Ubisoft’s follow-up to The Division is coming to PC but it will be skipping the most popular storefront on the platform.
Ubisoft has confirmed through Polygon that The Division 2 will not be released on Steam but instead will be available through U-Play and the newly launched Epic Games Store.
“We have no plans currently on releasing Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 on Steam,” Ubisoft told Polygon via email.
The Division 2 represents Epic Games first high-profile exclusive to appear on the platform so it’ll be interesting to see how consumers react to the game not being available on Steam.
“We entrust Epic to deliver a smooth journey for our fans, from preordering the game and enjoying our Beta to the launch of Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 on March 15,” said Chris Early, Vice President of Partnerships at Ubisoft. “Epic continues to disrupt the videogame industry, and their third-party digital distribution model is the latest example, and something Ubisoft wants to support.”
Epic Games offers a better deal for developers to release their games on the new platform as Epic gives 88 percent of the revenue to the devs while it keeps just 12 percent. Steam takes a much bigger piece of the pie, starting with 30 percent but lowering depending on how the game sells.
U-Play games have always been tricky with Steam. Buying a U-Play game on Steam still required U-Play to launch while playing, taking away part of the reason for buying it on Steam in the first place.
The Division 2 launches March 15 on PS4, Xbox One and PC.