I'm pretty sure the internal projections made sense to them. Or I hope so!
I guess they are still burning a lot of China funny-money and Fortnite is making the dough as their main sources of funding. Not forgetting the Epic store is also taking off and becoming a serious contender in the digital games store space.
They are indeed building an entire ecosystem like no other. Where the different areas feeds into each other.
I do not know their current economy in detail. Far from! I can only assume that it is favorable. They have been moving super aggressively of recent times.
A few years ago they were SUPER pressured. Then Fortnite was retrofitted with the battleroyale game mode and saved the day!
Fornite is still raking in a whole lot of money.
Tencent bought a 40% stake in them. And injected $330 million.
I guess their studio back catalog brings in a little. But nothing super crazy.
The Epic Store makes money I'm sure.
Also the Epic Marketplace. But not in the same league as the Store.
Expecting current and future Unreal Engine licensing to be (very possibly) financially viable.
Also they went into more of a Publishing arrangement. This has still to materialize as a source of income.
Quixel and their new opening up Epic Online Services for other developers is pure expenditure. But important building blocks in their ecosystem. Indirectly it will bring more developers into their ecosystem. Good for them!
I can only assume they are also developing more internal titles at the moment with a heavy price tag.
And they have been spending a whole lot of cash on filling up their Store and Marketplace with time limited free titles and assets. Bribing us all with free goodies. Hard to complain about.
All in all they bring in a lot of cash and they burn a lot of cash. I expect them to be around for a long time. While making money for Tencent as they go along. Technically supporting the CCP-regime's long term plans.
Unity will be fine I'm sure. But their current product and overall strategy is currently looking a bit more pressured in the long run than it used to.
Their original mission statement to democratize game development has certainly worked above and beyond.
Gamers and developers are certainly on the winning side from all this competition.
**Edit** you could also make the case that for developers. Competition will increase even more. So it's a give or take. Depending on if you are on the winning or loosing side of increased competition. Currently even solo developers or very small teams can make some quality-wise insanely good looking game productions. The recently freely available photogrammetry assets will only increase this. Overall it should mean more opportunities for developers.
And we will have to stand out. From initial concept to final delivery(ries). Find the niches we can fill. And be the most excellent game makers, community builders, IP wizards, business makers and marketers we can be. In order to stand a chance on the global market. While not breaking out backs completely in the process.
And with the all the talk of sustainable anti-crunch development. Which I whole wholeheartedly support. We need to be aware that there is always someone out there in cheaper countries (and cheaper is not even a prerequisite) also working smarter and harder. Giving it their best.
It's a train of increased competition that's not about to stop.
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