Jump to content

Tim Sweeney to Steam: Don't want timed-exclusives? Match our revenue split

D13H4RD

Well, it seems the battle between Tim Sweeney & Co. versus GabeN & Co. is going to get a wee-bit more interesting.

 

In response to a tweet from a user regarding Epic's potential response if Valve were to announce that they would be adjusting their revenue split to be more-in-line with what Epic currently does, Tim had the following to say;

Quote

If Steam committed to a permanent 88% revenue share for all developers and publishers without major strings attached, Epic would hastily organize a retreat from exclusives (while honoring our partner commitments) and consider putting our own games on Steam.

To recap, Epic Games operates with an 88/12 split, with 88% of the share going to developers/publishers and the 12% going to Epic, much of which are operating expenses. In comparison, Valve uses a much more conventional 70/30 split, with 70% going to devs/pubs and 30% going to Valve, although the developer share does increase by 5% increments after a certain revenue target is met, up to an 80/20 split.

 

From a developer's point-of-view, this much higher split is certainly much more enticing, specifically towards indies (the royalty fees for the Unreal Engine is also waived), who may also be interested in Epic's revenue guarantees, where Epic guarantees that a game will generate a certain amount of revenue, which it will compensate if it fails to meet such targets. However, the community has often debated whether this model can be sustainable when Epic inevitably adds more features (and hence, cost overhead) alongside concerns whether Epic could live up to this word given the seemingly rebuked response by Sweeney when asked if Epic were to continue snatching exclusivity away from Steam after the head of the EGS claimed that they did not want another fiasco like Metro: Exodus again.

 

Regardless of where one's stance is, it's mighty interesting to see where it goes from here. And it would be of keen interest to see if Valve responds to Sweeney's comments or if Epic finds more challenges to maintaining its 88/12 split once more features are added.

 

Personal take

Spoiler

It's certainly very well-understood on why Epic's strategy is enticing towards developers, especially indies, as it provides a good safety net if the title somehow fails to take off. And there's argument to be made in how taking on a giant like Steam may require drastic (and often unpopular, even controversial) decisions strategies in order to even make a dent. However, there is an important distinction to be made.

 

Epic's overhead is likely much lower than Valve's when it comes to operating their respective storefronts. That's mostly because Epic's storefront is very lean as of now whilst Steam is chock full of features, some of which can be a bit much for some, alongside others like investments into VR and such. While there is certainly some argument to be made that the 70/30 cut might be a bit too much, I don't think such a large storefront can do an 88/12 split. Perhaps an 80/20 split or at the leanest, an 85/15 split, but I could see issues if it goes any lower. It's also interesting to note that Valve actually doesn't take the full cut in some cases, notably when buying Steam keys off websites like Humble Bundle or GMG, which ends up being closer to 20% or less.

 

I think Valve will have to adjust their revenue split eventually, because whilst they have tweaked their policy in response to Epic's, it also seems to favor larger volume titles in terms of sales than indies, which could have played a role in EGS grabbing a number of timed-exclusive indie titles. At the same time however, I'm also beginning to question if Epic is able to maintain their 88/12 split once their launcher gets more features and such, with rumors from people who claim to be EGS staff claiming that Paypal transaction fees already take up a significant chunk of Epic's share.

Source: TechRadar

The Workhorse (AMD-powered custom desktop)

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3700X | GPU: MSI X Trio GeForce RTX 2070S | RAM: XPG Spectrix D60G 32GB DDR4-3200 | Storage: 512GB XPG SX8200P + 2TB 7200RPM Seagate Barracuda Compute | OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro

 

The Portable Workstation (Apple MacBook Pro 16" 2021)

SoC: Apple M1 Max (8+2 core CPU w/ 32-core GPU) | RAM: 32GB unified LPDDR5 | Storage: 1TB PCIe Gen4 SSD | OS: macOS Monterey

 

The Communicator (Apple iPhone 13 Pro)

SoC: Apple A15 Bionic | RAM: 6GB LPDDR4X | Storage: 128GB internal w/ NVMe controller | Display: 6.1" 2532x1170 "Super Retina XDR" OLED with VRR at up to 120Hz | OS: iOS 15.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

EGS doesn't do regional pricing, and as a result games are typically more expensive on EGS than on Steam for customers outside of North America. GoG did regional pricing until EGS started undercutting them. At that point, GoG released an announcement saying that they can't operate at a profit while continuing to do regional pricing at rates competitive with EGS, and so they're cancelling their regional pricing program.

 

EGS' 12% fee isn't enough to cover transaction fees for all countries without having to add additional costs in some countries. So, that tells me that EGS couldn't possibly do regional pricing and keep their current fee system.

 

 

From Valve's 30/25/20/0% fee system, they:

 

Supply games for download

Have developed and supports a comprehensive feature set that Tim Sweeney has said he doesn't plan to match

Do lots of physical product R&D (Steam boxes, Steam link, Steam controllers, HTC Vive, etc)

Do lots of software R&D (linux gaming, Steam features)

Offers regional pricing

Allows publishers / developers to print as many free Steam keys for their games as they want and sell them elsewhere, with Valve taking 0% on all of those sales - some estimates suggest that 30% of all Steam games are bought on a site other than Steam, in which case Valve would be getting 0% revenue from 30% of the games they supply hosting, download, community features, support, etc, for.

 

 

With EGS's 12%/18% fee system, they:

 

Supply games for download

 

Here are some other interesting posts from the Twitter discussion where Tim said EGS would retreat from exclusives if Steam matches their 12%/18% fee:

 

(for a large version of the image, click it, then click it again, then click it one more time)

 

1173958319_TimSweeney5.thumb.png.227bbf74f0d9d6f43228a895783b7156.png

 

 

And this is another look at the claim that EGS is 12% compared to a supposed 30% on Steam. The entire thread has to be read:

 

You own the software that you purchase - Understanding software licenses and EULAs

 

"We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the american public believes is false" - William Casey, CIA Director 1981-1987

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

Any games that go to the EGS in any exclusive way lose my purchase. Don't care what it is or how long I waited. I don't even fucking want steam but if I am going to be forced to give up physical media I'm damn well not doing it to 35 different launchers.

Also, from his "ultimatum":

Quote

The key “no major strings attached” points are: games can use any online systems like friends and accounts they choose, games are free to interoperate across platforms and stores, the store doesn’t tax revenue on other stores or platforms (e.g. if you play Fortnite on iOS+PC)...

Quote

More “no major strings attached”: if you play the game on multiple platforms, stuff you’ve bought can be available everywhere; no onerous certification requirements. Essentially, the spirit of an open platform where the store is just a place to find games and pay for stuff.

 

Good luck on that one. This is all just a giant PR move to have the internet kiss his ass.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

5 minutes ago, Rune said:

Good luck on that one. This is all just a giant PR move to have the internet kiss his ass.

agreed, it reeks of "no, we're doing this for you guys, we're trying to help developers, we're not being anti-competitive, trust us"

🌲🌲🌲

 

 

 

◒ ◒ 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

I don’t know how else to say this, but this is kinda like the Tesla strategy

 

Spend a heap of money to get stuff off the ground and then gradually pare back and become more mainstream once it does indeed get off the ground.

 

Honestly, I’m not sure if 88/12 is sustainable when EGS inevitable goes feature-parity with Steam. I’ll be mighty impressed if they manage to but it’s also a mighty tall order.

The Workhorse (AMD-powered custom desktop)

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3700X | GPU: MSI X Trio GeForce RTX 2070S | RAM: XPG Spectrix D60G 32GB DDR4-3200 | Storage: 512GB XPG SX8200P + 2TB 7200RPM Seagate Barracuda Compute | OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro

 

The Portable Workstation (Apple MacBook Pro 16" 2021)

SoC: Apple M1 Max (8+2 core CPU w/ 32-core GPU) | RAM: 32GB unified LPDDR5 | Storage: 1TB PCIe Gen4 SSD | OS: macOS Monterey

 

The Communicator (Apple iPhone 13 Pro)

SoC: Apple A15 Bionic | RAM: 6GB LPDDR4X | Storage: 128GB internal w/ NVMe controller | Display: 6.1" 2532x1170 "Super Retina XDR" OLED with VRR at up to 120Hz | OS: iOS 15.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

GabeN to Sweeney: Give your workers time off and pay them fairly 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

After he lied straight to our faces about exclusives, there is no reason to believe him anything. Also epic will sell games via sites like GMG who take 30% as Steam so yeah, don't believe him anything. He just wants to look like the good guy he never was. 

The ability to google properly is a skill of its own. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

I promise we won't won't try and be competitive if you change your business model to make less money, hmmmm  ?

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

Epic, get fucked with your dishonest bullshit. Steam ALREADY provides that because some games are sold with ZERO revenue while they still provide all the services Steam offers via externally sold keys that get activated on Steam. And don't get me started with how much more Steam offers to developers in terms of SDK's, exposure etc

 

Maybe they should adjust the cut for developers who are new to the game and not only give the cut to big corporations because they want to be more greedy, but other than that, Steam works fine and is not "greedy". Which I can't say the same for fucking Epic with their endless whining while stealing developers and making them exclusive to their garbage rotten platform.

 

So, yeah, Epic, get fucked. You suck and you suck more every time you open your god damn stupid mouth, just further reinforcing my stance on NOT buying any of Epic games. At all. And not even pirate them. Just ignore them like they don't exist. Not gonna give them satisfaction of whining about muh pirates.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I promise we won't won't try and be competitive if you change your business model to make less money, hmmmm  ?

Just seems odd that they are saying that this is somehow "saving PC gaming". 

 

I didn't think PC gaming needed to be saved to begin with. Is it good to have alternatives? Oh, for sure. But in this sort of way? It gets much cloudier in that regard. 

The Workhorse (AMD-powered custom desktop)

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3700X | GPU: MSI X Trio GeForce RTX 2070S | RAM: XPG Spectrix D60G 32GB DDR4-3200 | Storage: 512GB XPG SX8200P + 2TB 7200RPM Seagate Barracuda Compute | OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro

 

The Portable Workstation (Apple MacBook Pro 16" 2021)

SoC: Apple M1 Max (8+2 core CPU w/ 32-core GPU) | RAM: 32GB unified LPDDR5 | Storage: 1TB PCIe Gen4 SSD | OS: macOS Monterey

 

The Communicator (Apple iPhone 13 Pro)

SoC: Apple A15 Bionic | RAM: 6GB LPDDR4X | Storage: 128GB internal w/ NVMe controller | Display: 6.1" 2532x1170 "Super Retina XDR" OLED with VRR at up to 120Hz | OS: iOS 15.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, D13H4RD said:

Just seems odd that they are saying that this is somehow "saving PC gaming". 

 

I didn't think PC gaming needed to be saved to begin with. Is it good to have alternatives? Oh, for sure. But in this sort of way? It gets much cloudier in that regard. 

IF I ask my competition to match my price in exchange for me not undertaking competitive practices, then the proper term for this is price fixing.

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

It's never been about the revenue share, as Discord offer a 90% share, and barely anyone supports it.

 

Developers know of Discord, and if it was all about revenue split they'd be praising it all over. The difference is the cash lump sum Epic gives them as an incentive; despite having even less features, and a worse revenue split than Discord.

5950X | NH D15S | 64GB 3200Mhz | RTX 3090 | ASUS PG348Q+MG278Q

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

58 minutes ago, valdyrgramr said:

Both of their modern games are free.  I don't know why you'd buy either of them.

Their store is not about THEIR games. And neither is this "news". I don't care if Fortnite is free, I couldn't give any less shit about it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

This would probably carry more weight if the Epic store matched the features that steam has and still could turn a profit. I doubt they will be able to pull that off.

So until then it is just PR Bullshit

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

5 minutes ago, NeuesTestament said:

I doubt they will be able to pull that off.

Yeah, it's questionable if they're even able to maintain that revenue split once they achieve feature parity. 

 

Rumor has it that the PayPal transaction fees already take up a significant portion of it. 

The Workhorse (AMD-powered custom desktop)

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3700X | GPU: MSI X Trio GeForce RTX 2070S | RAM: XPG Spectrix D60G 32GB DDR4-3200 | Storage: 512GB XPG SX8200P + 2TB 7200RPM Seagate Barracuda Compute | OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro

 

The Portable Workstation (Apple MacBook Pro 16" 2021)

SoC: Apple M1 Max (8+2 core CPU w/ 32-core GPU) | RAM: 32GB unified LPDDR5 | Storage: 1TB PCIe Gen4 SSD | OS: macOS Monterey

 

The Communicator (Apple iPhone 13 Pro)

SoC: Apple A15 Bionic | RAM: 6GB LPDDR4X | Storage: 128GB internal w/ NVMe controller | Display: 6.1" 2532x1170 "Super Retina XDR" OLED with VRR at up to 120Hz | OS: iOS 15.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Delicieuxz said:

EGS doesn't do regional pricing, and as a result games are typically more expensive on EGS than on Steam for customers outside of North America. GoG did regional pricing until EGS started undercutting them. At that point, GoG released an announcement saying that they can't operate at a profit while continuing to do regional pricing at rates competitive with EGS, and so they're cancelling their regional pricing program.

 

-more about that-

That's definitely a concern, but couldn't Valve take a lower cut on "rich" regions like NA and adjust it regionally?

 

Also, doesn't the GoG statement kind of contradict you? If the games are more expensive outside of NA why would GoG's regionally adjusted prices be less competitive than before? If anything it should be the opposite. I think GoG is simply selling less games for a variety of reasons (not least of which their lower media presence and commitment to DRM free games, which by the way I applaud); the EGS is just another large competitor in a market that is already not in GoG's favor and to stay afloat they need to make more money on the games they sell.

Don't ask to ask, just ask... please 🤨

sudo chmod -R 000 /*

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, D13H4RD said:

I don’t know how else to say this, but this is kinda like the Tesla strategy

 

Spend a heap of money to get stuff off the ground and then gradually pare back and become more mainstream once it does indeed get off the ground.

 

Honestly, I’m not sure if 88/12 is sustainable when EGS inevitable goes feature-parity with Steam. I’ll be mighty impressed if they manage to but it’s also a mighty tall order.

Tesla is rather different. Tesla had to make all of the Design technology to make the products work and learn how to do high-end manufacturing at reasonable prices. The latter part has actually been harder than the first.

 

As for EGS, I did some basic math when this came up and 18% was the lowest rate I could come up with where EGS wasn't a poorly run company. What this means is Tim is taking the fact Valve won't really say anything and trying to get free publicity from it. However, what it really means is that this approach is already having problems.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

17 minutes ago, Taf the Ghost said:

As for EGS, I did some basic math when this came up and 18% was the lowest rate I could come up with where EGS wasn't a poorly run company. What this means is Tim is taking the fact Valve won't really say anything and trying to get free publicity from it. However, what it really means is that this approach is already having problems.

So in essence, a PR stunt. 

 

What I'm thinking of right now is just how sustainable it is. Because my wisdom leads me to think that it's more likely that the increased operational expenditure that will come when Epic adds more features may lead them to rethink their strategy when it comes to the dev/store cut. 

 

On a side note, what I mean by the Tesla strategy is mostly just the whole "spend a heap now and profits come later". Though now I feel the term "startup strategy" is more fitting. 

The Workhorse (AMD-powered custom desktop)

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3700X | GPU: MSI X Trio GeForce RTX 2070S | RAM: XPG Spectrix D60G 32GB DDR4-3200 | Storage: 512GB XPG SX8200P + 2TB 7200RPM Seagate Barracuda Compute | OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro

 

The Portable Workstation (Apple MacBook Pro 16" 2021)

SoC: Apple M1 Max (8+2 core CPU w/ 32-core GPU) | RAM: 32GB unified LPDDR5 | Storage: 1TB PCIe Gen4 SSD | OS: macOS Monterey

 

The Communicator (Apple iPhone 13 Pro)

SoC: Apple A15 Bionic | RAM: 6GB LPDDR4X | Storage: 128GB internal w/ NVMe controller | Display: 6.1" 2532x1170 "Super Retina XDR" OLED with VRR at up to 120Hz | OS: iOS 15.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, D13H4RD said:

So in essence, a PR stunt. 

 

What I'm thinking of right now is just how sustainable it is. Because my wisdom leads me to think that it's more likely that the increased operational expenditure that will come when Epic adds more features may lead them to rethink their strategy when it comes to the dev/store cut. 

 

On a side note, what I mean by the Tesla strategy is mostly just the whole "spend a heap now and profits come later". Though now I feel the term "startup strategy" is more fitting. 

It's definitely a stunt, and one that doesn't point to things going too well.

 

EGS could run at a lower split than Steam because it's fully curated. With being able to pick & choose, they don't take on any of the costs of having shovelware on their platform. Still, this is a move to get Market Share, but they're eventually going to need increase their costs. Especially on the Unreal Engine Games. Right now, if you publish on EGS, you don't have to pay the 5% revenue fee for using the Unreal Engine. This is why Borderlands 3 went to EGS. The per unit revenue will double for the publisher on the PC Sales. 

 

Which is why they'll eventually end up around 16-18% in the future, and we don't know if EGS, as a platform, will help with sales. For a 3rd party Dev with an Unreal Engine game, EGS makes complete sense. For everyone else, that's really questionable, beyond EGS acting as something of a Dev Oligarchy for the "chosen" smaller devs that get to join the platform. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

I hope Gaben ignore this troll. 

| Intel i7-3770@4.2Ghz | Asus Z77-V | Zotac 980 Ti Amp! Omega | DDR3 1800mhz 4GB x4 | 300GB Intel DC S3500 SSD | 512GB Plextor M5 Pro | 2x 1TB WD Blue HDD |
 | Enermax NAXN82+ 650W 80Plus Bronze | Fiio E07K | Grado SR80i | Cooler Master XB HAF EVO | Logitech G27 | Logitech G600 | CM Storm Quickfire TK | DualShock 4 |

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

8 minutes ago, Taf the Ghost said:

For a 3rd party Dev with an Unreal Engine game, EGS makes complete sense. 

Yep, the fact that the royalty fee is waived definitely makes it more enticing to those using the Unreal Engine. 

 

They'll more than likely keep that. But like you said, they will probably have to re-evaluate their cut when they inevitably expand and their costs balloon. 

The Workhorse (AMD-powered custom desktop)

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3700X | GPU: MSI X Trio GeForce RTX 2070S | RAM: XPG Spectrix D60G 32GB DDR4-3200 | Storage: 512GB XPG SX8200P + 2TB 7200RPM Seagate Barracuda Compute | OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro

 

The Portable Workstation (Apple MacBook Pro 16" 2021)

SoC: Apple M1 Max (8+2 core CPU w/ 32-core GPU) | RAM: 32GB unified LPDDR5 | Storage: 1TB PCIe Gen4 SSD | OS: macOS Monterey

 

The Communicator (Apple iPhone 13 Pro)

SoC: Apple A15 Bionic | RAM: 6GB LPDDR4X | Storage: 128GB internal w/ NVMe controller | Display: 6.1" 2532x1170 "Super Retina XDR" OLED with VRR at up to 120Hz | OS: iOS 15.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, xAcid9 said:

I hope Gaben ignore this troll. 

I hope people ignore Epic's bullshit store... It brings nothing but cancer to the PC gaming industry with the stupid exclusives. The "revenue cut" Epic takes is just a BS excuse to push around naive idiots who think they are helping by buying games from Epic store.

 

For consoles, while stupid, I kinda forgive them. It's a rounded platform with the hardware. PC already is that, we don't need fragmentation within that with stupid exclusives. And while Microsoft is actually pushing to merge Windows and Xbox, these idiots are trying to split us within same hardware platform. Which is just pure idiocy. And no, going with EGS isn't a solution. I'm not gonna support scumbags. I rather not play a game then. Which is exactly what I'm doing with all EGS games. Ignoring them entirely. And everyone should do the same as well. Epic isn't some indie loving charity. They are here to make money. But Valve at least isn't pretending about that, unlike Epic...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now


×