On April 22, 2021, the Epic Games Store, the large digital storefront best known for its games, opened its shelves to a handful of non-gaming applications. The most consequential of them is Itch.io, the marketplace where small independent developers sell their work, which now appears inside a far larger house. For the many creators who struggle to be seen amid the crowd, the move offers a new doorway into a vast audience, though a separate account still stands between a visitor and the games themselves. It is one more step in a store slowly learning to be something larger than a shop for games
Epic Games Store Adds Itch.io and Four Non-Gaming Apps, Widening Its Storefront Beyond Games
On April 22, 2021, the Epic Games Store, the large digital storefront best known for its games, opened its shelves to a handful of non-gaming applications. The most consequential of them is Itch.io, the marketplace where small independent developers sell their work, which now appears inside a far larger house. For the many creators who struggle to be seen amid the crowd, the move offers a new doorway into a vast audience, though a separate account still stands between a visitor and the games themselves. It is one more step in a store slowly learning to be something larger than a shop for games.
On April 22, 2021, Epic announced that several non-gaming apps had gone live on the Epic Games Store. The one drawing the most attention is Itch.io, the storefront for indie games, which now sits as an app inside a much larger storefront.
The pairing is unusual, but it could matter a great deal to small developers, who often struggle to get their games in front of big audiences. Itch.io already had its own desktop app. What changes is where people can find it: the Epic Games Store, which had more than 160 million users as of January 2021. Even a small share of those users downloading the app could mean millions of new visitors for Itch.io and its thousands of smaller games.
There is a catch. Buying and playing games still requires a separate Itch.io account, so the listing is a new doorway rather than a merged login. The Kotaku writer judged the extra step worth it, pointing to the many free games on the service.
The other additions include Brave, a free open-source browser that lets people send tokens to websites through cryptocurrency, KenShape, a tool that turns pixel art into blocky 3D models, Krita, a long-established painting app, and iHeartRadio, a radio and podcast service. This follows Spotify's arrival in December 2020, a sign that Epic wants its store to be more than a place to buy games.
What to watch is which apps come next, and whether Itch.io's presence actually sends new audiences to indie developers. No download figures or developer reactions exist yet, so the size of any effect remains an open question.
On April 22, 2021, Epic announced that a group of non-gaming apps had gone live on the Epic Games Store. The one that drew the most attention was Itch.io, the storefront for indie games, which now sits as an app inside another storefront.
The pairing is an odd one, as Kotaku's report put it, but it could matter a great deal to small developers, who often struggle to put their games in front of larger audiences. Itch.io already had its own downloadable desktop app. What changes is where it can be found: the Epic Games Store, which had more than 160 million users as of January 2021. If even a small share of those users download the Itch.io app, the report reasoned, the result could be millions of new users for Itch.io and for the thousands of smaller games sold there.
There is a catch. Buying and playing games through Itch.io still requires a separate Itch.io account, so the Epic listing is a new doorway rather than a merged login. Kotaku's writer judged the extra step worth it, pointing to the many free games available on the service.
Itch.io was not the only addition. The report's headline count lists five other apps, though the descriptions cover four. Brave is a free, open-source web browser that lets people send Basic Attention Tokens to websites through cryptocurrency blockchains, a feature the Kotaku writer called horrible-sounding. KenShape is a simple tool that turns 2D pixel-art drawings into blocky 3D models, which can be exported into various game engines. Krita, a painting and drawing app that has been around for some time and is already popular, now has a listing on the store. iHeartRadio, a podcast and internet radio service, offers hundreds of radio stations from around the country along with a long list of podcasts.
This was not Epic's first move beyond games. In December 2020, the company added Spotify to the store, which was read as a sign that the Fortnite developer wanted the storefront to be more than a place to buy games. Today's additions, the report said, confirm that Epic has more plans to build the store up.
What to watch is which apps arrive next, and whether Itch.io's presence on the Epic Games Store actually sends new audiences toward indie developers. The report offers no download figures or developer reactions yet, so the size of any effect is still an open question.
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