KickStarter Phoenix Point - the new game from X-COM creator Julian Gollop

[J1M]

I certainly hope that the Epic Store is a success.
Mostly because I also hope that this will lead to Valve being broken from their lethargy and actually improving their client, and not only by improving the algorithm that determines which games you see in the store...

Fabulously optimistic, I know, but who knows, in four years, we might have a better Steam plus other client/community/launcher packages that are good as well.

Or this changes the landscape so now exclusives becomes the norm and any major title will be exclusive to something.
In that case, I can only hope software like Playnite and Lutris really take off.

Imho i hope that soon there will be so many launchers that whole point of launchers will go away and everything will be tied to frontends in similar fashion to Discord.

Already discord is killing those launchers because all social aspects are taken out of those launchers killing their idea of "ecosystem". Your gaming friends list is on discord not in steam or other launchers.

at the risk of embarrassing myself, what the fuck discord?

Ventrillo + Slack + Digital Store

Basically modern IRC with voice chat.

 

[True Ukrainian]

I'm guessing the sales guarantee works like a publisher's advance against royalties. They probably pay developers a minimum fixed amount a month for a year and then take it out of royalties. So worst case scenario for them is that a game would take 4-5 years to repay the advance. I assume the developers won't be allowed to withdraw the game until the advance is repaid.

Does that mean that the publisher has confidence that the game will sell?

 

[Drakron]

Does that mean that the publisher has confidence that the game will sell?

No, its "insurance" as developers cannot just back out as their royalties are made in advance they would have to return then in case they break the deal. Its exactly the same trick that publishers do with developers with milestone payments as the studio is dependent on said payments to remain afloat and in this case its so the studio for a year is more or less entirely dependent on Epic monthly payments and cannot back out of it.

Epic writes this off as a way to keep those games exclusive and also without competition in relation to price, you can bet those games will always be full price for a year ... the real question is what comes after, I suspect most of those games will appear a year in Steam/GoG/Whatever at full release price, this is were we can see how this whole Epic store shitshow will go for the consumers on the other stores, I kinda hope Steam is quiet simply when that time comes ... they get to dictate the deal as selling a year old game is kinda like a clothing store selling last year collection, sure its still a shirt but its so last year.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Is it really monopoly when there's comparable products available or coming into markets?


Xenonauts 2 is coming and there's lots of other tactical games that are sold on other stores.

And then there is open X-Com

 

[Perkel]

at the risk of embarrassing myself, what the fuck discord?

Have you noticed how every site forum etc have discord links ? Try to use it.
Basically it is live chat + voice chat integration.

So shitload of people use it to play games with eatch other instead of native voice chat clients like Steam and other.
here is link to 3DS emulator Citra discord. Look at it yourself.

LINK

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

What I find interesting is that tidbit from Reddit AMA that Snapshot approached Epic.

I suspect that they must have worried about visibility and sales of Phoenix Point on more established storefronts; while under Epic they get to be the tactical game on that store + there's sales guarantee to give X amount of money for them.
One must remember that Chaos Reborn under performed on Steam and GOG (I think that it was hurt by its MP focus) and there's now way more titles on those older stores.

edit.
Gah! Chaos Reborn not Chaos: Resurrection.

 

[Perkel]

What I find interesting is that tidbit from Reddit AMA that Snapshot approached Epic.

I suspect that they must have worried about visibility and sales of Phoenix Point on more established storefronts; while under Epic they get to be the tactical game on that store + there's sales guarantee to give X amount of money for them.
One must remember that Chaos: Resurrection under performed on Steam and GOG (I think that it was hurt by its MP focus) and there's now way more titles on those older stores.

Another one why there should be more stores. More stores = more space for people to see games and promote their game.
Those stores also will spend money to promote their games on other platforms something Steam doesn't care to do because surprise surprise monopolies don't care about promotion as they don't need to fight for consumer.

But yeah for sure money guarantee is the biggest reason.
That is like complete security of success.

 

[GrainWetski]

What I find interesting is that tidbit from Reddit AMA that Snapshot approached Epic.

I suspect that they must have worried about visibility and sales of Phoenix Point on more established storefronts; while under Epic they get to be the tactical game on that store + there's sales guarantee to give X amount of money for them.
One must remember that Chaos Reborn under performed on Steam and GOG (I think that it was hurt by its MP focus) and there's now way more titles on those older stores.

edit.
Gah! Chaos Reborn not Chaos: Resurrection.

I mean, there's a much larger audience for a Phoenix Point type game than whatever Chaos Reborn is. Is it even worth bothering with single player in that game? They're not going to get any visibility on Epic's store because nobody actually uses it, so it would be fucking retarded if "lack of visibility on Steam"(this is something retardedly small indie devs and gamejournos have made up while being paid by Epic, you fucking idiots) was the reason.

In the end, they just don't have faith in their lower budget FiraXCOM. They want guaranteed, instant money because they don't believe their game will sell. There's nothing more to it no matter what the "muh monopoly!!1" retards want to think.

 

[True Ukrainian]

Still, the Epic store is an overall good thing. Steam has simply become too dominant as a publisher and Epic with its chinese money is in a position to really disrupt Steam's operations. Before anyone says that no one will install the Epic launcher, Epic is probably aiming at a global audience in markets where Steam and GOG is relatively weak. So the objections of Steam and GOG fanboys is the last thing on their mind.

 

[Themadcow]

The original Chaos was one of the greatest hot-seat multiplayer games of all time. Hell, I still play it occasionally and it's 35 years old. Like Chess, it's simplicity was it's power but I'm under no illusions that the player base wasn't pretty small in comparison to say Elite from the same era. I think most people got it from a cover tape on the front of a Spectrum magazine back in the day. It wasn't the MP focus of Reborn that was the issue, it was the implementation of MP and the impact that the visually confusing maps had on the purity of the gameplay. Classic 1980's Chaos >>>>>> Chaos Reborn, and there's hopefully Gollop learned a lesson there.

 

[Puteo]

Does that mean that the publisher has confidence that the game will sell?

Yes. Companies aren't in the business of throwing away money. And in anticipation of someone saying "they just want more people on their platform" that doesn't work for them if the game they bought for their platform doesn't sell.

The consequences for guessing wrong on this are different for Epic and Voltage.

If Voltage guesses wrong and people don't buy this game/genre and they're selling on steam then they go bankrupt, no one gets their bonuses, people can lose their houses, cars etc and the studio will fold.

If Epic guesses wrong and people don't buy this game/genre, they're out what? Less than a thousandth of their multi-billion dollar fortune they've built up from Fortnite?

It really is a no-brainer for both groups and it's Valve's fault this is happening. Their lack of innovation and greed with their 30% cut made an Epic-style competitor inevitable. A good question is what the fuck is Gabe doing with the billions upon billions of dollars he's made over the years? Certainly not reinvesting in his company. When he dies from a Big-Mac-induced heart-attack we better find out he secretly bought a third-world country to turn it into the world's largest orphanage or he's been donating his fortune to fusion power or something.

Even if Epic wasn't offering the sales guarantee the difference in cuts means that any developer can afford to piss off up to 17% of their potential sales and still break even with a store switch.

 

[Vault Dweller]

I'm guessing the sales guarantee works like a publisher's advance against royalties. They probably pay developers a minimum fixed amount a month for a year and then take it out of royalties. So worst case scenario for them is that a game would take 4-5 years to repay the advance. I assume the developers won't be allowed to withdraw the game until the advance is repaid.

Does that mean that the publisher has confidence that the game will sell?

I think they are confident that the game will sell eventually. Since they're mainly paying for new customers for their store, they can afford to drag the repayment for a few years. Let's assume they give Gollop 10 mil over the first 12 months, which solves all his problems and ensures his team can work stress-free and uninterrupted. If the game sells well, it will make twice as much in the first year (let's say 500,000 copies at $50 minus the store's cut). If it sells poorly, it will break even, meaning Epic gets their money back and everyone's happy. If it sells very poorly which is unlikely, it will take the game 2-3 years to reach that amount. So overall Epic risks very little and the store ensures that they'll be able to get their money back sooner or later.

 

[thesheeep]

I'm guessing the sales guarantee works like a publisher's advance against royalties. They probably pay developers a minimum fixed amount a month for a year and then take it out of royalties. So worst case scenario for them is that a game would take 4-5 years to repay the advance. I assume the developers won't be allowed to withdraw the game until the advance is repaid.

Does that mean that the publisher has confidence that the game will sell?

I think they are confident that the game will sell eventually. Since they're mainly paying for new customers for their store, they can afford to drag the repayment for a few years. Let's assume they give Gollop 10 mil over the first 12 months, which solves all his problems and ensures his team can work stress-free and uninterrupted. If the game sells well, it will make twice as much in the first year (let's say 500,000 copies at $50 minus the store's cut). If it sells poorly, it will break even, meaning Epic gets their money back and everyone's happy. If it sells very poorly which is unlikely, it will take the game 2-3 years to reach that amount. So overall Epic risks very little and the store ensures that they'll be able to get their money back sooner or later.

You know, this reminds me a bit of good old medieval/renaissance patronage.
Wanna see this awesome artist? Come to my castle!

 

[Perkel]

You know, this reminds me a bit of good old medieval/renaissance patronage.
Wanna see this awesome artist? Come to my castle!

Patreon for companies lol.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Babies can fly, but I think this game selling "very poorly" is a much more probable scenario than it selling 500k copies.

 

[thesheeep]

Babies can fly, but I think this game selling "very poorly" is a much more probable scenario than it selling 500k copies.

If it fails to sell, then probably not because of this drama.
Most people simply don't care.

 

[Grotesque]

Gollop stirred this shit up for visibility and publicity.
I bet that with this scandal, he sold more than the dolts that got their money back for this reason alone.

And Gollop shitting on his game because "lack of tutorial" when x-com came with a thick ass manual...

 

[Astral Rag]

It will still do very well, on TPB.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Babies can fly, but I think this game selling "very poorly" is a much more probable scenario than it selling 500k copies.

If it fails to sell, then probably not because of this drama.
Most people simply don't care.

Both, I guess. It being on epic store is definitely a shot in the foot consumerbase-wise, but to put it mildly, I don't think we had a super hit on our hands anyway.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Babies can fly, but I think this game selling "very poorly" is a much more probable scenario than it selling 500k copies.

XCOM2 sold 500k copies in the first week. Of course that was on Steam...

 

[Thal]

Babies can fly, but I think this game selling "very poorly" is a much more probable scenario than it selling 500k copies.

It looks and plays like NuXCOM, whose popularity only increased with XCOM2. People have been waiting for XCOM3 for quite a while and haven't gotten it. At the time of release, Phoenix Point will be the only new game of its type.

Word of mouth and first impressions will determine how well it will do. If the game will be good, it will do really well, no matter what launcher it is on.

 

[Dreed]

Btw, you that requested refunds. Did you get some kind of confirmation e-mail or something? I got nothing after requesting. Just wanna make sure nothing was screwed up.

I got an e-mail a few minutes ago:

Hello,

This e-mail is a confirmation that your refund request have been successfully recorded and will be processed within the timeframe set in the FAQ section.

In case you have questions, contact refer to e-mail set in FAQ section.

Best regards,
SnapShot Games Team

 

[Duraframe300]

Word of mouth and first impressions will determine how well it will do. If the game will be good, it will do really well, no matter what launcher it is on.

Except the market who is responsible for that word of mouth and those first impressions is already poisoned thanks to this move.

 

[Black]

Lemme tell you, the "old guard" of game devs doesn't look too pretty. How many of them have proven that they're either extremely incompetent or sell-outs or both?

 

[Obsequious Approbation]

Well, fuck me sideways, this game was my brief foray into the realm of crowdfunding. See you in the Humble bargain bin, Gollop.