DARQ has received a lot of attention as of late, owing at least a portion of it to the fact that Epic rejected the game because the developer did not want to pull DARQ off Steam.
Namely, Unfold Games wanted for DARQ to be available on as wide a variety of platforms as possible, which includes the Epic Store. However, it seems Epic isn’t interested in selling a game if it doesn’t afford them leverage over other, more popular platforms.
“It was important to me to give players what they wanted: options,” said Unfold, citing their decision not to infringe on player’s choice of game marketplace. As you might expect, Epic wanted for DARQ to be available solely on their platform, as an exclusive, and this didn’t sit well with the dev.
Furthermore, the only reason Unfold even mentioned that they had rejected Epic is because of the recent Ooblets controversy, which painted everyone it pertained to in a bad light. Fans of DARQ asked if same thing was going to happen with Unfold, which they had to refute right away.
As shown above, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney seems to be contradicting himself a bit. If Epic wishes for there to be a “multi-store future” where multiple video game marketplaces butt heads without unnecessary drama, it is strange that they would ask of indie devs to release exclusively on Epic, or not at all.
“I wish there wasn’t a double standard and indie developers were given an equal oportunity to sell their games across multiple store fronts, so the players can enjoy what they seem to want the most: a choice,” concluded Unfold.
