After claiming Steam's fees cost Valve some of the biggest games around, Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney doubled down, insisting that "lower fees and more openness might increase Steam profit." Sweeney pointed to companies "like Epic, Riot, and MiHoYo" as notable Steam skippers, and was swiftly reminded that Genshin Impact maker MiHoYo, now more commonly known by its HoYoverse or Cognosphere arms, has a growing presence on Steam.
A recent Twitter post from Sweeney wades into discussion of his comments regarding Steam. He responded to a user who sarcastically said "it is Steam's fault that Epic won't put their game on there apparently."
In full, Sweeney replied, "Here’s what’s happening economically: Steam charges such high fees that developers with strong brands and big enough audiences, like Epic, Riot, and MiHoYo find it more profitable to go it alone. Ironically, lower fees and more openness might increase Steam profit."
This quickly earned Sweeney a Twitter community note which clarifies that MiHoYo has had games on Steam since the 2021 relaunch of Honkai Impact 3rd, and, just weeks ago, released its action RPG Zenless Zone Zero on Steam to great success and reviews.
Additionally, new files spotted in the HoYoverse launcher suggest a Steam version of Genshin Impact may be on the way. However, this could also be a consequence of shared code that's not indicative of future changes.
Zenless Zone Zero came to Steam alongside the release of its big 3.0 update, a major season-like milestone. Genshin Impact is six weeks away from a similar milestone, update 7.0, which would be a tidy anchor for a Steam release. Speculation whirls that HoYoverse will push to reach more players with the final known chapter of Genshin's current regional storyline, which will begin with the release of the Snezhnaya area in update 7.0, perhaps by entreating the Steam audience.
There are a few other factors in the mix here. Zenless Zone Zero is the smallest of the modern HoYoverse games, trailing Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail in virtually all known metrics. A relevant counterpoint here is the game's presence on PC and PlayStation, with Sony showering partner awards on ZZZ amid chart-topping results, making mobile-only comparisons less useful. Zenless' seemingly much smaller audience may have made it a more appealing test for a Steam version. Importantly, Zenless also allowed account linking, letting existing players move to the Steam ecosystem and bring their account and potential purchases with them.
Sweeney doesn't specify it, but Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail are available on the Epic Games Store, which takes a smaller cut of sales than Steam. HoYoverse made a big show of its Epic partnership back in 2021, and it's unclear what terms Epic offered the company.
The latest Epic Games Store annual report confirms that fellow gacha RPG Wuthering Waves, Honkai: Star Rail, and Genshin Impact are, in that order, all among the store's top five "Mythic" PC games. Zenless Zone Zero, meanwhile, is in Epic's "Legendary" game tier alongside Grand Theft Auto 5, Infinity Nikki (another gacha game), Dead by Daylight, and EA Sports FC 26 (a gacha game in disguise).
By Sweeney's own logic of fees versus reach, revenue split alone may not explain HoYoverse's decision to skip Steam until recently. The Epic Games Store only attracts a small portion of the PC audience, and only 16 to 18% of users brought in by free games actually buy games on the store afterward, so with the Epic partnership, HoYo surely would've done some math on what it stood to gain when you put additional players on the scale with migrating players and third-party fees.
