Like what the title says. There’s always a catch unless it’s FOSS. So, what is the catch with them giving games for free that you can keep forever? What will the developers of the games get as a thank you?
It’s likely a scheme to entice people onto their platform because they’re not as trusted as valve or gog. If they become a monopoly then we’ll get to see all the various catches to that.
this tbh
though it doesn’t really work, i have 183 epic games, none of which have i bought lol
The catch is now you have games in their ecosystem and are more likely to spend more time and money there.
To lure people away from Steam and onto their platform. There is no ulterior motive. Origin does/did (IDK I haven’t played an EA game in years) this too for the same reason.
This. The court documents from the trials vs Google and Apple even showed that they divide how much they pay the publisher for the giveaway by the number of users acquired to determine the cost per user.
Amazon games does it too.
Same reason Microsoft allows people to use Windows without a license key.
(They want to get people used to their platform so they increase their popularity, and thus making more money in the end)
It’s also one of the reasons why they allow 3rd parties to run their own activation servers. All you gotta do is type a couple of lines in command prompt to change your activation servers from Microsoft’s to such a 3rd party, type in the volume license key they provide for free, and now you have a 100% legit copy of Windows, no cracks or workarounds needed.
Microsoft makes it so easy to activate Windows for free that there’s no way it was unintentional.
I’ve heard stories of Microsoft support team members suggesting cracks when they couldn’t activate the system the legal way.
it’s not “forever”. it’s however long they don’t have any ideas to the contrary.
why it was implemented - so that executive #279 can show executive #114 that number go up. look how our engagement is rising! look at all them people downloading our app! when I took over from exec #317, number was this big, lookie now!
same way google made their search worse, so you have to search multiple times, thus upping the engagment, page views, etc. and then exec X goes to exec Y and say “look there’s a huge rise in searches where my bonus at!”
it’s not “forever”.
So true. Today it is known that you only buy a license of the games from Steam. And since Epic Games works in the same way as Steam, this also applies to them. They can delete any games from your library whenever they want - just like that *click*. I stopped buying games on Steam when that came out publicly and moved to GOG instead.
At least in the first years, most of the games released on the Epic Games Store were DRM-free, in the strictest sense in that you could move the folder from PC to PC without needing the launcher, like on GOG. You can see the data as of today here.
Still below 600 (if the numbers are dead-exact) which makes me glad. GOG should be the only place for DRM free games. But that’s my opinion. What I know of, GOG is today the only place for downloadable installation files of games.
The numbers represent confirmed cases, so there could be more. There used to be a GOG thread dedicated to testing games for DRM on Epic, but then it was locked and its main contributors have switched to adding the information to the wiki.
It’s not about engagement. As the court documents have shown, they want to increase the number of users and then see how many of those convert to paying customers.
They want you to use their service. You’re more likely to use the service if you already have a library of games on it.
What will the developers of the games get as a thank you?
They wouldn’t be making them free without making a deal with the developer first. There was a leak that showed the actual amount a while back.
They wouldn’t be making them free without making a deal with the developer first. There was a leak that showed the actual amount a while back.
That is what I was after! Not the leak, but the catch. Do you have the link to the source for the leak?
The problem with EPIC games is, that you need an account with your full name and data, even for an free game, not needed in Steam or GOG, where it is enough with nick and mail, only the need for more if you want to buy a game. Searching free games, only Steam and Itch.io are full of these.
What do you mean, I have a nick, fake email, fake name and I’m enjoying my free games for years.
You have free games always for years if you like these, without the need of fake names and data, often even without the need of accounts, controlled by companies with desktop clients and other crap which rest a lot of privacy. Free games don’t need all this, less paid games, you install it and it’s yours forever, all other is an abuse of big corporations which make money with your data.
I’ve an Steam account, but forced, because a lot of years ago I bought in a store an CD with Portal, but to run it, it was mandatory an Steam account FOR AN LOCAL SINGLEPLAYER GAME WHICH I BOUGHT PHYSICALLY IN A STORE, WTF.
It’s 2025. If you are getting a ‘free’ software product, there’s a chance of about 99,9% that the answer to that question is either ‘analytics/tracking/telemetry/customer retention’ or a combination of many or all of them.
In that case, you have to deal with the shitty epic launcher that is prone to “lose” user data.
When it comes to non-FOSS, yes, I agree.
You’re absolutely right. Sorry for that (admittedly catastrophic) omission.
I’ve claimed probably 70% of the free games for the past four or five years. I’ve noticed some of the titles disappear. So one catch is, you may not get to keep the free game(s) you grab.
Nah that’s pretty weird I’ve not heard of that before. I’ve snagged a fair number and still got them as far as I can tell.
I still have hundreds, but they do disappear like any purely digital asset.
I hadn’t noticed this, and I’ve claimed a ton of them as well. Do you have an example?
I don’t even remember the name of the game, but it was one that was next to a title I do play often when sorted by “recent” which is based on purchase (or redemption) date. Might have been that underwater exploration title.
Hm, the only underwater ones I can think of are Subnautica and Abzu, both of which are still in my library (although I wouldn’t mind if Abzu went away, as it was basically just an underwater walking sim). I couldn’t find anything on the list quickly, despite a couple ones sounding like underwater ones, like Stranded Deep and Submerged: Hidden Depths, which didn’t look like they actually were underwater games.
Like any company offering “exclusive deals only in the app” the catch is you have to sign up for an account and install an app. That’s one more account and one more app that you would have not normally installed but for the “deal.”
The catch is downloading the Epic Launcher. Or not even that if you are on Linux.
heroic launcher works well as a replacement if you must. it works like steam in that it has built in proton to run the games you have with one click ease.
so if you want to run linux but have games on epic? there are better choices but you’re still covered.
Logistically, it’s super cheap marketing. Epic pays the dev a reasonable pittance ( assuming it’s not a free game, they do that too) you got to watch their ads during download/install, they got you email, they know what games you’re interested in. Your interests are for sale for sure, but for a free game, may be worth a throw away email.
Removed by mod
They also for sure get revenue from the hardware companies, seeing recent game releases like Doom -The Dark Ages or ILL, where you need a GPU with at least 32 GB to run it with more than 20 FPS in standart resolution, while you grill bacon on the power supply
Standard resolution for me is FHD. Heavy duty games O.o If it is true, that is. Any source? DOOM: The Dark Ages requires 16 GB in GPU on recommended and ILL’s system requirements are TBA.
When I read your comment, I could not stop thinking about those exclusive games that Epic Games have every now and then. I highly dislike that!
Hardware companies need money. Yes, Doom need at least 16GB Ram for running the game in 1024x768 pxs, as said windowed and ILL for sure need more when the release it. It’s programmed onsolence, while current PC can survive almost 15 years or more, they try it with the soft to make these obsolete. Apart of the prices for these games, DOOM>€100 and ILL for sure isn’t cheaper. OK. the graphics are stunning, but this don’t make a game better than others, these games anyway, apart of the graphics, offers normally an gameplay pretty lineal.
My favoritefirst person game since almost 10 years is The Dark Mod, nice graphics, not worse as in commercial games, intelligent gameplay, it don’t need an NASA computer to run it, almost any cheap Laptop is enough, works on Windows, Linux and Mac and is 100%free. 170 community made missions, more released every few month, you can download and add these in the same game menu.
make bad platform give free games ??? profit
