It's not easy for an independent development division to be able to make it big in the gaming industry. As WaterMelon Studios, developers of Pier Solar HD, describes it, "you pretty much feel like a tiny dot in the wide universe." Fortunately, since last year, Nintendo has been making large strides to improve their indie publishing policies and, so far, it has been paying off for both parties. In this particular case, WaterMelon studios describes their experience with Nintendo as "absolutely fantastic!"
Retro-focused developer blames bots, political correctness, and "digital fart ownership" for the company's financial woes.
Replies(1)
"political correctness" - The excuse regularly given when someone doesn't want explain what actually went wrong.
Usually theres a positive market response when devs ignore the woke cult. Ghost of Tsushima being the most recent example.
This has nothing to do with "woke" anything. But if you want to go that route, being woke didn't hurt TLOU 2 sales.
Back on topic though, it would be nice of them to explain what political correct issue he's having. Because all I'm seeing is an angry con man that tried to use the blanket statement of "political correctness" to cover up the fact that his poor business practices got his funds locked and seized
"it would be nice of them to explain what political correct issue he's having"
That was my point. If the issue was simply "political correctness", there should be no issue. Being politically incorrect should have been a benefit to his games. It sounds like hes making excuses.
@NapalmSanctuary
I misread your comment. I initially though you were defending what Fonzie did. But then i went back and researched when you bought up Ghost of Tsushima.
So now I'm going to do something that MAJORITY of people on this site seem to have difficulty doing when they're wrong. And that's say I'm sorry, my bad.
For anyone seeing this, see how easy it is to admit when you make a mistake and/or are wrong rather than double down and argue knowing you're in the wrong.
Political correctness is the bane of the modern world. Having to watch every single thing you say in case you hurt someone's feelings. Hell, in the UK they're trying to make it an actual offence to have offended someone.
Seriously, when did the world become so...snowflake?
Political correctness has no bearing on the fact that Fonzie didn't send out products to his backers after they paid.
Political correctness has no bearing on his lack of communication to his customers
Political correctness has no bearing on the fact that he started taking money from backers on a new project while leaving his previous projects backers orders unresolved.
So again, instead of hiding behind the political correctness blanket statement, he should tell people the reason(s) for this poor business practices.
He literally did the same thing that Kenji Inafune did with Mighty NO 9. Which is why his company ended up being bought by Level 5.
These guys threw out the hot-potato "political correctness" scare phrase, with the hope that some hyper-political snowflake would run with it and help them distract from the true narrative ... that they're a bunch of conmen.
Predictably their tactic worked.
Seems like he used the term political correctness, because he knows that all it takes to get some people on his side, and jump to defend him.
Well, ya win some ya lose some, I guess. That's the cost of doing business. I pre-ordered a copy, it got cancelled, went on sale again and I couldnt even send them a payment. The game ended up launching without me even knowing or getting notified as they promised, so everyone got a copy, I didnt so I had to order another and twice the cost, that was supposed to ship in April and now theyre shut down again, I lose money and have to wait and wash rinse repeat. If they arent able to ship my item, then I lose my money and have to deal with scalpers now identifying rarity and trying to take even more money from me, thats just my luck. I put money in to Kickstart the really expensive Elysian Shadows over seven years ago and nothing has been done with that either, I just have that kind of luck. Kickstarters for video games are just bad investments, and honestly, its gonna ruin it for everyone else, its too bad.... Just buy from reputable dealers is the best you can do, dont trust people with giving them your money til the jobs done, thats how dishonest people have become and been.
Fonzie has always been a horrible businessmen. Blaming everyone but himself for his own lack of communication and transparency. PayPal's issuing refunds because consumers have gone ages without receiving their items and WMs communication is terrible to say the least.
The fact that Fonzie started taking preorders for WMs next project, when most people still hadn't received their copies of Paprium (even jacking up the price for new consumers on the WM site) speaks volumes of the company's philosophy and integrity.
A fool and his money are easily parted.
No offense, but stop being so trusting.
I learnt the hard way
Aggro Sky of Gaming Rebellion details the rise of Watermelon Games, Pier Solar and talks about their newest release Paprium.
At long last, retro-centric developer Watermelon has announced that Pier Solar is now available to purchase for the Sega Dreamcast on their official store.
I think I will buy this for the Dreamcast. I never thought that I would be able to buy a new game for it.
Hucast and NG:DEVTeam have done a lot for the Dreamcast in recent years as far as new releases go. You might want to check them out. http://hucast.com/
Holy crap look how many platforms this game is on...
Pc
Linux
Ouya
Ps4
Dreamcast
Gensis
Ps3
Xbox one
Wii u
Andriod
Ps vita
Mac
WOW!
Here's hoping they move as many copies as they can. WM is a very talented studio and I'd love to see them tackle another RPG after projects N and Y wrap up.
I won't lie, this post almost made me shoot coffee from my nose. Well done, sir!
I hope this sells well for them, but I'm looking more forward to what they bring out next. Because I've already played this game and am looking forward to what's next.
This is great for Indies, and great for Nintendo, but not so great for Nintendo.
I'm not saying Nintendo should start treating indie studios like Microsoft, but they would better serve their customers by working as a publisher for these smaller studios--they don't need to give 'em huge amounts of money, but even just a modest budget for a small indie team could result in some much higher quality games--which would benefit the indie studio's reputation, and Nintendo's userbase by increasing the number of exclusive titles.
This really is the way to go. For the same amount of money and time it takes Nintendo to produce a single Mario mini-game collection, they could probably finance 2-4 solid indie titles in multiple genres.