This is where they've been throwing money at the problem: giving away a ridiculous amount of games for free.
https://www.theverge.com/2021/4/12/22380895/epic-games-store...
On the other hand, it should be possible for consumers to claim products they own on different platforms by peering a list of their their owned (licensed) products.
It happened to me. If you're in the industry long enough, I'll wager it happens to you too.
The problem was the critical mass issue - no users, no publishers, neither want to join without the other.
Amazon will definitely get publishers but will users join? That's not a given.
I think people just consider Steam as a store, but it has become much more than that.
Game overlays and capture were working fine, and the controller API was designed to support any number of controllers (Steam's support is great but their interfaces are subpar, in our opinion). We were also able to pull from a well known database of controller configurations and device IDs, which really made this a non-issue.
Linux compatibility was fine as far as the client went (all of our code was cross-platform and not webkit frames or the like). The client even ran on Android and iOS.
If you're referring to Steam's Proton, we really didn't want to touch that area for a while. But we had much better systems for searching for new titles, including those that worked well on the system and also matched all of the criteria (tags and whatnot).
Our social system was also designed to support "cross-talk" between different marketplaces (Steam, GoG Universe and Epic) but we never got as far as building out any client functionality - just the initial blackbox proof of concepts.
The store aspect was indeed just a smaller part of it, though it was complicated in its own right.
The project was a great idea and we were executing well on it. Lots of cool new tech was developed for it. But nobody we talked to wanted it - including publishers, users, investors, or even friends. It didn't matter how compatible we made it, the fact that we didn't push you to re-buy games, etc.
We wanted to make an non-shitty experience for gaming and the market simply said "no".
Look at Epic which offers free games but sees pretty slow growth outside of their flagships. Further, look at Amazon's lumberyard engine, which gathers dust for the most part.
I'm not convinced that their 'weight' will automatically guarantee wide adoption.
That's not a formula for winning.
Unfortunately, Amazon has all the money in the world to keep throwing at the problem. Eventually some of the spaghetti will stick to the wall.
> no users, no publishers, neither want to join without the other
> Amazon will definitely get publishers but will users join?
Well, the publishers will be there. If users have a reason to go there over Steam, they will. Amazon will lock in a few exclusives, people will start to come over. Who knows, maybe there will be some way to verifiably move your Steam library over to an Amazon account?
I don't think the bar to compete with Steam is as high as you're suggesting, but even if it is, if anybody was going to start listing companies that could conceivably do it, Amazon would probably be on the list.
The library is the #1 reason people stay in Steam. Lots of people just buy games in other places and just add it there.
Amazon could, for example, offer different royalties (say, 10% instead of 30%) for publishers willing to have their old games "moveable" to Amazon's hypothetical new platform and I bet a lot of studios would take the deal. This is not unheard of: it's how Apple does iTunes Match.
Given that steam has pretty strict terms with publishers over this, I highly, highly doubt they would do this unless they wanted to dump a huge ocean of money into free license comps for developers to make money from and for users to get free games.
Competing with Steam isn't only just a money/size thing, though of course that helps.
Like I haven't touched my Xbox One in years, but I'm still giving them $10/month for Xbox Game Pass for my PC.
"In its latest financial results, Microsoft announced that the gaming division revenue was up 50% year-on-year, boasting huge $3.53 billion earnings over the past 12 months. The vast majority of that income stems from Xbox hardware (largely the launch of the Xbox Series X/S), which is up 232%."
https://www.vg247.com/xbox-revenue-hardware-game-pass-boost-...
Okay, I guess hardware is still big for them. Huh.
- 10-15% commission
- Exclusives
- Curation/quality control
- Integrated anti-piracy
- Forums/modding/game guides
- User profiles/achievements/gamification
- Less generous regional pricing (like on consoles) in exchange for slightly lower overall pricing
- 5% cashback into wallets, like Nintendo eShop
Epic only does some of these things, which is why its struggling. Its lack of social features is a major reason for low engagement on the platform, probably driven by Tencent and Chinese censorship restrictions (in the same way that the Steam forums are unavailable in China).
Exclusives are anti-consumer and doesn't convince users if we follow what Epic did.
It's easy to say "curation/quality control" but to come up with a method and algorithmic way of doing it well is insanely difficult.
Anti-piracy is just called DRM and it's not really foolproof nor always desired. GoG is successful in catering that niche. It also requires a good understanding of reverse engineering hardening, so much easier said than done.
Forums/modding/whatever, yeah sure perhaps "simple" but quite extensive. Even for a large company, code doesn't write itself (well, not any code you want to rely on, at least).
I don't really get the console pricing aspect, sorry.
Cashback isn't a free thing, it's a marketing campaign - even if it runs indefinitely. I don't think that would work by itself, it's a bit of a gimmick.
Epic is struggling because of their anti consumer strategies, aggressive and oftentimes reckless CEO, seemingly constant and very public lawsuits with huge companies, and trying to stay relevant outside of Fortnite.
I agree that lack of social contributed to it but is far from the only problem. For example, Epic doesn't have a cart. It's been a widely requested feature, but they focus on other things.
Tencent is a cancer upon this world and I have little base respect for companies that go with them.
FWIW The notion that a company like Amazon or whatever can have it's tentacles in these kinds of things at will is proof they are getting too big.