• merc@sh.itjust.works
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    4 hours ago

    Pop it in your calendars? Maybe I’m using calendars wrong, but mine aren’t filled with things I should avoid doing. But, I’m willing to learn. What date should I put “Don’t Buy Subnautica 2” on?

  • Cheems@lemmy.world
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    1 hour ago

    Nooooooooooooooo I was literally just talking about being excited for this game.

  • Lovable Sidekick@lemmy.world
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    3 hours ago

    I will support this by continuing to be apathetic toward (and in fact ignorant of) the game known as Subnautica 2.

      • JackbyDev@programming.dev
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        2 hours ago

        First one was a cool premise but really annoying in some ways. The game sort of assumes you get certain fragments of blue prints by certain points but doesn’t actually make them easy to find nor really give you any hints to find them.

        For people who’ve played it was for the sea moth and and later the moon well.

  • ssillyssadass@lemmy.world
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    5 hours ago

    You should get a publisher if:

    You want to make one game then get fired

    You want your work to be bastardized by the publisher in the future

    You want countless hours of overtime/crunch and no compensation

    You want to be another disposable cog in the machine

    If that doesn’t sound like something you want, self-publish.

    • Wolf@lemmy.today
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      6 hours ago

      You Don’t Need a F-ing Publisher*

      *unless you do.

      It would just require smaller teams making lower budget games that are more focused on Art than sales, which I would be really happy about honestly. Too many people are in this industry solely to rake in the big bucks.

        • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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          3 hours ago

          Source?

          Pretty much every popular indie game has a publisher. Publishers are great because they provide relatively low cost marketing, the trick is to be careful when signing a contract that you don’t sign away too much while still getting value from them.

        • Wolf@lemmy.today
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          5 hours ago

          If you are going to compete with AAA games it’s going to require a big budget, which not all Devs have access to.

          A high quality AA game would probably do great, but would be unlikely to outsell a AAA with hundreds of millions of dollars for budget.

          Obsidian made a fantastic game with Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire but it was considered a ‘failure’ sales wise (at least at launch), despite being well received.

          Obsidian sold to Micro$oft despite making very high quality games and their crowdfunding campaigns consistently earning more money than they were asking for. The stated reason was they found it hard to keep their employees paid consistently and they didn’t want to lay people off. Also that they thought they could do just as good as other big players in the industry if they had access to larger budgets.

          I think it was a bad move. They managed to survive the massive round of 9,000 jobs cuts to Microsoft’s gaming division (this time), but you just know that Microsoft would cut them in a heartbeat if they thought it would save them a dime in the future. That being said I think it’s understandable to want to see your employees paid, and it’s just a sad fact that AAA games require huge budgets nowadays, so I can kind of understand why they sold, even if I don’t agree with it.

    • abigscaryhobo@lemmy.world
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      6 hours ago

      It sucks that this is going around too. Because no matter what the “right” choice is the devs are still gonna have to see what should have just been their fun project get thrown around in gaming politic hell

    • Ashtear@lemmy.zip
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      4 hours ago

      Everyone seems to be more interested in the latest techbro feud so I wanted to highlight what he said about Unknown Worlds staff not being given specifics on what their compensation will be. The statement was quite nebulous on that.

      Gods, I hate this culture. Make concrete, public promises to your staff to follow through on your acquisition deal? Nah, can’t have that. Open yourself up to liability by throwing the former execs under the bus, in detail? No problem!

    • buttnugget@lemmy.world
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      6 hours ago

      I’m sure there’s some truth in there, but it is hard to believe it entirely. This is what you get for unnecessarily selling your company.

  • BackgrndNoize@lemmy.world
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    6 hours ago

    I don’t understand how game dev works, how does a publishing company fire the CEO of a game dev company. Like do these publishers own the game company?

  • Signtist@bookwyr.me
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    10 hours ago

    They did all this because they know that the vast majority of the playerbase will never hear about this, and many of those that do will either forget, or simply not care enough to boycott the game. We’re in an age of apathy across the board, with so much bad press that any given scandal just fades into the background noise.