I was looking forward to the game but the FOMO is pushing me away

[Revalopod]

Considering how many games I own, my wishlist is quite small. I only wishlist games I intend to buy either when they release or on the next major Steam sale (Summer or Winter)
Ak-xolotl was one of the ones I might've bought as soon as it released, ie. now. But the more I hear about it the less enthused I am.

First, it launches with a twitch drops campaign locking cosmetics behind a single week event.
Then the release notes also suggests that limited time skins would be a repeating occurrence in the future. This really puts a sour taste in my mouth if I'm being honest. This is the kind of practise that I'm just like "Ugh, whatever, fine I guess" if it's in a multiplayer online game like Hunt or Pubg. But in a small niche indie singleplayer pixel art game in the genre of EtG and NT and TBoI? It's such a weird decision that doesn't elicit positives thoughts from me unfortunately.

Another odd decision is the price, which is fairly high for this kind of game considering the most comparable games are cheaper and are already beloved and critically acclaimed. The high price point is certainly not doing any favours to help persuade me to give it a try when similar games like EtG or NT or TBoI are already guaranteed to be incredible value for money and memorable experiences. It's not about whether I can afford the game, but about whether it's a wise decision. And IF I do buy this game and it turns out to be not so great, the price point would be a major factor in influencing whether my review would be negative.

I'm not asking or requesting for anything to change, I'm just one potential customer after all, and likely no one else could care less about anything I just mentioned. I just wanted to share my honest thoughts. I do wish this game the best of luck, as it is part of a genre I am particularly fond of. But among my greatest game industry peeves are battle passes, FOMO mechanics, and MTXs, so if a game features any one of these it will need to be stand out with exceptional reviews to regain my interest. And perhaps that is exactly what will happen with this game!

[Razzle]

wait wait
this has twitch drop nonsense in it ? I am going to look into it if it does im going to refund

First I play the game for 25 min and see a bunch of jank/unpolished feeling and now i hear about twitch bs
i already hated how COTL treated me with the fact I paid $30 for the game + Dlc and still missed out on skins in a singleplayer game cuz id idnt do twitch content

im so done with this man

[Revalopod]

Originally posted by Razzle:

wait wait
this has twitch drop nonsense in it ? I am going to look into it if it does im going to refund

First I play the game for 25 min and see a bunch of jank/unpolished feeling and now i hear about twitch bs
i already hated how COTL treated me with the fact I paid $30 for the game + Dlc and still missed out on skins in a singleplayer game cuz id idnt do twitch content

im so done with this man

Yeah https://steamcommunity.com/app/1479140/eventcomments/6266251726403414087?snr=2_9_100003_

"💜Twitch Drop💜

But that's not all! We're thrilled to announce a Twitch drop event to unlock EXCLUSIVE axolotls! Simply watching for one hour will grant you Axolotl_TTV, and after an additional two hours of viewing, you'll unlock Gigalotl. Hurry, as this event concludes on September 21st, so don't miss out!
[...]
Expect new rooms, challenging bosses, and limited-time only Axolotls for you to unlock!"

[Mouse]

I don't know who gave you a clown reward, because such kind of reviews on the start can be really useful for devs and for other users.

And I kinda agree that FOMO is a thing and time-limited content was a weird desicion.
And okay, it would be fine if the game wasn't feel empty... It reminds me Blazing Beaks (that also NuclearThrone-like), but has a lot of unlockables at least, and it's priced less, especially with current discounts...

Like, I'm a little bit sus about games with cute creatures, because it can be a bait to buy it, but I want a good game, not the game about cute creatures xD
I know it works, but it like Cult of the Lamb with a horrible rogue-like part with very bad balance (maybe now it's a little bit better, didn't check the new updates though), but most of people still enjoyed the game because of unique style that was really nice polished. But it was still bad-designed and didn't worth 25$ for 12-hours of gameplay for me personally, I was extremely dissapointed in difficulty levels, magic realization, useleness of most effects, and such stuff...
People said about rogue-like part that "it's isaac-like", but it only reminded isaac in a concept, and wasn't even 1% close to the isaac content. It was also confusing x_X

[Zachilles]

I can not stand exclusive twitch drops for games. Thanks for the heads up! Will be refunding.

[Razzle]

yeah i just refunded it
look man i live in a 3rd world country, my internet aint unlimited, i get very VERY limited data caps and I cant watch streams , never have and never will as long as I live here.

I wont subscribe to the idea of having to waste all of that knowing my internet bill isnt cheap, just so i can get the exclusive content.

This stuff would work on me if i had better internet and was far younger and get excited about this stuff, im near 30 now so I just go "meh" And refund/remove from wishlist

[2Awesome CM]

Thank you for sharing your honest opinions; your feedback is always valuable to us.

Regarding limited-time skins mentioned on the roadmap, they are meant to be a fun little "extra" reward for players who revisit the game during our future updates.

As for the Twitch drops, it's important to note that they only offer additional cosmetics and don't provide any gameplay advantages. The gaming industry is increasingly focused on content creators, and incentives like Twitch drops can be a great way to encourage more people to share their experiences with the game through broadcasts. We respect your opinions on this approach, but please understand that it was not our intention to make anyone feel excluded from any parts of the game.

Hopefully the game will be one of those "stand out" cases for you, either now or with future updates, and you will be inclined to give it a shot then. If that happens, The Pond will gladly welcome you! :)

[Revalopod]

Have to say, I'm surprised that others are ticked off by twitch drop campaigns and/or FOMO as much as me. I don't recall it being criticised in other games so I assumed it was just me.

And yeah I know it's just cosmetics, but it's still technically part of the game, no matter how small, that you will forever miss out on unless you set up linking a Twitch account and leave a stream running for 3 hours. And that's just so weird to me for a singleplayer indie game of all games, which is why it's the first time I'm speaking out against it. Apparently CotL did it too which is equally baffling to me.

[Flux]

For something like a free to play multiplayer game, I get that time-gated content exists to keep players hooked, but a singleplayer game shouldn't need this. The fact that it's just cosmetics doesn't help, it will still add the feeling of "you will never unlock everything because you missed the event".

I hope the decision to have exclusive content isn't final, I want to love this game but I keep running into things that I dislike.

[Xgpmcnp]

What FOMO? The FOMO of not getting a minor cosmetic for free? Nobody's charging for it, it's a marketing thing, this is clearly nothing to refund over, jesus.

[Kersakof]

Look I know there's things to be upset about, but two ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ skins on twitch? Do you people want to be fed literally everything? Pick your battles, Aggressive microtransactions and premium currency should be the focus of your hatred. Not some ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ that people can just open a tab and check on it occasionally to get them. This is the most entitled hill to die on.

[Mouse]

Originally posted by Xgpmcnp:

What FOMO? The FOMO of not getting a minor cosmetic for free? Nobody's charging for it, it's a marketing thing, this is clearly nothing to refund over, jesus.

You're saying this about a game where people can collect different axolotl skins for their own enjoyment, so it's a thing for them.

It's like saying in Pokemon that alternate versions (not shiny) of pokemons don't have a separate number in the dex so they are optional. That's obviously doesn't help.

[Soul]

Originally posted by Lean Demon:

Look I know there's things to be upset about, but two ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ skins on twitch? Do you people want to be fed literally everything? Pick your battles, Aggressive microtransactions and premium currency should be the focus of your hatred. Not some ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ that people can just open a tab and check on it occasionally to get them. This is the most entitled hill to die on.

I want to be fed the whole game when I buy it,not miss parts of it not because I didn't play enough to unlock it,but because I wasn't sittin on my ass watching some dude for an hour,bozo

[Razzle]

Originally posted by Xgpmcnp:

What FOMO? The FOMO of not getting a minor cosmetic for free? Nobody's charging for it, it's a marketing thing, this is clearly nothing to refund over, jesus.

For you, I'm sure it isnt.
For some people (me included) it is.

its perfectly fine if you don't at all care about this , or in games like COTL that did this + exclusive content that you need to be in the discord and active to join their "events" to get those skins and its fine if you think this is okay.

I aint gonna say some wacky stuff like "You are contributing to bad behavior" Nah, it aint like that.

I simply do not have it in me anymore to spend money that I work really hard on for a small indie game and to be told that I cant get everything in it, I will excuse it maybe if the game is some actual masterpiece that I am dying to play maybe, but other than that no I am pretty much done with all exclusive stuff.

[Razzle]

Originally posted by Lean Demon:

Look I know there's things to be upset about, but two ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ skins on twitch? Do you people want to be fed literally everything? Pick your battles, Aggressive microtransactions and premium currency should be the focus of your hatred. Not some ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ that people can just open a tab and check on it occasionally to get them. This is the most entitled hill to die on.

Ngl I Feel like you should take a step back and relax and let ppl refund a game for their own reasons instead of saying entitled stuff like this.

[Zogtar]

I half-understand the need for a twitch drop, just to bring the game to attention to a wider audience... but the opening post is valid feedback.

What's janky and unpolished so far? Need some more context.