Epic Games has announced the launch of the ‘First Run’ program for which it will pay video game developers 100% of the income they earn in the digital store. A change in strategy that will surely force other platforms such as Steam (or Apple) to make a move
Video games move an impressive amount of money. The world’s No. 1 entertainment industry easily exceeds the combined revenue of film and music, and its relevance goes far beyond gamessince more and more personal computers, components, peripherals and accessories are sold under the label of the Gamingas we are seeing this week at Gamescom 2023.
The sector also enters a large amount of money in professional creation machines or in data centers to maintain the large online platforms and the incipient game in the cloud and / or on demand that does not stop growing. A simple example of the relevance of the sector are the 69,000 million dollars What is Microsoft willing to pay for Activision Blizzard?
Epic Games, for Steam
Big digital software stores are another relevant part of the equation and they have thousands of developers who upload their games to tens and tens of millions of users. Steam, Valve Corporation’s digital distribution platform, has won the favor of a large part of gamers and, due to the number of users and income, it has become the true reference in the sector when it comes to buying games for personal computers.
Of course, there are alternatives. One of the strongest is the Epic platform and now it announces an initiative that will be of great interest to creators. First Run, which will be available from mid-October, is an attempt to court developers who they are getting tired of paying Steam’s 30% fee, an industry standard fee but considered excessive by many. The Epic Games Store already offers a more generous discount of 12%, but now it will go further.
In addition to getting all net sales revenueFirst Run games will get “exclusive badges, homepage placements and dedicated collections”. Products will appear in relevant store campaigns, including sales, events, and editorials, as appropriate. Epic demands something in return and it is the exclusivity of the games for six months.
Steam, despite its shortcomings and 30% of revenue, is the de facto platform for PC gamers, and developers know that when their game is available on both Steam and Epic, the latter represents only a small fraction. about the sales.
In any case, Epic’s initiative may be interesting for many studies. If one of them is publishing a big enough game that he knows users will buy, but doesn’t have his own store, Epic might be a better sales channel than Steam. We are likely to see some companies testing the ground here.
First Run aims to mark a new path in the relationship between creators and digital stores. And it could have repercussions in other sectors such as mobile software where Apple’s App Store, the most profitable app store on the planet, is an essential part of Apple’s multi-billion dollar mobile business. And it is also in the pillory for its prices and conditions, with complaints including those of Epic Games.
