Free games were a great way to "get us there" but not a great way to monetize us. They haven't come up with that. I've bought exactly 3 games on Epic, two that I price-camped because they were too expensive. The free games didn't influence my decision.

The third was a free game where they had the best price around on a "more complete edition". (Pathfinder Kingmaker). I feel like they could've done more of that if they wanted to monetize the free.

But what all these game stores need is to change the rules. GoG tried by making their Galaxy app pretty good at importing others' apps. I feel like someone (Epic? lol) could go all-in supporting and helping maintain an open-source game management app like Playnite, so people who use that app would put Epic on the same tier as Steam, and then Epic would just have to win on an even playing field.

And if Epic provided a "find your price in all services" extension to an app like Playnite, and then just made sure to be $1 cheaper on everything, they'd dominate the market.

Or they could just continue doing what they're doing and keep losing money.