Epic Games Store to continue weekly giveaways through 2021

[HEXUS]

Claims there are now 160 million EGS users and 31.3 million daily active users.

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[virtuo]

I'm not particularly offended by EGS, the free games have often been excellent, and the frequent vouchers mean I have grabbed some bargains on there, and being the home of big F2P games like Rocket league and, ugh, fortnite. it's fairly essential these days.

Interface is nice, doesn't hog resources as much as it used to. Certainly makes Steam show its age.

[Scryder]

Nice, free is a good price!

Going by those numbers the EGS doesn't just have lots of vultures descending upon it to grab the free games for a rainy day before disappearing.

A bit harsh there Hexus writer!

[naturbo2000]

Going by those numbers the EGS doesn't just have lots of vultures descending upon it to grab the free games for a rainy day before disappearing.

A bit harsh there Hexus writer!

Sounds fair enough to me. I've claimed 23 games from the Epic Store and am yet to launch a single one (some I already have duplicates via Steam or Xbox).

[fend_oblivion]

Good on Epic Games.

[Spud1]

Sounds fair enough to me. I've claimed 23 games from the Epic Store and am yet to launch a single one (some I already have duplicates via Steam or Xbox).

Regardless of anyone's opinion on Epics storefront (mine is well known here I think ) - if we sidestep that debate and focus on the developers, they get paid when you have installed & launch your "free" games - so for their benefit, it's worth doing it at least once even if you only get to the menus.

[stevie lee]

I'm up to 188 Free on Epic. installed/played around 10 of them.
first free was Shadow Complex from back in December 2015

its catching up to the 437 on Steam. got a bunch on GOG, uplay, origin, bethesda.net too. as long as the launcher works I'm none too fussed.

[Wrinkly]

I use a torrent client for Epic exclusives, since Epic has already paid for me.

[Joe91]

Sounds fair enough to me. I've claimed 23 games from the Epic Store and am yet to launch a single one (some I already have duplicates via Steam or Xbox).

...developers...get paid when you have installed & launch your "free" games - so for their benefit, it's worth doing it at least once even if you only get to the menus.

--> Is this really true? Seems odd. I would have thought getting the store user base increased was the goal and thus the store owner is the one taking the hit - at that point. The 'purchase' process seems fairly robust in it's wording - that a transaction had taken place. No mention that the developer only gets paid when you actually install. If it's true I'd think the developer would like some very clear wording included early on.

[Spud1]

--> Is this really true? Seems odd. I would have thought getting the store user base increased was the goal and thus the store owner is the one taking the hit - at that point. The 'purchase' process seems fairly robust in it's wording - that a transaction had taken place. No mention that the developer only gets paid when you actually install. If it's true I'd think the developer would like some very clear wording included early on.

Annoyingly I can't find the tweet from Sweeney that confirmed this - but yes, I understand that generally it's the case. Note that this does vary a little and for some of the giveaways, they will sometimes just pay a lump sum to the publisher first (maybe in addition? not sure) for the right to distribute free for X weeks. That has also been confirmed by Sweeney and cited by many news outlets last year.

I guess though we should be clear it's the publishers who get paid here and I have zero idea how much the actual development company ends up with from that, as it will depend on their individual deal with the publisher I imagine!

[Euphonium]

I've claimed every single Epic freeby for a rainy day, but the only one I've played so far was a couple of hours of Enter the Gungeon.

I have no intention of ever spending money on the Epic store, and absolutely refuse to support their use of exclusives. I'd rather wait a year and buy it on another platform.

The only platform I actually like is GoG, because I can download an offline installer of the game and actually *own* it.

[darcotech]

Yeah, me too, prefer GOG as you can actually have copy of your game and do offline installation!
In ideal world, there would be only one store, with fair prices and be fair to devs too.
Just dreamin'

[Tomdavies]

I love the free titles they give however the software and crashes are extremely annoying. Steam is far more reliable

[AGTDenton]

That's good! I did wonder if they might call it a day like EA & Ubisoft

I've avoided duplicates & games that just don't interest otherwise it will end up like my Steam account with a lot of junk titles.

[Ironbuket]

Nice to collect these free games, but I dont think Ive even played any of the ones Ive collected over the years. I completely forget Ive even got an Epic account until these free games get given away. These days I only use steam for games, despite having games in multiple other interfaces, I just dont load them...

[Scryder]

... otherwise it will end up like my Steam account with a lot of junk titles.

Not sure if you know, but you can hide games you don't like on Stream. Select the game, Right-Click --> Manage --> Hide this game.

Once I found this out, I could hide some of the rubbish games I picked up in bundles etc.