At the conference Unreal Fest Steve Ellison, General Manager of Epic Games Store, spoke about the company’s plans to develop the mobile version of the store.
Until now, the mobile Epic Games Store offered mostly the company’s own hits — Fortnite and Fall Guys. Ellison said that Epic is planning a large-scale expansion of the platform, which includes up to 50 third-party games by the end of 2024.
Epic Games wants to adapt the successful model of giving away free games from the PC version of the store to mobile devices. This strategy helped the company attract millions of users on personal computers.
In addition to the free games program, Epic Games is preparing a number of other innovations for the mobile platform. In the first half of 2025, the company intends to introduce tools that will allow developers to publish their games independently
Epic Games is also working on the introduction of social features and cross-platform gaming. These features are planned to be added by the end of 2025.
One of the first third-party games in the mobile Epic Games Store will be Ark: Ultimate Mobile Edition. Its release is scheduled for the end of 2024.
Epic Games has announced a new program «launch everywhere with Epic». It provides for a royalty reduction of up to 3.5% for games powered by Unreal Engine that are released on the Epic Games Store at the same time as other platforms or earlier.
Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games, criticized Apple and Google’s policies on mobile app stores. He accused the companies of creating obstacles for developers and «excessive taxation».
Source: Neowin, Mobilegamer