[Feature] Epic Games Store support

[btegs]

Lutris has support for bringing in your library from the Epic Games Store, so I was wondering if there were plans of adding support for it in GameHub. Can have it like with GOG where you can use the built in Proton or WINE to run the games.

[neuromancer]

(Somehow) duplicated of #240

[treymerkley]

Would @tkashkin be up to explaining why they dislike Epic and wouldn't accept pull requests? I haven't really been able to quite get why people dislike EGS so much, other than Epic's aggressive EGS-only strategy, which to me would be moot as a talking point if we had a solid launcher on Linux to work with it. This is just my take on it, which is why I'm asking.

[tkashkin]

@treymerkley

Would @tkashkin be up to explaining why they dislike Epic

Sure, it will be a long rant.

I don't like EGS and don't use it for multiple reasons:

• Their launcher doesn't have most features I care about in Steam.
  For example (without a particular order): Linux support, community, achievements, controller support, VR, Workshop, cloud saves, etc.
  (I've heard they may have implemented cloud saves for some games but I'm not sure)
• I care about SteamInput and SteamVR because I have a Steam Controller and HTC Vive.
  I like Valve hardware and probably would've already upgraded to Valve Index if it was sold here.
• I don't understand how did Epic release their platform in such state in late 2018. It doesn't look like they want to improve their platform. They have already missed deadlines on their roadmap and fixed that by removing dealines.
• They don't support Linux at all. That's not a huge dealbreaker for me, I triple-boot anyway and I still mostly game on Windows.
  (why did I even start this project then? idk) 😕
• As a consumer I don't really care about developer's publisher's cut. However I care about platform features and I can see where most of 30% Valve gets are spent.
• And, of course, exclusives.
  I wouldn't mind if they would fund exclusive game development like Sony does.
  I also wouldn't mind if their own games were EGS exclusives, like Valve own games are Steam exclusives and EA games are Origin exclusives.
  But I care when game that was marketed on Steam, that was available for preorders on Steam or that I have wishlisted on Steam suddenly moves to EGS.

And after all of that I don't have any reason to even try EGS.
I don't care about their free games, I have large enough libraries on Steam and GOG. I'm sure I probably won't play even half of my games in my lifetime.

In a last few years Steam and GOG did fully convert me from being a pirate into a paying customer. On the other hand EGS doesn't look any more appealing compared to torrent.

---

wouldn't accept pull requests

Where did I say that? I said I don't want to implement it myself since I don't use EGS, don't like it and wouldn't be able to test integration.

I don't use itch.io either, but @hagabaka has sent an initial implementation and now we are working on itch.io integration in #65. (however I do like itch.io model unlike EGS)

---

Hopefully I have explained my thoughts on it.

[treymerkley]

Hey, thanks for the write-up! I guess my perspective is different because of how much I use either platform, and how I think of GameHub: I only use EGS for their free games and occasionally playing Fortnite with friends when everyone's bored, and I've liked their larger cut to publishers, if only because indie game development sucks just like the rest of the industry and any way to help another dev out I'm happy with.

Conversely, I really like the look of GameHub and could see it replacing Steam Big Picture for me, so "x feature over y" doesn't mean anything for me because I can import the game into either and be pretty happy.

I completely misunderstood your position in #240. I thought you were saying that you would refuse anything EGS related being added to GameHub, not simply that you won't actively develop for it. I apologize.

[OvermindDL1]

I don't understand how did Epic release their platform in such state in late 2018. It doesn't look like they want to improve their platform. They have already missed deadlines on their roadmap and fixed that by removing dealines.

You'd understand more if you knew more about Epic-the-company, they've long been slow on development (though that was primarily on engine work in the past, rather than a store).

They don't support Linux at all. That's not a huge dealbreaker for me, I triple-boot anyway and I still mostly game on Windows.

It's a huge dealbreaker for me, I only use linux.

As a consumer I don't really care about developer's publisher's cut. However I care about platform features and I can see where most of 30% Valve gets are spent.

I understand the cut that they want, however Steam has immensely better service and features, everything from server hosting and matchmaking, ban handling, forums, mod distribution (big one here), lots of optional features that devs can put into their application (which do not make it require steam to use unless they program it to do so), in addition the devs are allowed to give away or sell steam keys on other services (as long as they also sell on steam for the same price) at no cost (steam takes no cut, yet the game still supports full features), as well as just so much more that I'm leaving out for brevity sake. The Epic Store supports not even what most would consider the bare minimum.

If devs took advantage of even a fraction of what steam offers it would not only save them money (probably enough to offset than 18% extra cut) from their own hosting and licensing costs, but would add so many more features for their community as well.

And, of course, exclusives.

I'm against the concept of exclusives, period. Steam at no point has ever EVER mandated an exclusive (or even gives any bonuses at all for being exclusive, there is no bonus whatsoever for being exclusive on steam nor has there ever been).

I also wouldn't mind if their own games were EGS exclusives, like Valve own games are Steam exclusives and EA games are Origin exclusives.

Eh, Valve's games needed steam to be installed, but they did not require purchasing on steam, there were other places (mostly brick and morter) that they could be purchased from, but still, that is a dev choice, not steam mandating anything.

But I care when game that was marketed on Steam, that was available for preorders on Steam or that I have wishlisted on Steam suddenly moves to EGS.

This, this right here is one of the big thing that shows the true colors and why I will not even support them now even if they got every steam feature out, similar reasons I don't use Windows, company morals is a big thing for me.

I don't care about their free games, I have large enough libraries on Steam and GOG. I'm sure I probably won't play even half of my games in my lifetime.

...yeah, I relate..

In a last few years Steam and GOG did fully convert me from being a pirate into a paying customer. On the other hand EGS doesn't look any more appealing compared to torrent.

Also agree there, though for me it was more of ~15 years ago that it 'converted' me. I'm happy to pay, but it must be more useful than getting it other ways, and steam is dead simple with the features I quite like, in addition to GoG, Humble Bundle, and Itch.io, they all support my platform and make it trivial to acquire whatever I want with 2-click payments in most cases.

A big thing for me, I feel absolutely no need to play a game if I don't agree with their morals, I won't pirate it, I won't even think about it ever again in my life and I write off the company. There are more than enough games to play otherwise, not just in my account but others via reputable devs that there is just no need worrying about the latest and prettiest XYZ game. I absolutely at this point in time (without EGS going through a major cleanup, including getting rid of the current CEO) will not support EGS, nor any game dev that chooses to go exclusive with them (not just their game, but the entire dev is blackballed at that point, will not even touch their past games that I might otherwise already own).

[neuromancer]

Just wanted to say that I think all the reasons exposed are quite interesting to read and discuss! Beyond that, if someone is planing to work on this feature in the future, it could be a good idea to take a look to this code which is used to download Fortnite game files using Epic's servers.

[treymerkley]

Hey, it's in C#, neato. That'll make conversion pretty easy. So what would it take, then, to spin it into something more general?

[neuromancer]

To be honest, I have no idea. I think a good first step is to ask the author of that code how likely is to get a more general code to download other games, apart from Fortnite.

[treymerkley]

WorkingRobot/FortniteDownloader#4

[treymerkley]

Okay, so it looks like what would be needed would be to be able to fetch the owned games for the user, and then from there feed the name to a fetching URL. They appear to have a public API, so that's good.

[neuromancer]

A small update on this. I just saw this open-source replacement for the Epic Games Launcher in case anyone is interested in reviving this feature.

[dotevo]

I'm not sure if someone started to investigate that issue. I've started digging into GameHub source code and I was able to use legendary (provided by @neuromancer ) to integrate EGS with GameHub. I'm far far away from ready solution but I have something:

I can install game and run it.

[neuromancer]

OMG, that's amazing! is your branch ready for testing? I can give it a try in that case..