News Epic Games Store

Kyougar

No reviews, no Buy
Nov 2, 2018
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This is entirely true. I notice the same thing in my own streams. Even though I stream a variety of different games, if I deviate from anything that is horror-related, the few viewers I do have tend to drop off. And that kinda sucks, cause there are non-horror games I'd love to stream more of (and I do, if I'm passionate enough about them). But I'm doing this as a hobby, so I can risk losing a handful of viewers for a week or two.
are you streaming daily/weekly?

if you are weekly, just advertise your different genre playthrough on another day if possible and make it an additional stream instead of "taking away" the streams from your loyal fanbase.
If you are daily, advertise a specific day in the week as an "anything goes stream or something.
 

Chudah

Just a chick who games
May 24, 2019
207
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store.steampowered.com
are you streaming daily/weekly?

if you are weekly, just advertise your different genre playthrough on another day if possible and make it an additional stream instead of "taking away" the streams from your loyal fanbase.
If you are daily, advertise a specific day in the week as an "anything goes stream or something.
I only stream 3 days a week due to work (and needing to spend time with my husband and/or extended family), so I'm pretty much stuck on those times/days. I'll sometimes toss an extra session in if I'm bored and nothing else is going on, though. And yeah, that's usually when I play different stuff.
 
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Alextended

Segata's Disciple
Jan 28, 2019
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Curation algorithms on an open store trying to offer fair and relevant and effective promotion per user bad.

Sweeney's own curation that changes based on his whims dictating what even can get on the store, good.

Got it.

Also like algorithms somehow stop developers from doing promotions and their own marketing on top using the same "creators", lol. Steam doesn't have any exclusivity clauses Tim, it's not all in and nothing else or all out, you can do everything you want on top and outside of it even if you're in. What tools fall for that?
 
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gabbo

MetaMember
Dec 22, 2018
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Toronto
Curation algorithms on an open store trying to offer fair and relevant and effective promotion per user bad.

Sweeney's own curation that changes based on his whims dictating what even can get on the store, good.

Got it.

Also like algorithms somehow stop developers from doing promotions and their own marketing on top using the same "creators", lol. Steam doesn't have any exclusivity clauses Tim, it's not all in and nothing else or all out, you can do everything you want on top and outside of it even if you're in. What tools fall for that?
Isn't it more: Curation algorithms: bad. Curation based on competitor's users' wishlist data: good?
As to your second question: people with an axe to grind, as they don't want their games to lose eyeballs to other games that might get them instead with algorithm changes. it's the discover-ability equivalent to 'fuck you, got mine'.

Also, doesn't steam have built in streaming capabilities now?
 

JMTHEFOX

Planning to Be a Game Designer
Oct 4, 2018
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Brooklyn, NY
Its embarrassing how it took them so long to acknowledge Thailand language support. Fortnite never had a Thailand language option even at post-launch.
 
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Deleted member 113

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Still waiting for my shenmue refund...

That makes two. :mad:

Is anyone aware of people from tiers over $100 getting a refund?
I still haven't seen anyone mentioning it. I asked for a refund later in the day, on the 20th, and from what I understand the emails were sent 14h or so before I applied for one.

But still, people have been receiving refunds for 2 or 3 days now, and so far, I got nothing.

Was there really that many people applying for refunds?
 

Chudah

Just a chick who games
May 24, 2019
207
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That makes two. :mad:

Is anyone aware of people from tiers over $100 getting a refund?
I still haven't seen anyone mentioning it. I asked for a refund later in the day, on the 20th, and from what I understand the emails were sent 14h or so before I applied for one.

But still, people have been receiving refunds for 2 or 3 days now, and so far, I got nothing.

Was there really that many people applying for refunds?
Mine is just the base game, and I still haven't gotten a refund for it yet. Not that it answers your question, but it seems even some in the lowest tier are still waiting.
 

C-Dub

Makoto Niijima Fan Club President
Dec 23, 2018
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It really depends on how they're processing refunds. Maybe they had a lot of requests?
 
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C-Dub

Makoto Niijima Fan Club President
Dec 23, 2018
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Surprised to see Jackbox Party Pack 6 isn’t an EGS exclusive. I thought that one was a cert. It’s pretty much streamer bait so they could’ve made good use promoting it with that “Creator Code” dogshit.
 

gabbo

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Dec 22, 2018
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Myradeer

Rayon de Soleil
Apr 17, 2019
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Origin has had vertical icons for ages too. And Uplay, kind of.
I actually don't get current hype about vertical icons. Maybe I'm too familiar with old design, but I don't see what improvement vertical library brings exactly - feels like a design that takes up a lot of real estate. I'd prefer square boxes or icons like desktop background or something.
 
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Chudah

Just a chick who games
May 24, 2019
207
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I actually don't get current hype about vertical icons. Maybe I'm too familiar with old design, but I don't see what improvement vertical library brings exactly - feels like a design that takes up a lot of real estate. I'd prefer square boxes or icons like desktop background or something.
I actually find them more aesthetically pleasing. You're able to create more interesting icon images this way too, imo.

Plus, if you think about it, vertical images are basically what we've had for most physical game cases since forever. This kinda brings back the feeling of game covers for collections.
 
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lashman

Dead & Forgotten
Sep 5, 2018
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I actually don't get current hype about vertical icons. Maybe I'm too familiar with old design, but I don't see what improvement vertical library brings exactly - feels like a design that takes up a lot of real estate. I'd prefer square boxes or icons like desktop background or something.
I actually find them more aesthetically pleasing. You're able to create more interesting icon images this way too, imo.
honestly, i think it's just volvo throwing in the towel :p as in: everyone else does the vertical format, so they're transitioning to it as well (to make devs' lives easier ... eventually) ... watch the next big store update change the horizontal capsules to the vertical ones as well
 

Alextended

Segata's Disciple
Jan 28, 2019
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I actually don't get current hype about vertical icons. Maybe I'm too familiar with old design, but I don't see what improvement vertical library brings exactly - feels like a design that takes up a lot of real estate. I'd prefer square boxes or icons like desktop background or something.
I don't really care, I use the small view almost exclusively when not checking out the store stuff. That's still available in the beta, right?

Gog used to have those shelves and vertical old school PC box view which was neat if you had your favorite classics on there rather than a bunch of backlogged random things but they had changed it since, and now once again with Galaxy 2.0. Either way with it and Origin vertical isn't really a "new" vs "old".

I'm also fond of the view you had in Wii homebrew USB loader's later versions. That was really elegant like scrolling through a shelf and bringing up the game.

It had lots of different view options with more or less shown or lists or details or whatever but I liked the view above the most, scrolling until you chose one.

This was so many years ago it probably pioneered many styles of library views but doesn't get the credit, ha. Wii homebrew community was amazing.
 
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C-Dub

Makoto Niijima Fan Club President
Dec 23, 2018
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Maybe Borderlands 3 will prove that games just don’t have a sales tail on EGS. So the hardcore fans may hold their nose and use it, and maybe even a few players, but those who aren’t day one buyers often find it easier to wait when things aren’t exactly as they want them.

It might mean Epic has to pay more for exclusivity to accommodate that, or exclusives may be shorter in length.

Even six months seems like a long time when your sales fall off a cliff after the first month. Especially for services games that live and die on there being people to play with.
 

Alexandros

MetaMember
Nov 4, 2018
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Maybe Borderlands 3 will prove that games just don’t have a sales tail on EGS. So the hardcore fans may hold their nose and use it, and maybe even a few players, but those who aren’t day one buyers often find it easier to wait when things aren’t exactly as they want them.

It might mean Epic has to pay more for exclusivity to accommodate that, or exclusives may be shorter in length.

Even six months seems like a long time when your sales fall off a cliff after the first month. Especially for services games that live and die on there being people to play with.
I think that's a safe bet. I am certain that most games crater in sales after the launch hype dies down, even the big ones.
 

Kyougar

No reviews, no Buy
Nov 2, 2018
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If you didn't sell through your sales guarantee and the current sales are also not that great and will get you not over the threshold, every sale on EGS would cost you money.

You don't get any money from EGS unless you sold through the sales guarantee.
 

Alextended

Segata's Disciple
Jan 28, 2019
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If they sell less than the threshold that means the deal was winning to them though, they got more from Epic than the game would make for itself (on EGS). If they sell more than the threshold then that means they gave them exclusivity for free just to have the guarantee in case they sold less so it's a loss. Although we don't know the specifics of each individual deal so things could vary, maybe some of them get the deal money and all the actual sales on top. The way some things were worded around BL3 it sounded like they actually got money in exchange for exclusivity, not just an x amount of sales guarantee like indies. Idk.

I do wonder why nobody has spoken up against that sales guarantee since in that case Epic doesn't lose money to the studios if the games sell above the threshold and the developers gain nothing extra from going exclusive outside peace of mind in case of failure before the actual sales happen. I'm sure other companies like Sony pay a ton of extra money to keep certain games exclusive, not just give a sales guarantee to the companies involved.

For every game passing the threshold that means Epic got the exclusive for free so their stash allocated to exclusives remains available for the next deal. With how they tend to just choose promising/hyped/wishlisted games rather than allow any indie in they always play things to their favor. Any indies approached by Epic should instead reinforce their faith in their product and not accept the deal rather than go exclusive over the risk of failure.

If Epic wants you in that likely means you can do well without them so exploit the potential yourself rather than give it to any would be savior.
 
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Digoman

Lurking in the Shadows
Dec 21, 2018
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I think that's a safe bet. I am certain that most games crater in sales after the launch hype dies down, even the big ones.
I think Satisfactory is the only expection to that so far... but that 500k sales number was during their mega-sale so who knows. This is where those pesky store discoverability issues come into play. Since Epic is betting everything on "use the influencers", good luck with the long tail sales after the initial peak of popularity. Loss leading sales help of course, but at some point they probably want to turn a profit :p

As for Borderlands 3, we have to wait to see if there are any more PR or tweets. If after 1 month they are still in silence mode than it will probably be safe to assume that the legs aren't good.

No Twitch, don't be that guy >_<
Why do people involved in the gaming industry are always trying to antagonize others?

"Hey, we know that you may prefer to have it on other stores, and of course understand if choose to buy it there. But we are working hard on our launcher and think it's more than worth to try it (specially for free games)".

Or... don't say anything... even better.
 

「Echo」

Reaper on Station。
Nov 1, 2018
2,771
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Mt. Whatever
Maybe it was already discussed or mentioned, but forgive me for asking...

When they are counting up Borderlands 3 sales for PC, claiming it's the best ever 2K title (sales wise) on PC... They're aren't actually counting sales to customer numbers right? They gotta be including the money-hat from Epic which counts as money worth so many "buys" ... right?

Otherwise I severely underestimated Borderlands popularity.
 

CommodoreKong

Mercenary in the Badlands
Jun 15, 2019
758
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Maybe it was already discussed or mentioned, but forgive me for asking...

When they are counting up Borderlands 3 sales for PC, claiming it's the best ever 2K title (sales wise) on PC... They're aren't actually counting sales to customer numbers right? They gotta be including the money-hat from Epic which counts as money worth so many "buys" ... right?

Otherwise I severely underestimated Borderlands popularity.
Epic basically pre-buys copies so I would assume 2K is including those copies. We'll probably never know how many copies Epic pre-bought for Borderlands 3.
 
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Alexandros

MetaMember
Nov 4, 2018
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Maybe it was already discussed or mentioned, but forgive me for asking...

When they are counting up Borderlands 3 sales for PC, claiming it's the best ever 2K title (sales wise) on PC... They're aren't actually counting sales to customer numbers right? They gotta be including the money-hat from Epic which counts as money worth so many "buys" ... right?

Otherwise I severely underestimated Borderlands popularity.
No one knows. That's the benefit of not releasing any numbers, you can claim anything.
 

Futaleufu

Laughing Chojin
Mar 14, 2019
702
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I acknowledge the quality of that Zelda game (I played the GB DX version, and while kind of short it was good from start to finish) but it has to suck for Gearbox to lose against a mobile enhanced remake of a 25+ years old game.
 

AHA-Lambda

MetaMember
Oct 9, 2018
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Anyone still waiting on shenmue 3 refunds?

Saw someone on era say they were refused cos they changed their version to PS4 :/
 

Deleted member 113

Guest
Anyone still waiting on shenmue 3 refunds?
Still waiting on mine. No refund, no replies to emails, I continue to be extremely pleased with the way I was treated by everyone behind this campaign.

Saw someone on era say they were refused cos they changed their version to PS4 :/
Yeah, from what I understand by reading the Shenmue III kickstarter page (among the "sea" of insults other backers are throwing at the people who are refunding the game; lovely bunch of people), if you changed your version from PC to another option before September 20th, you don't have the option of refunding the game. You have to contact them, and hope they have the decency of granting you one.
 
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AHA-Lambda

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Oct 9, 2018
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Still waiting on mine. No refund, no replies to emails, I continue to be extremely pleased with the way I was treated by everyone behind this campaign.



Yeah, from what I understand by reading the Shenmue III kickstarter page (among the "sea" of insults other backers are throwing at the people who are refunding the game; lovely bunch of people), if you changed your version from PC to another option before September 20th, you don't have the option of refunding the game. You have to contact them, and hope they have the decency of granting you one.
I changed mine to PS4 but I changed it back to Steam before September 20th. Should I still contact them?
 
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