Valve says its "unfair" that metro exodus is epic store exclusive

Dragnelus

https://kotaku.com/valve-says-its-unfair-that-metro-exodus-is-exclusive-to-1832129331

Today, Valve posted a notice to the Metro Exodus Steam page. “We think the decision to remove the game is unfair to Steam customers, especially after a long pre-sale period,” the company wrote. “We apologize to Steam customers that were expecting it to be available for sale through the February 15th release date, but we were only recently informed of the decision and given limited time to let everyone know.”

Tiller

I read this earlier and I feel it's kind of a nutkick for those waiting to get it on Steam.

Sovrath

Dragnelus said:

https://kotaku.com/valve-says-its-unfair-that-metro-exodus-is-exclusive-to-1832129331

Today, Valve posted a notice to the Metro Exodus Steam page. “We think the decision to remove the game is unfair to Steam customers, especially after a long pre-sale period,” the company wrote. “We apologize to Steam customers that were expecting it to be available for sale through the February 15th release date, but we were only recently informed of the decision and given limited time to let everyone know.”

In this case they are right. It is unfair.

It's not like the game was an Epic Exclusive from the get-go. They didn't say that about Ashen which came first to Epic (it's on Steam for some future release as far as I remember).

If this was on Steam and steam customers were waiting for it, putting it on their lists and then suddenly it's removed then that's not a very customer centric thing.

Then again, They still can get the game.

edit: It seems like they are going to honor the pre-orders so that's at least good.

SBFord

What's interesting is that the price is $10 less for preordering on Epic, especially with the 88/12 split. It's $50 on Epic, $60 on Steam. 

https://www.epicgames.com/store/en-US/product/metro-exodus/home

https://store.steampowered.com/app/412020/Metro_Exodus/

Those who said the lower split wouldn't result in consumer-friendly pricing are wrong, at least in this case. It'll be interesting to see if it continues with other games.

I know where I'll be buying if the reviews show it's worthwhile.

MadFrenchie

Yes, pre-orders on Steam are being honored.  This is competition, which is good, but the timing was awful.

FlyByKnight

Title is a little bit click-bait. It reads like Steam was selfishly crying on their own behalf when actually they are talking about the fact that their consumers had a pre-sale period and then got hit with a renege. It is unfair, but again these companies view us all like livestock so I'm not surprised.

SBFord

It's going to be fully supported on Steam with updates and DLC. I also read somewhere it's only a 1-year exclusive so there's also that.

alkarionlog

SBFord said:

What's interesting is that the price is $10 less for preordering on Epic, especially with the 88/12 split. It's $50 on Epic, $60 on Steam. 

https://www.epicgames.com/store/en-US/product/metro-exodus/home

https://store.steampowered.com/app/412020/Metro_Exodus/

Those who said the lower split wouldn't result in consumer-friendly pricing are wrong, at least in this case. It'll be interesting to see if it continues with other games.

on this case and on metro, we  know very well, by past anouncements, then not all devs are thinking about selling cheaper on epic for a win-win situation, though this move should be done before they did anounce the game on steam too, that is just a cheap move really.

and again i'm in wait and see till they do launch a game I care enough to play

crankked

SBFord said:

I know where I'll be buying if the reviews show it's worthwhile.

Same place everyone else is forced to buy it from (regardless of the price), the EPIC game store??

SBFord

crankked said:

SBFord said:

I know where I'll be buying if the reviews show it's worthwhile.

Same place everyone else is forced to buy it from (regardless of the price), the EPIC game store??

Well duh.

I'll buy any GOOD game on whatever platform provides the best deal. I'll admit, however, that I'm glad I didn't preorder it. My purchase all depends on reviews.

Shaigh

Denuvo, because gamers love DRM that cause frame rate drops.

Ginaz

Does the Epic game store allow customer to leave reviews and comments?  If not, that's a huge problem for me even though a lot of Steam "reviews" are hot garbage.

Lokero

SBFord said:

Those who said the lower split wouldn't result in consumer-friendly pricing are wrong, at least in this case. It'll be interesting to see if it continues with other games.

Ha, we'll see... this was just a case of trying to put out fires before they spread.  They knew they were pulling the carpet out from half of their customers and tried to soothe the flames with a discount.  If they weren't doing this last-switcheroo, I'm betting the price would have been $60 on EGS, just the same.

While I personally don't like Steam, in general, it's not an inspiring business move to pull at the final buzzer.  I don't blame them for wanting to move over to EGS and away from Steam, but it's pretty tasteless to pull last-minute shenanigans.

But, at least, they are trying to handle it with a discount, which is better than nothing.

I'm sure it will cost them a few of their customers... but probably not as many as we'll see complaining.

Ginaz

It also look like Epic's game store doesn't do the regional pricing thing.  So if you're from a BRIC type country...sucks to be you.

https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgaming/comments/akpv2e/thank_you_epic_games_store/

SBFord

Ginaz said:

It also look like Epic's game store doesn't do the regional pricing thing.  So if you're from a BRIC type country...sucks to be you.

https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgaming/comments/akpv2e/thank_you_epic_games_store/

Now that truly sucks and needs to be addressed.

Xasapis

SBFord said:

crankked said:

SBFord said:

I know where I'll be buying if the reviews show it's worthwhile.

Same place everyone else is forced to buy it from (regardless of the price), the EPIC game store??

Well duh.

I'll buy any GOOD game on whatever platform provides the best deal. I'll admit, however, that I'm glad I didn't preorder it. My purchase all depends on reviews.

I don't understand this comment. Right now and at least for Metro, there is a single platform that sells it, Epic. This is how exclusives work. No competition, thus you're forced to buy it from a single source.

Also:



Do you think he got paid to promote the Steam store?

SBFord

Xasapis said:

I don't understand this comment. Right now and at least for Metro, there is a single platform that sells it, Epic. This is how exclusives work. No competition, thus you're forced to buy it from a single source.

Meaning....I know it's an exclusive. FFS....it was stated originally, and in response, to be ironic.

I'm sure I could have explained it better, so here goes:

My bottom line is twofold: 1) good reviews; 2) best price when I'm ready to buy it. I'm in literally no hurry to buy it and chances are it'll be at least a year. Depending on who has the best price when I'm ready will get my dollars. We'll see where it is then, eh?

I hope that we see games that are on both platforms compete for our business. Exclusives are sorta eh as far as I'm concerned. I'm not married to any one platform so I don't care about it and with rare exception, there just aren't that many games that are must haves day one or even year one for me.

Gruug

I have too many launchers and too many stores on my desktop now. While I like competition, this is getting crazy. Wonder what will happen as these stores start folding and your games that you purchase there become unreachable?

Slapshot1188

SBFord said:

What's interesting is that the price is $10 less for preordering on Epic, especially with the 88/12 split. It's $50 on Epic, $60 on Steam. 

https://www.epicgames.com/store/en-US/product/metro-exodus/home

https://store.steampowered.com/app/412020/Metro_Exodus/

Those who said the lower split wouldn't result in consumer-friendly pricing are wrong, at least in this case. It'll be interesting to see if it continues with other games.

I know where I'll be buying if the reviews show it's worthwhile.

Beware "introductory" pricing concepts...  Like when a company offers a really low rate but then at the renewal time its back to the same as everyone else.

But maybe not... options are always good.

Akulas

The price only shows the US price

Ginaz

Slapshot1188 said:

SBFord said:

What's interesting is that the price is $10 less for preordering on Epic, especially with the 88/12 split. It's $50 on Epic, $60 on Steam. 

https://www.epicgames.com/store/en-US/product/metro-exodus/home

https://store.steampowered.com/app/412020/Metro_Exodus/

Those who said the lower split wouldn't result in consumer-friendly pricing are wrong, at least in this case. It'll be interesting to see if it continues with other games.

I know where I'll be buying if the reviews show it's worthwhile.

Beware "introductory" pricing concepts...  Like when a company offers a really low rate but then at the renewal time its back to the same as everyone else.

But maybe not... options are always good.

I highly doubt the developers are going to lower their prices just because they're selling exclusively on Epic's store.  They'll pocket whatever the difference is and keep charging the same prices as they were on Steam.  The best way to let these companies know that PC gamers aren't cool with exclusives and going the way of consoles is not to buy them.  There's plenty of great games that will still be sold on Steam and GoG that you can spend your money on.

Aethaeryn

Ginaz said:

Does the Epic game store allow customer to leave reviews and comments?  If not, that's a huge problem for me even though a lot of Steam "reviews" are hot garbage.

No reviews, forums. . download speed settings.  Offline play was hit and miss for me.  If you just buy games and are always online then you are okay.  I think the services are quite different so their prices (as mentioned) should be a bit lower to attract buyers.  Devs will likely choose both if there is no incentive to be exclusive.

Aethaeryn

Lokero said:

SBFord said:

Those who said the lower split wouldn't result in consumer-friendly pricing are wrong, at least in this case. It'll be interesting to see if it continues with other games.

Ha, we'll see... this was just a case of trying to put out fires before they spread.  They knew they were pulling the carpet out from half of their customers and tried to soothe the flames with a discount.  If they weren't doing this last-switcheroo, I'm betting the price would have been $60 on EGS, just the same.

While I personally don't like Steam, in general, it's not an inspiring business move to pull at the final buzzer.  I don't blame them for wanting to move over to EGS and away from Steam, but it's pretty tasteless to pull last-minute shenanigans.

But, at least, they are trying to handle it with a discount, which is better than nothing.

I'm sure it will cost them a few of their customers... but probably not as many as we'll see complaining.

They must be offering something to get exclusives as well.  Likely an even larger cut to the developers.  I think Steam as a service offers a lot outside of the games and updates.  I read reviews with a grain of salt but the discussion forums on games are helpful in my decision to buy a game.

Palebane

Their loss imo. Exclusives are dumb. I wish we could have all games on wichever launcher we liked best.

TheDarkrayne

They've ensured that I will be pirating the game instead. Sorry, but that's the truth of it. I simply don't want to build up another library of games somewhere else and that's my choice to make. I'm not waiting a year when I don't have to.

My games collection is complicated enough as it is. I have Steam, GoG, uPlay, Origin, Arc, Blizzard Launcher, the horrendous Microsoft Store...

I'll only buy on launchers other than Steam now if there's no other option, like if it's an online only game or I want to play multiplayer. Steam is where the bulk of my collection is (almost 700 games).

If it was on Steam I would have bought it in two days when I get paid.

Quizzical

I say that it's unfair that so many games are exclusive to Steam.  So there.

They didn't renege on any deals.  For everyone who bought the game on Steam, they'll still honor it.  Though if you can cancel the pre-order to get back your $60 and buy it for $50 on Epic, you'll come out ahead by $10.  The developer comes out ahead, too, getting to keep $44 rather than $42.

I don't see why so many people are whining about developers wanting to be paid for their games.  Of all the ways that they could try to make more money, a smaller cut coming from the publisher has got to be about the least objectionable thing ever.