Metro Exodus Will Be Exclusive to Epic Games Store on PC, Steam Pre-Orders Will Be Honored

[Elfgore]

lot of games are skipping steam nowadays. it maybe a sign that valve will go back to make games.

Doubt it. Steam makes Valve a looooooooot of money. Supposedly 4.3 billion USD in 2017 [https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-03-23-valves-generates-record-breaking-usd4-3bn-from-sales-revenue-in-2017]. Any game they make would need to be a megasuccess to even come close to that Steam money. They'd essentially have to create the next Fortnite, except even bigger. But that's risky, and requires effort, and Valve doesn't seem to like effort.

If this publishers bailing for Epic thing becomes a trend, rather than them refocing on making games, it's far more likely Valve will try making Steam a more attractive platform to publish on instead. Less risk, less effort and probably still more profitable.

none of bethesda game from now will be on steam, not Doom Eternal, not Rage 2 and certainly not their games like starfield and elderscrolls.

activision now put their games on blizzard.net. and COD along with other games will be exclusive on that.

more and more competition will be good thing. i think epic launcher is new. it just launched last month and publisher are going there. first division 2 now this althought just for one year.

But this isn't competititon. It'd be competition if they had it on both store fronts and you could choose which service you'd prefer but they've removed that choice, so who are they competing against?

Here's an actual example of competition. Hotline miami is available on steam, humble bundle and GoG. Thats three different stores with three different prices (roughyly $1-2 difference between them) Each store is competing for your business.
You want another example of competition? How about Ulitmate Doom, available on the same three stores as above AND the bethesda launcher. Those are examples of competition, each is competing with the other for your business.

Making something exclusive to one store and not available on others isn't competition, since you have no-choice but to use their service, and people don't seem to understand that that is not competition. Its no different to games being console exclusive.

But that's not what competition is.

https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-competition-in-marketing-definition-types-quiz.html

"Competition is the rivalry between companies selling similar products and services with the goal of achieving revenue, profit, and market share growth."

This is competition. Just not the kind you want.

 

[Burnouts3s3]

This is THQNordic's Statement of the situation.

[tweet t="https://twitter.com/THQNordic/status/1090217923434737664"]

[tweet t="https://twitter.com/THQNordic/status/1090217924357443586"]


And Valve's statement of the situation.

Sales of Metro Exodus have been discontinued on Steam due to a publisher decision to make the game exclusive to another PC store.

The developer and publisher have assured us that all prior sales of the game on Steam will be fulfilled on Steam, and Steam owners will be able to access the game and any future updates or DLC through Steam.

We think the decision to remove the game is unfair to Steam customers, especially after a long pre-sale period. We apologize to Steam customers that were expecting it to be available for sale through the February 15th release date, but we were only recently informed of the decision and given limited time to let everyone know.

It sounds like it?s a one year timed exclusive [https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/335423/Deep_Silver_owner_THQ_Nordic_distances_itself_from_Metro_Exodus_exclusivity_deal.php] for Epic. Really sleazy of Epic to do this though, if their service is as awful as people say. They don?t even have anything to do with development or publishing yet here they are swooping in to influence where it?s being sold.

Having said that, Deep Silver is categorically more pathetic for taking the bait.

 

[Saelune]

I honest to gods don't understand why people are freaking out about this so much. The exact same thing happened when Origins was announced. Like jackshit has changed besides I now have to log into Origins to play The Sims or Battlefront. Fucking GASP!!!!

By putting it up for pre-order on Steam, they were making a promise to sell it on Steam, and they broke that promise.

If they never put it up for sale on Steam and said they would put on Steam and just said from the start it would be an Epic exclusive, fine, but that is not what happened.

As for Origins, fuck EA, and fuck having Mass Effect 1 and 2, Dead Space 1 and 2, and Dragon Age Origins all on Steam, but not the rest of the series.

But they are honoring the pre-orders on Steam. They have the right to pull their product from a store shelf if they do not want to sell it in that store. Also it's only a timed exclusive to Epic, it will return to Steam eventually so technically they aren't breaking any non-existent promise.

Edit: They are still bending promises and that is not ok for them to do.

 

[Trunkage]

lot of games are skipping steam nowadays. it maybe a sign that valve will go back to make games.

Doubt it. Steam makes Valve a looooooooot of money. Supposedly 4.3 billion USD in 2017 [https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-03-23-valves-generates-record-breaking-usd4-3bn-from-sales-revenue-in-2017]. Any game they make would need to be a megasuccess to even come close to that Steam money. They'd essentially have to create the next Fortnite, except even bigger. But that's risky, and requires effort, and Valve doesn't seem to like effort.

If this publishers bailing for Epic thing becomes a trend, rather than them refocing on making games, it's far more likely Valve will try making Steam a more attractive platform to publish on instead. Less risk, less effort and probably still more profitable.

none of bethesda game from now will be on steam, not Doom Eternal, not Rage 2 and certainly not their games like starfield and elderscrolls.

activision now put their games on blizzard.net. and COD along with other games will be exclusive on that.

more and more competition will be good thing. i think epic launcher is new. it just launched last month and publisher are going there. first division 2 now this althought just for one year.

But this isn't competititon. It'd be competition if they had it on both store fronts and you could choose which service you'd prefer but they've removed that choice, so who are they competing against?

Here's an actual example of competition. Hotline miami is available on steam, humble bundle and GoG. Thats three different stores with three different prices (roughyly $1-2 difference between them) Each store is competing for your business.
You want another example of competition? How about Ulitmate Doom, available on the same three stores as above AND the bethesda launcher. Those are examples of competition, each is competing with the other for your business.

Making something exclusive to one store and not available on others isn't competition, since you have no-choice but to use their service, and people don't seem to understand that that is not competition. Its no different to games being console exclusive.

But that's not what competition is.

https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-competition-in-marketing-definition-types-quiz.html

"Competition is the rivalry between companies selling similar products and services with the goal of achieving revenue, profit, and market share growth."

This is competition. Just not the kind you want.

You don't win Capitalism by actually competing against other businesses. The best way to win is block opponents access to a product. If this involved a government, it would be called corruption.

But since it's all private we call it 'doing a deal.' They'll just pretend that this is actual competition when its actually anti-competitive.

But, as you say, until we tweak the definition of competition, this action would definitely be called competitive

 

[Mcgeezaks]

I honest to gods don't understand why people are freaking out about this so much. The exact same thing happened when Origins was announced. Like jackshit has changed besides I now have to log into Origins to play The Sims or Battlefront. Fucking GASP!!!!

Because we are entering an era where shit will be spread out across a ton of different services. Where you used to be able to get most of your entertainment from one place, now you have to go to a bunch of different ones, the only benefit of a digital game store is the price of entry for the consumer is free, unlike streaming services, of which we will soon have a decent number more of. Its really fucken annoying.

Opening up a program, one you probably already have your login info saved on, is that annoying? Seriously? It takes like thirty seconds to open up Origin or Steam. Yeah, I'm gonna take the extra competition over that trifling issue.

The issues goes further than that

The Epic launcher is lazy and it has no features beyond being able to buy and play a few games on, it's so bad that they have to pay publishers of 3rd party games to make their games timed exclusives for their platform so they can force people to use it. Everyone but maybe EPIC and the publisher for Metro is a loser in all this.

 

[Worgen]

I honest to gods don't understand why people are freaking out about this so much. The exact same thing happened when Origins was announced. Like jackshit has changed besides I now have to log into Origins to play The Sims or Battlefront. Fucking GASP!!!!

Because we are entering an era where shit will be spread out across a ton of different services. Where you used to be able to get most of your entertainment from one place, now you have to go to a bunch of different ones, the only benefit of a digital game store is the price of entry for the consumer is free, unlike streaming services, of which we will soon have a decent number more of. Its really fucken annoying.

Opening up a program, one you probably already have your login info saved on, is that annoying? Seriously? It takes like thirty seconds to open up Origin or Steam. Yeah, I'm gonna take the extra competition over that trifling issue.

Another account that needs your cc info that you have to worry about being secure on top of another program running in the background sucking up who knows how much personal information. Plus, the way they are going about being competition is really assholish. Its one thing for the games you make being exclusive, but these guys are being assholes and getting 3rd party exclusives. They are doing more and more to make the pc space like the console space. Fuck epic. Sure Valve could use a file lit under its butt, but fuck epic.

 

[Dalisclock]

Its if its going to return to steam in a year, then why even remove it in the first place?

Uhhh...money?

I thought that was obvious.

Epic taking a 12% cut as opposed to Steams 30% cut isn't exactly something to sneeze at.

I mean, Steam could learn from this and realize that's one of(possibly the) Reasons devs are going to the Epic Store. I'm not confident they will since Valve seems awfully complacent right now.

 

[Hawki]

lot of games are skipping steam nowadays. it maybe a sign that valve will go back to make games.

One can hope.

'Exodus' is a rather fitting title for what steam is going through these days. A gift of coincidence for headline writers.

Fun fact, it's an adaptation of the book Metro 2035.

...round about the time where we can expect Half-Life 3 perhaps?

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

Fun fact, it's an adaptation of the book Metro 2035.

Seems like Exodus is actually a sequel to 2035. At least, according to this interview with Metro author Dmitry Glukhovsky [https://www.vg247.com/2018/12/21/metro-exodus-dmitry-glukhovsky-political-interview/]. Relevant excerpt below (emphasis mine).

?They cannot expand this space as the technology is lost and they cannot get out of it because the surface is not suitable for them to leave ? at least as they think in the first two books. But in Metro 2035, which prepares the players for the story of Metro Exodus, the main character is making the discovery of how and why the life outside of the bunkers, of metro, was possible, and why for two decades people in the stations and tunnels did not know that life outside the metro was possible. How did they ignore it?"

 

[CritialGaming]

I honest to gods don't understand why people are freaking out about this so much. The exact same thing happened when Origins was announced. Like jackshit has changed besides I now have to log into Origins to play The Sims or Battlefront. Fucking GASP!!!!

By putting it up for pre-order on Steam, they were making a promise to sell it on Steam, and they broke that promise.

If they never put it up for sale on Steam and said they would put on Steam and just said from the start it would be an Epic exclusive, fine, but that is not what happened.

As for Origins, fuck EA, and fuck having Mass Effect 1 and 2, Dead Space 1 and 2, and Dragon Age Origins all on Steam, but not the rest of the series.

But they are honoring the pre-orders on Steam. They have the right to pull their product from a store shelf if they do not want to sell it in that store. Also it's only a timed exclusive to Epic, it will return to Steam eventually so technically they aren't breaking any non-existent promise.

Edit: They are still bending promises and that is not ok for them to do.

That's why you shouldn't pre-order and you shouldn't play shit in early access because you are under no gaurantee to get anything that you paid for. Especially in regards to early access. As for pre-ordering you are under no promise that the game will be as good as advertised.

Here they aren't breaking any promises. You pre-ordered the game on steam and you will still get the game on steam. Nothing has changed. The only difference is that future players must purchase from a different store. That's it. This literally has zero affect on anyone that has already bought the game on Steam.

 

[Burnouts3s3]

It?s ridiculous that every big game publisher needs its own launcher now. Never used to be that way. Could you imagine needing a different OS for every big game? In principle it?s not much different.

 

[meiam]

Ultimately this is just going to make pirating more prominent in the long run. Imagine you lose access to your account from one of those service (say there's another massive data leak), you probably won't feel like re buying the game you already bough, so you'll just pirate it. But the next time a game comes out exclusively to the store, are you really going to want to make a new account to buy it? Nah you're just going to pirate it again.

Steam did more to combat piracy than any DRM because it became easier to buy game legally than pirate it and that most people are fine paying for there game in exchange for the convenience of having everything in one place with good service bundle together.

At this point I'm guessing what will happen soon will be some sort steam for game launcher, where you'll have a storefront that will let you buy any game from any service by just redirecting any purchase to the actual game launch in the background. Even if that service was to charge just a 1% fee on top of the price they'd make good money since they wouldn't have to host the servers or anything like that.

They could even go further and always get you the best price since at any one time almost every game is on discount from one place or another, with website like greenmangaming having pretty much constant discount on most of there library. It's a pain as a customer to have to seek the best price every time I want to buy a game, but if the service did it for me they'd guarantee that I'd always buy it trough there service and I would always get the cheapest price, so win-win.

 

[Kwak]

Anti...consumer? How is this anything new?

Denuvo has been a thing for a long time. Nobody likes when games use it and yet they keep doing it so, either wait for it to be cracked or deal with it.

User reviews? I don't understand why people care about this so much. There are countless reviews that will be on Youtube and metacritic and all over the fucking place. The Epic game store is Anti-consumer because they don't let any random butthole with a keyboard write shit on their storefront? Then so is ever super market on the planet, go find me the user reviews at a Wallmart about a can of Pringles.

People shouldn't have to rely on their peers to tell you if something in a store is good. Because a good store CONTROLS what it fucking sells and will not sell you outright toys filled with stale cum. From what I've seen so far, Epic is controlling their store and not letting anyone and their mums put whatever shit game up there they want.

Hell they are at least honoring the pre-orders on Steam. If they wanted to be anti-consumer they could have just fucked right off and refunded people. Actually if they were REALLY smart, they'd just e-mail the pre-ordered accounts a code to get the game on the Epic store and not even put it on Steam in a limited capacity.

This isn't anti-consumer. It might be Anti-LAZY consumer, but it is still far better than what Steam has become.

aka 'stupid entitled gamers, having opinions and preferences for their user experience'.

 

[skywolfblue]

It?s ridiculous that every big game publisher needs its own launcher now. Never used to be that way. Could you imagine needing a different OS for every big game? In principle it?s not much different.

Yes, this is annoying. Where did the days of just launching a game go?

Now it's clicking on the Civ 6 Icon launches steam, which spends 30min on a steam update.
Then the game needs to update another 30min or so.
Then finally you get the Civ 6 launcher.
Then you have to click the start button to finally start up the actual game.

ITS ABSURD!!

 

[Lufia Erim]

Maybe I'll pick it up in a year, probably not though, at least till its on deep sale. I'm not fucking with the epic store thing. I don't even get ubisoft games cause I don't like uplay, literally the only other distribution service I will put up with besides steam is GOG and that is more of a, I support what gog does with older games and drm then actually use it, I almost never start it up, I just allow it on my machine.

Is it because Steam was first? I mean competition is good for consumers no?

 

[Mcgeezaks]

Maybe I'll pick it up in a year, probably not though, at least till its on deep sale. I'm not fucking with the epic store thing. I don't even get ubisoft games cause I don't like uplay, literally the only other distribution service I will put up with besides steam is GOG and that is more of a, I support what gog does with older games and drm then actually use it, I almost never start it up, I just allow it on my machine.

Is it because Steam was first? I mean competition is good for consumers no?

They're not being competitive though, they're not contributing anything by doing this, they basically just bribed a publisher to make their 3rd party game a timed exclusive for their horrible platform.

If they want to be competitive then they should make people want to use their platform, not the opposite.

 

[Worgen]

Maybe I'll pick it up in a year, probably not though, at least till its on deep sale. I'm not fucking with the epic store thing. I don't even get ubisoft games cause I don't like uplay, literally the only other distribution service I will put up with besides steam is GOG and that is more of a, I support what gog does with older games and drm then actually use it, I almost never start it up, I just allow it on my machine.

Is it because Steam was first? I mean competition is good for consumers no?

Steam has enough functionality to make it a good service even outside the games. Plus, epic is going about this in a very asshole way. Its one thing if a game you make is exclusive but they are going to thirdparty games and grabbing up exclusivity deals which is shit for consumers. If there is one thing you have to give Valve, they seem to have a pretty light touch with their store, they don't really seem to demand things from devs, but now that might have to change. If you like competition then you don't want Valve to really flex its might like epic is attempting. Competition is fine, but epic are being dicks about it.

 

[CritialGaming]

aka 'stupid entitled gamers, having opinions and preferences for their user experience'.

What are you even implying by this?

You you saying people are acting entitled because they can't get what they want from their preferred store? Try ordering a Big Mac at a Burger King then, they both sell burgers right so it should be easy just to get the burger you want from any store that sells burgers.

Don't label people blindly to make a useless and frankly stupid statement.

 

[FakeSympathy]

Speaking of reviews, Both 2033 and Last Light Redux are getting review-bombed on Steam. Both games are now labeled "Mostly Negative", because people are protesting against the epic store decision. The details of these negative review aren't even about their respective games; Just people complaining how much epic game store sucks. It is very stupid and pathetic, and I facepalm every time I visit both store pages.

Since you can only review the game once you own it, that means most of these people are lying about the reviews. Because as far as I can remember both games were hailed as some of the best post-apocalypse games. I played both and I thoroughly enjoyed them. But now that the 3rd game is switching over to another store, are people really lying about their experience? There are also a possibility that people bought both games just to review them, not even playing them. That is bottom line pathetic. What if people who never heard of the two games or wants to check them out before Exodus comes out, only to see the unreliable negative reviews? It will ruin their experience without even given a chance for them to play the two games.

Look, I am not happy with this decision either. I think it is stupid how now we need to install another launcher to play the game. But just because of that I am not gonna review bomb both games. They are great at should not receive such unfair treatment.

 

[Bilious Green_v1legacy]

Guess I'll buy in in Feb 2020 then.