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Epic Games spent nearly $12 million giving away free games in their first nine monthsThey paid $1.5 million for Subnautica alone
They paid $1.5 million for Subnautica alone
The trial between Epic Games and Apple kicked off yesterday, almost seven months afterEpic first filed an antitrust lawsuit against their fruity foes. In the lead up to the court case, we’ve seen plenty of info come out about how the two companies operate. But now, it seems some financial documents have been made public that Epic most likely did not want to be made public. They reveal that the company paid game developers almost $12 million (around £8.6 million) to be able to release their games for free on the Epic Games Store in the first nine months of its life.
According to Carless, this doc is amongst a few that were accidentally released early. They were briefly removed, but seem to be back up now. You can find the full docright here(which has the lovely header “HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL - ATTORNEY’S EYES ONLY”), amongstloads of other documentspertaining to the court case.
Big numbers.
The most Epic appeared to pay for a game was $1.5 million for Batman: Arkham trilogy, withSubnauticanot far behind at $1.4 mil, and Mutant Year Zero costing a smooth £1 mil. On the lower end, they paid just $50,000 for Super Meat Boy, $45,000 for Rime, and, well, nothing for Metro: 2033 Redux - it seems Koch Media let them have that one for free.
Top 10 New PC Games For May 2021Watch on YouTube
Top 10 New PC Games For May 2021
Regardless, it all still adds up to a lot of new people looking at the Epic Games Store. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like a lot of those people are sticking around to actually buy any games, because the document also says that only 7% of users who nabbed a freebie have made a purchase.
I can’t help but wonder if the weekly free games giveaways have a shelf life with stats like that. Though, Epic bossTim Sweeney has previously saidthat the Epic Games Store isn’t profitable and won’t be until 2023, so it all appears to be part of the plan.
Elsewhere in “good lord Epic has a lot of money” news, last monthcourt documents revealed they spent $444 million to secure exclusive games for their store in 2020. As the trial continues, I imagine these aren’t the last financial documents we’ll see.
