American video game developer Epic Games revealed several statistics for the past year of 2019 for its Epic Games Store. With a multitude of releases and the massive popularity of battle royale title Fortnite, Epic has become a household name to many gamers.
Epic Games Store in 2019
Epic Games Store attracted 108 million customers on PC, who spent a total of $680 million on game purchases and in-game transactions. In addition, a further $251 million was spent by players on third-party PC games in the Epic Games Store. The numbers described above reflect actual spending by customers and don’t include the value of coupons, Epic Games’ funding of developers, or other promotions.
Over $23 million worth of coupons and discounts were fully funded by Epic. In total, 73 games were offered for free over the past year, with a total value of $1,455. These games had an average critical score of 80% according to review aggregation website Open Critic. In addition, over 200 million of these free games were claimed by Epic Games Store users.
A popular feature released by Epic Games was the creator code. This allows influencers, content creators, and personalities to create their own coupon or promo code that supporters can use. In turn, the former receives a percentage cut of the player spending. Creator Codes were used 1.73 million times on third-party store purchases, with 235 countries represented by creators.
Massive growth with Fortnite success
Epic Games grew on social media, with 2.32 million followers on Instagram, 3.41 million followers on Twitter, and 644,000 followers on Facebook at the end of 2019. The United States made up the greatest active player base for the digital game store at 17.24%, followed by Russia in 2nd at 10.15% and China in 3rd at 8.36%. Countries like Brazil, Germany, France, Poland, and the United Kingdom followed closely.
The most popular titles included World War Z, Satisfactory, Dauntless, Untitled Goose Game, The Outer Worlds, Borderlands 3, Metro Exodus, Tom Clancy’s: The Division 2, and Control. Upcoming exclusive releases consist of games like the new Magic: The Gathering, Predator Hunting Grounds, Auto Chess, Rogue Company, and Godfall.
Featuring 88% revenue sharing, support for developer and publisher payment systems, and integration with platform-independent online services, Epic has attracted many publishers looking to leverage recent popularity from titles like Fortnite.
