Adventure Gamers - Forums

I was planning on getting the game and playing it but there’s been so many great games released in the past few months that I didn’t get to it…
It’s sad to see an innovative company going down like this…

Karlok - 22 June 2015 08:51 AM

[img]All of six responses to the game itself when it was released a month ago and 950 to Tale of Tales’ latest blog post. It goes without saying that about 98 percent of the responses is extremely negative, uninformed, aggressive or downright nasty. There’s a message here…

Ignoring the nature of reddit and some of the resulting harshness I’d say that’s not surprising at all, and while you can never plan something like this, it sure looks like a last measure PR stunt to me. People love drama. I’m pretty sure we’ll see games from them in the future again.
In my case it worked. I want to know what this is all about, even if I’m not too interested in games like that. But there seems to be no demo available and the game is back to its original price tag on humble and steam.(20 Euros, here.)
This goes against the PR stunt theory, I have to admit.

I’m not spending 20 Euros out of mild interest and when I’m completely unsure if I’ll like it, when I have plenty of unplayed games in my library. 
They seem to have needed and expected constant cash flow and are now forced to react at a time when it’s much too early to draw a real conclusion.
Maybe the “failed” sale added to that.
The truth is, hardly anyone will spend even 10 bucks on a short game with mixed reviews where you have to dig to find details about the actual gameplay. You don’t reach a new audience that way, just the people you already convinced in the past.
Especially during the Steam Summer Sale. I’m not sure about the actual timing, but even with the Sale around the corner, people are anticipating that one.
Like it or not, but it’s a reality and you can’t just hope to replicate the success of Gone Home.

As for the blog entry:
Having only played the demo of The Path (an interesting but far from brilliant experience for me) my first reaction is mostly negative, too.
The disappointment is understandable and they are very honest about their mistakes (while also blaming everyone around them) but there is also a huge sense of entitlement showing through and the occasional self-mocking and sarcasm can’t really make up for that, in my opinion - and might be completely lost on many readers.

I have no idea how it compares to their other games, but 4,000 copies is a pretty decent first month number for an indie/niche adventure game. I know a large chunk of those went to their backers, but that’s always a risk of Kickstarter - you tap out your most eager audience before the game’s even out.

Clearly it’s not what they expected and isn’t paying off their debts, but I think it’s a shame this is being waved around as a commercial failure after only four weeks.

Karlok - 24 June 2015 06:18 AM

And that certainty is based on what?

Ultimately it’s my gut feeling.
Partly it’s because of the way the text is worded. We don’t think we’ll do that again, but support us here, support us there and buy our games. In other words: We might reconsider if you tell us you love us enough and give us some more money. Also note that they say they won’t do “commercial” games again. I don’t think something like The Path is a commercial game for them. It’s “art” and I would be surprised if they’d give away their art completely for free in the future, especially when they had some time to look at things from a less emotional point of view.

As I read the blog post, in their minds they lowered their standards for this game, their high ambitions being the only thing keeping their brilliant games from commercial success. Because commercial success is as easy as painting by numbers. Now they are disappointed that they did their part, but the world did not react according to plan.

Karlok - 24 June 2015 06:18 AM

Well, I have only seen positive or fairly positive reviews, gameplay explained and all.

I see plenty of reviews in the 50-60 range.
And there are a few pretty negative user reviews on Steam, too, and they don’t seem to be written by “Hey!This is not a shooter!“guys but are fairly detailed and articulate.
A huge majority found those useful, too, but this might have to do with the blog and reddit.

As for the lack in gameplay presentation I was mainly speaking about spontaneous purchases because of a sale.
The sale they did was in my opinion one for people already interested in the game (who also need to be informed about the sale.)
But if you happen to stumble across the sale by chance, there is too little information available on the page.

A comment from one of the Ethan Carter developers:

http://www.theastronauts.com/2015/06/what-really-happened-to-tale-of-tales-sunset/