When we had 0 interest rates companies could make a bunch of big long term bets because money was cheap (ZIRP - Zero interest-rate policy).
Epic also happened to be sitting on the Fortnite money hose, so taking on Steam (and this money hose) made total sense as a business.
But not we don’t have 0 interest rates and Epic have made a bunch of layoffs
- https://www.epicgames.com/site/en-US/news/layoffs-at-epic
And they’re still not profitable:
Best monthly numbers I can find are old (specifically for Epic)
- 132 million monthly players (https://www.demandsage.com/steam-statistics/)
- 10 million in 2019, but not clear what % is just Fortnite (https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/DX-3712.pdf)
It’s no longer cheap to take on Steam. Do you think at this point Epic still has a decent chance of making this a two player market?
Personally I don’t use it at all. How do people feel about it? Any loyalty or friends networks there outside free games and fortnite?
Fortnite was funding everything that Epic did for a good time, like their game publisher, store, new HQ, acquisitions, lawsuits, but their problems started when they decided to change their business model to a different system, the Creator Economy, where Epic gives a share of their revenue to developers who makes stuff for Fortnite. And they got kinda reckless with their fortnite cash at the same time where they deliberately decided to make less money, which led to their layoffs and divesting the stuff that never made sense in first place, like the Bandcamp acquisition
Epic will never surprass Steam or anything and they probably know that, but they already cemented their place at the PC market just like GOG and Game Pass, and the next few years sounds more promising than ever because of their publishing branch (alan wake 2 was a great start)
Many people doesn’t have any issues with using their store since most of the complaining is just a vocal minority console warring for free game launchers, but they just need a better management, since they’re constantly improving their app while also transitioning their store to more healthier strategies that doesn’t involve spending millions on exclusive games. They’re still in growth model and expecting to be profitable in 2027 so we’ll see if they’re going to be more careful from now on, or still act like they did in the past lol.