I mean that’s good for developers I suppose but I’m still not going to be buying from Epic.
It is still Epic Games, therefore I will continue my streak to not buy from them and claim all the free games without playing them.
I gave up on the free games at this point. Just too much of a hassle to check regularly with what little free time I have as I ironically post mid day.
They’re also encumbered with Epic spyware, so despite having collected some of those free games early on, I won’t even run them (or the Epic store app) anymore.
You can use Heroic Games Launcher to download and play Epic games. It doesn’t have any kind of online functionality for the games, plus I block them in my firewall so no calls home. Works great for single player games. Usually end up buying it on Steam if I like the game but it’s great to check stuff out without having to deal with the Epic launcher.
Works on Steam Deck too! Also has GoG and Amazon Games support.
You can use Heroic Games Launcher to download and play Epic games.
I could, but those games contain and execute Epic code. (I checked this by examining the binaries, which is probably against Epic’s terms of service, but I don’t care if they find out and ban me.) This would still be true even if they were launched with Heroic or some other launcher. After the snooping that Epic code has already been caught doing, I don’t trust it to run on my systems.
plus I block them in my firewall so no calls home.
Wise decision.
Crack the executables and then block them in your firewall. Though it’s mostly just changes in the directories for where the game and its saves are located that differ from Steam or GOG releases.
Can you elaborate on the spyware part? This is new to me
Probably the most famous example is when their store app was caught copying Steam files, collecting friends play history, and scanning running processes.
https://old.reddit.com/r/fuckepic/comments/wakewr/epic_games_spyware_vs_steam_vs_as_comparision_ea/
https://www.pcgamesn.com/epic-launcher-spyware
Separately, Epic Online Services (which is embedded into many games from the Epic store and some from other stores) collects more information than many people are comfortable with.
And then there’s the fact that Tencent owns a sizeable chunk of Epic.
Some folks don’t mind these things, but they’re not okay with me, so I don’t allow software from Epic to run on my systems.
There are games I have as Epic freebies, but just thought it was easier to re-buy on Steam for convenience sake on my Steam Deck.
Junkstore is worth looking into
I second this. Junkstore is really well integrated, I’ve installed so many forgotten Epic freebies on the Steamdeck because it’s so much easier than going through KDE. I hope the GOG implementation comes soon.
This might make more devs consider putting things up on EGS, but unless they are sold for 30% less on average than everyone else (or lock in to be an exclusive), this means fuck all to the consumer.
Unless the consumer has principles and wants to give more money to the people that are the most like them, i.e. the devs, instead of giving it to a billionaire.
In my case Valve definitely deserves a cut, as I’m only buying the game because steam makes it really easy to play it on linux.
Their work on drivers and proton is what makes me buy the games, because if I have to tinker just to play on my preferred OS, I’ll tinker with pirated versions instead.They could afford to do all of that and take a smaller cut if Gaben didn’t collect yachts.
