Information from the Epic v. Apple lawsuit suggests that Epic Games Store is losing money on smaller indie games and is yet to turn a profit.
During the Epic v. Apple lawsuit, a lot of information was released about the Epic Games Store’s financial situation. As reported by TweakTown, it appears that the rate that funds are recouped for small indie games is causing the store to lose money.
The information suggests that Epic often makes a return on investment when securing exclusivity deals for AAA games such as Borderlands 3. Epic Games Store will offer developers a minimum guarantee. This is an amount that Epic will pay developers regardless of a game’s actual sales.
Epic categorised games into tiers, with small devs landing in tier 3. Most of the tier 3 games on the store do not earn more than their minimum guarantee, meaning that Epic is spending more than it is earning. In total, Epic has made back less than half of what it has spent on these deals.
Epic has since established a new publishing system that will fund games with lower risk on return. The first titles to be published this way are Alan Wake 2 and Alan Wake Remastered. For these games, Epic will pay for 100 per cent of development costs, go-to-market costs, and more in exchange for a 50 per cent split of profits. This new system could see the Epic Games Store finally return a profit.
In other news, 1047 Games CEO has said that Splitgate and Halo Infinite will help each other’s popularity. He explained that this could be related to the fact that many of the younger players will not have experienced Halo style shooters before, and together the two games could help revitalise the genre.
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