Epic Games: Crossplay with Steam should finally come

A message that hardly anyone would have expected: Epic Games wants to build bridges instead of barricades and is finally enabling crossplay between the in-house platform and Steam.

Until now, Valve’s popular platform and Epic’s own offering have been strictly separate. This should now come to an end, because Epic enables game developers with the appropriate tools to let players play together via both launchers on the PC.

Epic Games and Steam: Crossplay is intended to bring the community together

Epic Games justifies its decision in a blog post with the fact that it creates a simple way for developers to bring the different communities together. In addition, one promises to simplify the work on games. The most recently presented developer tools for the PC are just a start, others, possibly intended for consoles, are to follow in the future.

In the blog finds The publisher put it in clear terms: “In order to reach all target groups, the developers have to port their titles to several shops and platforms by setting up different services and account systems for each shop. Since these services are not interoperable, players cannot play with friends who bought the same game from different retailers even though they own the same game.”

Crossplay on the rise – much to the delight of players

While we’ve probably been wondering for ages what’s the argument against crossplay, the topic has long been forbidden fruit for most developers. But the advent of cross-platform gaming is unstoppable: After Microsoft had already become a pioneer with the Xbox Game Pass, Sony also followed suit, at least with individual PlayStation-exclusive titles.

Much to the delight of gamers, for them the upheaval means they are no longer dependent on a particular console or platform, especially not to be able to play with their friends. The fact that Epic Games in particular dares to take the step towards its main competitor, Steam, should be seen as a milestone.