The backlash against Epic Games Store exclusivity deals is rumbling on, but Epic's Tim Sweeney has been defending the practice, saying that it's the only way he sees Valve's current monopoly in the PC space being broken, outlining why he thinks alternative approaches just won't be enough to entice a critical mass of players away from existing platforms.
"We believe that there's no set of features which Epic, or any other store, could add that would be so revolutionary as to lead to a large-scale move of gamers from a dominant storefront to a new one," Sweeney wrote on Twitter. "We believe the lock-in effect of having a large library of games on a dominant storefront is more powerful than features, and hence a dominant store can only be challenged through exclusives."
The exec outlines in more detail why the company decided to go down the exclusivity path:
"We believe exclusives are the only strategy that will change the 70/30 status quo at a large enough scale to permanently affect the whole game industry. For example, after years of great work by independent stores (excluding big publishers like EA-Activision-Ubi), none seem to have reached 5% of Steam's scale. Nearly all have more features than Epic; and the ability to discount games is limited by various external pressures.
"This leads to the strategy of exclusives which, though unpopular with dedicated Steam gamers, do work, as established by the major publisher storefronts and by the key Epic Games store releases compared to their former Steam revenue projections and their actual console sales.
Why make the change, though? Sweeney says it's because the 88/12 revenue split offered by Epic is healthier for developers than Valve's offer:
"The 30% store tax usually exceeds the entire profits of the developer who built the game that's sold. This is a disastrous situation for developers and publishers alike, so I believe the strategy of exclusives is proportionate to the problem."
Summing up, Sweeney wrote: "I believe this approach passes the test of ultimately benefitting gamers after game storefronts have rebalanced and developers have reinvested more of their fruits of their labor into creation rather than taxation."
"Of course, there are LOTS of challenges along the way, and Epic is fully committed to solving all problems that arise for gamers are for our partners as the Epic Games store grows."
Are you happy to take your custom over to the Epic Games Store, are you sticking with Steam despite the rising number of exclusivity deals?