'Epic has been great for many indies', says X-COM and Phoenix Point creator
Did you know Julian Gollop has written four columns for us, including subjects like the creation of the deckbuilder genre? Find them all here(opens in new tab).
Epic's strategy of timed exclusives helped make it an established source of videogame deals, but not without inspiring quite a bit of vitriol—some from folk with understandable grievances, but a lot of it from Steam stans. This vitriol often gets directed towards the developers who accept these deals, too, as it did when Phoenix Point(opens in new tab) studio Snapshot Games teamed up with the store. This has not, however, soured CEO and X-COM creator Julian Gollop on the strategy.
«When we did our Epic exclusive—this was the very early days of the Epic store promotion—yeah, there was a lot of hostility. And also a lot of conspiracy theories about it. The whole Chinese spyware and all the rest of it. Obviously, that's settled down a bit, and Epic has been great for many indies, in fact. It was another avenue to get funding, of course, which is very, very difficult to get with an indie studio. So overall, it was very positive for Phoenix Point itself. We had extra money that would go into making the game, which we didn't have otherwise. So it really did help the quality of the game itself, helped us get it released sooner rather than later and enabled us to put more content in so it was good.»
It was another avenue to get funding, of course, which is very, very difficult to get with an indie studio.
Steam, of course, gives developers access to a vast audience, so waiting a year before releasing it on the platform still comes with some risks. «It's always better to have the widest access to storefronts as possible,» Gollop acknowledges. «If you have the money to
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