Like in the title, I would like to share some of my thoughts and ask you about yours.
My perspective may be detached because I do not own the game. I did not buy it. I was thinking about purchasing it. I do like Xcom games, and some other games that went into that style were pretty good too. But I was far too many times disappointed to make a preorder on unproven grounds. Even though I trust Paradox more than anybody else in the industry, and that I was bombarded on social media with advertisements of this game. And then I saw the reviews after the launch, which were mostly negative. As far as I can tell, the game had many obvious flaws that developers and people involved had to be aware of. But the game was released anyway because this is the game industry.
And here we are, over half a year after the release, and the review situation has not improved. Over half of the people that reviewed this game did it negatively. Looking at steam charts, the game has a small player base too. But the first DLC is on its way. For 15€... When Imperator Rome had a bad start, they did not jumped with such a price for the first DLC.
I just wonder what is going on. Will this DLC improve this game to such a degree that it will justify such a price? I have many doubts about that, but I will gladly listen to other people who actually have the game. First, I thought that this is madness. Charging people such a price for a game that has not many people playing it and that has over half negative reviews. But I have looked on the Steam store page, and I have a theory why it is so. It may be that this is a way out. In their haste, they were selling pre-orders for Deluxe Edition and Premium Edition. In such a situation, simple cutting losses on a project with little chance of recovery would look really bad and may bring some trouble. So maybe they will pop a couple of overpriced DLCs to a depopulated game to "satisfied" people who paid extra in the dark, then they will thank everybody and say how great there are, but time moves on, and so must they. Or they would just turn the switch off and say nothing to anybody because this happens in this industry too. I don't see any attempt to appease people with free DLC here. Something that often happens in similar situations if the people involved are trying to regain people and show their commitment.
I do not say that I'm right. I do not have the full picture, and my is even narrower. This is something I came up with, and to me, it may be a logical course of action. But I would like to know what other people think about it.
One more thing that I would like to touch here is that I do not understand what convinced Paradox to publish this game, let alone preordering it in some Deluxe and Premium editions. This is my limited perspective again, but who was the target for this game? Niche people, that would like some prohibition-era gangster game? I don't think so, looking how the gameplay looks like. Instead of expected families and gangs, we have The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. I don't think that gangsters in 1920s Chicago were running around after loot crates too. The combat system could not be to the liking of such people as well. Maybe Xcom players, like myself? I don't think that this game offers much novelty or interesting approach to this game genre to bring them in. Especially that this game had many bugs and the launch, as well as many people were pointing out that it is shallow, repetitive, oversimplified and AI is poor.
My perspective may be detached because I do not own the game. I did not buy it. I was thinking about purchasing it. I do like Xcom games, and some other games that went into that style were pretty good too. But I was far too many times disappointed to make a preorder on unproven grounds. Even though I trust Paradox more than anybody else in the industry, and that I was bombarded on social media with advertisements of this game. And then I saw the reviews after the launch, which were mostly negative. As far as I can tell, the game had many obvious flaws that developers and people involved had to be aware of. But the game was released anyway because this is the game industry.
And here we are, over half a year after the release, and the review situation has not improved. Over half of the people that reviewed this game did it negatively. Looking at steam charts, the game has a small player base too. But the first DLC is on its way. For 15€... When Imperator Rome had a bad start, they did not jumped with such a price for the first DLC.
I just wonder what is going on. Will this DLC improve this game to such a degree that it will justify such a price? I have many doubts about that, but I will gladly listen to other people who actually have the game. First, I thought that this is madness. Charging people such a price for a game that has not many people playing it and that has over half negative reviews. But I have looked on the Steam store page, and I have a theory why it is so. It may be that this is a way out. In their haste, they were selling pre-orders for Deluxe Edition and Premium Edition. In such a situation, simple cutting losses on a project with little chance of recovery would look really bad and may bring some trouble. So maybe they will pop a couple of overpriced DLCs to a depopulated game to "satisfied" people who paid extra in the dark, then they will thank everybody and say how great there are, but time moves on, and so must they. Or they would just turn the switch off and say nothing to anybody because this happens in this industry too. I don't see any attempt to appease people with free DLC here. Something that often happens in similar situations if the people involved are trying to regain people and show their commitment.
I do not say that I'm right. I do not have the full picture, and my is even narrower. This is something I came up with, and to me, it may be a logical course of action. But I would like to know what other people think about it.
One more thing that I would like to touch here is that I do not understand what convinced Paradox to publish this game, let alone preordering it in some Deluxe and Premium editions. This is my limited perspective again, but who was the target for this game? Niche people, that would like some prohibition-era gangster game? I don't think so, looking how the gameplay looks like. Instead of expected families and gangs, we have The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. I don't think that gangsters in 1920s Chicago were running around after loot crates too. The combat system could not be to the liking of such people as well. Maybe Xcom players, like myself? I don't think that this game offers much novelty or interesting approach to this game genre to bring them in. Especially that this game had many bugs and the launch, as well as many people were pointing out that it is shallow, repetitive, oversimplified and AI is poor.
