The Epic Games Store is coming to the Microsoft Store, for some reason
Stores within stores within stores
Microsoft are making a new Microsoft Store, and you'll be able to download even more stores from it. They've announced that they're adding a number of third-party storefront apps, including Amazon and Epic Games. These will arrive sometime in the next few months, after the new Microsoft Store launches alongside Windows 11 next week. Finally, you'll be able to launch a store you don't want from a store you really don't want.
"Just like any other app, third-party storefront apps will have a product detail page that can be found via search or by browsing – so that users can easily find and install it with the same confidence as any other app in the Microsoft Store on Windows," Microsoft say.
You won't be able to browse the games on the Epic Games Store through the Microsoft Store, they're just letting you download the Epic app. They say they "look forward to welcoming other stores in the future" too, so we'll see more storeception down the line.
Back in April, Epic added the better store Itch.io to their platform, which means soon you could launch Itch from Epic from Microsoft. I don't know why you would want to when you could simply find the store you want via your browser, but hey, it's certainly an option.
I am curious, would you use a store to find another store? When I want to download something like that I typically run to Google. I do appreciate that being on a larger platform is good for an indie-focused store like Itch, because it would drive more people to check it out. But Epic and Microsoft are both quite large, and both quite rubbish.
At any rate, the new Microsoft Store will arrive alongside Windows 11 on October 5th, which will be a free upgrade from Windows 10 if you want it. If you don't, Windows 10 will still be supported until 2025, so you have a good four years until Microsoft cut your updates off.