The head of Epic Games, Tim Sweeney, has now announced that PC players will not have the option to start a preload for the shooter Borderlands 3 . The reason: The feature is not yet finished in the Epic Games Store.
Here is the announcement: The Epic head, Tim Sweeney, was asked on Twitter whether one could download Borderlands 3 before the release. Because players want to start immediately at midnight on release and not wait for the thing to be downloaded.
The response of the self-made billionaire is sober: I’m sorry, but we will not support a preload when the release of Borderlands is imminent.
It indicates: The feature is simply not ready yet.
“You are only interested in Fortnite”
This is how fans react: The person who asked thanks politely.
But other users are not so thankful. One user on Reddit says that he hopes the servers of Epic Games will withstand the download stress on the release day of such an AAA title.
For critics, directly on Twitter, the cancellation of the preload is a confirmation that the Epic Games Store does not provide a real alternative to Steam and that it was a mistake to release Borderlands 3 exclusively there.
There are some flames “You don’t even try anymore” or “You are only interested in Fortnite.”
A quote from Borderlands head, Randy Pitchford, from April 2019 is dredged up, stating that the Epic Games Store will be a different entity in September when Borderlands 3 releases, than it was at that time in April.
This is the thing with Epic and Borderlands 3: The Epic Games Store has secured the exclusive rights to Borderlands 3 for PC. This is done to get closer to the major competitor Steam and take market share from it.
Sweeney has said that the only thing that really helps to attack the quasi-monopolist are exclusive titles.
From Sweeney’s perspective, Steam needs to be attacked because they ask for too much money from developers and that this is bad for the industry in the long run.
Epic Games faces criticism for exclusivity policy
This bothers the fans: Players who want to play Borderlands 3 on PC are practically “forced” into the Epic Games Store.
However, players accuse the Epic Games Store of not offering the features that have long been standard on Steam. This includes features like rating games, commenting, or starting a preload.
Epic says that they will bring many of the features in the future, but they are not yet available at the moment.
Critical players believe that Epic should invest their money and efforts to build a strong store – not in exclusive titles. Epic is accused by other competitors of throwing money around to buy advantages.
The statement now that there will be no preload for Borderlands 3 is fuel for the critics who already have reservations about Epic.
The critics are also angry at Gearbox CEO, Randy Pitchford. They feel that he has sold them out. However, Pitchford already responded back then, that the choice for Epic was the publisher’s decision, not his as studio head.
