We now know how much the Epic Games Store paid for 505 Games and Remedy’s Control — despite the game failing to make various top ten charts. According to Digital Bros. (parent company of 505 Games), we learn that Epic paid £8.36 million / €9.49 million / $10.45 million respectively for the third-person shooter.
The news broke thanks to Digital Bros. posting up its consolidated and separate report document for June 30th, 2019, on digitalbros.com.
As per usual, social justice activist and analyst for Niko Partners, Daniel Ahmad, caught wind of all of this and did some calculating to reveal what Epic dished out to have Control as a timed exclusive.
Digital Bros, parent company of 505 Games, has disclosed that they received a payment of 9.49 million euro from Epic Games for Control.
Which I would imagine is for exclusivity.
55% of that payment going to 505 Games.
Report here: https://t.co/ocmbIQeOfJ
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) September 20, 2019
Some people questioned Ahmad and thought that the £8.36 million / €9.49 million / $10.45 million had contribution from PS4 and Xbox One pre-orders, but that couldn’t be any further from the truth in that zero payment went out before June 30th in the console department.
Payment for Control was 9.49 million euro total, all from Epic.
PS4 and XB1 had pre-orders too but 0 payment before June 30th.
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) September 20, 2019
And then a naysayer rose up to dispel the whole thing like it was a false notion only to find that Digital Bros. indeed confirmed Ahmad’s previous tweets in the consolidated report.
Control is also listed separately at 9.49m. So 100% of it was for Control.
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) September 20, 2019
Another individual that happened to read the actual report found the same results as Ahmad and notes that Control’s earning derived from the digital marketplace that requested exclusivity for its distribution:
Yep. The payment from Epic was 100% for Control and was for the exclusivity deal. There was no payment from Sony or Microsoft.
Unclear if there were any other strings attached to the payment, other than exclusivity ofc. https://t.co/5BbHuiuA3n
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) September 20, 2019
Despite Remedy and 505 Games looking to bring new content to Control, the third-person shooter isn’t getting over with gamers even when heavily discounted. We know this because the game dropped off the UK charts during the second week, and according to the U.S. analyst social justice activist himself, Mat Piscatella, the game sits at the 23rd spot on the NPD Group’s chart:
Quick hit takes – Wow Minecraft, Wow GTAV, Age of Wonders surprised, no digital tracking for Control hurts, software was rough overall, but should recover in Sept. Switch carrying hardware in a big way.
— Mat Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) September 12, 2019
23rd for the month.
— Mat Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) September 12, 2019
So there you have it, the £8.36 million / €9.49 million / $10.45 million by Epic is funding the “Expeditions” which is a new game mode set for this December, the first expansion dubbed “The Foundation” set for release in early 2020, and a second expansion rocking the moniker “Awe” sometime in the mid-part of 2020.