Epic Games is in the headlines, for the wrong reasons again. Apparently, they had refused to allow SkateBIRD developers to retail on their store because developers Glass Bottom Games had refused to sign a deal of exclusivity. The second cause for rejection seemed to be that SkateBIRD offered Steam keys as part of their Kickstarter. Glass Bottom Games founder Megan Fox has not taken to Twitter openly highlighting the ordeal.
Interesting tidbit:
Epic doesn't want SkateBIRD. They say they're focusing on exclusives, and SkateBIRD promised Steam keys in its KS, therefore, nah.
I suppose that may change by our launch, but it seemed like an interesting data point anyways.
— Megan Fox (@glassbottommeg) July 30, 2019
Epic Games had always maintained that their store was the perfect one for indie developers to get recognition and be in the spotlight. Epic’s actions here seemed to be in contrast with their words (not really the first time). From Megan’s tweet, it seems that their main objective at the moment is to create more exclusives – basically titles that people are excited about. It also seems that Epic is trying to avoid another Kickstarter disaster like Shenmue 3, which had prompted a lot of anger from Kickstarter backers.
Megan’s follow-up tweet provides another perspective to Epic’s business strategy (which was already quite obvious)
(do I regret listing Steam keys on the KS / leaning heavily on wishlisting in the KS?)
Well we have over 15k wishlists now, and are trending toward 30k-40k by launch at a bare minimum projection, so. No. No I do not regret my choices. pic.twitter.com/HnV23VTvud
— Megan Fox (@glassbottommeg) July 30, 2019
It seems that Epic is trying to push more anti-Steam sentiments around, and has taken a war footing to be the better storefront (albeit not with better store features, but with exclusives). Well, it seems that Tim Sweeney wasn’t joking when he said that Epic has very strict “guidelines” about what it wants and what it doesn’t on its store. However, Megan isn’t concerned about it, as it seems that SkateBIRD already has around 15000 wishlists on Steam at present, and is “trending towards 30-40k at launch”.