Judas - narrative FPS set on a disintegrating starship from Ken Levine's Ghost Story Games

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

Let's not get stupid, this game probably sells more than Kenshi's lifetime Steam sales within its first full year. Looking at the last numbers Take-Two released for BioShock 3 in May 2015, (it sold 11 million copies by that point) this problem does really good.

It is funny that Ken Levine fired the majority of Irrational Game, restructure the studio, and even rebranded it...all with the desire to make smaller games, and after eight years of work the first game they show of looks like rebranded BioShock. A rebranded BioShock that actually kind of sounds like he's trying to do bigger things with it. I don't really get the thinking behind any of it. I wonder if there's top people at 2K wondering what the fuck the runaround was all about?

 

[Silverfish]

Let's not get stupid, this game probably sells more than Kenshi's lifetime Steam sales within its first full year.

I don't know, man. "From the minds behind Bioshock Infinite" doesn't sound like much of a selling point.

 

[Major_Blackhart]

I didn't even click to see the trailer so I have to trust people what it looks like. The reason is I just don't really want to reward it with a view or some kind.

Overall, the games were pseudo intellectual horse hockey with left tard college professor courses thrown in for good measure than actual games.

The gameplay in the original didn't feel good. It didn't have the... weight behind it that FPS games did, and do now.

And by weight I mean... feel, quality, shock when shooting a gun, environmental reaction, physical reaction.

There's a lot that goes into making a good fps. And let's face it, for all Bioshocks magic and "rpg" elements it was an FPS. And it was lacking a lot of the weight needed to make a shooter feel like you're shooting.

I mean that's part of the fun of shooters. And he did that lackluster crap for 3 games getting praised.

So I fully expect the same with this one: unexciting gameplay with a bullshit neo-left lecture about how America and Capitalism bad.

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

Let's not get stupid, this game probably sells more than Kenshi's lifetime Steam sales within its first full year.

I don't know, man. "From the minds behind Bioshock Infinite" doesn't sound like much of a selling point.

It sold 11 million in two years, (about half of that came in its second year) there's clearly an audience for which that is a selling point.

 

[Silverfish]

Gonna press X to doubt, but feel free to call me a retard after Judas releases to sales in the millions.

 

[Morgoth]

I'm curious if Ken's "Narrative Lego" idea he was shilling about years ago is still intact in that game; and of course what it actually entails.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

this game probably sells more than Kenshi's lifetime Steam sales within its first full year

Kenshi was a top selling Steam game. I remember being surprised at this, can't remember what metal category it was in but it did very well.

Edit:
2019 bronze seller.
https://store.steampowered.com/sale/2019_top_sellers

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

this game probably sells more than Kenshi's lifetime Steam sales within its first full year

Kenshi was a top selling Steam game. I remember being surprised at this, can't remember what metal category it was in but it did very well.

Edit:
2019 bronze seller.
https://store.steampowered.com/sale/2019_top_sellers

And? The sales estimates are also all lower than the first year of BioShock 3's sales. You're not telling me anything about Kenshi I don't already know, I wouldn't have written what I did if I didn't have some idea it sold under 11 million.

Steam sale estimates aside, back in 2020 Lo-Fi announced the game had "hit a milestone of 1 million global sales." Its peak player count was also four years ago, so the game hasn't been averaging more new players as time goes on.

 

[Hobo Elf]

What I wanna know is how many copies Judas has to sell before it becomes profitable. Sales numbers are just pointless ego stroking if they don't even cover the years of wasted development time that it seems to take many AAA games these days.

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

It seems to be a fairly small studio from the sound of it. Cut it down to 15 people, then 12 with the rebranding, grew to 25, in 2020 they had 33 it seems. It is possible this is a fairly low budget game, at least as far as games put out by the big publishers go. Those Persona games that spend years in development are low budget games with small teams, looks like the Persona 5 team was actually a little bigger than Ghost Story Games. And while it looks like they're just making another BioShock again, it doesn't seem like they grew the studio to the old Irrational Games size in the process.

 

[Roguey]

2K cut Levine's team to the bone because while they were very happy with Bioshock Infinite's numbers, they were extermely unhappy with how much it cost to make. This is their grand experiment to see if they can get Infinite numbers with a fraction of the cost given his own particular wasteful management style (given how many years it's taken, it's become quite a large fraction).

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

2K cut Levine's team to the bone because while they were very happy with Bioshock Infinite's numbers, they were extermely unhappy with how much it cost to make. This is their grand experiment to see if they can get Infinite numbers with a fraction of the cost given his own particular wasteful management style (given how many years it's taken, it's become quite a large fraction).

It's totally possible given this team's small size that this game, despite how long they've been working on it in some way, didn't cost all that much as far as these things go. There's little Japanese studios that take this long to put out games too, and said games are low budget games. The funny thing with this game is the mission statement of this rebranded studio, when in the end it looks like they're just doing the thing Levine didn't want to do seven years ago.

I doubt they were unhappy with the cost, which as far as I know we've never heard anything about...at least that's real anyways. If they were unhappy with Infinite they wouldn't have given Levine all this time and leeway for another game. This didn't seem like 2K making cutbacks because they were unhappy, in fact it seemed like the total opposite, it looked like them bending over backwards to keep Levine happy, and keep Levine at Take-Two.

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

Hey rusty_shackleford, you can be pissed off by reality and the facts all you want, but that doesn't change anything. Kenshi's Steam numbers are not in the 11 million ranges, or even the 6 million range, if I were to guess its somewhere under two million since I don't think they ever announced anything after it hit a million a couple years ago. That's not some quality statement, but it is the reality of what it sold. Just seems fucking stupid to be like: Oh, you think this BioShock follow up is selling better than Kenshi; well, did you know Kenshi sold over 1 million by 2020 when BioShock 3 only sold 6 million in its first year? Sorry I pointed out reality to you.

If it's any consolation the gameplay probably will suck, but I doubt it sells badly, and I think it's safe to say it sells far better than Kenshi has.

 

[Morgoth]

rusty should become an EA or 2K executive. He'd let one person work on a game for 2 years, and if it wasn't selling 11 million units, he would declare it a massive failure.

 

[Roguey]

It's totally possible given this team's small size that this game, despite how long they've been working on it in some way, didn't cost all that much as far as these things go. There's little Japanese studios that take this long to put out games too, and said games are low budget games. The funny thing with this game is the mission statement of this rebranded studio, when in the end it looks like they're just doing the thing Levine didn't want to do seven years ago.

A team of 30 working for 10 years is still going to run up a budget in the 10s of millions. But that's acceptable as long as he still gives them a great return.

I doubt they were unhappy with the cost, which as far as I know we've never heard anything about...at least that's real anyways. If they were unhappy with Infinite they wouldn't have given Levine all this time and leeway for another game. This didn't seem like 2K making cutbacks because they were unhappy, in fact it seemed like the total opposite, it looked like them bending over backwards to keep Levine happy, and keep Levine at Take-Two.

If they were truly happy, they would have spun the Infinite team off into a separate studio where they could keep making big budget Bioshock or Bioshock-like games minus Levine. Instead they fired them all and gave the next Bioshock to an almost-entirely new studio in 2019, five years after they shut down Irrational. The most likely reason for these actions is that they like Levine, respect him as an auteur, and believe he's the primary reason for Bioshock's success but can't afford his wasteful perfectionism on AAA-budget games (Infinite had a team of 150 and five years of development).

 

[Cross]

It has become increasingly obvious that while Ken Levine is credited as the lead designer of System Shock 2, it's the lesser known Looking Glass employees who worked under him who made that game what it is. This is the fourth time Levine has produced a successor to System Shock 2 and just like the 3 BioShock games the only things he considers important enough to carry over are purely aesthetical: audio logs, 'whacky' enemies who talk a lot and the character's outstretched hand from which you fire Psi Powers Plasmids Vigors whatever your abilities will be called in Judas.

 

[Roguey]

It has become increasingly obvious that while Ken Levine is credited as the lead designer of System Shock 2, it's the lesser known Looking Glass employees who worked under him who made that game what it is. This is the fourth time Levine has produced a successor to System Shock 2 and just like the 3 BioShock games the only things he considers important enough to carry over are purely aesthetical: audio logs, 'whacky' enemies who talk a lot and the character's outstretched hand from which you fire Psi Powers Plasmids Vigors whatever your abilities will be called in Judas.

Levine had nothing to do with Bioshock 2 which likely contributed to why it's the best one.

 

[Lyric Suite]

It has become increasingly obvious that while Ken Levine is credited as the lead designer of System Shock 2, it's the lesser known Looking Glass employees who worked under him who made that game what it is.

Many such cases going back to the beginning of the industry most likely. The shy but brilliant nerds took the back seat while the boot lickers and extroverts stole all the credit. It wouldn't surprise me if the reason everything sucks is that as soon as real money started pouring in the industry the ratio between the extrovert posers and the nerds with the real talent got scewed massively towards the first.

 

[RepHope]

Well, well, well look who went crawling back to the only template he knows how to follow. For a so-called “auteur” Levine sure seems to suck at creating something new, everything about this reminds me of Bioshock Infinite. I’m sure he’s totally scrapped his old plans and is now just trying to get a game out. Thing about Levine is he’s the type of asshole boss who will ask you to do something, you’ll point out how impractical/stupid/time-consuming what he’s asking for is, he’ll still insist, you’ll do it, then by the time it’s done he’ll decide he didn’t actually want that after all and order you to scrap everything and start over.

Bioshock Infinite had so many scrapped levels that didn’t appease his autism that they reused them as the floating islands you see in the background of Columbia. I’m sure this game has been through absolute hell, remember all the gameplay concepts they talked about in Infinite that wasn’t in the final game because Levine kept scrapping things? Certain we’ll see a repeat of that here. It’s so funny, for all the hype around him the man is incapable of innovating in terms of gameplay systems or storytelling. Same old base he’s been doing for ages rears it’s head again here.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

 

[Zlaja]

If it's any consolation the gameplay probably will suck, but I doubt it sells badly, and I think it's safe to say it sells far better than Kenshi has

In order for Judas to sell as much as Bioshock games, it would have to have 'Bioshock' in its name. The average gamer has no clue who created what, or who the fuck Ken Levine is.

 

[Roguey]

In order for Judas to sell as much as Bioshock games, it would have to have 'Bioshock' in its name. The average gamer has no clue who created what, or who the fuck Ken Levine is.

Very few people knew what a "System Shock" was when they released Bioshock in 2007. Normies will see "Hey this looks like Bioshock!" and get it.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

In order for Judas to sell as much as Bioshock games, it would have to have 'Bioshock' in its name. The average gamer has no clue who created what, or who the fuck Ken Levine is.

Very few people knew what a "System Shock" was when they released Bioshock in 2007. Normies will see "Hey this looks like Bioshock!" and get it.

nobody still knows what a system shock is

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

The screenshots make it look like some cheap Bioshock knock-off. Which I guess is exactly what it is.

Oh, and the person who designed that logo should be immediately fired with all rights to severance package revoked.

 

[Cross]

In order for Judas to sell as much as Bioshock games, it would have to have 'Bioshock' in its name. The average gamer has no clue who created what, or who the fuck Ken Levine is.

Very few people knew what a "System Shock" was when they released Bioshock in 2007. Normies will see "Hey this looks like Bioshock!" and get it.

It's not the mid-2000's anymore, when any console shooter with a decent marketing budget could become a success. Halo and Gears of Wars were big hits back then, selling far more than BioShock, yet both franchises are now struggling.