We already knew that Epic had a serious hit on their hands with Fortnite, even if we don’t all agree it’s worth playing. The game is now available on all current generation hardware including cell phones, and has an active player count of 78 million monthly players. The game’s Battle Royale is entirely free to play yet rakes in several hundred million dollars a month. And now, it is clear that Epic is using this money to expand what they do with the Epic Games Store.

The Epic Games Store will be entirely digital, similar to that of Steam, and will offer an incredible incentive for developers to put their games on it. Most digital stores take roughly 30% of the profits for overhead, and this is across almost any store. Be it PSN, XBL, Steam and so on, so what exactly is Epic offering developers? They will be giving developers an unprecedented 88% of the profits, keeping only 12% for themselves for overhead fees.

Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney said in a press statement:

“As a developer ourselves, we have always wanted a platform with great economics that connects us directly with our players. Thanks to the success of Fortnite, we now have this and are ready to share it with other developers.”

This statement sounds like it’s not only good for the developers monetarily, but also for fan feedback and direct communication. Another cool thing that Epic is doing for developers who release on their store comes in the form of their engine, the Unreal Engine 4. If a developer uses the engine, they won’t have to pay any additional royalty fees past that 12%. Before, under the agreement for using Unreal Engine 4, if a developer grossed over $3,000 per calendar quarter they would have to pay 5% for the use of the engine. Now, with the advent of the Epic Games Store, that is no longer a thing, assuming the developer publishes solely on the Epic platform. The details aren’t all given yet, but we’re willing to bet they would still have to pay those royalties if they publish elsewhere.

But Wait, Epic Isn’t Done Yet

Along with the store announcement, Epic has further plans to launch a “Support-A-Creator” program. This will connect developers across several platforms like YouTube, Twitch and so on. The developers that take part in this can share a percentage of their game’s revenue with these video producers who make content about their game, with Epic covering the jumpstart costs for the first five percent. How neat is that? If you’re a streamer, you will now be able to have a direct tie to different developers AND make money as a sort of freelancer.

Already Making Headway

If you missed The Game Awards last night, there was quite a bit announced (no worries, we have a recap here). What many may have missed even if they did see it, was that quite a few of the new games announced were also announced to be launching on the Epic Games Store as well. It’s clearly enticing to developers, and we’re likely to see many other developers new and old bring their games to it.

What we wonder is, how will this affect other stores like Origin, Steam, and so on. Also, will they have policy changes to try and beat the competition to keep developers on their platform? Will it be a hit and become a new standard in the industry? Only time will tell. I guess you’ll just have to stay tuned to find out.

Let us know what you think in the comments below!