Metro Exodus Developer Discusses Boycott of the PC Platform for Sequels over Steam Review Bombing

[lexluthermiester]

Because the publishers front development money, in anticipation of a game recouping their investment plus profit.

Then the publishers should have had more sense than to pull the rug out from under everyone.

So the member of the dev team is simply pointing out that without sales, the dev team gets paid less and the publisher won’t front pc development and distribution money again. This person recognizes the harsh realities and how 4A gets the short end of the stick in this.

Sad truth. So maybe the devs need to find a better, less narrow focused publisher who will make their game available to the largest audience possible. That's good business ethics. What they're doing now is a good way to go out of business.

 

[rtwjunkie]

Then the publishers should have had more sense than to pull the rug out from under everyone.

Sad truth. so maybe the devs need to find a better, less narrow focused publisher who will make their game available to the largest audience possible.

Absolutely! I agree with both of your points!

 

[OneMoar]

No. A member of the dev team (supposedly) stated the truth: if money is not made on the PC platform, there won’t be any money for the next game to be on PC. Do you know why? Because the publishers front development money, in anticipation of a game recouping their investment plus profit.

So the member of the dev team is simply pointing out that without sales, the dev team gets paid less and the publisher won’t front pc development and distribution money again. This person recognizes the harsh realities and how 4A gets the short end of the stick in this.

to this I say kthxbai
take your toys and leave the sandbox then
what we have here is a toddler throwing a tantrum because he knows hes in trouble

 

[rtwjunkie]

to this I say kthxbai
take your toys and leave the sandbox then
what we have here is a toddler throwing a tantrum because he knows hes in trouble

But HE is not in trouble. Very few devs can just pick up and leave a publisher. Most are tied in tight, legally, and end up getting screwed when things like this happen.

Leaving the sandbox is not easy. It’s usually a long and exhausting legal fight over IP, past royalties, future games, and quite expensive. The news is full of these accounts over the years.

 

[OneMoar]

But HE is not in trouble. Very few devs can just pick up and leave a publisher. Most are tied in tight, legally, and end up getting screwed when things like this happen.

Leaving the sandbox is not easy. It’s usually a long and exhausting legal fight over IP, past royalties, future games, and quite expensive. The news is full of these accounts over the years.

Except again ignoring the back peddling THQ already said that this was a 4a decision

so here is what I imagined happened

4a/Koch Media saw Epics tasty bit of a offer and wanted in on it THQ Nordic (the guys that really have the final say) said no knowing better 4a/Koch Media pitched a fit and THQ was forced begrudgingly to allow it hence there initial statement throwing 4a/Koch Media under the bus, once they saw all the idiots in support of the decision they back peddled to save face

you guys really need to step back and evaluate how these scum lords operate

 

[Patriot]

It is not more than that. Its a store. You're not buying a piece of the Epic Store, you're buying a game and the Store is the medium that feeds you it. Steam is just the same, except with a ton of junk built around it, of which the better half is filled with pretty useless clutter. That list @Patriot posted up there... it contains every Steam feature so that it can put lots of red boxes next to the other stores... but it lacks a crucial security item like 2FA. That alone speaks volumes. This is 10 year old temper tantrum level of argument. It is a lazy customer argument, it is a short-sighted customer argument. Nobody cares about 75% of the features on that list.

How come we never saw this kind of noise about Origin, or Battlenet, or Uplay? The biggest shitstorm we saw was 'I need to DRM twice' when going through Steam and Uplay. No game boycotting, no lists like the one above... yet Origin and Uplay have been considerably worse for quite a long time. Oh, and last I checked, those stores are doing just fine.

I'm sorry mate, but the level of this discussion is an all-new low for PC gamers worldwide. This is the reality: people are too lazy to install another launcher, and the 4A dev quote hits the nail on the head - if people can't be bothered to take that effort, they're not really waiting for a Metro game. He gets it, and he lays out the consequence of a boycot for the PC platform. Again: he gets it. If the game doesn't run a profit on the PC, it won't go there again. That argument has nothing to do with Epic or Steam. Its about the game. Not the store.

Dev and you are delirious.
I am not giving my money and information to Epic so that it can get stolen or sold. In the short time they have had their excuse for a store open they have already had 2 security breaches.
I would love to play the game, but I won't be paying for it till it comes to GOG or Steam. AND yes there is plenty of people who no longer play certain games because of Uplay.

People care about support forums
People care about ease of playing together.
People care about gifting and game sharing...
People care about name change
about....
Well over half of those things I would say everyone cares about, and the rest shifts depending on the group.
Just because the list favors the most built out content delivery system that currently exists doesn't mean you should just ignore it.

You may not care about anything other than playing single player because you have no friends... but in reality they are wanted features. The consequence for using a content delivery system for your advertisement and revenue generation, then stealing from them is lack of sales.

I intensely dislike Origin, I will not use Uplay or MS store, GOG gives choices and drm free options, for that I am grateful and you don't have to use the launcher if you don't want, just download the game and play directly because no DRM, can even add the game to steam and play that way.

Treating your customers like shit is why piracy happens. Forcing them to do things your way... We play on PC to have choices, not be locked into a particular launcher... especially one as shitty, unstable and insecure as Epic. Just because a list is made by someone who is not security minded and values 2FA the way I do doesn't make it less valid...

From a dev and publisher point of view, there is a lot that steam does for that 30%
Like the advertising, distribution and storage forever, customer support, forums, they let you run the game how you want.
Is 30% too much? Perhaps, that is something to negotiate, not to leverage advertisement and then lock exclusivity. I am not against a new store front, I am against Exclusives.
Like I said, plenty of titles I do not play because of them being locked inside Uplay...

 

[rtwjunkie]

Except again ignoring the back peddling THQ already said that this was a 4a decision

so here is what I imagined happened

4a/Koch Media saw Epics tasty bit of a offer and wanted in on it THQ Nordic (the guys that really have the final say) said no knowing better 4a/Koch Media pitched a fit and THQ was forced begrudgingly to allow it hence there initial statement throwing 4a/Koch Media under the bus, once they saw all the idiots in support of the decision they back peddled to save face

you guys really need to step back and evaluate how these scum lords operate

Exactly. I’ve been saying all along that THQ are the scumlords. Devs almost never have control of distribution. Koch Media is not 4A. They are another publisher layer. THQ has decided to throw the dev under the bus here instead of taking responsibility. It’s too bad more people can’t blame the proper organization.

You may not care about anything other than playing single player because you have no friends... but in reality they are wanted features

Only an insecure person who needs masses of “friends” (yeah, we both know they aren’t actual friends) to feel good, would accuse someone who happens to like single player games of only liking them because they have no friends. It was totally uncalled for.

People who like single player love the story and worlds created, and want to see it play out, to be entertained. SP games are in the same category as literature and movies, most of which have great stories, in which they want to see it played out.

 

[OneMoar]

Dev and you are delirious.
I am not giving my money and information to Epic so that it can get stolen or sold. In the short time they have had their excuse for a store open they have already had 2 security breaches.
I would love to play the game, but I won't be paying for it till it comes to GOG or Steam. AND yes there is plenty of people who no longer play certain games because of Uplay.

People care about support forums
People care about ease of playing together.
People care about gifting and game sharing...
People care about name change
about....
Well over half of those things I would say everyone cares about, and the rest shifts depending on the group.
Just because the list favors the most built out content delivery system that currently exists doesn't mean you should just ignore it.

You may not care about anything other than playing single player because you have no friends... but in reality they are wanted features. The consequence for using a content delivery system for your advertisement and revenue generation, then stealing from them is lack of sales.

I intensely dislike Origin, I will not use Uplay or MS store, GOG gives choices and drm free options, for that I am grateful and you don't have to use the launcher if you don't want, just download the game and play directly because no DRM, can even add the game to steam and play that way.

Treating your customers like shit is why piracy happens. Forcing them to do things your way... We play on PC to have choices, not be locked into a particular launcher... especially one as shitty, unstable and insecure as Epic. Just because a list is made by someone who is not security minded and values 2FA the way I do doesn't make it less valid...

From a dev and publisher point of view, there is a lot that steam does for that 30%
Like the advertising, distribution and storage forever, customer support, forums, they let you run the game how you want.
Is 30% too much? Perhaps, that is something to negotiate, not to leverage advertisement and then lock exclusivity. I am not against a new store front, I am against Exclusives.
Like I said, plenty of titles I do not play because of them being locked inside Uplay...

ALL OF THIS
30% is peanuts for the service you get

I get unauthorised login attempts for my epic account at least once a month they didn't even have 2fa for over a year

also the only reason epic can afford to have a pricing war is dat forkknife money when that runs out the percent will go up

 

[Metroid]

Well for me if i was a developer I would do a multi-platform game as I would more people to know about it, exclusivity is only good if you make your own console like Nintendo and I would like Nintendo to terminate its console business altogether and start behaving like sega, imagine Metroid/Zelda games for pc, its games would be many times more successful/profitable if they launch for pc.

 

[moproblems99]

Only an insecure person who needs masses of “friends” (yeah, we both know they aren’t actual friends) to feel good, would accuse someone who happens to like single player games of only liking them because they have no friends. It was totally uncalled for.

This thread is the reason I gravitate towards single player games now.

 

[somethinggeneric]

Nice clickbait, did you "forget" to include what the developer said (in English), or would this undermine your low quality article? Here's what was said:

I watched the bubbling. Impressions are twofold. On the one hand, the withdrawal from Steam is ambiguous, so no one has done so sharply (as far as I can tell). This is new, which could cause rejection. Yes, and such a move pulls the need to install the Epic launcher, which could cause some inconvenience to the players, and therefore cause discontent.​

On the other hand, the reaction of a certain category of players is hardly adequate. It seems that people did not want to play, just waited for a reason to pour out their bile. That is, it turns out that we (the developers) for years have been hard and painful, with losses, trying to do something special, but a certain category of players believes that our work is not worth even a couple of minutes to install the launcher. Naturally, it is their life and their right, but then what do they care about Metro? Obviously, it is not interesting to them. I can only say that they were not our players either, they are not interested in our work, which means that, for example, the opinion of such people is not interesting for me either. What is the point for me personally (and not only) to listen to their opinion?​

But! Consider the situation deeper. Someone says that if they crap Exodus and the previous games in the series, it will make the world better, they will put greedy developers in their place. To this, I can answer that in a pinch, if all the PC players announce a boycott of Metro Exodus, then the next Metro, if it does, is definitely not going to be on the PC. Better or worse, decide for yourself. I personally feel sorry for the loyal fans, yes. But my assessment of the work done personally by me and my friends and colleagues will not change this. I firmly know that almost everyone who pours this dirt on the net is also incapable of a bit of what we have done and hopefully do more. And that means they have no idea what they are talking about.​

And further. Despite the fact that during the development I went through each level of each game, hell knows how many times, it is interesting for me to play Metro. I went through the previous parts completely and more than once, and now I am going to go through the whole PC version, to which we make the final touches. For me, this is already a tradition, I always replay the game completely before release. It allows you to evaluate the work done. What is it for me? I remember the words of the Prof, which I have heard more than once, both from myself and on the Internet – the game must be made for myself, so that you like it first. And only now do I begin to understand this fully – no clever man can shake me about the value of the work that we have done. And there will always be disgruntled.​

Source in English: https://wccftech.com/boycott-metro-exodus-next-wont-be-pc/

 

[birdie]

Nice clickbait, did you "forget" to include what the developer said (in English), or would this undermine your low quality article? Here's what was said:

...

Source in English: https://wccftech.com/boycott-metro-exodus-next-wont-be-pc/

There's no source in English, the original post was in Russian. Mind that I translated it earlier and WCCFTech translation looks like to be loosely based on mine - they even copied my round brackets verbatim, lol.

 

[TheOne]

https://www.pcgamer.com/metro-publi...ture-of-series-following-boycott-controversy/

The developer apparently says that "a PC version will always be at the heart of our plans".

 

[somethinggeneric]

There's no source in English, the original post was in Russian. Mind that I translated it earlier and WCCFTech translation looks like to be loosely based on mine - they even copied my round brackets verbatim, lol.

Source seems to be a loose word for this, its just Google translated and WccfTech just cleaned up things like that it seems. Below is a google translate of the original post on the forums, notice "stim" instead of Steam, Really like your version though since you caught the little things that Google translate doesn't. Hopefully they update the article with your translation!

I watched the bubbling. Impressions are twofold. On the one hand, the withdrawal from the stim is ambiguous, so no one has done so sharply (as far as I can tell). This is new, which could cause rejection. Yes, and such a move pulls the need to install an epic launcher, which could cause some inconvenience to the players, and therefore cause discontent.

On the other hand, the reaction of a certain category of players (onli torrents and all that) is hardly adequate. It seems that people did not want to play, just waited for a reason to pour out their bile. That is, it turns out that we (the developers) for years have been hard and painful, with losses, trying to do something special, but a certain category of players believes that our work is not worth even a couple of minutes to install the launcher. Naturally, it is their life and their right, but then what do they care about the Metro? Obviously, it is not interesting to them. I can only say that they were not our players either, they are not interested in our work, which means that, for example, the opinion of such people is not interesting for me either. What is the point for me personally (and not only) to listen to their opinion?

But! Consider the situation deeper. Someone says that they say they crap Exodus and the previous games in the series, it will make the world better, they will put greedy developers in their place. To this I can answer that in a pinch, if at all all the PC players announce a boycott of the Metro, then the next metro, if it does, is definitely not on the PC. Better or worse, decide for yourself. I personally feel sorry for the loyal fans, yes. But my assessment of the work done personally by me and my friends and colleagues will not change this. I firmly know that almost everyone who pours this dirt on the net is also incapable of a bit of what we have done and hopefully do more. And that means they have no idea what they are talking about.

And further. Despite the fact that during the development I went through each level of each game, hell knows how many times, it is interesting for me to play Metro. I went through the previous parts completely and more than once, and now I am going to go through the whole PC version, to which we make the final touches. For me, this is already a tradition, I always re-pass the game completely before release. Allows you to evaluate the work done. What is it for me? I remember the words of the Prof, which I have heard more than once, both from myself and on the Internet - the game must be made for myself, so that you like it first. And only schA begin to understand this fully - no clever man can shake me about the value of the work that we have done. And there will always be disgruntled ..

 

[Upgrayedd]

Review bombing is a joke

 

[B-Real]

The same happens with Blizzard. In the past few years, a bunch of idiots defiled the Interet. I just can't understand what drives them to such pathetic behaviour. And Steam is just as pathetic as these idiot Internet trolls are, as it lets these negative reviews stay there.

 

[Upgrayedd]

ALL OF THIS
30% is peanuts

also the only reason epic can afford to have a pricing war is dat forkknife money when that runs out the percent will go up

What about Valve and Dota2 and CSGO. What happens if THEY stop making money? Raise rates higher than 30%? Valve makes truckloads off those games.

 

[TheDeeGee]

I don't recall having this issue back in the day with hard copies... Worked fine without having the need for a platform.

 

[somethinggeneric]

I don't recall having this issue back in the day with hard copies... Worked fine without having the need for a platform.

True, but I personally like the advantages such as the Workshop, discussion boards, easy patching methods, and being able to download the game again. When I was a wee lad, I think I bought Age of Empires about 3 times because I kept losing the CD Key and you couldn't install the game without it.

 

[VSG]

There's no source in English, the original post was in Russian. Mind that I translated it earlier and WCCFTech translation looks like to be loosely based on mine - they even copied my round brackets verbatim, lol.

There was an issue on our end preventing a timely update to the post with your translation, and it has been fixed now. I have now updated the post accordingly, and thanks again for your help with the translation.

 

[somethinggeneric]

There was an issue on our end preventing a timely update to the post with your translation, and it has been fixed now. I have now updated the post accordingly, and thanks again for your help with the translation.

Wow, article updated, color me impressed and with a bit more faith in humanity. Though their quote doesn't mention boycotting PC games, rather, seems to point to the obvious fact that if PC gamers shit on their game and don't buy it, they won't release for PC, which makes sense.

 

[lexluthermiester]

You may not care about anything other than playing single player because you have no friends... but in reality they are wanted features.

I'd respond, but what I was thinking has already been said..

Only an insecure person who needs masses of “friends” (yeah, we both know they aren’t actual friends) to feel good, would accuse someone who happens to like single player games of only liking them because they have no friends. It was totally uncalled for.

Have to agree here. Very uncalled for. Though I have to say the graph is kinda cool. And it seems mostly accurate.

 

[Cavernoso]

heheheheh Exodus Pirate

 

[Deleted member 177333]

If all of the companies producing games could stop being dumb that would be great.

As a whole I am tired of having to install everyone and their brothers launcher. If everyone wants their own launcher go back another step and let me just launch the game. Skip the launcher. Why there has to be another layer of frivolous software on my pc I don't understand.

If everyone thinks threatening to drop PC or whatever is the best choice for them, then regardless of how good the game is I would rather play EA garbage than deal with a dev that thinks he can tell me how to live my life.

Also stop ruining things I enjoy.

Thanks, in advance for ignoring what people actually want.

Ya that's pretty much where I come down as well on this. +1

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Like the advertising...

Steam was good about that before 2015. Since they invited all of the Unity asset swap garbage on their platform, there's a whole lot of noise and very little in the way of solid advertising. Let's look at what 90% of your developers actually care about...
1) Regional pricing if your game has lots of localizations.
2) Online gaming because running your own servers sucks.
3) Early Access if your game is not completely funded.
4) How much money the distribution platform keeps per sale (chart doesn't include this and it's a make or break thing).

Niche things developers may care about:
5) Marketplace/Microtransactions for additional revenue stream at low cost.
6) VR support if the developer is making VR games.

The rest is work for them or doesn't affect them in a meaningful way.

I am not against a new store front, I am against Exclusives.

If you look at what Tim Sweeney said, it is very possible that Metro Exodus wouldn't even exist without Epic Games committing monies to help develop, market, and publish it. If there is, in fact, an exclusivity agreement between Epic Games and A4 Games, then Epic Games is more than a distributor (like Steam), it's a publisher too. Think of Metro Exodus like Unravel for Origin/EA. Independent games that are published by a larger company and a requirement for that is exclusivity to the Origin/EA market on PC.

Here's a VERY important quote from Tim Sweeney:

The proliferation of launchers is an annoying side effect of this, but the problem could eventually be solved through federated or decentralized software update tools. There are ongoing conversations about this.

I have been advocating this for years and it's something blockchain technology can make possible. There needs to be an open infrastructure for game distribution which all distributors participate in (build servers and add them to the network, get paid for servicing users on the network). The entire network acknowledges your right to software and so long as there as at least one participating, it will be honored. If Sweeney is on the verge of making this a reality then more power to him.

Epic Games Store is relatively young and perhaps it is just a stop gap measure...but that's going off topic.


Point is, the relationship between Metro Exodus and Epic Games is likely more complex than it appears on the surface. If Metro Exodus is contractually exclusively, it was a mutually agreed to thing. If you don't like it, wait until the contract expires and buy it where you want. If you don't mind then support A4 Games and Epic Games in their pursuit of cheaper, better games. The store should only be a temporary inconvenience.