Numerous developers have reported that there is a significant spike in
sales once their exclusivity deal with Epic has ended. PC gamers see
the Epic storefront as a negative, not a benefit, and have repeatedly
shown a willingness to patiently wait it out until the game shows up
on other digital marketplaces. I'm not sure why Remedy thought their
game would be any different.
Of course, you could argue that people like me -folk who refuse to buy
the game on Epic- are the real problem; that if we really care about supporting quality games (and the developers who produce them) we
should just pony up and buy "Alan Wake" regardless of what platform
it's on. But I just don't like doing business with Epic, and that -unfortunately- means no sale. But were the "Alan Wake 2" on Steam,
I'd buy it in a heartbeat.
It's been nine months since "Alan Wake 2" came out, and it still
hasn't made a profit.*
Which is odd, since the game was one of Remedy Entertainment's fastest-selling titles, and the long-awaited sequel to a beloved game.
It received generally favorable reviews, even if most agree it wasn't
quite as good as the first game. It should have put Remedy into the
black on day one. What went wrong?
Well, exploding development costs probably didn't help (a problem
faced by developers across the industry) but I think the biggest
problem is that Remedy -thanks to their publishing deal with Epic-
limited the release to Epic Games. The game still isn't on Steam, and
there have been no publicly announced plans on when -or even if- it
will ever make it that platform. The last we heard was on the matter
was that the Epic Games store exclusivity deal would be for "a long
time". There are so many comments by fans that are along the lines of,
"well, it looks interesting and I want to play it, but I think I'll
wait until it's on Steam".
Epic probably hoped "Alan Wake" would drive more people to its
platform; that "Alan Wake" might be a showcase game for its digital storefront, sort of like "Half Life" was for Steam. But it doesn't
seem to have worked out too well for either Epic or Remedy.
Indications are that most of the sales of the game were on consoles;
PC gamers apparently weren't convinced to switch platforms. And now
Remedy is paying the price.
Which is a real shame, since I /like/ Remedy. Partly, it's because of
their history (they're born from the demoscene, with their founding
members coming from FutureCrew!) but mostly because I like their
games. They're a mid-tier developer that produces top-tier games. You
can see their demoscene ancestry in their games, though; their
products tend to push the envelope in terms of technology, and the
focus on artistry tends to trump both gameplay and monetization (The Scandinavian influence is pretty obvious too).
But this focus on product over sales has probably cost them; it's no
wonder they've had to rely on publishers like Microsoft and Epic to
fund their games development. But Remedy's deal with the latter may
run the company into the ground, and that would be a loss to the
industry as a whole. Presumably at the time the bargain with Epic was
struck, it seemed like a good idea at the time, but maybe Remedy
should have known better.
Numerous developers have reported that there is a significant spike in
sales once their exclusivity deal with Epic has ended. PC gamers see
the Epic storefront as a negative, not a benefit, and have repeatedly
shown a willingness to patiently wait it out until the game shows up
on other digital marketplaces. I'm not sure why Remedy thought their
game would be any different.
Of course, you could argue that people like me -folk who refuse to buy
the game on Epic- are the real problem; that if we really care about supporting quality games (and the developers who produce them) we
should just pony up and buy "Alan Wake" regardless of what platform
it's on. But I just don't like doing business with Epic, and that -unfortunately- means no sale. But were the "Alan Wake 2" on Steam,
I'd buy it in a heartbeat.
But Remedy is, sadly, stuck with their current publisher and that
publisher has said, "No Steam release for this game", even if it costs
the developer its much-needed success. At the time, the deal probably
looked pretty good, but I bet Remedy is regretting that partnership
now.
But Remedy is, sadly, stuck with their current publisher and that
publisher has said, "No Steam release for this game", even if it costs
the developer its much-needed success. At the time, the deal probably
looked pretty good, but I bet Remedy is regretting that partnership
now.
It's been nine months since "Alan Wake 2" came out, and it still
hasn't made a profit.*
Which is odd, since the game was one of Remedy Entertainment's >fastest-selling titles, and the long-awaited sequel to a beloved game.
It received generally favorable reviews, even if most agree it wasn't
quite as good as the first game. It should have put Remedy into the
black on day one. What went wrong?
Same. Again, it doesn't help that Epic doesn't really do much to
broadcast its exclusives. And many people, they hear a game is on
Epic, they go, "Oh, well, I'll just wait until its on Steam", and then
forget the game exists until it arrives on Valve's platform.
Which is a tragedy, because I/like/ Remedy's games. But they're a
mid-tier studio, and extremely vulnerable to the twists of fortune.
They release maybe one game every two or three years; the profits from
the last game are all that keep the company alive to make the next
product. Big-name publishers can weather a flop because they have the resources. Even Indie studios can survive a failure more easily,
because their overhead is so much less. But the mid-tier studios are
often one bad game from closing. And "Alan Wake 2" might be that bad
game.
On Tue, 11 Jun 2024 08:45:00 +0100, JAB <noway@nochance.com> wrote:
On 10/06/2024 23:38, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
Same. Again, it doesn't help that Epic doesn't really do much to
broadcast its exclusives. And many people, they hear a game is on
Epic, they go, "Oh, well, I'll just wait until its on Steam", and then
forget the game exists until it arrives on Valve's platform.
That's certainly my attitude, the days when I just had to have a game
are long gone. It's the same with all the freebies they give out.
There's some that I look at and wouldn't mind playing but as yet nothing
that I've thought I want that so much that I'll sign up with Epic.
I have an account with them and grab the games, but I don't actually
play any of them on Epic. I like to think that, somehow, I'm costing
Epic money by doing so. ;-)
Epic burned a lot of goodwill with gamers with how it handled the Epic
Game store and I don't think it ever will fully recover from that
blow. It was bad enough that it was seen as an unnecessary product
that existed only for Epic's benefit. And it didn't help that Epic had
made a number of anti-PC gaming decisions and statements in years
previous. Badmouthing Valve, who was -fairly or not- seen as the
darling of PC Gaming didn't help either. But then locking games behind years-long exclusivity contracts (and not backing down when it was
clear how unpopular this move was) was the final straw.
AFAIK, the Epic Game Store remains an unprofitable money-sink. The
latest estimates I've seen say it isn't expected to start seeing
positive revenue until 2027 (about five years later than originally anticipated). A lot of that pain could have been avoided had Epic not
gone into the market so bullishly, or had shown some more appreciation
for their consumers.
*The impression I get is that a lot of top executives really do think
that I've done really well so I must be intelligent, our customers have
done no where near as well so they must be stupid as should be treated
accordingly.
The unfortunate fact of the matter that we as customers ARE that
stupid. "Company X does horrific thing" rarely results in more than a
brief outrage before people go back to buying their products again
(assuming they even stopped whilst moaning about it). Rarely will
consumers actually follow up with a proper boycott, and video-gamers
are the least scrupled of the lot.
So, "Do Evil Thing", that may or may not be followed by a meaningless non-apology is all you need to keep the money flowing in. Customers
almost never expect more, and will happily swallow any bullshit thrown
their way. And, no, I'm sure I'm just as guilty of this sort of idiocy
as the next. So I'm sure that it is hard for executives NOT to believe
their customers are morons. We sure act like idiots.
The other recent big story is whether microsoft gamepass is killing the industry, and whether xbox as a whole has lost it's way.
On Tue, 11 Jun 2024 08:45:00 +0100, JAB <noway@nochance.com> wrote:
On 10/06/2024 23:38, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
Same. Again, it doesn't help that Epic doesn't really do much to
broadcast its exclusives. And many people, they hear a game is on
Epic, they go, "Oh, well, I'll just wait until its on Steam", and then
forget the game exists until it arrives on Valve's platform.
That's certainly my attitude, the days when I just had to have a game
are long gone. It's the same with all the freebies they give out.
There's some that I look at and wouldn't mind playing but as yet nothing >>that I've thought I want that so much that I'll sign up with Epic.
I have an account with them and grab the games, but I don't actually
play any of them on Epic. I like to think that, somehow, I'm costing
Epic money by doing so. ;-)
Epic burned a lot of goodwill with gamers with how it handled the Epic
Game store and I don't think it ever will fully recover from that
blow. It was bad enough that it was seen as an unnecessary product
that existed only for Epic's benefit. And it didn't help that Epic had
made a number of anti-PC gaming decisions and statements in years
previous. Badmouthing Valve, who was -fairly or not- seen as the
darling of PC Gaming didn't help either. But then locking games behind years-long exclusivity contracts (and not backing down when it was
clear how unpopular this move was) was the final straw.
AFAIK, the Epic Game Store remains an unprofitable money-sink. The
latest estimates I've seen say it isn't expected to start seeing
positive revenue until 2027 (about five years later than originally anticipated). A lot of that pain could have been avoided had Epic not
gone into the market so bullishly, or had shown some more appreciation
for their consumers.
The other recent big story is whether microsoft gamepass is killing the industry, and whether xbox as a whole has lost it's way.
rms
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