Fortnite’s popularity has elevated its developer Epic Games to a new level with the company able to start its own game-distributing store and pursue other opportunities, but the company’s CEO said it’s still not anywhere near as big as other tech giants like Google or Facebook. However, Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney said that’s the level Epic Games would like to see itself at. Keeping Fortnite’s popularity in mind along with those other ventures, Sweeney said “we are a business very well positioned” to reach the same level as though two companies.

Sweeney spoke to Variety about the size that Epic Games has grown to and credited events such as Ninja playing with Drake and the massive Marshmello concert as some of the driving factors behind the size that the game’s at now. Saying that “Fortnite is a harbinger of things to come” when talking about how the industry is changing, Sweeney also compared the game to a social network where players can converge and socialize with one another while playing.

The talk then turned to Sweeney’s comparisons to Google and Facebook which referenced the Epic Games Store, the new PC marketplace that’s been selling games and snatching exclusives recently. Sweeney said the company isn’t on par with Google and Facebook yet, but that doesn’t mean it’s not possible.

“We feel now is the time and we have very large ambitions,” Sweeney said. “Even with our game engine, our business with the Epic Game Store, we’re still nowhere near the size of Google or Facebook. We really aspire to be that level of a supplier to the developers of the world.

“When you line-up Fortnite with the other things we’re doing we are a business very well positioned to do that,” he continued.

Along with Fortnite’s success and the new Epic Games Store, Epic Games also has its Unreal Engine backing up these endeavors. Plenty of developers use Unreal Engine to build their games, and Sweeney told Variety that Epic Games plans to “pour a lot of resources” into the Unreal Engine team while the company is also “entertaining some experimental projects.”



Posted: Mar 31, 2019 7:57 pm
Related Forum: Gaming Discussion

Source: https://comicbook.com/gaming/2019/03/30/fortnite-epic-games-big-as-facebook-or-google/