Midnight's Edge did a video explaining that
Dustborn was funded by a grant from the Norwegian government and even if it fails the company that made it will still get more grants.
As long as they are funded by Norway's taxpayers it doesn't matter if it makes money or not. In fact, if it helps them get more grants they'd probably prefer a failure to a modest success. Also, they designed the game the way they did because they know what the board that hands out the grants likes, so they made the game for them.
Continuous failures. And especially BOMBS aren't going to keep getting funded forever.
You can live in decadence if you can sustain it somewhat. This, nah. This isn't just a "eh we barely broke even". No this is cataphoric failure. No returns on investment, no givies back. No way to build from there.
Turbo bombs scare investors badly, and when it's back to back even grants like these have been pulled away.
Still. I'm an optimist, so who knows.
Hero shooters have been a plague for years now and while this is the funniest fuck up so far its a shame we haven't gotten to the point of where the majority of the focus didn't go on creating obnoxious personalities for people with none to attach themselves too.
Most of these games have completely unremarkable gameplay that people say is good but how many times can you play big hook character with a shotgun without it feeling exactly the same? Its completely by the numbers and adding a slightly different tempo by giving universal roll mechanics can't cover up the already worn out base.
People don't mind playing as a faceless John Gunguy as long as you give them some decent customizations and the game feels good. People will turn and be repulsed by playing cross dressing faggots that says obnoxious lines that only other fags think are witty every 12 seconds.
This was an 8 year production. Probably like how Deadlock was. (Mark my words, that shit's gonna be doing pretty bad numbers wise too. It's valve so it will survive, but barely)
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One of the issues aside the "mechanics" is just how controlled and contained it is. You compare this to like capture the flag or 6v6 fights in old halo or quake and it's night and day. Freedom to customize your character, freedom to wield any gun you want. Able to leap bounds over the terrain, a very simple goal that doesn't rely on fucking retards trying to wrangle a slow moving payload for 30 minutes. You don't need to blame your team too much, you just play the fucking game.
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TF2 survives not only because of nuts mobility but because you can genuinely make builds, and those builds make far more interesting gameplay variety overall. And you can make maps. Make custom games. Have really goofy ass cosmetics. And the game radiates sovl. And you can genuinely carry as a good player alot.
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Tell me ANY fucking hero shooter that has had a soul in the last decade. Even Overwatch was a soulless piece of shit that people gravitated to because it was the first one of it's kind (I would know, I played the fucking thing). And it almost broke the mold with that dynamic gameplay but then bolt capped even that. I remember the days when the OW "pros" were cope covering for how much worse the game was made. (And in OW2, the pros are even WORSE about that. Lmao 5v5)
Combine that with this constant pandering devs now feel pressured to do towards fucking degenerates and a very corporate bland feel, and this was bound to die.
But man, no one expected it to bomb this badly.
