[hooli42]

This is exactly the situation for desktop games right now, something Epic is profiting immensely from. It's an extremely annoying situation for users, having a dozen launcher/store apps around contributing to bloat.

[brink]

That's exactly the competition that keeps PC from having the hiked prices the likes of Switch/XBox/PS5 stores and having to pay $15/mo to play games with your friends online.

I'll happily have to deal with a few extra launchers on PC in comparison to what the alternative is.

[Mindwipe]

No it isn't, the competition is great and is lowering prices across the board, and no arbitrary censorship exists.

The desktop games market is much heathier and less dangerous for users than the mobile app market.

[makeitdouble]

> It's an extremely annoying situation for users

This is where I see how long that battle will be.

The future where this "extremely annoying" situation is fully solved is Xbox XXX being un removable and the only Game Store allowed on any PC sold, with legal threats to anyone jailbreaking.

As long as user have a choice and control on their device, and competition is alive, we'll hopefuly have different stores with different rules and you'll be extremely annoyed I think.

[kobalsky]

I'm getting a free game from Epic every week for having their launcher installed.

Competition is awesome.

[SSLy]

I think you can even just grab them via www.

[wiseowise]

I literally don't have anything but Steam installed.

[tiledjinn]

More fair to say Epic is money pitting from, given discoveries from Epic v Apple and Epic v Google..

[maxwell]

Speak for yourself. I love shopping around and comparing prices. Competition is not bloat.

[mvdtnz]

> It's an extremely annoying situation for users

Is it? I regularly use Steam, Epic and XBox and occasionally Ubi, Larian and whatever the GoG one is called... and it's fine. It's just another program.

[fkyoureadthedoc]

Yeah, it is. I don't use anything except Steam. If it's not on Steam I'm not buying or playing it. Making your game exclusive to one distribution channel is stupid.