post by Rebelgecko » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:47 PM UTC

billfruit wrote: post #55

I keep repeating this: two things Steam does right are effortless no-questions-asked refunds, localized prices in many regions of the world, so that people in poorer countries pay affordable prices. I do think that Steam is only going to grow bigger, because most of the growth in game sales are going to come from China, Russia, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Africa, Mexico, Brazil etc than US and Europe. But most othe…

Valve's refund process is certainly better than nothing, but it's not consistent. I don't think you can get a refund for Artifact (Valve's own game). You can do a credit card chargeback, but then they'll ban your entire account.

Re: Fortnite dev launches Epic Games Store that takes 12% of revenue

#160

Post by nottorp » Tue, Dec 04, 2018, 9:52 PM UTC

tialaramex wrote: post #102

nottorp wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Fortnite is free to play crap, so like 0.1% of those 75 million actually paid something?

Valve got the initial userbase for Steam via, among other things, giving away "free to play crap" as well as their award-winning Portal. It was several years before my Steam account had a single purchase on it, Valve correctly guessed that users who never buy anything at all help generate those enormous userbase numbers and don't cost that much to service so it's fine.

Hmm, wasn't it Half Life 2 (paid for) and only then their award-winning Portal (also paid for)? There were no or very few free to play abominations back then.