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[RavageX]

They made plenty of good games before, one bad game is enough to close down everything?

In the end, this was more of a mismanagement problem, but as always, those who don't call the shots are the first to be cut.

Yes, if money and time was pouring into the game...yes one BAD game is enough to ruin you. Again, I personally would fire everyone involved in this, but then again it seemed like a bad idea from the start. I wouldn't have allowed it to go forward as a release. I would have focused on a Baldur's Gate style co-op action RPG.

I even think a mortal kombat/soul blade style game would have made better sense than a Gollum game.

 

[ungalo]

Why those morons from Nacon bought them for more than 50 millions one year ago ???

 

[Kagoshima_Luke]

 

[DonkeyPunchJr]

Maybe some of the devs can team up with former Redfall + Forspoken devs and create one giant pile of shit that nobody wants to play.

 

[Moses85]

With these bunch of amateurs

 

[TLZ]

 

[YeulEmeralda]

Honestly did anyone even want a Gollum game?

All these LOTR spin offs are a bit ridiculous.

 

[fatmarco]

What was Daedalic even thinking when they picked Gollum? They should have just honored Tolkien's wishes.

It's funny, as bad as Gollum is as a game, the Shadow of Mordor series still beats it as the worst Lord of the Rings canon expansion in gaming.

 

[Larxia]

Such a weird thing this game. Daedalic actually made some good (and really pretty) games on PC before, like their point n click series such as deponia, night of the rabbit etc... It's really weird that they decided to make this gollum game and worst of all, it's sad that the studio dies because of that game.

 

[Deerock71]

Gollum killed Daedalic.

 

[stickkidsam]

Oh NO! Gollum was myGOTY.. was looking forward to the sequel... imaginary pre-order canceled.



Never got his sentiment...

Some jobs deserve to be lost... paying anyone actual money to do actual work is not a charity. If I pay someone to clean my place and they do a piss poor job of it, should I keep paying them because I don't want them to be jobless?

This game was so bad... that if I were ever hiring devs to work on a game and I see this game on their CV... it would disqualify them.

They set out to make a game outside of their wheel house and failed. That's at least commendable and if that ambitious attempt causes them to lose their jobs then yeah, that's sad.

Hell, it's sad in general when people lose their jobs due to circumstances outside their control. Especially if it's due to poor leadership. It doesn't matter how well you do your job if the guys steering the ship are failing at theirs.

 

[Sorcerer]

This is sad!!! I think its a huge hit to point and click players. Haven't kept up with them recently and Gollum seemed out of their wheelhouse when I learned about it.

 

[Hero of Spielberg]

It wasn't a Gollum sequel, it was a second game set in the LotR universe featuring a different character.

Daedalic Entertainment Has Another Lord of the Rings | GameWatcher

Daedalic Entertainment's second Lord of the Rings game is set to launch before the end of August 2024, according to Germany's Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action.

www.gamewatcher.com

Tom Bombadil's Sing-a-long no doubt

 

[cash_longfellow]

Damn, that's shitty for the employees………wait, there was a sequel already planned, holy fucking bad higher ups Batman.

 

[Mr.Phoenix]

They set out to make a game outside of their wheel house and failed. That's at least commendable and if that ambitious attempt causes them to lose their jobs then yeah, that's sad.

Hell, it's sad in general when people lose their jobs due to circumstances outside their control. Especially if it's due to poor leadership. It doesn't matter how well you do your job if the guys steering the ship are failing at theirs.

I am sorry... I just don't see it that way.

I dunno what's with the whole giving out medals for the effort thing. If they decide to do something, and that was out of their comfort zone, then its on them. They worked on it for years. They saw the state it was in. And they released it anyways. Why the fuck should we have sympathy for them, did they have sympathy for all the poor saps that paid money for that game? Are they refunding them? You cant nw come and say well it was their boss's fault. Tome, everyone should be held accountable.

look at something like The Order 1886... Crap game, stupid short and near archaic mechanics. But the game excels in certain areas. So even if they failed to build their original vision, their talent still shone through even in the failure.

Can you point out one single good thing in this game? Just one?

 

[Danjin44]

At least it's not bad as this….

 

[Grildon Tundy]

Maybe some of the devs can team up with former Redfall + Forspoken devs and create one giant pile of shit that nobody wants to play.

lmao that's so mean

 

[Danjin44]

Maybe some of the devs can team up with former Redfall + Forspoken devs and create one giant pile of shit that nobody wants to play.

 

[Darkmakaimura]

I'm one of the only people - actually, I'm probably the only person - that thinks the Gollum game is good.

There was no excuse for the technical issues. None at all and they announced in their apology that they are going to patch it but from hearing what I'm reading in this thread, we may never even get those patches.

That part really sucks.

 

[Sleepwalker]

Maybe some of the devs can team up with former Redfall + Forspoken devs and create one giant pile of shit that nobody wants to play.

Hopefully a fast and furious game where you control vin diesel as gollum and he just repeats family over and over instead of my precious.

 

[brian0057]

Damn. That's a shame.
Maybe they should try making a good game next... Oh, wait.

 

[Raven117]

Sorry to hear, but seriously…. Whose idea was that? Of all of middle earth to choose from, they pick the absolute dumbest character to make a video game about. It just boggles my mind how that got done

 

[theclaw135]

Full disclosure: I was hyped for the Gollum game.

 

[aries_71]

I feel sorry for them. It's clear to me that they attempted more than what they could really achieve. They tried.

 

[PSYGN]

Step 1. Research the market
Step 2. Make a game about a character 99% of people don't care for
Step 3. Wait for reception
Step 4. Start working on the next game in the series

 

[theclaw135]

Step 1. Research the market
Step 2. Make a game about a character 99% of people don't care for
Step 3. Wait for reception
Step 4. Start working on the next game in the series

I'll give it's not easy to portray a character of the sort. At any moment he'll swap personality between wanting you to feel sorry for him, to a creepily violent rage.

 

[Calling 911 Melts Beams]

Shoulda watched the 3rd movie

Gollum always bites the hand that feeds him

 

[Heimdall_Xtreme]

They should play the game with a pretty girl like Galadriel

 

[YCoCg]

At least it's not bad as this….

That's at least super nacho cheese bad, it's an experience in badness that also hilarious to play because it makes you question soo many choices they made for the story and gameplay.

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

So this means that Gollum is not coming to Switch anymore?

 

[Braag]

Whoever was responsible of greenlighting these Gollum games should be the first to go.

 

[Darkmakaimura]

So this means that Gollum is not coming to Switch anymore?

I thought it was already out on Nintendo Switch but I did a Google search and it shows it's going to be released December 31st of 2023.

That of course sounds like a placeholder and yeah, it looks like it won't be arriving on Switch.

 

[bender]

Now we will never know how the Gollum story finishes. Sad.

 

[TheSHEEEP]

That's sad. They were one of the few devs left who know how to make 2D point-and-click adventure games.

Honestly, I expect a good chunk of them will go on making games just like that on their own as a new studio.
At least I hope.

 

[Darkmakaimura]

So I just learned that they made a couple Das Schwarze Auge games.

 

[Hudo]

Honestly, I expect a good chunk of them will go on making games just like that on their own as a new studio.
At least I hope.

I hope so as well. I think hand-drawn 2D point-and-click adventures still have a niche that can be profitable.

 

[TransTrender]

Pfft

Good luck with that...

Holy shit it's real.


This whole project seems wildly beyond in both scale and scope compared to any of their other games, so someone will have to remind me how they managed to get access to this IP and how they managed to afford scaling up to even attempt something like this.

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

I thought it was already out on Nintendo Switch but I did a Google search and it shows it's going to be released December 31st of 2023.

That of course sounds like a placeholder and yeah, it looks like it won't be arriving on Switch.

That's a shame tbh, I really wanted a Switch physical copy for posterity's sake. Oh well.

 

[Soodanim]

That's a shame tbh, I really wanted a Switch physical copy for posterity's sake. Oh well.

Sometimes the universe saves you from yourself

 

[Filben]

Deadalic was in trouble financially several times now the last couple of years. Their studios in Düsseldorf and Munich were liquidated in 2021 and lay offs happened on regular basis since 2015. Since then some people also left voluntarily because they found the working environment not stable and secure enough and looked for better perspectives.

Gollum was just the last coffin nail and maybe their desperate attempt to hit it big international to safe the company's game development department.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Step 1. Research the market
Step 2. Make a game about a character 99% of people don't care for
Step 3. Wait for reception
Step 4. Start working on the next game in the series

Gaming companies would be a lot more successful if they actually did market research on what games to make and put in quality workmanship into it. There is no way any kind of research would show gamers want a stealthy Gollum game.

Instead of this hide and seek/make what we feel like it/let's wing it and tell gamers 3 years into dev what we're doing, just get back to basics. I bet there's more research done at Pepsi making a new offshoot limited edition Lay's potato chip than any game company sinking in 4 years of dev and budget breaking costs making their game.

It's all about risk, reward and budget. But just because shooters are popular doesn't mean 100% of game companies have to make all shooters. Like ice cream, if chocolate and vanilla are the most popular flavours, companies dont just make those two flavours. Companies can make a mix of variety and collectively be successful.

But the key difference is making a new tub of ice cream doesn't have an R&D and development cost of $50M or whatever to make. So if it fails, no frozen dessert company is going to shut down or beg for investors money to stay alive. But game company X might.

 

[chromhound]

He look like took some molly

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Nonsense...

Its easy to always blame upper management.

Its unfortunate that said upper-management gets to keep their jobs.. as far as I am concerned... when I see a game that is this bad across the entire board. It was not even like it was good in a single area. Not music, not performance, not animation, not graphics... NOTHING.

Nope... I am axing that entire team.

Even the janitor gets the ax too. Just by association.

Exactly.

People have this crazy view that when things go bad every manager and director cant get fired too. As if all boss level jobs get forever employment. I've seen my share of bosses canned, including VPs. The key difference is that when underlings get canned, the entire world knows about it in some kind of lay offs article. But when a director gets canned, it's quietly done and no high up boss complains on Twitter or Linked In they got canned like babies.

 

[stickkidsam]

I am sorry... I just don't see it that way.

I dunno what's with the whole giving out medals for the effort thing. If they decide to do something, and that was out of their comfort zone, then its on them. They worked on it for years. They saw the state it was in. And they released it anyways. Why the fuck should we have sympathy for them, did they have sympathy for all the poor saps that paid money for that game? Are they refunding them? You cant nw come and say well it was their boss's fault. Tome, everyone should be held accountable.

look at something like The Order 1886... Crap game, stupid short and near archaic mechanics. But the game excels in certain areas. So even if they failed to build their original vision, their talent still shone through even in the failure.

Can you point out one single good thing in this game? Just one?

Sure. With only watching a few playthroughs, I can say the character models (e.g. Golem and Borocs), environment design, and music range from serviceable to good. The gameplay holds some interesting ideas with the players choice to empower Smeagol or Golem. From what I've seen it just doesn't amount to enough to feel impactful.

The major flaws of the game seem to be repetitive puzzle design and poor optimization. Given another shot, perhaps the studio could put out a better product from lessons learned. It's my understanding that this studio has made multiple well regarded point and click games.

To your other point though, you don't see holding everyone to the same level of accountability as reductive? There's a reason that a managerial role holds much more weight than a crewman. If the people at the top can't direct a project in congruence with the other departments of a project then it's going to fail regardless of how well any individual person works. Even further up you've got directors and producers who actually decide on which project a studio will take on. There are different levels of decision making within a project and each have varying levels of impact on the project as a whole. To hold every level with the same degree of accountability is just unreasonable. You don't hold a fry cook accountable for a popular item being replaced with a shitty one.

Ultimately, it's on the studio as whole how well their product turns out. That's the nature of the beast. Drop this ridiculous notion though that expressing sympathy is equivalent to handing out gold stars to everyone and saying the game is totally good. You can show understanding that failing sucks and wish people the best while also acknowledging their product sucked balls.

 

[Heimdall_Xtreme]

How many copies sold the game?

 

[Moses85]

He look like took some molly

 

[GreenAlien]

So I just learned that they made a couple Das Schwarze Auge games.

I played Demonicon last year. I didn't finish it, it has issues, but it wasn't terrible.

I mean, look at this. (It's the player character's sister, but that doesn't need to stop you. It didn't stop him either ;-) )

Edit: According to steam, that one is not related to Daedalic

 

[Darkmakaimura]

I played Demonicon last year. I didn't finish it, it has issues, but it wasn't terrible.

I mean, look at this. (It's the player character's sister, but that doesn't need to stop you. It didn't stop him either.)

I don't think that particular game is made by Daedalic. There were four games that they made based off that setting and they were Chains of Satinav and Memoria which were point and click adventure games.

They made two other games based off the setting called Blackguards which are strategy role-playing games.