Epic Games is set to offer free mobile games on its platform later this year, aiming to challenge Google Play Store’s dominance. The gaming giant, known for titles like Fortnite and Fall Guys, announced during its Unreal Fest event in Seattle that it will expand its popular free gaming programme to mobile users.
It also announced plans to begin giving away free third-party titles on its mobile store. Since launching in 2018, the Epic Games Store has been a hit among PC gamers by offering free games weekly, and now, mobile gamers can expect the same perk.
At the Unreal Fest roundtable, Epic Games’ general manager, Steve Allison, revealed plans to launch up to 50 games on the mobile store by year-end, with Ark: Ultimate Mobile Edition being one of the first releases, according tomobilegamer.biz. However, Allison noted that the rollout may face a slight delay due to ongoing work on a “payment solution” that could push the launch back by a few months.
“In the holiday season, we’ll open up with our first third-party applications. We probably expect somewhere between 10 and 50 of them to be ready, and the biggest thing is just going to be implementing a payment solution, so that may push some of these out into the subsequent months,” Allison, said quoted Men's Journal. The company is also expanding the social aspects of its PC and mobile stores, he added. This covers cross-platform multiplayer and in-game chat, among other things.
Along with third-party games that will be available on the Epic Games Store, the company is also developing features that will allow users to collaborate and play together even if they are on different platforms, such as in-game chat and cross-platform interoperability, similar to what is seen in the PC versions.
Epic Games has also revealed that it is developing “self-publishing” capabilities that would enable developers to release their games on the store without requiring them to communicate with the firm.
Epic has recently accused Google and Samsung of preventing customers from installing apps from third-party shops and has filed a second antitrust case against the two companies. Epic Games filed a similar antitrust complaint against the internet behemoth roughly four years before the current action.
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