Epic Games Store vs Steam: Has PC Gaming Turned Into a Battle of Exclusives?

Steam may be host to the widest range of PC games, but others are slowly but surely taking a slice of the pie. Epic Games Store now has a AAA title in The Division 2, which will not be going to Steam. Along with that it is offering developers 88 percent of the revenue, which is higher than what Steam offers. It also offers free games to players just for signing up. Will all of these things combine to deal a crushing blow to Steam or is Steam too big to be bothered by these isolated incidents? Games editor Rishi Alwani and friend of the podcast Mikhail Madnani join host Pranay Parab to discuss. We begin this episode by talking about Epic Games Store’s launch and all the features that have been added since. We look at what we want from the store. Then we talk about the privacy concerns raised by some and whether these hold any merit. The next section deals with the games that are on Epic Games Store and whether the store has enough games for people to abandon Steam altogether. Will Epic Games Store survive in case Fortnite falters? We discuss that too.

Then we discuss Ubisoft and whether The Division 2 will be the only game from the developer to make it to Epic Games Store. Ubisoft may not consider Steam as vital as some players do, but the fact of the matter is that the company is far less reliant on Steam for revenues than some people think. We look at other Ubisoft games that could skip Steam, before talking about games from other developers that could be jumping ship. Finally, we talk about the games we’ve been playing this week which includes Forza Horizon 4, Chrono Trigger, Resident Evil 2, and Animal Crossing: New Leaf.

You can subscribe to Transition via Apple Podcasts or RSS, download this episode,or just listen to it by hitting the play button below. The music for this episode comes via Magnus Souleye Pålsson’s album PPPPPP, which is the soundtrack for the game, VVVVVV.