World War Z Sold 250K ( out of total 1M ) on Epic Store in launch week , Way above expectations according to Developers

[Finale Fireworker]

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[Nooblet]

No, they don't.

- First of all, one can't argue about users not caring about where they buy their games and suddenly argue that the Fortnite users are loyal to Epic or the EGS.
- Second, GaaS gamers care about GaaS games they will flock to the next big GaaS game, wherever it is.
- Third, didn't happen with Steam and Dota gamers "Mister Epic Store" (Galyonkin) himself wrote a long article about GaaS gamers not buying many games and took Dota2 as an example.

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-Please show me where I am arguing about users not caring about where they buy their game. I never brought that point up or spoke about it.

- It's not loyalty, it's that these players do not have steam installed but do have EGS installed. EGS is all they have seen ever since they started gaming. That fact in itself will make it more likely that when they buy games they will buy it off EGS rather than a client they don't use/don't have an account on. I do not see how that's disagreeable.

-I'm a GaaS gamer and I buy games, as do plenty of people. Even if they were to flock to other GaaS games, not all GaaS games are F2P. Can you say with certainty that no one from this demographic I described in my previous post will buy games at all? Cause I don't believe that's happening.

 

[Mars People]

People celebrating pc players getting screwed over by giving them no choice where to buy their games is sad and baffling to me.

 

[Kyougar]

-Please show me where I am arguing about users not caring about where they buy their game. I never brought that point up or spoke about it.

- It's not loyalty, it's that these players do not have steam installed but do have EGS installed. EGS is all they have seen ever since they started gaming. That fact in itself will make it more likely that when they buy games they will buy it off EGS rather than a client they don't use/don't have an account on. I do not see how that's disagreeable.

-I'm a GaaS gamer and I buy games, as do plenty of people. Even if they were to flock to other GaaS games, not all GaaS games are F2P. Can you say with certainty that no one from this demographic I described in my previous post will buy games at all? Cause I don't believe that's happening.

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https://galyonk.in/your-target-audience-doesn-t-exist-999b78aa77ae

 

[Nooblet]

https://galyonk.in/your-target-audience-doesn-t-exist-999b78aa77ae

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I'm not sure which part of my post is that suppose to address.
I believe already addressed your third point about GaaS gamers flocking to other GaaS games in my third point.

All I am saying is that kids who play Fortnite will grow up, and their habits can change over time when they grow up and start making money. The teenage audience that never buys game will be made up of different people in the coming few years than it is now, and the teenagers from now who grow up in the future will create a new demographic on EGS...one that has not used steam.

 

[ShinUltramanJ]

The idea that people only use EGS to play Fortnite is just flat out ignorance.

People shop. They browse. They impulse buy. And people who play Fortnite also play other games (hard for people here to accept, I know).

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And yet nobody knew the store launched in 2014.
You'd think Fortnite's raging success might've boosted Unreal Tournament that's been sitting in their store for free.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

EGS success means success for the developers publishing their games on that plattform .....so no I won't be neutral about sales success stories regardless of the plattform.

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Ok, first things first: grossing more money overall means success for the developers. Not favoring one service over the other.
If "making as much money as possible" was your greatest dream for devs, then you should have probably cheered for a multi store release, which you aren't for some reason.

Second: I personally don't give the slightest whiff of a shit of how favorable a deal may be for the developer when the compromise necessary to their benefit is to offer a far worse product/service to me. Not sure why anyone should, in fact.
A restaurant could make far better profits if I had to bring my own dishes, there was no serving personnel in the hall and I had to queue in the kitchen to eat. It doesn't mean it's a kind of offer I'm interested in.

 

[NoblesseOblige]

Lol with all the buzz this game got, 250k really isn't that impressive

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Buzz? Most people I know never heard of the game.

 

[Nintendo]

People celebrating pc players getting screwed over by giving them no choice where to buy their games is sad and baffling to me.

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More like celebrating that a good game is successful.

 

[qa_engineer]

Assuming thats good? I never pay attention to PC sales numbers. I bought a copy but promptly returned it because of the lack of 21:9 support but decent game nonetheless.

 

[Kyougar]

I'm not sure which part of my post is that suppose to address.
I believe already addressed your third point about GaaS gamers flocking to other GaaS games in my third point.

All I am saying is that kids who play Fortnite will grow up, and their habits can change over time when they grow up and start making money. The teenage audience that never buys game will be made up of different people in the coming few years than it is now, and the teenagers from now who grow up in the future will create a new demographic on EGS...one that has not used steam.

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The link "proves" the point that the overwhelming audience of GaaS gamers don't buy other games. It comes from Galyonkin, the head of Epig Games Store. Dota Gamers grew up and didn't change their buying Habits.

 

[z1ggy]

250k + Epics moneyhat should be good/enough for the devs, for Epics investment im not sure. Also if they didnt dick wave about the rest of the games i guess they sold less than 250k so welp.

Congrantz i guess?

 

[Detail]

250k people willing to give money to a company who couldn't care less about them as consumers.

Sounds about right, saying that, it's unavoidable sadly, it's been proven time and time again that people do not wish to wait for things even if it means it benefits them to do so.

At the end of the day, if consumers stopped buying things and demanded DRM free games then they would get them because companies would be desperate enough to do it.

But they know that the want for new things mostly always trumps logic when it comes to consumers.

 

[Braaier]

Epic doesn't even need to pay more money to keep WWZ exclusive. It was Saber Interactive's own choice to skip Steam: https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2019-01-04-moving-platforms-forward-in-an-epic-games-world

If WWZ does better than expected on EGS, a Steam release is very, very unlikely.

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Thanks for posting this. Definitely an interesting choice by the developer. Although this part of the article is interesting:

Editor's note: A Saber representative said Epic is not paying the company or giving it an advance to put World War Z on the store, but "there are incentives for the PC version being released exclusively there versus Steam."

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What does this mean? If Epic is not paying the developer for making it exclusive, what are these incentives?

 

[R dott B]

Good stuff.

 

[Detail]

Also, people caring more about developers and publishers than themselves as consumers is incredibly sad to me, especially when devs and pubs wouldn't exist without consumers.

It's clear from numerous conversations that I have had, even on here, that developers only care for what benefits them, that's straight from a developers mouth on ERA btw, they seem blissfully unaware that they are also consumers but nevermind that, benefiting devs and pubs is all that matters apparently.

 

[Cecil]

What does this mean? If Epic is not paying the developer for making it exclusive, what are these incentives?

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If what's been told before is true, then I guess it's about Epic guaranteeing a certain level of revenue for the game, and will compensate if the game doesn't reach that. But if a game like this is succesful enough, then it's true that Epic aren't paying them anything.

I'm no insider though, so anyone who knows more then me about this are free to correct me.

 

[Braaier]

If what's been told before is true, then I guess it's about Epic guaranteeing a certain level of revenue for the game, and will compensate if the game doesn't reach that. But if a game like this is succesful enough, then it's true that Epic aren't paying them anything.

I'm no insider though, so anyone who knows more then me about this are free to correct me.

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Okay, that makes sense! So if the developer was concerned that the game wasn't going to sell as well as they'd hoped this agreement would hedge against that up to a certain level. But given how well the game has sold on the Epic store, Epic may not owe anything. And if that's the case, this worked out REALLY well for them!

 

[PorcoLighto]

What does this mean? If Epic is not paying the developer for making it exclusive, what are these incentives?

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If what's been told before is true, then I guess it's about Epic guaranteeing a certain level of revenue for the game, and will compensate if the game doesn't reach that. But if a game like this is succesful enough, then it's true that Epic aren't paying them anything.

I'm no insider though, so anyone who knows more then me about this are free to correct me.

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From the article:

While Steam provides a whole host of services and features that have been built over the years and upon which many developers have relied, the reality is that for many developers these features are unnecessary. Many game makers already provide much of that functionality on their own; in other scenarios, players either don't need those features or have broadly opted to provide them on their own using third-party services.

To use World War Z as an example, Saber is providing our own matchmaking in lieu of the platform holder's services. Nor do we need Steam workshop support. Obviously a strong feature set is important for a platform in the broadest sense, but for companies like mine, paying for features we don't need and that our end users don't want ultimately means compromises on development and unnecessary costs passed onto consumers.

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So, what does Epic offer right now to justify even a 12% fee?

First and foremost: visibility (which, even on its own, is arguably sufficient). Epic has built up an absolutely gargantuan audience thanks to Fortnite, and I'd venture they've broadened the market for non-casual games among casual gamers in ways we can't yet fathom. Beyond possibly Minecraft, I can't think of a game that has brought more mainstream gamers into the same sphere as AAA games. Now whether or not that Fortnite audience comes to play our titles or those of companies like us is another question -- none of us can predict yet what that demographic will do -- but it's a meaningful opportunity and the prospect of active support from Epic goes a long way to help curb the risk.

It's been noted for years, even by Valve itself, that the state of product visibility and discovery on Steam leaves a lot to be desired, and this often comes at the cost of developers. While Steam has my utmost respect for what it's achieved in terms of influence and functionality, the sentiment among indies seems to be a growing fear their games will be lost in a rapidly expanding ocean of both legitimate and junk/spam titles.

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And even as I expect some consumers may very well choose not to buy our products simply because they're outside of the Steam ecosystem, I am willing to take that risk for greater exposure and a chance to be part of something that ultimately will change the industry and benefit us all. As a developer who has licensed numerous properties, often paying far more than the 12% Epic is charging, I feel confident that the value the Epic Games store is offering even in its current state is greater than what I would pay for a licensed property to help establish visibility for my titles.

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[Nintendo]

What does this mean? If Epic is not paying the developer for making it exclusive, what are these incentives?

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88%(EGS) vs 70%(Steam) cut.

 

[Duxxy3]

Pretty solid numbers. Maybe consumers just aren't seeing the value in what Steam offers, instead opting for the game instead.

 

[Cosmic Schwung]

What does this mean? If Epic is not paying the developer for making it exclusive, what are these incentives?

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Besides the cut, it's basically getting a lot of free promotion. It gets to be one of a few games on the store, and Epic are currently covering expenses for any steamers promoting games that are on EGS and they must have taken advantage of it because the few I follow were playing it despite not normally doing promo stuff. Also just announcing as being exclusive to EGS must have got it a lot of attention it previously didn't have.

 

[Assenzio]

Thanks for posting this. Definitely an interesting choice by the developer. Although this part of the article is interesting:



What does this mean? If Epic is not paying the developer for making it exclusive, what are these incentives?

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Bigger share and some free marketing offered by them

 

[TheRuralJuror]

How does third party exclusivity benefit you?

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Folks come in gloating like they're making dough on the deal.

 

[ThereAreFourNaan]

88%(EGS) vs 70%(Steam) cut.

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No. They said for putting it there exclusively. What you have described is not what developers get for being exclusive, it's the normal operating revenue split.

If they are recieving an incentive for exclusivity as the statement says, and it's not a cash advance or direct payment, then it may be some sort of marketing deal (like paying for streamers to carry show off game or something like that).

 

[Deleted member 43]

Epic guarantees a certain number of sales in a given time, and makes up the difference if that target is not met.

No matter how you feel about the Epic Store, this result is objectively a positive sign for its viability as a marketplace.

 

[scitek]

This was probably inevitable. Most "Epic store sucks" hatred online has been directed towards the launcher's lack of features instead of what is really bad about it: the removal/reduction of third party key site deals.

Epic is pretty much succeeding in their plan to remove all avenues of finding cheaper keys for games and will force everyone to pay full price for everything. Modern Warfare 2 Boycott.jpg all over again. People are already fine paying $60 on Steam instead of finding cheaper Steam keys so they'll be fine with paying $60 on Epic.

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They said 1/4th of that was in the US, which would put it at just over 60k. I believe most speculated the huge portion of sales being elsewhere is because of physical copies being tied to the store.

 

[GhostTrick]

Epic guarantees a certain number of sales in a given time, and makes up the difference if that target is not met.

No matter how you feel about the Epic Store, this result is objectively a positive sign for its viability as a marketplace.

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A viability when the option is given ? Yes.
A viability in the long run ? They wont guarantee a certain number of sales for every game and forever.

 

[Adamska]

I see Epic's tactic is paying off. Hopefully this means titles in the future might benefit from these kinds of deals even during their development, though I suppose that's the case with Hades for instance.

 

[AHA-Lambda]

This is so sad to see
Fuck Epic

 

[PorcoLighto]

They said 1/4th of that was in the US, which would put it at just over 60k. I believe most speculated the huge portion of sales being elsewhere is because of physical copies being tied to the store.

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Physical copy of PC version is not on sale at the moment so all of those sales are from the store. https://wwzgame.com/en/buy/

 

[Kalamour]

I see Epic's tactic is paying off. Hopefully this means titles in the future might benefit from these kinds of deals even during their development.

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How is that Epic's tactic paying off? The game is already successful on console and, as was noted here, the pc to console split is nothing great for this kind of game.
I understand that Epic « deals » would be attractive for a developer or publisher unsure about its product, but this doesn't seem to be the case here as the game is successful everywhere.

 

[Deleted member 43]

A viability when the option is given ? Yes.
A viability in the long run ? They wont guarantee a certain number of sales for every game and forever.

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...?

I'm talking about WWZ's sales being a positive sign for the store.

 

[Deleted member 3897]

Looking forward to give more publishers my 88% out of my 0,0€.

And btw, fuck the Epic monopoly.

Trash launcher. Doesn't even have playtime tracking and cloud saves.

 

[GhostTrick]

...?

I'm talking about WWZ's sales being a positive sign for the store.

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That something that an be verified once we get actual games releasing on more than one store.

 

[Deleted member 3897]

Also, gonna re-post my rant:

/rant

The lack of playtime tracking, cloud saves and every game in your library on EGS having it's own "page overview" where you see achievements, playtime, news and quick links to everything related to that game is disturbingly terrible and I hate it.

Even if I really wanted to buy a game, for example Hades, I could not do it due to the lack of information available for the game. There is just fucking nothing. Launch, install, verify, uninstall, auto-update and version number.

I mean, wtf Epic, get your head out of your ass and fix your goddamn basic crap launcher.

Even fucking Origin, UPlay and GOG Galxy, which by the way is not even mandatory got all those things.

Fucking crap launcher.

I need my info and things like "cloud saves" before buyign and playing anything

And before anyone goes "well playtime is not that important, I can handle playing games without it" well good for you, I need it.

Xbox Games on the Windows Store got cloud saves and playtime tracking (through the Xbox app), so that makes the goddamn Windows 10 Store automatically a better launcher than EGS.

/rant over

 

[Deleted member 43]

That something that an be verified once we get actual games releasing on more than one store.

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Well, sure that remains to be seen, but that Epic has reached this level of engagement is, like I said, a positive sign from a business perspective.

 

[ThroughtheVoid]

Literally the definition of a fallcious bandwagon argument.

The point made is that the system is inadequate. That a certain set of people put up with it doesn't make the system less bad.

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It's literally mentioned in every single thread that somehow involves the Epic Storefront, even when the thread itself is not regarding the shortcomings of the store itself.

 

[AHA-Lambda]

Well, sure that remains to be seen, but that Epic has reached this level of engagement is, like I said, a positive sign from a business perspective.

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Whoop de doo

The forum that is constantly railing against lootboxes, mtx and is quite anti capitalism leaning in general, always likes to frame everything around Epic as pro business though cos it doesn't affect most users here >_>

 

[scitek]

Physical copy of PC version is not on sale at the moment so all of those sales are from the store. https://wwzgame.com/en/buy/

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Ah ok, good for them, then.

 

[Deleted member 43]

Whoop de doo

The forum that is constantly railing against lootboxes, mtx and is quite anti capitalism leaning in general, always likes to frame everything around Epic as pro business though cos it doesn't affect most users here >_>

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I'm not talking about users at all, or even devs. I'm speaking strictly from the business end of the storefront.

We can not like something and still talk about it from a dispassionate, objective viewpoint.

 

[DigitalOp]

I think people are really overlooking mid tier pricing playing a factor on sales numbers

We saw with HellBlade and even Yooka Laylee. Mid Tier priced games certainly have demand in the market.

 

[Sidebuster]

250k Doesn't really seem amazing considering how many people are supposed to have the Epic store installed. With nothing to compare it to, I have no idea how successful it really is. I can't just take the developers and Epics word for it since they have incentives to potentially pretend everything's doing amazingly. Especially since we've already seen how two faced Tim Sweeney and the Steam Spy guy are.

 

[Detail]

Well, sure that remains to be seen, but that Epic has reached this level of engagement is, like I said, a positive sign from a business perspective.

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You're right that from a business perspective for Epic it's good news and for the developers and publishers it's good news.

But for the consumer it's bad news because Epic still continue to indulge in anti-consumer practices.

Also, on an unrelated note to your post, lost amongst this entire debate over percentages and what is good/not good for developers is the simple fact that without consumers none of these developers or publishers would even exist, that's what makes me laugh.

We have people almost begging to save developers and publishers from the tyrannical cut of steam (which is industry standard) because they believe if developers and publishers save money they would, out of the kindness of their hearts, lower prices and give better deals to consumers over the long run, rather than you know, just keeping a larger cut of money and charging more money because they know consumers will be limited in their purchasing choices.

I really just wish consumers would put themselves first for once rather than worrying about how much extra money their favourite companies could be making, it's such a backwards way of thinking and will only end in disaster for consumers.

 

[Ge0force]

Thanks for posting this. Definitely an interesting choice by the developer. Although this part of the article is interesting:



What does this mean? If Epic is not paying the developer for making it exclusive, what are these incentives?

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It seems Epic doesn't always pay developers up front for exclusivity. The devs of Rebel Galaxy Outlaws confirmed to me as well that they didn't get any money up front. There are other reasons to choose EGS tho:

- There's the 12% cut vs Steams 20-30%
- These developers think that their game will get more visibility on EGS compared to Steam (which I doubt tbh)
- Epic helps promoting their games (sponsored articles, sponsored streams etc)
- Epic guarantees a certain number of sales in a given time, and makes up the difference if that target is not met.

 

[Kyougar]

250k Doesn't really seem amazing considering how many people are supposed to have the Epic store installed. With nothing to compare it to, I have no idea how successful it really is. I can't just take the developers and Epics word for it since they have incentives to potentially pretend everything's doing amazingly. Especially since we've already seen how two faced Tim Sweeney and the Steam Spy guy are.

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We have the Number of >80 Million Fortnite PC Players, that doesn't include users that don't Play Fortnite but have EGS installed for either the free games or specifically for buying games on the EGS (unless Epic stupidly Counts every EGS user a Fortnite user)

So the minimum ratio is 250,000 out of 80,000,000 so 0,3125% We don't know the non-Fortnite userbase could be 1 Million, could be 5, could be 10, the bigger the non-fortnite ausidence, the worse the Sales ratio.

 

[flawfuls]

I'm constantly amazed at gaming industry. Other industries strive to sell products in as many shops and locations as possible to reduce hurdles for consumers and maximize reach. But gaming industry is like "nope, fuck all that, we want to sell our games in as few places as possible and inconvenience our customers as much as possible!".

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I think most indstries have similar issues, at least when it comes to digital goods . Off the top of my head TV, movies, audiobooks, music and digital comics and anime all have the same kind of service exculcivity issues and I would say most of these are more annoying than in gaming. The only industry that I can think of that mostly avoids this is ebooks thanks to Amazon's monopoly.

 

[Cecil]

From the article:

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Those quotes....

Reading a dev being so reductive about features that I really use myself is just going to make me less and less enthusiastic about that devs games. Listen to your audience and learn what they want, instead of trying to decide for them want they want.

I'm still trying to understand how this move will benefit me as a potential customer. What am I (here in Sweden) getting out of the game not being provided where I prefer to buy it? Am I getting a lower price? Less DRM? Other features? Anything?

 

[Ebullientprism]

Really solid numbers. Goes to show most gamers dont care where they buy their games from.

I'd consider buying it on EGS.

If the store wasn't in Euros.
If EGS had a library game page viewer with game info like Steam.
If EGS had cloud saves and playtime tracking.
If EGS had a screenshot function.
If EGS had in-game overlay.

But it doesn' so I can't.

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You could add the game shortcut to steam and instantly solve most of these issues.

 

[ShinUltramanJ]

Epic guarantees a certain number of sales in a given time, and makes up the difference if that target is not met.

No matter how you feel about the Epic Store, this result is objectively a positive sign for its viability as a marketplace.

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Why should I care about the viability of a marketplace that's aiming to starve every other marketplace of games?