Batman Arkham Collection is free via Epic Games for a limited time

[HEXUS]

And the firm is simultaneously giving away the Lego Batman Trilogy.

Read more.

[mark_a_scott]

I hope you mean Thursday 26th September otherwise this is posted too late

[[GSV]Trig]

I grabbed all of these last night, never played any of them but free games are free games right..
There's been some good ones for free in the past and I tend to grab most of them, even if it is to just try them then uninstall them again after a few hours..

[Ttaskmaster]

At that price, they're probably worth a go.
I'm not massively into Batman, so probably won't get most of the jokes or references, so hopefully it's good gameplay.

[EvilCycle]

Nice offer! The batman trilogy is great, however, Epic Games Launcher is definitely not. I'll still pass.

[Ttaskmaster]

Nice offer! The batman trilogy is great, however, Epic Games Launcher is definitely not. I'll still pass.

Remind me again why people are so against Epic and the launcher?
Serious question... Are they selling data to the Russians and Chinese, or something?

[Mapester]

Remind me again why people are so against Epic and the launcher?
Serious question... Are they selling data to the Russians and Chinese, or something?

I think its because some people have had their accounts hacked / compromised on epic launcher due to weak security, also when you try to uninstall the launcher it tries to aggressively re-install itself which seems a bit shady for a games launcher. The biggest issue is possibly all the exclusive nonsense, tbh that is not being competitive at all with deliberately making it a one horse race. Imo I'd rather see the games on all the stores and let myself the customer choose which store I wish to support. My preferences are GOG and steam.

As for the Batman games they are all great except the one with the car which wasnt any good especially when it released in a very broken state where I did a steam refund.

[Usernamist]

Arkham Asylum changed games forever. Well crafted games that become genre-defining are extremely rare, and there hasn't been a game that has effecteviely combined gameplay and story as well as Arkham Asylum since

[Spud1]

Remind me again why people are so against Epic and the launcher?
Serious question... Are they selling data to the Russians and Chinese, or something?

Epic are in the middle of trying to take a monopoly on the PC Gaming market, push prices higher than ever and ultimately remove choice and competition in the market. That is why I and so many are against them and will kick off at any given opportunity

The idea of another storefront is absolutely fine, and I would love Epic to succeed and provide competition against Steam - but that is *not* what they are doing. Their big play is that they pay developers more - great! That is good for developers and should allow for greater price competition, choice and all that, right?

Well that only works if you don't bribe said developers into exclusives for your platform. Picture two scenarios:

1) Borderlands 3 is released as an epic exclusive on PC. Consumers *have* to buy it from epic and *have* to pay £49.99 for it at launch. Epic makes $$, developers make more $$ than they would have on steam, consumers pay top whack and have no choice about it
2) Borderlands 3 is released on steam, epic, GOG and whatever other platform you want. Price on Steam is £49.99, Epic is £44.99 (as developers can afford to sell it for less and STILL make more money), GOG is £48.99 etc. Epic makes $$, developers make more $$ than only selling on steam, other companies also make $$ and consumers get to choose where to buy it from AND save some money.

Which option would you prefer?

Option 1 is killing the market at the moment and if the trend continues, we'll see less and less competition and higher and higher prices over the next few years.

I completely refuse to support their store initiative until they drop the exclusives approach - if they do and they try and compete fairly on price, features or whatever then great, i'll support them - but until then...any 3rd party game released as an Epic exclusive is going to be immediately blacklisted on PC. I should note that I don't have as much of an issue with this when it's 1st party games - e.g. what EA or Acti-Blizz are doing, particularly when there is a consumer benefits to doing so (e.g. given how tightly battle.net is integrated into most Blizz games) - its the practice of buying up exclusives they were intended to be multi store/platform that I find abhorrent.

edit: Problem is that most people CBA to put up a fight and just give in, or they dont have another platform to buy said game on, so Epic likely wont stop. We saw a similar thing with Microtransactions & FTP 15 years ago - we all *knew* it was a terrible thing for PC gaming that was going to push up prices, introduce the concept of paying full price for 50% of a game with the rest coming as paid DLC later...but we (the PC gaming community) still bought those games, still paid the cost...and now microtransctions are rife in our games and we can't get away from them. I'm as guilty as the next person of doing this, but this time I am taking a better position on it and not supporting Epic

We need the courts to step in and stop this madness like some have done with loot crates. it's getting way out of hand.

[fail_quail]

Epic are in the middle of trying to take a monopoly on the PC Gaming market, push prices higher than ever and ultimately remove choice and competition in the market. That is why I and so many are against them and will kick off at any given opportunity

I completely agree.

I was going to post something similar, but i think you worded it better than i could.
Likewise i have a personal 100% ban on anything on the epic store untill they cease their excluvity approach.

On the plus side, this is saving me a lot of money on games. I think i'm now at 4 games i haven't brought that i would have done had they been available on any other store...

[FRISH]

Remind me again why people are so against Epic and the launcher?
Serious question... Are they selling data to the Russians and Chinese, or something?

Epic are in the middle of trying to take a monopoly on the PC Gaming market, push prices higher than ever and ultimately remove choice and competition in the market. That is why I and so many are against them and will kick off at any given opportunity

The idea of another storefront is absolutely fine, and I would love Epic to succeed and provide competition against Steam - but that is *not* what they are doing. Their big play is that they pay developers more - great! That is good for developers and should allow for greater price competition, choice and all that, right?

Well that only works if you don't bribe said developers into exclusives for your platform. Picture two scenarios:

1) Borderlands 3 is released as an epic exclusive on PC. Consumers *have* to buy it from epic and *have* to pay £49.99 for it at launch. Epic makes $$, developers make more $$ than they would have on steam, consumers pay top whack and have no choice about it
2) Borderlands 3 is released on steam, epic, GOG and whatever other platform you want. Price on Steam is £49.99, Epic is £44.99 (as developers can afford to sell it for less and STILL make more money), GOG is £48.99 etc. Epic makes $$, developers make more $$ than only selling on steam, other companies also make $$ and consumers get to choose where to buy it from AND save some money.

Which option would you prefer?

Option 1 is killing the market at the moment and if the trend continues, we'll see less and less competition and higher and higher prices over the next few years.

I completely refuse to support their store initiative until they drop the exclusives approach - if they do and they try and compete fairly on price, features or whatever then great, i'll support them - but until then...any 3rd party game released as an Epic exclusive is going to be immediately blacklisted on PC. I should note that I don't have as much of an issue with this when it's 1st party games - e.g. what EA or Acti-Blizz are doing, particularly when there is a consumer benefits to doing so (e.g. given how tightly battle.net is integrated into most Blizz games) - its the practice of buying up exclusives they were intended to be multi store/platform that I find abhorrent.

edit: Problem is that most people CBA to put up a fight and just give in, or they dont have another platform to buy said game on, so Epic likely wont stop. We saw a similar thing with Microtransactions & FTP 15 years ago - we all *knew* it was a terrible thing for PC gaming that was going to push up prices, introduce the concept of paying full price for 50% of a game with the rest coming as paid DLC later...but we (the PC gaming community) still bought those games, still paid the cost...and now microtransctions are rife in our games and we can't get away from them. I'm as guilty as the next person of doing this, but this time I am taking a better position on it and not supporting Epic

We need the courts to step in and stop this madness like some have done with loot crates. it's getting way out of hand.

Getting out of hand? All you need to do is download a separate launcher, hardly that big of a deal. Meanwhile you get console exclusives where you SoL and no-one bats an eye. Epic store with no exclusives would flopped, and timed exclusives are not the worst exclusives you can get. People can praise GoG all they like, but it doesn't change the fact that no-one is as big as steam and that's not something that is easily changed. I think the majority of people are overreacting.

[Spud1]

Meanwhile you get console exclusives where you SoL and no-one bats an eye.

Well, it's actualy a huge frustration when consoles do exclusives - so it's not like no one bats an eye, lots do..but there is nothing we can do about it - its too late. We don't want the same thing to happen to PCs though. Just because someone else does a bad, anti consumer move elsewhere doesnt mean we shold apply the same to PCs.

Epic store with no exclusives would flopped, and timed exclusives are not the worst exclusives you can get.

That's the point though - in it's current state, with high prices, yes it would have flopped. If Epic had bothered to build a store/network/offering that people wanted (instead of converting the Fortnite launcher) or offered incentives such as cheaper prices, then they could have rode the success of Fortnite and I believe it would have been a success. I have no particular loyalty to steam and buy my games wherever they are cheaper, in general.

The separate launcher isn't the big issue (that's just an annoyance that you deal with) - its the anti consumer, anti competitive practices that are the problem and why this actually is a big problem.

[Dashers]

Played the first Batman, really enjoyed it, picked up the second for a steal in a sale and never got round to play it. Now have all three and the lego ones, which will also sit in my library with limited chance over ever getting played!

I've picked up most of the Epic freebies, haven't played a single one yet. One day maybe.

[Percy1983]

It concerns me that people are saying epic is trying to create a monoply, isn't it quite the opposite as in they are trying to break one.

Yes epic have some great games so could just have their own games on a launcher, with that Ubisoft and EA have some great games and already did this... have any made a dent in steam?

Yes epics current tactics of many free games and exclusives is an aggressive tactic but this is needed to make any kind of dent in the current monoply.

[Ttaskmaster]

Almost finished downloading two of the six games. Should be ready to start on the 3rd one this evening...!!

Which option would you prefer?

Fifty quid for a game?
I don't even spend that much on Steam, so it makes no bones to me - If it's too expensive, I won't buy it and that's the end of it. We have exclusives everywhere already, with Origin and Uplay being created to facilitate exactly such a thing. If the game is naff or too expensive, I won't buy it. End of. They lose more custom from charging stupid money than they gain from being exclusive.

Option 1 is killing the market at the moment and if the trend continues, we'll see less and less competition and higher and higher prices over the next few years

It's certainly driving a lot of people to dodgy CDKey websites... But I'd argue that both options are as bad.

its the practice of buying up exclusives they were intended to be multi store/platform that I find abhorrent.

Well, whoever is selling them the games doesn't seem too morally wounded by this affront to their intentions...

[Spud1]

It concerns me that people are saying epic is trying to create a monoply, isn't it quite the opposite as in they are trying to break one.

Yes epic have some great games so could just have their own games on a launcher, with that Ubisoft and EA have some great games and already did this... have any made a dent in steam?

Yes epics current tactics of many free games and exclusives is an aggressive tactic but this is needed to make any kind of dent in the current monoply.

I get the argument, but it doesnt quite stack up. A monopoly is defined as "the exclusive possession or control of the supply of or trade in a commodity or service" and that is exactly what they are doing...hence why I am saying they are busy creating another monopoly. If everyone jumped ship from steam to Epic we'd be in just the same situation wtih a different store.

Epic could really have tried to *compete* on pricing/features/stability/privacy or whatever, but they didn't even bother to give that a try, and just went straight in wtih a flawed and unhelpful approach.