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[Draugoth]

Game developers defend Lord of the Rings Gollum's poor reviews: "No one wants to ship a bad game"

Fellow devs are sharing their experiences of rocky launches

www.gamesradar.com

It's no secret that Daedalic Entertainment's Lord of the Rings game hasn't been received very well. In our The Lord of the Rings: Gollum review, we gave it 2 out of 5 stars with many other outlets giving it a similar, if not worse, rating. With all the bleak discussion surrounding Gollum's release, some game developers have openly defended the title and shared their own stories.

One of these developers is Dannie Carlone, senior environment artist at God of War studio Santa Monica Studio. In their tweet, Carlone shares a photo of a wall in their home that features all of the games they've worked on so far, including God of War Ragnarok, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Marvel's Avengers, and Sonic Boom. This last game is especially important, as Carlone explains: "I display my 'lowest score' game because I'm proud of the time I had working with some of my favorite people in this industry."

In the same tweet, Carlone shares the Metascore for Sonic Boom which is a humble 32 and adds:

"Games are hard to make. Regardless of the score, every project has positives/lessons learned," the tweet continues, "Some things are out of your hands. Be kind to each other."

Similarly, Silent Hill: Townfall director John McKellan of No Code shared a screenshot of the Metascore for All Points Bulletin adding: "Still proud of our work. Lots of 4/10s made for [a] sobering day." McKellan continues:

"No one wants to ship a bad game, and there are thousands of reasons it can happen that are outside of anyone’s control. All you can do is learn from it."

Aaron Durkin of John Wick Hex studio Super Spline also weighed in on the discussion by saying:

"A long time ago I learnt lots and had a good time with a small team trying to make something fun for kids. No one sets out to make a bad game. This business is hard!" along with a screenshot of the Metascore for Nintendo Wii game All-Star Karate. Jack Tondeur, who previously worked at Firesprite Games, also had some words of wisdom to share along with a screenshot of 2017's The Troll and I's Metascore: "This was the first game I worked on from start to finish. A bunch of talented people tried to do something very ambitious and for various reasons, it didn't land but working on this basically taught me how to be a gameplay animator."

 

[Alebrije]

They should create the "Under 40" club and share their experiences...

 

[T.v]

"We appreciate your understanding"

Come on, there was zero understanding for this game even existing from the start.

 

[SmokedMeat]

 

[Dr. Samuel Hayden]

How long until they claim (with no proof) their devs are receiving death threats/harassment to try and score sympathy points?

 

[MiguelItUp]

This is the first time where I don't find myself feeling bad for the studio. They delayed the game, and they STILL managed to a game of this quality out. This game was being developed for a LONG time too. Maybe the publisher was pushing them to release it? Maybe the project was too big for their studio? Unsure. But to know of the quality, even after announcing that it's gone gold, only to apologize for it is truly bizarre to me, they HAD to have known.

 

[Sleepwalker]

> open chrome
> open https://chat.openai.com/
> Write an apology letter for our failed videogame "The Lord of the Rings: Gollum™". Promise to fix technical issues and provide better experiences in the future.
> CTRL+A
>CTRL+C
> open twitter.com
> CTRL+V
> Send tweet
> log out

 

[Camreezie]

You gonna refund all the customrrs that got given a piece of shit? Its all good to say be kind but dont shit in your customers hands and then tell them to clap

 

[The Infectious Paradox]

I remember when this got announced I think like last year. The reception was the same as it is now. They should have dropped it then. Blame yourselves.

No one wants a Batman game where you're doing chores as Alfred

 

[SmokedMeat]

At this point I’m so not caring that I can’t even bother to watch the review videos ripping the game, because I’ve heard it all already. Even those are old to me now.

This is also why I’ll never go to bat for developers/publishers. I remember people arguing how 30% was too much and developers need a bigger cut, etc. Tell you what…fuck ‘em. I don’t give a shit. If anything some don’t even deserve a 70% share of the sale.

 

[Sleepwalker]

I remember when this got announced I think like last year. The reception was the same as it is now. They should have dropped it then. Blame yourselves.

No one wants a Batman game where you're doing chores as Alfred

Wait a minute, hear me out

A strategy game where you play as Alfred, your job is to guide Batman through the perilous nights of Gotham City, you will be tasked with providing intel, strategic output and words of encouragement in this new turn based RPG.

 

[DJ12]

No one wants to ship a bad game, but here we are shipping a bad game. Doesn't really make sense.

 

[HeisenbergFX4]

 

[jshackles]

I think if this game were released as a budget title ($29.99 tops, $19.99 ideally) then there wouldn't be as much blowback. The fact that the full game is $59.99 and the edition with the DLC (that should have been included in the game anyway) is $69.99, means people have a lot higher expectation of what this game should be.

"Nobody wants to ship a bad game", but surely somewhere along the way someone must have play-tested this game and told them it was a bad game. And they shipped it anyway.

 

[keefged4]

"We are committed to providing you with patches that will allow you to enjoy the game to its fullest potential"

..How? Are they going to unrelease the game?

 

[The Infectious Paradox]

Wait a minute, hear me out

A strategy game where you play as Alfred, your job is to guide Batman through the perilous nights of Gotham City, you will be tasked with providing intel, strategic output and words of encouragement in this new turn based RPG.

Or how about just dusting simulator. Power wash simulator had good reception

 

[Sleepwalker]

"We are committed to providing you with patches that will allow you to enjoy the game to its fullest potential"

..How? Are they going to unrelease the game?

They will add guns and a jetpack in the dlc

 

[digdug2]

"We are committed to providing you with patches that will allow you to enjoy the game to its fullest potential." This is such bullshit.

Dear developers and publishers, we are sick of being your fucking beta testers and waiting for 10 patches to drop so that your game isn't total bullshit. I understand that you have investors and shareholders, but for our sakes, release a decent product on day one, or don't release it. Full stop. Patches should be for minor shit, not so that you can patch in the other half of the game after launch.

 

[AlteredForms]

Daedalic deserve most of the blame as expected, though they tried to branch out and do something they wouldn't normally do which blew up in their face. To me that has to be applauded somewhat, and to all those people who aren't familiar with their work and are incessantly shitting on them because it's the status quo, I'd recommend checking out their point and click adventures as they're solid on the whole. All they can do is damage control at this point by refunding or making good on whatever they can.

 

[Games of Today]

Ouch, ok now I just feel bad.

 

[Hugare]

What must be soul crushing is that games are developed by hundreds of people.

And sometimes and environment artist, for example, may have done the best work of his career, but it was on the fucking Gollum game where every other people did a terrible job in their respective roles. So despite being an amazing job, the game still sucked and you'll have a 38 MC game in your resumé.

"Oh but find a good job at Ubisoft or whatever". But maybe you live in a small country with limited options.

But my empathy does not go to the company as a whole. They knew they had a stinker on their hands and decided to launch it at $60.

If you cant make a game of this scope, then dont make a game of this scope.

Would have been better to make a point and click adventure using the Deponia games engine then, in the LOTR world.

 

[Loomy]

The fact that this apology comes after the game came out and people spent money on it makes it meaningless. It's not like the game being what it is is a revelation to them today. They know what they were shipping. They've known for a while. And while I understand that they have financial responsibilities to their employees and publisher, they also knowingly shipped a bad game.

I empathize with them and the situation they're in, but not a lot of sympathy, unfortunately.

 

[digdug2]

Daedalic deserve most of the blame as expected, though they tried to branch out and do something they wouldn't normally do which blew up in their face. To me that has to be applauded somewhat, and to all those people who aren't familiar with their work and are incessantly shitting on them because it's the status quo, I'd recommend checking out their point and click adventures as they're solid on the whole. All they can do is damage control at this point by refunding or making good on whatever they can.

While I understand that this game isn't in their wheelhouse, there has to be a point in the development cycle where you wince and scrap your game because it just isn't working.

 

[digdug2]

Would have been better to make a point and click adventure using the Deponia games engine then, in the LOTR world.

That would have probably been pretty rad, in all actuality.

 

[Mossybrew]

Yeah yeah we get it. Lots of people worked on this game and if it ended up a massive turd, well at least they learned some lessons along the way. All very heartwarming and I'm sure the rubes who spent sixty bucks on this game are totally understanding, they are glad to have helped fund those lessons.

 

[Luipadre]

Fuck off with these twitter apology letters

 

[Cyberpunkd]

Tweet is good, but if they are LotR fans - who TF had an idea to put Gollum as the main character?

If I think LotR I think this insufferable shot? C’mon man.

 

[Cyberpunkd]

While I understand that this game isn't in their wheelhouse, there has to be a point in the development cycle where you wince and scrap your game because it just isn't working.

There is a concept in organisational behaviour studies about escalating commitment - project should have been scrapped, but people involved put so much energy and effort into it they cannot bring themselves to ax it. This is what happened here.

 

[GHG]

How about refund everybody who pre-ordered your game rather than these pathetic empty "apologies"?

 

[SirKicksalot]

They can't even spell the name right in the fucking apology lmao

 

[Captain Toad]

You gonna refund all the customrrs that got given a piece of shit? Its all good to say be kind but dont shit in your customers hands and then tell them to clap

Anyone who bought this is on them. There was every reason to realize this game was a disaster.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

They had a review embargo that lasted until release...

They knew exactly what they had.

No one asked for this game in the first place...

 

[digdug2]

They can't even spell the name right in the fucking apology lmao

Fuck, that's brutal.

 

[AlteredForms]

While I understand that this game isn't in their wheelhouse, there has to be a point in the development cycle where you wince and scrap your game because it just isn't working.

That isn't always possible. Daedalic is a German studio and they're not tremendously loaded due to making point and click adventure games. I'm sure the project looked good at the beginning and eventually the workload and constraints hit them bad and they simply had to trudge along in the hopes of salvaging this heap. The wise thing to do was find a publisher and stick within the 2D or isometric genres, like how Larian Studio did with the Divinity series. Come to think of it, they would probably have been a much safer bet lol.

 

[GHG]

They can't even spell the name right in the fucking apology lmao

Sums up the shitshow really. Nobody cares about the standard of their work over there.

 

[Deerock71]

Will pick it up for under a buck for the lulz. I actually had (somewhat) high hopes for this game. A stealth game set in the LotR universe had some potential.

 

[Mr Hyde]

If you don't want to ship a bad game, then don't ship a bad game. The fucking nerve from these developers. Releasing a broken, buggy, awful looking heap of crap, at full price, with some of the most greedy dlc content I've ever seen, and then asking their customers to "please understand. Game development is hard. It's not our fault. Things just happen, it's out of our hands. Thanks for your money."

 

[Ar¢tos]

At least players didn't need to finish the game to read the apology this time!

 

[Zimmy68]

Love the... We are so sorry, thanks for the $59!!!

 

[AlteredForms]

I must admit that they shit the bed by charging full price for this train wreck. Their previous point and click adventure games were a fraction of the price and were much more enjoyable. I'm curious, if this were a $30 game then would the backlash be as strong?

 

[Clear]

No one wants to ship a bad game, but here we are shipping a bad game. Doesn't really make sense.

Don't assume the same people demanding it be shipped are the ones working on it. It doesn't work like that.

Please understand the top-down nature of the business, the people with the money and their representatives are the ones with the real decision making power and everyone underneath gets to abide by their decisions. All it takes is a middle-man to make bad choices and things can go very badly irrespective of the talent and work-ethic of the people tasked with doing the actual work.

 

[ANDS]

And sometimes and environment artist, for example, may have done the best work of his career, but it was on the fucking Gollum game where every other people did a terrible job in their respective roles. So despite being an amazing job, the game still sucked and you'll have a 38 MC game in your resumé.

This is exactly what the GOW developer is trying to highlight in their tweet that everyone is glossing over. You can personally do the best job you can, but in a collaborative environment, one weak bolt sinks the entire ship.

 

[HeisenbergFX4]

 

[cormack12]

Unfortunately it looks like a game that couldn't even have interesting mechanics to mask the other stuff. But I mean we all knew this.

 

[kruis]

The Lord of the Rings: Gollum was too broken to review on PS5 | Digital Trends

We tried to review The Lord of the Rings: Gollum on PS5, but an uncharacteristically poor prerelease state made that task impossible.

www.digitaltrends.com

If a game has so many game breaking bugs that reviewers simply were unable to play the PS5 version to the end, it should never have shipped. Just imagine what kind of company would put such a completely broken game on a Blu-Ray disc and then print tens of thousands of copies?

 

[balls of snow]

Lol how is this dev so infamous now to even warrant an apology letter. They made state of mind which had an all time peak of 200 players on steam. Major leagues shit right here guys.

 

[nemiroff]

I wish them no bad. But to be honest, this is not the right time for them to be learning from their mistakes.

I mean, the mistake started already in the moment this idea formed in someone's head. Then the mistake for some fucked up reason continued when it was green lit by some kind of dumbass or dumbasses. ..Then the mistake continued and continued and continued. There was an ocean of time to learn from their mistakes way before release.

 

[Sleepwalker]

They can't even spell the name right in the fucking apology lmao

Chatgpt has feelings, no need to shame it

 

[AlteredForms]

Chatgpt has feelings, no need to shame it

Would be funny it they couldn't even be bothered to write an actual apology letter lol. But I think it's a simple typo, I mean they are German after all, not grammar Nazis!

 

[Fake]

No one wants to ship a bad game, but we think different.