"Journey ahead" posted to M&D Steam and Discord

[Mister Wekonu]

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/mightanddelight/announcements/detail/528706478197965653

Today we got a post that confirmed the recent team reduction. Unlike the 2021 layoff, this one deceptively leaves out that it was ~80% of the company again: the entire Meadow team and almost the entire BoT team, leaving behind less than 10 out of 35+. "Back on track" couldn't be further from the truth, and is honestly offensive to the team members you've let go, and to your dedicated community that's been waiting for a morsel of info or hope.

The announcement teases map "updates." If this entails new zones, they must be unreleased ones left behind, as no environmental artists, quest designers, UX designers, or writers remain, so what does "updates" mean? What about Cooking, the feature that was planned after Combat and Inventory Rework and was briefly seen in beta? After 6 months, what is the status of the Combat fixes to allow the return of creatures and addition of the unreleased ones and/or the other weapons? You know a community loves even the roughest roadmap possible!

This also announces that there is a half-way done new project slated for Fall 2025. Many of the old dev team members didn't even know this project existed, and if it's half-done and releasing in under a year, surely there's more to share than a sudden vague surprise of it... right? This reeks of corporate, dangling a carrot of shiny faux hope. Based on a formerly-cancelled game, Child of Cooper, on SteamDB suddenly receiving beta and dev comp key generation, it's probably not even a "new" game anyway. If this proves true, this will be a blatant act of customer deception.

What is the plan for having 10 people work on 3 projects? Will you re-hire more for BoT a third time, despite having none of the OG team left and a very poor lack of documentation, guides, outlines etc for new hires to fall back on? Will you release this next project and just trickle-support BoT in the dust over the years like you so painfully did to Meadow? Based on LinkedIn updates, it seems your plan is just to throw work at new interns again instead of re-hiring any of the 60+ people you've thrown away as per Sweden's union laws (or, y'know, common decency and logic)

If the plan is instead to can BoT and Meadow after these hotfixes/balance patches, please just say that for your followers instead of stringing along optimism and ambiguity in a time that requires raw truth after half a year of silence. The article calls out a desire for "preservation." How will this be done? Offline compatibility? Player hosting servers? Going open-source? Selling the IP or getting a publisher? Have you put work into any of these options? Which options would the community prefer most? You haven't reached out to us to ask or test the waters.

You tote 15 years in the business (5 of those getting BoT to a mere 20% completion) and accuse "weathering a storm in the industry," but all of this was because of direct (higher up) company choices. I know the few devs left behind don't know the full picture ahead and I feel for them and the new, not-introduced person you threw under the bus to write this article, but you claim a studio is only as good as its players, so please: give those players (and your own employees, former and current) honesty and clarity.

[Genghis Pawn]

I don't think you and I have ever seen eye-to-eye on much of anything, but we are aligned on this.

[ekurisona]

how can they even carry on production with that many new people - will those people even understand the vision of the project and what needs to be done. hate to see passion projects completely careen like this. i backed it because i believed in what what they wanted to accomplish. sad. : |

[Rhapsody]

Originally posted by ekurisona:

i backed it because i believed in what what they wanted to accomplish. sad. : |

This isn't Kickstarter or crowdfunding. This is Steam early access. You pay for what you get right at that moment, no more, no less. And that's also why, frankly, none of us are entitled to answers to questions of the OP.

[Genghis Pawn]

Originally posted by Rhapsody:

Originally posted by ekurisona:

i backed it because i believed in what what they wanted to accomplish. sad. : |

This isn't Kickstarter or crowdfunding. This is Steam early access. You pay for what you get right at that moment, no more, no less. And that's also why, frankly, none of us are entitled to answers to questions of the OP.

What about those of us who kickstarted the game and are still waiting for it?

[Rhapsody]

Originally posted by Genghis Pawn:

Originally posted by Rhapsody:

This isn't Kickstarter or crowdfunding. This is Steam early access. You pay for what you get right at that moment, no more, no less. And that's also why, frankly, none of us are entitled to answers to questions of the OP.

What about those of us who kickstarted the game and are still waiting for it?

That's a different matter, of course. I don't know how the campaign went and what exactly was promised there. But too many people buy an early access game on Steam without realizing that it's a product that is being sold "as is". This has its limits too, but so long as the game doesn't shut down prematurely or downscale into something completely different from its current form, I doubt there'll be any violations.

[Genghis Pawn]

OP is a kickstarter backer, FWIW.

I'm of the opinion that if a Studio makes overtures about cultivating a community and soliciting their input as part of the EA process, they incur obligations to their players that go beyond the bare minimum of not violating Valve's terms of conditions for EA. If too many people set the bar too high for EA games, still, we don't need to dig a trench to put it below the floor.

[Congescor]

i believe in the project. that's all.

[[RM] Thunderhunt]

Originally posted by Congescor:

i believe in the project. that's all.

what project?

[Hiddles]

Man, I had been really looking forward to this game's potential when I backed it. Even got some copies for friends who I knew would like this kinda thing to help it out. Played it a bunch when it first released, helped with reporting bugs and so on and eventually as things weren't progressing yet I chose to wait... and wait... and wait. This sort of result is incentive to stop backing games and stop believing in the potential of a company even with finished projects already behind them. It's super disappointing.

Went back to look through their Kickstarter page and all the things they promised. At the bottom was the following:

Risks and challenges

Might and Delight are experienced developers and publishers and fully aware of the demands and challenges of a busy production shedule. While we cannot rule out that minor delays may occur, we are fully confident that the project (which is part way through developement) will be successfully completed and delivered to all backers without issue.

[Genghis Pawn]

Friendly reminder from Steam's FAQs regarding User Reviews:

Originally posted by Steam:

Q. Can I write a negative review?
A. Yes. If you are unhappy with the product, or don't believe that it is delivering on what it promises, you may write a review and tell other customers why you do not recommend it.

[Orange Goodman]

I wish I could refund this game everyday.

[GrinningRabbit]

Yeah this game (sadly) is done. I keep coming back to see how its going from time to time in hopes for a flip around and that my prediction would be wrong. But ill be honest, after the first layoffs i knew it was toast. This was just the confirmation.

To those holding onto hope.. just dont.. trust me.. save yourself some time.. ive been here and done that with so many EA games (and regular games also) before this one. It sucks.. it really does.. but.. its best to move on imho. The "nail in the coffin" issue here is if they weren't able to get the game farther along with the number of people they had.. they sure as heck arent going to with 10 people. Realistically speaking.

So here's to hoping we get another game like it some day down the road. Best of luck to all of you and enjoy your life the best you can. Devs and players alike.

[WeaponsGradeHumanity]

That's a profoundly sensible take.

[ObsidianKey]

BoT players are very deadicated. *hisses the sleeper*

[Sirtim]

Came to give my moment of silence. Remember backing this in 2019 for $100 crazy its jan of 2025 now.