The Epic Games Store is congruous with players wanting cheap PC games, and has been for the last several years. Every week, fans can visit a designated free games page for a weekly giveaway that highlights many different experiences depending on recent trends. Thursdays mark the rotation of the titles players can pick up alongside the announcement of what the next week will bring. Recently, the Epic Games Store has spread its giveaways to its mobile store as well, but PC users can still expect a free game to pick up every Thursday at 10 AM CT.
In fact, the week of May 8 will see the Epic Games Store give away titles that almost seem to celebrate the history of PC gaming. While Windows computers are still commonly used as gaming devices these days, PC gaming used to feature its own games more exclusively than they do now, separate from the console game ecosystem, but still adapted and evolved to the growing gaming landscape all the same. There are few combinations that show this off as well as Epic Games' giveaway of Deadtime Defenders and Touch Type Tale.
Epic Games Store Free Game Touch Type Tale Explained
Touch Type Tale is a Typing Game of Old
Now that smartphones have made it so almost everyone has a miniaturized computer in their pocket, typing has become an essential skill. Being able to type sentences to communicate has become dramatically more important in the digital age, and ways to learn how to type have evolved along the way. Those who have watched computers become more common in their day-to-day lives growing up may have learned their home row key by typing in a video game, and that makes Touch Type Tale a nostalgic freebie.
Touch Type Tale is a real-time strategy game that helps players improve their skill with a keyboard in order to progress. Through this unique combination, two genres dating from the 1980s and 1990s have merged together to create a challenge all its own. Fans will find themselves using words like "eve," "flush," and "macro" to do necessary tasks such as building, swordfighting, and other surprising actions. Each correctly typed word feels like a reward as hand-drawn environments and people move like a living medieval tapestry. Both its gimmick and its art style give Touch Type Tale plenty of charm, making it an inviting offering on the Epic Games Store free games page. It's hard to argue against picking it up when playing it may improve such an important skill at the same time.
Touch Type Tale puts itself as an RTS game first above its typing aspect, so it may be trickier than educational games meant to teach the skill. Players can adjust the difficulty, but basic typing skill is required to fully enjoy the game.
- Released
- November 4, 2024
- Developer(s)
- Pumpernickel Studio
- Publisher(s)
- Mythwright
- Engine
- Unreal Engine
- Multiplayer
- Online Multiplayer
WHERE TO PLAY
- Genre(s)
- Adventure, Strategy, Rhythm, Visual Novel
Epic Games Store Free Game Deadtime Defenders Explained
Players who pick up this Epic Games Store freebie will take on the role of an elite soldier tasked with exploring strange dimensions. During this journey, the soldier stumbles upon a world with a mysterious ongoing phenomenon called the "deadtime." All the while, each mission players take on hides rare weapons, and so the player's goal is to obtain them without falling to the horde of enemies they'll encounter. There's even an end-game mode for players to unlock in Deadtime Defenders full of legendary loot.
As the description suggests, Deadtime Defenders is a looter-shooter. While many players already have their favorite looter-shooter they go back to regularly, Deadtime Defenders stands out with its unique miniaturized art style. Looter-shooters may feel like a more recent sub-genre, but the first one, Hellgate: London, was released back in 2007. It may not be as old as the typing mechanics found in Touch Type Tale, but there's a reason as to why the looter-shooter genre is so commonplace in gaming today. Between Borderlands, Destiny, Remnant: From the Ashes and more, many of these games have found their way onto PC eventually. Now, Deadtime Defenders aims to join the ranks in players' Epic Games Store libraries at the hard-to-argue price of free.
- ESRB
- T For Teen // Blood, Violence
- Developer(s)
- Arcane Embers
- Publisher(s)
- Arcane Embers
- Early Access Release
- February 18, 2020
WHERE TO PLAY
- Genre(s)
- Beat 'Em Up, Looter Shooter, RPG
Deadtime Defenders and Touch Type Tale are a great example of the variety that the Epic Games Store can display throughout its free games campaign. As a pair of full-fledged titles, these two are a breath of fresh air for the storefront, considering plenty of live-service packages were given away throughout April instead of individual games. The free games giveaways by Epic are showing no sign of stopping anytime soon, so there's bound to be even more experiences at no cost in plenty of players' futures.
