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Is Below the biggest indie flop of this generation?
- Thread starter Vire
- Start date
Oh this thread is about SALES? Did OP provide some numbers or the usual: "I have no idea or numbers but i think X game didn't sell enough because i didn't like it or because MS is low" ?
Not for me, but i havent played it yet.
I just found it weird that after all these time the release was a bit less of a celebration than i hoped for - it kinda just was there.
Very talented team though and what ive seen from far from the game looks good.
I just found it weird that after all these time the release was a bit less of a celebration than i hoped for - it kinda just was there.
Very talented team though and what ive seen from far from the game looks good.
Pretty much this.
OP
OP
The thread wasn't intended to discourage others from playing.
It's worth trying for yourself, especially since it's on Game Pass. Maybe it'll float your boat, but it was more related to your second point how you didn't even know it released.
Now you are making me feel bad. I swear I bought Sword and Sworcery twice. :(
Not to be a dick, but how do you expect to run anything on 4 GB RAM today? Most phones have 4 GB RAM.
Don't trust others people opinion, if you are interested in X game try it first.
I'm definitely not the biggest fan of No Man's Sky, but if it sold a 'fuckton' then in what way is it the biggest indie flop? If anything the way the dev's have turned things around and made it into the success it is (despite the train wreck PR at launch) I'd say it's anything but a flop.
On-topic though - OP I don't know if Below has flopped, but I felt underwhelmed when I finally got to try. I think they had some great ideas but I felt the screen was just too far zoomed out for me to enjoy it and I also felt the hunger/thirst mechanics weren't needed.
Well, it has 1-2 million sales on Steam according to Steamspy and didn't it have an incredibly good launch week in the UK with something like 140k sales? For a self-published indie game that cost full price and had a dev team of like 15 people I'm sure they made a shit load of money.
He wasn't saying they flopped. He was responding to the question of Indies that were hyped and lived up to it.
As to the OP.
Below is an extraordinarily hardcore game. Playing it my first thought was "this game would have absolutely fucking killed it back in the 90s". Like, if this game had released back in like 1994 or something it would probably stand now as an all time classic.
It wasn't for me. I'm too old now for something this hardcore, but it was pretty to look at. I think Capy might have known it was going to be divisive.
OP
OP
I mean I played Return of the Obra Dinn, Florence, Celeste, Dead Cells, Between Two Gardens, Into the Breach, Donut County and a tiny bit of The Messenger this year in 2018. I also play a fair amount of phone games. (Monument Valley being my GOTY a few years back)
If that's not enough, I'm not sure what to tell you.
Didn't watch Microsoft E3 then did ya? :)
Judging from many responses, I guess you could say that its release flew "Below" the radar!
I'll be here all week, folks!
I'll be here all week, folks!
This seems hyperbolic, we don't know if it's actually flopped and even if it did flop, it's not even close to being the biggest indie flop ever. It was never touted as as big a deal as you make it out OP.
That said, relative to how much it was hyped it, it was released to so little fanfare and with barely any build up. That's the problem. I doubt many people know it even released, but that's on Microsoft/Capy rather than the game itself.
That said, relative to how much it was hyped it, it was released to so little fanfare and with barely any build up. That's the problem. I doubt many people know it even released, but that's on Microsoft/Capy rather than the game itself.
Exactly, no one is denying the sales success, but the reviews, the horrible launch and the state of the game, all the lies and the dip in playerbase and user reviews on Steam was not a "flop"; only a "disappointment" for one of the most hyped titles of this generation. And i'm not a casual hater, i bought the game day one.
Also this, Below didn't have Cuphead or Ori hype nor No Man's Sky hype to begin with, calling it "the biggest flop" without providing actual sales or revenue means nothing.
A 71 on metacritic is not a critical flop. Average sure, but not a critical flop. And it certainly hasn't been a commercial flop either.
Some of you guys have no idea what 'flop' means.
So you played most of the highly rated indie game's and this one didn't meet the bar so it's the biggest flop all of a sudden?
It has 71 in metacritic, Mostly positive rating on steam, but its the biggest flop cause ya didn't like it right?
What is your criterion? Below spent 5+yrs in dev but we also know that Cappy worked on and released several games during that time. So I don't think that anyone outside of Cappy can say. It's obvious that they didn't bet the studio on it, nor was it the primary project. I see it as just "the game they wanted to make". I'd say let's wait a little more than 3 weeks after it's release to see if it resonates.
Agreed. Below was in development and then it felt like the 'out now!' announcement just came out of nowhere, and at a pretty busy time of year too. I wouldn't be surprised if many still had no idea it was even available to play now.
OP
OP
All of the sudden, I don't think you read the OP. I outlined pretty clearly why I felt it was a flop in terms of expectations vs reality.
Define flop because if we're talking about sales (and normally I would when using that word), I don't think we know enough about Below's sales performance to make this assumption.
A flop, is a game that failed on both sales AND critical reception. NMS only failed on one of that. Did it live up the expectations? Hell no, but that doesn't have anything to do with the game being not a flop.
This:
A game can bomb (be a failure in sales) or be panned (be a failure in critical reception) but it need fail at both to 'flop'
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You might say its sales were -- under -- expectations...
Edit - wait, shit, that doesn't work.
No Man's Sky for sure. Not really into shitting on indies unless they're doing shady shit like Hello Games was. Below is really cool and well worth the wait though.
Im just joking around. Thanks for buying Sworcery!
OK FINE I'LL WADE IN MORE... FWIW, seeing our reviews range from 90/80/70/60s etc really means the game was divisive. Is that a flop? I dont think so at all, but I'm just one biased dude.
Read my edit. 71 Meta with positive rating on steam just cause it didn't meet your expectation doesn't mean it's like biggest flop .
If you are proud of what your team made and no one's going hungry over it, I think a 60 review score doesn't really matter. Seems like quite a few people in this thread enjoy the game, so obviously it works for some folks.
I expect a game that lists 4GB of RAM as its minimum requirement, to at least actually run on a system with 4GB of RAM.
On top of that, just because it is "today", one should not give a free pass to poor optimization. A game that looks like Below does, has no business using 4GB of RAM before it even loads the first level, no matter the current date. That's just shoddy resource usage and - using the term correctly for once - lazy programming.
This could have been a GotY candidate and everybody's darling
...
If they ditched the whole rogue-like permadeath idea. That killed the hype for a lot of people I think.
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If they ditched the whole rogue-like permadeath idea. That killed the hype for a lot of people I think.
By "flop" the OP is talking about sales.
No Man's Sky was critically panned but sold quite well.
Below ... well, that describes its relation to its sales expectations.
OP
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For me?
It's too close to Furries.
It's a mouthful (keep it simple! Like Below! ;)
It's rather non-descript and I have no idea what the game is even related to based on the title. (Then again, I'm sure that could be said about a number of games)
Good art-style severely bogged down by tiny birds-eye view and probably the most frustrating checkpoint system I've ever experienced.
Terrible game.
Terrible game.
Below is like the most non-descript name you could have, it tells you nothing about the game. Personally, I don't think that has anything to do with making a good title though.
Fwiw, I like both of the names, and I think the confusion with Furries is silly.
No Man's Sky didn't flop even if you didn't like it.
I'm curious what happened though. The game was in dev hell for years.
I'm curious what happened though. The game was in dev hell for years.