Epic Games Store reports continued growth, 765 million free games claimed in 2021

Jimmy2x

Jimmy2x

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Recap: Earlier this week Epic Games released their 2021 Year in Review. The release, which provides no shortage of self-reported usage and sales statistics, points to an overall increase in the platform's use. But feedback from the gaming community questions if the increase is due to more users joining the service for the content or simply stopping by for the store's free games.

Epic's Year in Review 2021 highlighted an overall growth trend across the year, adding 34 million new users since 2020 and increases in daily, monthly, and concurrent user counts. The publisher's growth is the result of their own efforts to grow the platform as well as the explosive growth of PC gaming and hardware sales in 2021.

In 2021 the Epic Games Store gave away 89 free titles valued at $2,120, which added up to a hefty 765 million copies claimed across the year. Epic's announcement confirmed the company will continue the free game giveaways in 2022 to attract new users and provide quality content to existing customers. The free titles are made available to the store's users on a weekly basis and are a permanent part of their game library once claimed.

Despite how it might sound, the "free" games that are given away are hardly free to Epic. The company is still responsible for paying game developers for the right to make it available to their users at no cost. Epic looks to continue offering these games in hopes of continued user base growth and increased spending on future exclusives. While it might seem like a losing proposition, the free games have been a big driver in Epic's ability to gain some ground against services like Steam.

The company's announcement highlighted several other developments coming in 2022, including expanded social and community features, game hubs, and Epic Games Store application enhancements. Fans and critics alike can follow Epic's planned and upcoming content and enhancements through the Epic Games Store Roadmap on Trello.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/93186-epic-games-store-reports-continued-growth-765-million.html

 
What I'd want to know is if they're profitable yet (considering all the freebies). Or are they still propping it up with their Fortnite money?

Currently betting on the latter...
 
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I prefer having one library with all my games, but that's close to impossible so I won't complain about free games. It could be worse...like it is on consoles. One day, I might even spend a dime on Epic.
 
I keep claiming them but haven't played a single one so far. I have too much backlog on Steam already, might as well collect it for free on Epic and probably never touch it again.

And if I had have to buy something I will still do it on Steam for convenience...
 
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I would buy Elden Ring from Epic Store, but it's seemingly not going to be published there. This is the simple major issue for me with their store - I would buy, but major releases are not all there. That is the most pressing issue they should solve. They still have about a month to get Elden Ring there. I guess the problem here is Steam's network services play part in the multiplayer of Elden Ring or am I completely wrong here? I also purchased Deathloop from Steam just because it was discounted and Epic Store's page (still) says "coming soon".

EDIT. Though if a third party game key seller sells Elden Ring cheaper than either Epic or Steam, then the game will be activated on Steam naturally, because I doubt any party sells keys to Epic Store over Steam. It would be the best if customer could decide himself where he wants to activate the product.
 
Great job Epic, you've lost yourself a lot of money, fragmented the PC player base, split collections across two game launchers, and used your cash to arrange exclusives that caused players to have to wait to play, or pay more, or get gimped functionality such as no achievements. All while delivering not a single improvement to any gamer as far as better prices or functionality, which is supposed to be the benefit of competition.

I guess the one bright side is that the developers selected for the free games probably get some sort of payout. I claim most of those games, although I have yet to play a single one, because I like the idea that Epic loses a little money and that maybe a nice indie developer gets a little.
 
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Epic and GoG are my go-to places for games shopping. GoG is great because of no DRM, Epic - because of great prices (tenner for any game on many sales is just too good), and because they do not reap 30% as middleman. Steam is great - their linux approach is wonderful, but sits at close 3rd.
 
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And thus the cancer keeps growing.

dangh said:
Epic and GoG are my go-to places for games shopping. GoG is great because of no DRM, Epic - because of great prices (tenner for any game on many sales is just too good), and because they do not reap 30% as middleman. Steam is great - their linux approach is wonderful, but sits at close 3rd.
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They just destroy the PC market ecosystem with third party exclusivity deals. That "great price" is the only price.
 
HardReset said:
Tell me better way to compete with Steam? Gog already has no-DRM approach. Other alternatives are what?
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You know, use the money to make a good product? The smaller cut for the devs would have been a huge draw for gamers as many of them want to support their favorite devs (I often buy games even if I know I don't have the time to play them just to support the devs).

Goodwill towards gamers goes a VERY LONG long way, but they decided to destroy their goodwill by being cancerous and focus on short term growth.

Do you want me to support anti-consumer practices? If devs want to sign a contract with Epic then they will never get my money. I don't care about the free games "bait", I'm old enough to buy those games. 90% of my games were bought searching for good deals on all stores (Humble, GOG, GMG, Amazon, Steam, etc). Sales happen all the time, I don't have to wait for Epic to grace us with one.

What Epic is doing is basically telling you: your only choice is our price and platform, here's a free game so shut the f up.
 
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Puiu said:
You know, use the money to make a good product? The smaller cut for the devs would have been a huge draw for gamers as many of them want to support their favorite devs (I often buy games even if I know I don't have the time to play them just to support the devs).

Goodwill towards gamers goes a VERY LONG long way, but they decided to destroy their goodwill by being cancerous and focus on short term growth.

Do you want me to support anti-consumer practices? If devs want to sign a contract with Epic then they will never get my money. I don't care about the free games "bait", I'm old enough to buy those games. 90% of my games were bought searching for good deals on all stores (Humble, GOG, GMG, Amazon, Steam, etc). Sales happen all the time, I don't have to wait for Epic to grace us with one.

What Epic is doing is basically telling you: your only choice is our price and platform, here's a free game so shut the f up.
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Ok, I'll put it another way: Steam has very strong position on today's market. How you get Steam user to buy game from Epic store instead Steam? Making "better store" just won't cut it. Steam users will continue using Steam because there are no real reasons to switch into another store.

Epic wants to be Steam alternative. Gog.com already have strong position on DRM-free market. About only thing they could do is to offer exclusives you cannot get on Steam. Sad but true.
 
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HardReset said:
Ok, I'll put it another way: Steam has very strong position on today's market. How you get Steam user to buy game from Epic store instead Steam? Making "better store" just won't cut it. Steam users will continue using Steam because there are no real reasons to switch into another store.

Epic wants to be Steam alternative. Gog.com already have strong position on DRM-free market. About only thing they could do is to offer exclusives you cannot get on Steam. Sad but true.
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"Epic wants to be Steam alternative" - Epic wants your money, don't ever try to excuse what they are doing to me, it doesn't work. According to the definition of an alternative, both parties should be offering the same product (the same games in this case).

Epic has both the money and brand recognition to compete with Steam. I don't care if they don't become the defacto leader, they just needed to be an alternative, not the only choice.

Imagine all of the money they put into buying games invested into marketing to bash Steam for taking 30%. Hundreds of millions wasted on bringing the cancer that was limited to consoles to the PC.
 
Puiu said:
"Epic wants to be Steam alternative" - Epic wants your money, don't ever try to excuse what they are doing to me, it doesn't work. According to the definition of an alternative, both parties should be offering the same product (the same games in this case).

Epic has both the money and brand recognition to compete with Steam. I don't care if they don't become the defacto leader, they just needed to be an alternative, not the only choice.

Imagine all of the money they put into buying games invested into marketing to bash Steam for taking 30%. Hundreds of millions wasted on bringing the cancer that was limited to consoles to the PC.
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Should offer but Steam is offering much more games than Steam do. We're back in start: how could Epic compete with Steam, that has much more games and much higher user base, if exclusives is not an option?

Now let's see: Steam has much more users, Steam has much more games. Existing Steam users will not go for Epic games without good reason. New users will use Steam because it has more games unless Epic can offer something special. Like what?

Like I asked many times. Where they should have put that money? If Epic store would be just Steam with smaller amount of games, then it has very few reasons to exist. Again, what Epic store should have done instead buying exclusives?
 
How about if Epic can not think of a single thing of value to offer games, they just don't open the store to begin with? Which is lots of PC gamers begged them to do.

Ultimately there was no way to prevent them from throwing away their own money to misdirect a few good games to their store in crippled, exclusive fashion for an initial period, but I'm going to be mad at them for doing that for a long time. Hopefully they'll eventually run out of money to throw out the window and we can go back to either someone comes up with a store that is actually offering a benefit, or we stick with Steam and GoG (and any of the dozens of other retailers who will be happy to sell you Steam keys so it's not like there isn't price competition.)
 
HardReset said:
Should offer but Steam is offering much more games than Steam do. We're back in start: how could Epic compete with Steam, that has much more games and much higher user base, if exclusives is not an option?

Now let's see: Steam has much more users, Steam has much more games. Existing Steam users will not go for Epic games without good reason. New users will use Steam because it has more games unless Epic can offer something special. Like what?

Like I asked many times. Where they should have put that money? If Epic store would be just Steam with smaller amount of games, then it has very few reasons to exist. Again, what Epic store should have done instead buying exclusives?
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Marketing and development. We are talking about hundreds of millions here. They just went with the cheaper/faster, but anti-consumer, solution. That's what they could have done. Anything else are just excuses that are nonsense.
 
Puiu said:
Marketing and development. We are talking about hundreds of millions here. They just went with the cheaper/faster, but anti-consumer, solution. That's what they could have done. Anything else are just excuses that are nonsense.
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Again, how marketing would take existing Steam user to Epic store? How marketing would take new users to Epic store instead Steam as Steam has much more games available? Development, they are doing it constantly as far as I see.

I have never purchased game from either Steam or Epic Store. But I understand why Epic Store must do something special to compete with Steam. They already offer more money for developers but that's mostly invisible to customers.
 
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HardReset said:
Again, how marketing would take existing Steam user to Epic store? How marketing would take new users to Epic store instead Steam as Steam has much more games available? Development, they are doing it constantly as far as I see.

I have never purchased game from either Steam or Epic Store. But I understand why Epic Store must do something special to compete with Steam. They already offer more money for developers but that's mostly invisible to customers.
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I don't get this is so complicated for you? You seriously think marketing doesn't work? You are sorely mistaken my friend. Marketing is a powerful tool and they even had the perfect "good guy" image to go with it. But like I said before, it's just easier to give others money instead of working yourself.
 
Hexic said:
Too bad their launcher has some things to be desired.
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Yeah I also wish Steam would finally add: "Remember" option during launch of the game which has multiple options to select. Damn it has been like what 3-5 years now and still nothing? :)
 
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