A couple of months ago, we reported how Tim Sweeney came hard on Microsoft by accusing the software giant of creating a closed platform by bringing together PCs, mobiles, and consoles and moving everything in its own store. Till today, there is no love lost between the Epic Games CEO and Microsoft.
The matter was discussed at the last month build conference where Microsoft emphasized Windows was, is, and will remain an open platform for developers, still it couldn’t convince Tim Sweeney of Microsoft’s good will.
In his recent interview with GamesBeat, Tim Sweeney reiterated his stand against Microsoft saying the company is adopting a strategy similar to Apple’s, and looking to establish a closed ecosystem which will dramatically affect the rest of the industry.
“We want a direct relationship with our customers. To build a business and sell products to them. The most ridiculous thing is this. As a result of the digital distribution revolution, all of these giant retailers – Wal-Mart, Best Buy – were replaced by Microsoft, Apple, and Valve. It’s really critical that we fight to maintain the openness of the key platforms in our industry,” Sweeney said.
The reason Tim Sweeny is so miffed with Microsoft is because he said to have spent an almost 18th month in convincing the company against this strategy to no avail. He also noted that only developers that are paid by Microsoft are actually creating universal apps for Windows 10, and the interest in UWP is still low.
“Nobody is adopting UWP except for a small number of developers that Microsoft is paying to adopt UWP. The same goes for the Windows Store in Windows 8.1. It’s a dump for ports of Android games to Windows that Microsoft has paid for. If you search for ‘GTA’ in the Windows store, there’s this mobile GTA game. Where is GTA? It’s the number one game on the PC of all time, and it’s not there,” he said.
When asked why he was the only one to be vocal about this issue, he iterated that nobody is willing to take on such a big corporation, but acknowledged the consequences he is stating. Microsoft hasn’t responded to his latest comments as of now, but we will update this space when something comes out.