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[Lord Malachite]

Damn sorry to hear that dude.

It's not fun. But hey, I'm still alive and I'll continue to be. And I've gotten well known around the hospital and have mastered the fine art of "hospital living" and how to make it work out okay for me.

 

[Team Andromeda]

Please keep buying them so we don't have to, thanks!

Sadly 1 full price sale per IP isn't enough these days

I do try, sorry!

 

[ShadowNate]

It's a sad development. I was hoping that they'd have anticipated mediocre sales.

This is a title they decided to bring back by attempting a remake of the original (plus a bit more), when it was considered deader than dead by the fans of the series and, really, there were only a handful of good things anyone could write about any of the sequels and reboots past the original one in Derceto.

They (pubishers, project managers) ought to have taken this into account. Maybe skip the big names in the cast? Aim for a smaller scale yet larger impact scope? Have a contingency plan of not completely shutting down the studio within months after release?

Yes, the industry is ruthless, but this is a case where the publisher had to have a sense of what to expect for the title and some sort of plan to power through the inertia of the fan base and build towards a renewed version of the franchise.

Or even they also hoped for a RE2 Remake situation, which would make them idiots.

 

[Madserb2023]

If the gaming industry was the same back in the 90s as it is today, it would have completely collapsed. So many well renowned developers today had multiple failures before finally becoming successful.

 

[Hypereides]

If the gaming industry was the same back in the 90s as it is today, it would have completely collapsed. So many well renowned developers today had multiple failures before finally becoming successful.

I agree.

Too bad the current day big wig exec fail to realize they're creating and contributing to an ill environment for games to properly flourish.

 

[Arsic]

I bought it after the last update but got bored after the swamp level.

Not scary, not interesting, not worth a dollar. Game needed to be a gamepass title at launch and even then it isn’t fully worth your time.

Mileage may vary.

 

[Team Andromeda]

If the gaming industry was the same back in the 90s as it is today, it would have completely collapsed. So many well renowned developers today had multiple failures before finally becoming successful.

Tell that to the Scavenger teams, Clockwork Tortoise to name but a few

​

 

[Games of Today]

Devs need to start saying no. Stop selling out and stop making shitty games for unoriginal and repetitive IP's like Marvel.

 

[Deerock71]

 

[Madserb2023]

Tell that to the Scavenger teams, Clockwork Tortoise to name but a few

​

There were some studios that shut back then but it's not like it is now. Just look at something like Bubsy 3D. It's regarded as one of the worst games ever made but they were given a second chance and went on to make Syphon Filter. They then later became Sony Bend. There are so many examples like this. One failure and you're out now. No chance for any kind of redemption.

 

[Team Andromeda]

There were some studios that shut back then but it's not like it is now. Just look at something like Bubsy 3D. It's regarded as one of the worst games ever made but they were given a second chance and went on to make Syphon Filter. They then later became Sony Bend. There are so many examples like this. One failure and you're out now. No chance for any kind of redemption.

It's not much different now. Developevers have to merge to try a new start up . Some of my fav corps had to close down or form a new studio after their last game failed and that started to get really bad in the 2000s

The gaming industry is brutal. Yes it's worse now given the manpower needed to make a game and I still feel COVID overreaction is playing it's part.

But plenty of studios closed in the old days after a couple of poor sales

 

[bender]

I feel that moving from Halloween wasn't a bad choice as they wouldn't be able to escape from comparisons to Alan Wake II and remain in its shadow. The same month also had Spider-Man 2, Assassin's Creed: Mirage, Super Mario Wonder, Lords of the Fallen, City Skylines 2, Dave the Diver, Total War: Pharaoh and MGS: Master Collection among many others. Plenty of games to pick on various platforms. Few of them were also buggy messes (City Skylines 2, Total War: Pharaoh) or had some controversies (MGS Master Collection), so AitD would most likely be remembered as one of October's flops (looking at its state at launch), buried under the pile of so many games

Survival-horrors as a genre unfortunately doesn't have that mass appeal beyond Resident Evil franchise. Alan Wake II still isn't profitable, EA shelved Dead Space after remake underperformed in sales, Microsoft closed Tango Gameworks aka creator of The Evil Within games, etc. I think Embracer and Pieces made a huge mistake of investing in Hollywood stars to voice this game. It was supposed to draw more people in, but ultimately I think sales would be similar if they would use lesser known voice actors and budget would be much smaller, so being profitable would probably be much more achievable. Other thing they fucked up was that awful Prologue demo. It's cool they tried to honor the older standalone game with making it about Grace Saunders, but demo is supposed to give you a better indication of what this game will be about and how it plays. They didn't made a good job with it, which I feel might have discouraged some people who would be eager to give it a chance if that demo wouldn't be a 15 minute long walking sim

Fair points but I still think you need to utilize advantages of a Halloween season if you have any hopes of selling outside of the audience who remembers Alone In The Dark (fondly). Going up against Alan Wake would have been tough and I suppose delaying it until Halloween 2024 is out of the question considering the studio was shuttered.

 

[A2una1]

Of course, it was along with Dr Hauzer on the 3DO and we all knew it.

Mikami does like to spin it a little now again mind. I seem to remember him saying he'll never work on the PS2 LOL

But Resident Evil brought it into main stream. Alone in the dark was not very successfull outside of europe. And the successors focused on the wrong things from the first part..

 

[Team Andromeda]

But Resident Evil brought it into main stream. Alone in the dark was not very successfull outside of europe. And the successors focused on the wrong things from the first part..

I never said it didn't . My point was a few games did RE gameplay before RE and it was a lit disingenuous from Capcom to say try and make out , they had never heard or played AITD.

It wdd very clear they did.

 

[Bartski]

I never said it didn't . My point was a few games did RE gameplay before RE and it was a lit disingenuous from Capcom to say try and make out , they had never heard or played AITD.

It wdd very clear they did.

That is also not true, back in 96 RE was another game in the relatively new action adventure genre that started with AITD in 92 and its two sequels, Esctatica games, Bioforge and many more. It did nothing truly original aside from perfecting the formula and felt like a „next-gen” AITD if you will

 

[Pegasus Actual]

 

[Denton]

If the gaming industry was the same back in the 90s as it is today, it would have completely collapsed. So many well renowned developers today had multiple failures before finally becoming successful.

In the 90s AA game like this did not cost 50 million USD..

Not to mention..most companies from 80s and 90s that survived until today were actually successful right out of the gate, even if their biggest megahits came later.

 

[Badlucktroll]

 

[Team Andromeda]

That is also not true, back in 96 RE was another game in the relatively new action adventure genre that started with AITD in 92 and its two sequels, Esctatica games, Bioforge and many more. It did nothing truly original aside from perfecting the formula and felt like a „next-gen” AITD if you will

You're basically making my point for me. I'm just saying AITD and DrHazuer did RE style gameplay and puzzles solving long before RE.

Capcom staff clearly had played those games before making RE.

 

[Warablo]

People just don't buy those kinda games anymore.

 

[Success]

Can’t we have an industry that has games that sell a lot to cover for games that are more niche and don’t sell as much. Can’t we have some fucking balance already. What are we doing closing studios that don’t sell millions and millions of copies because they made a title that is just not for everyone.

Even Nintendo remastered Prime with the highest of quality and Metroid sells a fraction of their other IPs.

What a naïve take.

Games that don't sell get their studios closed down.

Games are all about getting players engaged.

The Alone in the Dark reboot was incredibly mediocre and nobody found the game engaging.

 

[FinalBossWithTheMostPower]

Game was a refreshing take on the genre.

The collector's edition was sick.

As, I have said before....

FUCK EMBRACER.

 

[coffinbirth]

I end up hospitalized with a level of frequency for small intestinal obstructions due to a gal bladder surgery that went poorly back in 2019. Basically I never know when I eat a meal if it's going to be one to send me to the hospital or not. And I have to plan my life financially around these frequent hospitalizations.

Despite these issues, I feel blessed that there's no immediate threat to my life and that despite challenges and inconveniences and some very unfun procedures, I'm still kicking I'll just be dealing with this the rest of my days.



I mean, this certainly makes good sense. But then, if they're going to continue to close down studios, they may not have the manpower. They certainly don't seem like they want to stop releasing their own games.

Embracer is just extremely mismanaged. I'm reminded of my past and a national cable company that I worked for that was made by simply buying up all the unwanted markets from other cable providers. The end result was a lot of major problems and without question the largest and most dysfunctional company that I ever worked for, one that continuously abused both its customers--many of which were essentially "hostage" because they had no alternative or satellite possibility--and its employees to such length that, as an employee, it was hard to tell who you hated more--the people screaming at you on the phone for 8 hours a day or the management banging a drum in the middle of the call center floor chanting "FASTER FASTER CHEAPER CHEAPER". Literally nothing the company did worked and no one who worked there was happy unless they had some cushy office and didn't need to have any interactions with the customers or the product.

As we've seen from Xbox, you can't just buy your way to automatic victory. Acquiring a whole bunch of studios other publishers are divesting themselves of does not a successful publisher make. It takes time, support, care, and a willingness to navigate the complicated economics of modern gaming. Embracer only cares about the race to the bottom to grab as much cash as possible before imploding.

I'm of the mind your first(in bold) take is the correct one. The second one, not so much. I'm fairly certain they haven't been spending all of this money acquiring studios and investing in niche titles for however many years just to become a failure. This is, and has been since 2022, an industry-wide culling and Embracer are still in the middle of releasing games that were greelit and developed by studios that were purchased prior to all of this. They are essentially getting caught with their pants down and getting hosed, investment-wise. Now, I'm not out here stanning for fucking Embracer Group, of all things, but in the greater context of what is happening in the industry, they are just trying to get back into the black.

Alone in the Dark is hardly a cash grab. It's a good game.

Now, it is entirely possible the "race to the bottom to grab as much cash as possible before imploding" phase is still forthcoming, hahaha.

 

[YeulEmeralda]

Yeah, like I could read the future about this studio closure because their game didn't sell. Like I said, I'm not the biggest fan of Alone in the Dark, but I would get around to it eventually. It's a matter of priority and economics, there is too much games releasing now + other things that happens in life. And I can still be sympathetic for a studio closing even if I didn't buy their game day 1.

Word. I'm usually years behind as a patient gamer.

Although it sucks that this developer is shut down ultimately there are so many games coming out that I don't feel the need to support mediocre titles. I'll try to support stuff I really care about though (Atlus, Falcom).

 

[Jesb]

At what point does the industry get a problem of people not wanting to work in games anymore? That would be the end of videogames wouldn’t it.