Epic’s expensive war with Valve over PC gamers’ cash still hasn’t paid off, the company has admitted.
The Epic Games Store launched nearly five years ago with eye-catching PC exclusives that cost the company behind Fortnite an arm and a leg to secure.
Since then, Epic has thrown bucketloads of cash at securing PC exclusives (Alan Wake 2 being the latest) and weekly free game giveaways in a bid to carve out a piece of the PC gaming pie. It’s even launched aggressive revenue terms for publishers and developers to try and attract more games to its platform.
Despite all this, the Epic Games Store is yet to turn a profit for Epic, and remains a loss leader as it approaches its fifth birthday in December. Confirmation comes from Epic itself during the ongoing Epic versus Google court case, as reported by The Verge.
Epic Games Store boss Steve Allison said on the witness stand that while the store isn’t profitable yet, Epic’s “goal” is still growth. According to The Verge, emails revealed during the Epic versus Apple trial suggested the company was hoping to claim half of all PC gaming revenue.
It’s surely a disappointing situation for Epic, which recently suffered a devastating round of layoffs that saw hundreds of staff let go across Epic itself and its subsidiaries, including Fall Guys developer Mediatonic.
The Epic Games Store continues to offer publishers and developer an 88/12 revenue split, compared to Valve taking a 30% cut of Steam sales. Epic also launched the First Run programme, which trades 100% of revenue for six months of PC exclusivity. Back in March the company launched a suite of new self-publishing tools designed to help creators and publishers release their games onto the digital store in a more seamless fashion.
Steam, meanwhile, continues to dominate the PC gaming market. In January, Valve’s service smashed its record for concurrent online users with just shy of 32 million players online.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
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