Two more fantastic PC titles are on offer through the Epic Games Store‘s fortnightly free game service, as the point and click adventure title Thimbleweed Park launches on the store today. Then, on March 7, the eclectic Slime Rancher will take its place as the latest in a string of games offered to users as an incentive for signing up to the relatively new digital marketplace.
The two games join a growing list of games which have been gifted to users of the Epic Games Store, including Axiom Verge, Super Meat Boy and the BAFTA award-winning What Remains of Edith Finch. In a system not unlike PlayStation Plus’ monthly free games offering, the Epic Games Store has been trying out these incentive programs as a means of maintaining user interest and courting new ones. To claim your download all you need to do is sign up for a free account on the store or simply log back in with an existing one. However, unlike PlayStation Plus, there is no subscription so users can keep the game past any certain date.
So far no solid user data has been made public about the newest face in the digital games marketplace though early numbers suggest that the Epic Games Store has seen an influx of younger users who have come to the store through popular battle royale title, Fortnite. Despite the store’s greatest challenge being the overarching prevalence of Valve’s Steam store, these numbers indicate that the younger users had never even owned a Steam account, making the Epic Games Store possibly their first experience with a PC digital marketplace.
This potentially new audience would not carry with it the weight of expectations from older users accustomed to Steam’s systems. This, when paired with offering users free game every fortnight, could possibly create a new generation of Epic Games Store users.
While these younger users may not get a huge amount out of the retro-inspired adventure Thimbleweed Park, March’s first free game is sure to be a hit. Developer by Monomi Park, Slime Rancher tasks players with attending to a sci-fi farm full of adorable slime monsters who need to be fed and cared for through a series of lite-farming sim activities.
You can download Thimbleweed Park through the Epic Games Store right now until March 7 when Slime Rancher will become available.
