Bethesda might not sell Rage 2 on Steam

Polycount

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More and more big players in the game industry are moving away from Steam as their sole distribution platform, and Bethesda has been one of the latest companies to do so.

Fallout 76 on PC was only available directly through the Bethesda.net game distribution client - it could not be purchased through Steam or any other third-party platforms. Now, evidence has surfaced that suggests the company may do the same for ID Software's upcoming Rage 2, the sequel to 2010's Rage.

The chaotic, Mad Max-like shooter has not appeared for pre-order on Steam and attempts to pre-purchase the game through popular key-selling website Fanatical displays a message warning users that all sold keys are for Bethesda.net, not Steam.

Furthermore, attempting to pre-order the game directly from its official website will only give you the option to purchase through Bethesda.net; Steam isn't listed anywhere.

All of this combines to make it fairly clear that, at least on launch, Rage 2 will most likely be a Bethesda.net exclusive - for better or worse.

That doesn't mean the game will never arrive on Steam, but for now, it's not looking good. If Rage 2 does well enough, Bethesda's future games (perhaps even main series entries like The Elder Scrolls 6) might never arrive on platforms other than Bethesda.net.

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Wayyyy to many damn platforms now....

uPlay
Steam
Battle.net
Bestheda.net
Origins
Epic Game Store
Microsoft Store
Discord Store

what else am I missing??
GOG
All the clients are fine to me. Why not make your own store and take all the profit? Valve was asking for it all to happen by taking 30%.
Eh I wasn't going to buy it either way. No co-op.
 
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Wayyyy to many damn platforms now....

uPlay
Steam
Battle.net
Bestheda.net
Origins
Epic Game Store
Microsoft Store
Discord Store

what else am I missing??
GOG
All the clients are fine to me. Why not make your own store and take all the profit? Valve was asking for it all to happen by taking 30%.
Eh I wasn't going to buy it either way. No co-op.

It kind of bothers me a lot because I don't like having so many different things installed. I especially hate it when I have to install a platform to just play 1 game.

Also some platforms just provide a better experience than others :\
 
Wayyyy to many damn platforms now....

uPlay
Steam
Battle.net
Bestheda.net
Origins
Epic Game Store
Microsoft Store
Discord Store

what else am I missing??

Twitch also sell games. I happened to get Tyranny on Twitch due to Amazon Prime while already got it on Steam.
 
Ugh. It's as bad as all of the studios starting their own streaming services - I want simplicity, not a thousand different accounts I have to juggle just to get the content I want to consume. Same with gaming.

Feels like the entire industry is getting less consumer-friendly on the PC front. I find it amazing that the very studios who vehemently defied the "PC gaming is dying, consoles are the future" mentality over the years, are slowly driving consumers to a state where the simpler single console/platform provider option is enticing.
 
Ugh. It's as bad as all of the studios starting their own streaming services - I want simplicity, not a thousand different accounts I have to juggle just to get the content I want to consume. Same with gaming.

Feels like the entire industry is getting less consumer-friendly on the PC front. I find it amazing that the very studios who vehemently defied the "PC gaming is dying, consoles are the future" mentality over the years, are slowly driving consumers to a state where the simpler single console/platform provider option is enticing.


Not to mention some may not be up to security standards, leaving your personal information more at risk if you have accounts on all those platforms....
 
I miss the days of simple physical media distribution. You own the physical disks from floppies to CDs and DVDs bought from your favourite store either in the mall or outside, which came with boxes and thick manuals. It's just you and your game in your hand, and you feel like an extension into the gameworld by holding the physical medium in your hands.
And some games came with peripherals and accompaniments which further extended the gameworld into this world.

Nowadays, they are rip-offs in the name of "collectors edition" with prohibitive prices and you have to pay for them, instead of getting it default like those days.
 
Wayyyy to many damn platforms now....

uPlay
Steam
Battle.net
Bestheda.net
Origins
Epic Game Store
Microsoft Store
Discord Store

what else am I missing??

What you're missing my friend, is a damn all-in-one store that I don't want to disable at windows start up.
 
I'm a big fan of competition, particularly in the gaming industry, but all of these platforms are becoming overwhelming. Developers now expect us to have anywhere from 3 to 7 game store clients running on our computers at any given time - if you ask me, that's completely unreasonable.
Worst part is, the revenue split argument doesn't even apply to these big companies, because their games sell enough that they fall into Steam's lower revenue split bracket automatically.
Now, if all 7 of these clients had similar game line-ups and not just company-exclusive titles (FIFA, Anthem, Mass Effect, etc.), I wouldn't argue so much. But it's starting to feel like it's just the video streaming situation all over again - gotta have Netflix, Prime Video, Hulu, and a dozen other services just to watch a few specific shows now.
 
But it's starting to feel like it's just the video streaming situation all over again - gotta have Netflix, Prime Video, Hulu, and a dozen other services just to watch a few specific shows now.
I wouldn't really care from a browser based perspective. But requiring independent clients is as you say unreasonable.
 
I already decided on against giving any money to Bethesda anyway. Fallout 76 is a joke and a slap in the face to consumers and I won't support Bethesda moving forward because of it.
 
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