Epic Games’ Tim Sweeney launches blistering attack on Microsoft, over what he sees as plans to curtail users’ freedoms and subvert rights of developers

One of the world’s biggest and most successful games development studios has launched a stinging attack on Microsoft.

Tim Sweeney, co-founder of Epic Games, creator of the multimillion selling Gears of War series, has accused the Redmond corporation of attempting to monopolise and control the entire PC games market.

“[Microsoft is] curtailing users’ freedom to install full-featured PC software, and subverting the rights of developers and publishers to maintain a direct relationship with their customers,” he wrote in the Guardian.

Sweeney’s anger is directed at the newly announced Universal Windows Platform (UWP), a programming application for Windows 10 developers. Microsoft says UWP will allow studios to produce a single version of a game – or any piece of software – which will then run on all current Microsoft devices, including Windows 10 PCs, the Xbox One console and Windows smartphones and tablets.

The concern voiced by Sweeney and echoed by other developers the Guardian has spoken to is that UWP is a closed platform, which means developers will need to be licensed by Microsoft to distribute games written using the platform. It could also mean that Microsoft will be able to control the sale of PC games and applications, ensuring that UWP titles will only be available through its own Windows Store.

The unprecedented attack on the Microsoft’s direction by one of its most valued game development partners will be seen as a huge blow to the company. The Gears of War Ultimate Edition, a new version of the classic Xbox title updated for Windows 10, was one of the key draws at Microsoft’s recent Spring Showcase event. Gears of War 4 (which is not developed by Epic Games but uses the company’s Unreal Engine 4 technology), is one of this year’s most anticipated Xbox One titles.

Tim Sweeney writes: “Microsoft is moving against the entire PC industry – including consumers (and gamers in particular), software developers such as Epic Games, publishers like EA and Activision, and distributors like Valve and Good Old Games.

“Microsoft has launched new PC Windows features exclusively in UWP, and is effectively telling developers you can use these Windows features only if you submit to the control of our locked-down UWP ecosystem. They’re curtailing users’ freedom to install full-featured PC software, and subverting the rights of developers and publishers to maintain a direct relationship with their customers.”

A key concern is that Microsoft is set to include and update features in UWP that won’t be supported by older development platforms. This means that games studios will need to support and use UWP if they want games to remain at the cutting edge of games capabilities on Windows 10.

Microsoft has faced the ire of developers and PC gamers in the past. Its Games for Windows Live initiative, launched with Windows Vista, was an attempt to create a “walled garden” for the sale of PC games – it proved hugely controversial with gamers and game makers and the company later conceded that it “wasn’t the right approach”.

Currently, UWP will not affect Xbox One development. However, Phil Spencer, the head of Microsoft’s Xbox Division, announced at a press event in San Francisco last week that developers will be able to roll-out UWP-developed games onto the console. Sweeney fears that if Microsoft upgrades the hardware of the machine at some point in the future, Microsoft could seek to lock down game creators to the platform.

In response to Sweeney’s allegations, Kevin Gallo, corporate vice president of Windows at Microsoft, told the Guardian: “The Universal Windows Platform is a fully open ecosystem, available to every developer, that can be supported by any store. We continue to make improvements for developers; for example, in the Windows 10 November Update, we enabled people to easily side-load apps by default, with no UX required.

“We want to make Windows the best development platform regardless of technologies used, and offer tools to help developers with existing code bases of HTML/JavaScript, .NET and Win32, C+ + and Objective-C bring their code to Windows, and integrate UWP capabilities. With Xamarin, UWP developers can not only reach all Windows 10 devices, but they can now use a large percentage of their C# code to deliver a fully native mobile app experiences for iOS and Android. We also posted a blog on our development tools recently.”