Personally, Vanguard anti cheat and a lack of real ownership made this a no-go for me. I’m very in the FGC, but everyone I know that still plays the game, hates it. I don’t know why they do it.
Personally, Vanguard anti cheat and a lack of real ownership made this a no-go for me. I’m very in the FGC, but everyone I know that still plays the game, hates it. I don’t know why they do it.
It’s hard to believe they didn’t do the market research* to recognise that the FGC is quite small compared to other genres.
* like just talk to literally any gamer
I’ve seen too many fighting games sell 10 million copies now to agree that fighting games are a small market.
This one was f2p, so it doesn’t matter how many copies it “sold”. It needed dedicated long term players that would shell out for hats.
The casual fighting games market does exist, but it’s going to be people that buy the fighting game for an IP they like (say, Dragon Ball Z) and play it for a couple months then put it on the shelf. Maybe they boot it back up (and pay $10 again) when the DLC adds Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta or whatever.
2XKO was never a game that could make money from casuals, because there was no reason for anyone except “fgc mechanics heads” to give a single shit about the game. And those fgc heads saw a 2v2 tag fighter with ten characters and responded with a resounding “lmao”. Doesn’t help that it’s a fighting game with kernel anticheat.
A game like DBFZ can reach more than 10 million players even with a price barrier, so I can see the rationale for free to play. Personally, I think free to play is a horrible gamble for just about any game these days, regardless of genre, but only 10 characters and an enormous grind to unlock more, I would agree, was a death sentence for this game. Even if they launched with 20 characters, they were never going to get new ones out in this genre with a cadence that resembled League of Legends. And yeah, while the mechanics borrow heavily from some of my least favorite fighting games, they also told me to straight up not bother with it by way of anti-cheat.
Well that’s what I mean tho. If DBFZ reaches a million players in year 1, Bamco gets sixty million dollars (pre taxes and fees and licensing yadda yadda). If 2XKO reaches a million players, Riot gets zero dollars unless you also got some of that million to buy hats. A guy who buys DBFZ and plays for a week before dropping it got you sixty bucks. Same dude in 2XKO that doesn’t buy a $20 hat gets you zilch.
I mean, the hope is for something new; to be that one that creates a genre boom. I’m sure Among Us wasn’t the first party deception game.
I’m guessing at least some of the planning just came from developers who are fighting game fans that want to see a success there, rather than business planners.
But you’re also right that a lot of the audience has zero patience for trying a game where two characters face off with a big life bar in three rounds. Hundreds of thousands have been promised “It’s good for beginners now!” and had that promise broken with motion inputs and skill gaps.
That‘s what I thought. I wonder if there was any game they could‘ve made in this genre that would‘ve met THEIR expectations. There‘s money to be made for sure, but THAT kinda money with a fighting game? Just no way.