550°

Biomutant criticized after locking one of its classes behind pre-orders

A Biomutant pre-order bonus locks the entire Mercenary class behind a pre-purchase of the game, a new trailer for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One game has revealed.

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gamerevolution.com
IanTH1491d ago (Edited 1491d ago )

Amazingly, it gets lamer. They replied to a comment on the YouTube page with this doozy:
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"The Merc will be available later.

Only digital and CE pre-orders get it for pre-ordering, unfortunately we can't offer it for physical standard editions as a bonus."
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So it is not only segmented as a preorder bonus, but it's further segmented as to what format you preorder in! And "later" has yet to be clarified. Available later for free? Available later as paid DLC? How much later is later? It's an impressive number of misfires on what should be a trivial thing.

1490d ago
isarai1491d ago

Aw, that's not cool dudes, c'mon

-Foxtrot1491d ago

With how long this game has taken to come out, the fact it might get buried under other games or treat differently as it's from an unknown studio with a new IP on their hands and the games reception could go either way, I don't think locking a class, gaining bad PR is worth it.

Silly Mammo1490d ago

I was very excited about this game when I first heard about it, but I've kind of moved on.

VTKC1490d ago

Wasn't this suppose to be ps4? Lol take any longer and there won't be enough people to care.

monkey6021491d ago

This annoys me. I planned to buy the game but I dont pre order anything. Stupid practice. Don't lock me out of something because I am unwilling to pay you before you put a product out. Even though I will be spending the same money as anyone else on release day

mac_sparrow1491d ago

I mentioned to my wife just yesterday that I had been following this since it was announced and wanted to play it day one, even though there's no PS5 version yet.

Today though, today I think I can wait until it's under £20. I love video games and I really like the look of this, but I won't support this bullshit.

SullysCigar1491d ago

Can't fault your logic there. I've been rooting for this game for bloody ages, but I'll be doing the same as you, sadly.

monkey6021491d ago

I've greatly toned down my spending on new games the last year so I can easily wait this one out if they go this route. Which is sad because there's only a couple of games I've permitted myself to get excited for this year and buy on launch day. Most of which are small developers that I'd like to support.

(Biomutant, Kena, Little Devil inside, Back 4 Blood and Ratchet if anyone was curious)

DogJosha1491d ago

I support boycotting them to show them this is wrong, but if you are desperate, last time I preordered years ago, Best Buy required $0 down for in-store preorders, and possibly Amazon too. Also, GS would still give you your preorder bonus if you went in and preordered the day before the release date.

PappyQ1491d ago

Right there with you. I was planning on getting it day one on XBox, but crap like this = wait.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 1491d ago
mac_sparrow1491d ago (Edited 1491d ago )

It's important to remember that this started with things like 79p for weapons skins, then it was new items, early unlocks/so called time savers, extra characters... Now it's content being held back and expansion passes to see the actual ending of some titles. It's snowflakes on a mountain side and I want no part in it.

I buy a lot of games, even though my backlog is extensive, partly through excitement and partly through a desire to support an industry that has brought me a great deal of joy; but that doesn't mean I'll sleepwalk towards being unfairly disadvantaged, a potential industry crash, or an unsustainable business model that leads to a race to the bottom in terms of quantity over quality in order to maximize audience retention at the expense of truly memorable experiences.

mac_sparrow1491d ago (Edited 1491d ago )

I will (and do) buy DLC, when it is clear that it is delivering content beyond the scope of the original vision for the game, or is a well crafted continuation of a narrative that has already had a satisfying conclusion.

This is neither. This is cut content and pressure selling.

I agree with Monkey, I will pay for the product when it is released, not before. An exchange of money for goods, not goods in potentia. I wouldn't buy half a car, with the rest being delivered 6 months later, just as I wouldn't buy pork futures... I'd be more likely to buy a sausage inna bun from CMOT Dibbler.

anast1491d ago

@Mac I get that for sure. And a preorder bonus for characters that that no one has any connection to is a strange marketing decision. I was so ready to day 1 this game and now I just feel let down and uninterested, all that fun hype is gone.

IamTylerDurden11491d ago

It's an unpopular opinion but I can't fault a publisher for pre-order bonuses. At a time when games regularly go half price just a month or two post launch, there needs to be incentive for day one purchases. However, locking a class behind a pre-order is extreme and I understand the outrage. But I will say the situation with Deus Ex Mankind Divided was overblown and the bad PR hurt an otherwise good game.

monkey6021491d ago

I regularly buy games on release day with none of the pre order incentives included. I dont typically care. Cosmetics mean nothing to me really.

In fact the only time I can think of buying one is when I bought the Elsa Walker skin for Claire in the Resi 2 Remake but that had a value to me as someone who followed the series since the mid 90s.

Gameplay effecting incentives are unforgivable if that content isn't later unlockable through progression.

The worst I can remember was the preorder DLC chapter for Mass Effect 3. Where they locked an entire plot point and character behind it.

amazinglover1491d ago

This isn't a pre-order bonus though this is what should have been normal built in content.

Relientk771491d ago

Hopefully this gets insane backlash, and the devs add this class to the game. It's so stupid when companies try to pull this crap.

monkey6021491d ago

I'm hoping they do pull it back and give it to every copy. If I think they're holding shit back from launch day buyers, I'll just wait until the inevitable PS5 update/version and get it cheaper

IamTylerDurden11491d ago

The problem is, there is a slight possibility that this class was specifically created for the bonus. It's unlikely, but if true, we look like dicks..

1490d ago
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60°
6.0

Biomutant Review - Thumb Culture

Biomutant has finally arrived on Switch! Dive into a world of cute mutants and monster-bashing combat. Find out what we thought about it!

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thumbculture.co.uk
Crazyglues322d ago

This game could have been huge, but sadly it fails big time at just being a lot o fun to play... Which is what it should be because that's how it looks when you first hear about the game.

-But at every turn they fail at fun to play.. What do I mean? Glad you asked -(remember Mario from Nintendo, any Mario, the first time you played it, there was one thing really clear right off the back) -It's super fun to play... Period, no matter what your doing it's fun.

Bungie once said the secret to good game design is take something that is really fun about the game, and extending it to all over the game.

Biomutant could have hit that bar with very little effort. The game has so much going for it. In my opinion the only thing they needed to nail was how it plays / and that's where it fails the most. This is a game that could have sold 23 million copies and instead did 1 million...

anast322d ago

I was really hyped for this game.

Glemt322d ago

I'm still wondering "what do you mean". I've not played the game and am genuinely interested in what your argument is. But your argument boils down to:
Biomutant devs failed at every turn, because Nintendo made their games fun? Because Biomutant fails at "how it plays". Are we talking control scheme? Combat? Exploration? What exactly?

Again, genuinely interested to hear more of your thoughts on this because it seems you know exactly why this game didn't work.

Crazyglues319d ago

@ Glemt

Ok, I'll explain... I guess if you have not played the game then you are lost on what I was saying. So ok I get that. -but I think for anyone that played the game you know what I mean because it stands out like a soar thumb, what's bad in the game.

I'll try to keep this short / I'll try / the game has bad combat, bad exploration, bad overall game mechanics, in the way it feels... Now mind you, that's just one persons opinion but it's also just a gaming thing. (meaning as a gamer you know what you like and what you don't) So for example:

Iin Grand tursimo 7 gas, or making the car go forward on the track is the R2 button on the PS5 controller / as a game designer you can change this to something else, but it is a bad idea because it's a universal idea.. Something people have just come to expect and something they know without reading instructions.
People start to play a racing game or just start driving and they expect R2 to be gas or to go forward...

So expectation is important in game design. (I remember the Watchdogs developer was doing an interview and he said all the playtest they did / people hated the driving, it didn't feel right. And it was bringing their view of the game way down. Because they were expecting it to drive like Grand theft Auto. And he said, "But our game is not about driving, that's a small part of the game." --> But that is Gamers Expectation.. or you can call it we are Spoiled because of Whatever game did driving really well / that becomes your standard or expectation.

Biomutant does not play like what you expect. It's very dry, very un-rewarding, and overall boring. Not fun.

Some will push pass this but most gamers won't. They won't forgive the game for that and will stop playing very quickly. Why?
It's like just how gamers are, some get really into your game mechanics and push past what's hard and find the sweet spot, but most gamers just want fun, so if it's not fun right off the back they stop playing or move on.

It's why a ton of gamers look at game reviews, they want to know if the game is any good, worth my time. Will it be fun to play in the end. People want their game time to be interesting and fun.

I can get into how you would do this step by step in making the game, but I don't think you want to hear all of that.
So let's just say this, Steve Jobs, never made or invented anything at apple, he was the person who decided what needed to be made or designed. (they put five of apples best iPods or Mp3 players as they were called back then on a table and Steve played with each one, and then he picked the one Apple would go with) that became the iPod we know today with the scroll wheel / he knew the feel of that would be a game changer it made it work in a way that was really interesting and fun to scroll thru your music. Keep in mind No one else of the people at the top of the company knew which one would be good or why.

Game design seems to be the same way, they need a Steve Jobs leading the team, or just someone who's really into gaming / someone that really get's Gamers, a gamer like me. To explain why this is fun and why this is not. (I think I really need to start a company to help game companies) I would have showed them how to make that game sell 23 million copies instead of 1 million...

Right now I'm sure Biomutant could have made the character walk 22 different ways, but only one of those ways is going to be really good, and fun to play, who is deciding which one is the one to go with? You need that person to make decisions on all aspects of the game.

70°

THQ Nordic says Biomutant on Switch has sold more copies than they expected

Biomutant received a surprise release by THQ Nordic on the Nintendo Switch and while it has various compromises to run on Nintendo’s now aging Switch hardware, it is still good fun.

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mynintendonews.com
Philaroni335d ago

Good for them, I miss games like this is, was rough at some points but by now I feel it must have got better. Maybe I'm just a sucker for fuzzy things like Ratchet and Clank, and the old Conker and Jak/Dax games. Don't know, just reminds me of those times.

90°

Biomutant – Three Years Later

After launching three years ago in a relatively disappointing state, how does Experiment 101's open-world action title hold up?

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gamingbolt.com
sweatyrich341d ago

I played it on the PS5 in 40fps mode and it was pretty decent. Looked great, gameplay was a little but clunky at time, and fairly repetitive, but there's a large map to explore, LOADS of things to do, and you're a gun-toting, kung-fu'ing racoon !!
Accept the game for what it is, and you'll have a good time like I did.

Can't speak for how it was at launch, but the game I played was a 7.5/10

anast341d ago

I would like to see this game get a sequel with all the lessons learnt from the rocky launch and with newer tech.

Demetrius340d ago

I finished this not too long ago, definitely one of my most favorites I was really in tune with it, I didn't silence the narrator cause it always felt like I was being told a story, lol just like real life I enjoy old people telling me stories every since I was a kid I've always enjoyed that, biomutant 2 would be so mf nice to happen, definitely going for a 2nd playthrough on ps5 this time around