Epic Games announces publishing deal with multiple studios

Epic Games has just announced that it's created a new multiplatform publishing effort in which developers come first.

Big-league industry giant Epic Games' publishing side has been praised by developers for fair pay cuts that are leagues better than, for example, the Valve counterpart. Earlier today, we reported on the fact that Control developer Remedy Entertainment had teased two multiplatform games within the same universe as part of a publishing deal that would grant the developer a 50% cut of the game's sales figures and now, this publishing deal has been confirmed as one with Epic Games Publishing. This makes sense for Remedy, considering Control was made Epic Exclusive and that the studio has been in a publishing deal in which it didn't own its own IP prior. This will not be the case as part of Epic Games Publishing.

Epic Games aims to have the most developer-friendly terms in the industry and will cover up to 100% development costs for the partnered studios, meaning QA, localisation, marketing and publishing costs will be covered by Epic Games. Once the game in question sells past cost, developers will get at least 50% of the profits. Apart from that, as mentioned earlier, the developers will retain 100% of all intellectual property and full creative control.

Also joining the Epic Games Publishing partnership is Playdead of Inside and Limbo success and The Last Guardian developer genDESIGN. More development partners are set to be announced for the multiplatform publishing effort in the coming months and, as we reported on earlier, two games are already being made a reality by Remedy Entertainment as part of the deal (read more about this here), one AAA multi-platform game that's currently in pre-production and one smaller-scale project set in the same franchise.

Tim Sweeney, Epic Games CEO and founder, stated; "We're building the publishing model we always wanted for ourselves when we worked with publishers,".

Head of Epic Games Publishing Hector Sanchez, chimed in; "gen DESIGN, Remedy, and Playdead are among the most innovative and talented studios in the industry, with strong visions for their next games," "They will have full creative control, while Epic will provide a solid foundation of project funding and services".