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What's up with Epic Games? (lemmy.world)

submitted 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) by ElPussyKangaroo@lemmy.world to c/games@lemmy.world

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I can't seem to find that one comment explaining the issue with them...

But for the sake of promoting conversation on Lemmy, what's the issue with Epic, and why should I go for Steam or GoG?

Note: Piracy is not an answer. I understand why, and do agree to a certain extent... But sometimes, the happiness gained by playing something from a legitimate source is far greater 🥹... coming from someone who could never ever afford to purchase games, nor could my parents... Hence I've always played bootleg, or pirated games.

TL;DR

What's wrong?

Their launcher has a terrible UI AND UX.
They make exclusive deals with studios to prevent other platforms from getting games. (Someone mentioned that Steam did the same thing in their infancy. Also, I have another question; why is it ok for Sony and Microsoft to make exclusive games for their consoles but not ok for these PC platforms to do so?)
They have been invested in by a Chinese company, Tencent. (Someone mentioned that it isn't that big of a deal, but idk.)
They are actively anti-linux for some reason.

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[+] wooki@lemmynsfw.com -7 points 10 months ago

        Steam cons
You don’t own the games, they are leased, like Sony
store costs to developers/publishers are insanely high for a digital distribution platform
early access games have very high volume of abandonware

[-] mcforest@kbin.social 10 points 10 months ago

store costs to developers/publishers are insanely high for a digital distribution platform

Isn't the 30% cut what basically everyone takes? AFAIK GOG, Ubisoft, EA and all three console manufacturers take the same share.

Besides Epic only itch.io with their choose your share system and Discord (do they even still sell games?) take/took less.

[-] FrederikNJS@lemm.ee -1 points 10 months ago

You don't own the games on any digital platform, neither steam, epic or gog. You're only being sold a license to use it, and the license can be revoked whenever the company feels like it.

Thisbis actually true for most of the physical media back in the day, the only difference is that they didn't really have a method to revoke the license... But that nice old cardboard box you have in your attic, with the nice shiny plastic disc... You still don't legally own the software on it.

[-] wooki@lemmynsfw.com 1 points 10 months ago

So what. It’s still valid Cons for the platform.

Stop making excuses for scamming one sided purchase agreements.

[-] FrederikNJS@lemm.ee 1 points 10 months ago

You are absolutely correct, but it's a con for Epic too. Your comment makes it out to look like you don't own your games on Steam, but by omission you make it seem like you do own your games on Epic.

I just want to make it very clear that you don't own the games on either platform. But also want to mention that even if you buy a good old CD/DVD with the game on, then you still don't own the game...

It's absolutely awful that it's practically impossible to own a game, and it's even more awful that the platform can take away a game you paid for, let alone that they don't even have to refund you for it...