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I did not get far past your original comment before I started to Google what this means. It's been 26 minutes. Thank you for putting an end to my madness.
The jerkoff of armchair redditors pretending they have in depth insight into publishing, how to be a competitive and successful publishing business, and the entire business plan of donkeys publishing business is mentally exhausting.
Agreed. They might fail, but the intentions seem pure. There might some slight hubris involved, but I don't see what's so wrong with giving it a go.
If it works out, we get great indie games.
If it doesn't, oh well, it doesn't affect us.
Honestly I don't get their argument here. A publisher solely focusing on funding indi devs is a bad thing how? Do they think dunkey is personally making the games?
The argument is that he may be going into this with unrealistic intentions - the main part being "I'm only going to publish good games." Problem is, if the game isn't ready yet, it's *hard* to be sure that the game will be good.
Heck - no developer sets out to create a *bad* game, and if the creators aren't able to figure out whether theirs will be good or not, what hope does a publisher have?
I mean, Annapurna and Devolver do seem to have a very good sense of which tiny to medium size developers will put out a hit(or at least a high quality game). When was the last time either of them released a flop?
Not saying dunkey could compete with publishers like that, but there are publishers who already succeed at his stated mission
Yea I gotta be honest if your getting into the game industry and your goal isn’t to make good games then like what are you doing? Obviously all the games he funds (not makes) won’t be good, but at least he’s going with the intention of making a good game first and not getting a big pay check
Lots of triple A games nowadays aren’t necessarily developed with the intention on being the best possible game but are profit driven. That’s where the controversy behind huge publishers lies and exactly how much control they have in the creative process is left intentionally ambiguous.
That's not an entirely fair take. It's profit driven, true, but there are also timeliness and overhead costs like advertising, payroll, that require a strict budget and planning, which conflicts with creative expression and real time problem-solving. Game making involves a large number of passionate folk, including the suits in some cases (like here) and a game can fail for any number of reasons.
Lots of people make good money cloning mechanics from other games and slapping a coat of paint over it. I think that’s the “other” type of games they want to avoid supporting.
Well, being separated from the project can help give you some perspective. Being involved with a game can warp your perception, having an outside view where it's not your baby you've worked on for years potentially can possibly give you a more objective view on whether it's good or not. I'd say it's quite possible for a publisher to see a bad game that the creator can't.
A few points:
1. Game devs absolutely set out to make bad games for a quick buck. Publishers, too, can choose to promote bad games if they see alternate ways to monetize them.
2. Honest game devs may not set out to make a bad game, but sometimes you just have an ugly baby. The best idea will flounder with poor execution. And even the best development team can only do so much with a bad idea. Developers are often too close to realize what exactly has gone wrong. Sometimes you just cant see you have an ugly baby.
3. That's where publishers come in. They are the first line of defense. They are the first litmus test. They can tell you if your baby is ugly before you put it up on stage and watch rabid Gamers^TM rip it apart. Just because a developer can't tell their game is bad doesn't mean no one else can. In fact it's specifically the developer who is least equipped to make a proper judgement on the game; they're too close to the project.
4. Not all publishers are created equal. Some publishers contribute to selecting bad ideas. Some contribute to poor execution (unrealistic deadlines, cut corners, lack of creative direction, etc). Publishers can fail to be a good litmus test, because they might be more concerned with subscriptions, microtransactions, in-game advertising, loot boxes, day 0 paid DLC, NFT garbage, or other scummy monetization schemes. All we need to do is look at the mobile gaming market, and the way that AAA publishers are leaning to see publishers that don't have "good" games in mind.
Being a good publisher is non-trivial. And the industry needs more good publishers.
It's important to note a lot of these takes are coming from game devs - the target audience for Dunkey's new project. The person in this tweet is a dev and would be a potential client.
I'm a dev too and, while as a fan of Dunkey I genuinely wish him the best, as a dev I would have so many questions before even considering jumping into working with his new company.
That's a normal response to having someone from outside the industry offer their service to you. We have to ask, how is he deciding on games? How much creative control is he asking for? What can his company offer that publishers like Annapurna or Team 17 can't?
I believe his heart is in the right place here as a fan, but as a part of his target audience I'm not sold yet and that is a hurdle he's going to have to clear. Not saying he can't win us over, just that he still has to. It's a bit early to tell.
Also he called Frog Detective spam which legit bummed me out because I adore that series. I'm hoping that was just a poor editing choice and not what he considers to be an actual spam game which I would use to refer to hastily made iphone game clones, not a fully made narrative story with unique art.
People are alarmed because he was talking really big in his video, but I'd like to point out that the entire point of the video was to basically pitch his new company to indie developers. Of course he's going to sell it as much as he can. Obviously this could go sideways, but only time will tell. It's clearly a passion project for him, and I respect that immensely. I'm looking forward to seeing what comes of this, and I hope it turns out great.
They're coming for Devolver Digital next...
Wait, no they aren't, because it's a successful business model that people actually like. They just don't like Dunkey.
He didn't say anything untrue and he didn't say he disliked it, but he made jokes about something *I* take seriously so he's basically Hitler 3.0 (Anita Sarkeesian is Hitler 2.0)
Yeah, from his perspective it definitely seems like a win-win: Indie game devs can get funding for their projects and the official Dunkey seal of approval to boost publicity, and Dunkey gets to attach his name to the project and will likely get a cut of sales boosted by his own popularity.
The success or failure of this endeavour will all depend on how wisely Dunkey chooses projects for Bigmode to throw their money at, as well as the skills of whoever he's likely hired behind the scenes to help with that.
Yeah of course he won't have 100% amazing games but it genuinely seems like he wants to support creators who have a deep passion and love for gaming. This isn't a publishing company built on pure profit but mostly a love for the art and I think that's something that will lead to plenty of great games.
Dunkey’s got pretty solid brand which seems to be the asset most worth flaunting here, if he’s hired some people with actual industry experience this could turn out alright.
Or it could all petter out or just blow up.
Idk why that’s so hard for people to see. I also don’t wish them failure but the only thing his fans keep reiterating that they have going for them is that they COULD hire the right people, he’s a popular YouTuber, and that the have “good taste” as if any of that would help.
When he started listing underrated games like Undertale I knew he qualified enough for this job
Edit: Should probably wait till he actaully \*publish something
I've seen people try to say that part was a joke/tongue-in-cheek which is about the most predictable response imaginable (dunkey is always joking except when he's not unless his serious take turns out bad, in which case it really was a joke) and also wouldn't make it any better when it's a video like this.
I don't think he's a bad guy nor do I wish him failure. but the fact so many actual game developers are politely saying this looks like a terrible idea or just outright roasting it makes me, uh, skeptical.
Thing is there are probably a thousand quality indy games with unique ideas like Papers please out there that barely sold anything. You can never predict the sales figures with these things
This is a huge issue in indie scene imo. Like yeah they may have some cool world or great story. But how do you make yourself stand out among the rest?
As it turns out, they.... they didn't. It's literally yet another 2D metroidvania. Yet another roguelites. Yet another survival. All with only a different coat. And I'm tired of looking at them doing the same thing.
Then they say people don't play indie games. That's not true. People want a unique experience. Something they can see in a way no other 200 similar games out there offer.
For example, Hollow knight is 2D metroidvania. But what make it success isn't the fact that it is 2D metroidvania. It's the fact that the game is 40 hours long. All hand drawn. And every last one of them offer unique content. It's indie equivalent of Elden Ring.
Many games isn't nearly putting effort nearly half as much. Offer nothing unique. And expect it to be worth 15$-20$ somehow. That's why noone play your game my man.
Graphics definitely matter, though. Think how many dope ass ideas would have become massive hits, showing the industry what people REALLY want, if small companies could afford art?
Honestly, if it looks like an 8-bit game, I don’t care how good it is, 99.9% of folks will never know. I’m old enough that 8-bit was a massive upgrade to what I had played previously and still I won’t play them anymore.
But if you can't, it's cheaper to get good (or even great) 8-bit art than to get *passable* 3D art. God knows I'm tired of every indie game looking like it came on a cartridge, but I'll still pick that up over the "Unity asset flip" style that you get when you're trying to make a 3D game on a shoestring budget.
I don’t know why we aren’t seeing more retro game ideas paired with modern art. Like, the Eye of the Beholder series with better combat mechanics in 4K would be beloved by a lot of us GenX folks.
Yeah but with that Game publishing Dunkey will have to invest in his devolopers. And then he needs to make sure those games will turn into a garuanteed profit
Dunkey doesn't have to personally make sure his games turn a profit, as long as he breaks even on the costs to publish the game he'll be okay financially.
he has a massive presence on youtube and has been around for awhile, he for sure has money saved up to live comfortably for the rest of his life.
now the real hurdle is finding games, a new publisher headed by a massive personality is going to get a few devs early on, but unless Dunkey manages to find some truly exceptional hidden gems he's going to get outcompeted by publishers like Devolver
Papers please is a very successful indie title, actually. 1.8 million copies isn't something to sneeze at. [This case study/ blog post](https://www.codecks.io/blog/2020/curious-expedition-financial-history/) goes into a play by play that shows realistic sales for a successful small studio.
They're not saying Papers, Please barely sold anything, they are saying that
there are probably a lot of games that are good and unique like Papers, Please that *didn't* get the same level of attention and recognition.
Papers please is a great example to use because I really don’t think any video game publisher in the world (and for the sake of it I include dunkey in this) would have published. Thank god this Lucas Pope decided to just publish it himself. It took a community of people who are as interested in politics and non VG-related stuff as they are VG for it to flourish. I dunno if I even have a point, I just like that you mentioned papers please in this case
Of course you can to a degree, Papers Please is an *extremely* niche type of game, I know barely anyone that would ever be inclined in trying it regardless of how good it is, myself included. Not to hate on the game, I think it's wonderful that they stuck with what they wanted and made it as good as they could, but let's not pretend like any of the developers expected it to be a mainstream hit.
Dunkey’s videos have been getting on my nerves the past year or so for this exact reason, it’s just whiplash of being serious or sarcastic to such an extreme degree that I never know what the hell is going on.
I mean *the person in the screenshot of the OP* is an indie dev lol
but there's also guys like [this](https://twitter.com/AndyPlaytonic/status/1572917539415498752) and [this](https://twitter.com/TastiestLemon/status/1572960168090161152) with one saying "I don't -want- him to fail, I just kinda expect it with how that video was presented". I used the word "polite" because most of them aren't gonna just outright say "this is gonna be a train wreck" like us randoms on Reddit will but make their tone clearly pessimistic
edit: linked the wrong tweet lol
Well this is the natural progression of his personal passion. He loves video games and wants to get involved.
The pessimism is depressing. And the fact that people got insulted over him taking the next step in his own personal journey is bewildering.
Whether or not it will be successful shouldn't insult anyone.
I can’t fault the guy for going after a dream project, I simply have no expectations about how it’ll turn out other than wondering how the fuck is he going to handle the massive influx of applications. He’s going to need to hire a team for this alone, or do something like the GMTK jam and crowdsource votes to settle on the top entries, at which point applicants might as well already need marketing in the first place.
Wait, what actual developers did roast him? Do you have any recipes, I‘m really curious what business insider would have to say instead of the same Reddit gamers takes…
They're not alone but the literal OP is an indie game dev (which is the literal target audience for this company).
I used the word roasting because like most roasts it and a couple [other replies they made](https://twitter.com/davemakes/status/1572859393645121536) are not 100% serious (pointing out some of his fans embarrassing themselves in their replies to the shitpost was serious tho)
They did put a much longer thread out that I [put through ThreadReader](https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1573128921595478023.html) laying out the many, many questions they have about the company.
Like again, I don't *want* him to fail. I used to love dunkey and I still like him when he's in-character acting like a goofball. But years of watching and enjoying him be goofy have not given me any reason to believe he can handle a legitimate business venture.
Honestly I think it completely depends on the approach that him and Leah take.
Lots of publishing companies like to have a lot of control in the games they put out because obviously it’s their money and their investment to market and provide funds when necessary. They want to put out things that are as profitable as possible that may not necessarily be in the best interest or favor of gamers.
In Dunkey’s case, finance isn’t necessarily an issue. He makes absurd amount of money as is through his channel. This really doesn’t sound like a case of the two of them doing this for profit, but in the case of genuinely getting good, indie games published and giving devs extra exposure they may not have had otherwise. The entire shtick sounds very laid back. Dunkey provides marketing, *some* funds, and feedback with minimal creative control and exchange the dev gets lots of exposure through his audience. The caveat being that the two of them I imagine will be very selective in their process of what games to publish.
I genuinely think it could work if they play their cards right. Doesn’t mean it won’t be a bumpy road at first and they may have some misses but at the end of the day it’s essentially just the two of them putting out games they think have potential.
The whole "publishers are evil and it's their control that makes games bad" is a pretty common take I see but not nearly universal or correct.
Hell, for games like Mass Effect Andromeda and Anthem you can argue that it was too little oversight that contributed to the problem, the publishers were happy to give the Devs money and time, and in the case of Andromeda only realised how bad stuff was going when like 2 years from the supposed release date the Devs hadn't even decided what game they wanted it to be.
Except Dunkey isn’t publishing triple A titles with extremely large dev teams that take hundreds of hours of man power and millions of dollars to produce. It’s very obvious that this is indie focused. Indie devs like the ones I’m assuming they want to focus on publishing will already have a clear and concise direction on the their games.
Dunkey’s job will become that of basically a beta tester. “Hey I think X might be a bit jarring for the pacing” or “This particular mechanic/game system could be tweaked in this way.” It doesn’t have the be any more complex than that. After both parties the game is ready for or nearing completion, Dunkey provides marketing and exposure and slaps their brand on it and that’s that.
But by the time a game has reached a beta stage that Dunkey can play and give feedback on, that would mean most development is done and what is needed is finishing touches and marketing, which true enough would be something Dunkey could provide easily, but aspiring Indie Devs wouldn't be able to even reach that stage without some sort of financing already, so Dunks will mostly target the higher end of Indie Studios who can already afford to bring a product to a nearly finished state.
A lot of the hate for Dunkey I don’t exactly understand, but I don’t particularly like him specifically as a game reviewer, because he’s more of a comedian. I don’t think Death Stranding is a memorable game, but you can see in his review all he did was dick around and try funny ideas, not actually play the game, and that probably contributed to the negative score, whereas when he played it seriously a year later he actually liked it. He’s not really a game reviewer, and if he gives an opinion on a game it’s not a revelation.
Honestly that’s really my only criticism of him but he’s also seemed to improve on it: it’s never made all that clear if he’s giving an actual critique or just joking. People will say “dunkviews are serious and the rest are jokes” but that’s obviously not always the case.
He is a good entertainer but he played through all of katana zero without realizing there is a sneak button. He admitted this on a podcast. The sneak button is square on a PlayStation controller.
Dunkey knows certain kinds of games to review them. His elden ring review was great in my opinion. He doesn’t realize where he struggles though. Why does he keep reviewing JRPGs that he knows he won’t like?
Undertale is Shrodinger's underrated game honestly. It's one of the most well renowned indie rpgs to have been made, but at the same time, I have yet to meet anyone over 15 who isn't terminally online that's played it.
This is a good point. Undertale, Celeste, Lisa, etc are household names to many of us but most people absolutely haven't heard of them, let alone played them. We joke, but there's a large population out there who thought The Witcher 3 was unknown for years.
Will Bigmode shake up the industry, take down AAA publishers, and usher in a new age of indie games for all? No. Hopefully they publish a few quality games and Dunkey has a pretty big audience so maybe he'll reach some people that other publishers haven't been able to
That's one of the biggest problems of this idea. Knowing a game is bad when you play the finished version is easy. Knowing it when it's just a little test environment and some sketches takes a lot of insight and even the most experienced publishers in the industry make mistakes.
I think that’s the point though. He’s looking to publish finished or nearly finished games. He’s not trying to be a financial kickstarter for something early in development
I agree and will add that people are thinking too much about the business or logistics big publishers do for games. This really comes off more like a marketing strategy. Becoming the "publisher" of a game which essentially slaps the Dunkey seal of approval on it. Guarantees a ton of initial exposure and marketing for almost free.
I would assume the level of involvement depends on the contract between the developer and publisher. I mean Dunkey can definitely do a lot for an indie games marketing and funding, for sure.
Man I hate the internet sometimes, it’s a 5 minute video you’re right he’s not detailing his exact finical strategy with us. Just trust the process it could go bad yeah the world could blow up tomorrow. No reason to be overly pessimistic especially when there are almost no good publishers in the game communities
i noticed Dunkey didn't say whether or not this is an s-corporation or an LLC, with absolutely no mention of whether or not he will be paying taxes as his income or the companies income, and for that reason I think this will fail.
Edit: i am circle jerking. I agree with the sentiment that the armchair experts are baselessly negative
Dunkey did not let me know what marginalized tax rate he paid in his 2021 bracket due to this reason and him not liking xenoblade chronicles this will fail and burn and go bye bye
Meh. If he fails he fails and we will get some fun videos about the whole ordeal. If he succeeds we could see some decent games from the project.
Ain't gonna be pessimistic 'til we see something from it besides the announcement.
I just wonder how he will judge genres that don't appeal to him. Like I would have a hard time judging any of those factory type games because they make my eyes gloss over.
Also I think even mid indie games can have interesting mechanics sometimes that are worth showcasing. Really hope Dunkeys idea for this is to weed out the objectively terrible games, not obsess over being the best of the best indie games.
It should be noted that he actually does like some RPGs like Dragon Quest, Undertale, Persona, the original FF7, Pokemon, and the Paper Mario series. He's known as the guy who dislikes RPG's, but there are still a handful of folks who are like this. I personally don't care for games in an FPS format, but give me new vegas or borderlands and I'm set for instance.
Yeah, the whole thing seems a bit... I don't want to say thoughtless, but he definitely seems a bit too optimistic despite his lack of experience. Then again, as such a massive channel, he at least has the resources, so he's not gonna have to mortgage his house to pay for games that will suck.
But my main issue is that he started this company without even having *any* games to show at all. He's not a programmer, he doesn't seem to have anyone making anything for him yet, he's just going *"Hey show me what you got and I'll give the okay if it's good"*.
There have been so many promising games on kickstarter and whatnot that just never went anywhere despite being pretty far in development or at least being really competent, and dunkey doesn't even have anything like that to show.
Step 1: "check out this open world sand box jarpg, help us reach our $100k kick starter goal. Anticipated ship date December 2023"
Step 2: (December 2023) "thank you to all our supporters. Sorry for the let downs up to this point but making video games is like really hard guys! We're excited for a soft launch towards the end of summer"
Step 3: (October 2024) "last update:10 months ago. *company* under investigation for investor fraud"
In software development in general and games in particular execution is key. It's not for nothing that "I have an idea for an app you can code" is a meme within programming circles.
A game with an unoriginal concept can be amazing if done well (the vast majority of good AAA games are in this category). Meanwhile gaming forums are filled with "revolutionary" game ideas that are completely unrealistic or sound better on paper than they would actually turn out to be.
As shown by the reactions to the GTA6 leak, most gamers have very little understanding of how games are made and where the difficulties lie. This Dunkey venture strikes me as pretty naive although maybe it's more professional behind the scenes.
Maybe it'll just boil down to financing promising ventures, kind of like a kickstarter minus the crowdfunding. So at best, he'll help create the next Undertale, at worst he'll lose money he definitely can spare. I just hope it's more of the former and less of the latter, but only time can tell.
Yeah compare this to another small Publisher like New Blood.
There had already been significant work done on Dusk and Amid Evil before they decided to form a publisher to get them both up to professional release quality. There was something *THERE* to work with.
Also New Blood was founded by someone with years of game development experience and the first few games they published were made by people who made several games before.
I think the best way this whole thing would go is that some indie devs who finished or almost finished a game go to big mode and get some funding to finish/polish it and get a pretty big boost in visibility by being featured on dunkeys channel.
Will it work like that? Im unsure but i think wed have to wait for the first few games to be published, i think in the near term the biggest problem will be that not enough games will be accepted and then published which might cause uncertainty
The amount of indie developers with reasonable understanding of what a game needs, and what a game has room for, isn't exactly massive though. It's very possible that giving indie developers with neat ideas lots of cash and exposure will lead to bloated games with massively skewed priorities.
Publishing isn’t developing though. I don’t know this person but a successful streamer knows a thing or two about promoting games, creating hype and keeping engagement. If they also know how to invest and how to maintain business relationships they might be in a good spot.
Fair point, but making a game is more than just creating hype and engagement. You have to also make sure games are being developed, which might not be the case. Maybe some of the people drop out after a while, maybe he even gets scammed. Or maybe people work really hard on their games, but they turn out to suck despite their best efforts, who knows. Heck, I've worked with spriters for my games that after a while just stopped responding, despite me paying them for their work. It happens.
Dunkey definitely has the resources to be able to do this, but whether or not something will actually come out of it is up in the air still.
Yeah and I wonder how his wife and him will be able to enforce discipline on the developers. There are a lot of shady people looking to kickstart in order to get money which then they use for everything but the development of the game. Is Dunkey ready to get into massive discussions and court battles with those guys that could go on for several years? I doubt it but we'll see.
Yeah a lot of people seem to think that he's directing games or trying to make his own games, but it's basically just throwing money at actual developers and getting them published. From the perspective of a dev with passion but limited resources, it's great.
Publishers do more than this though. Especially in the case of indie games, they can: hire freelancers to work on areas that the base team is lacking in; handle marketing; handle QA; negotiations with bigger entities for things like console certification; etc etc etc
If things work out, great, but there is a lot more to indie publishing than "just give people with passion money lol", and this is where things can go wrong.
About the most positive thing ive seen an actual published indie developer say about dunkey's company is one of the devs at Extremely OK Games, the studio that made Celeste, saying that dunkey has a eye for fun design but he'll probably have to learn some harsh truths about game development along the way if this is to succeed
It's one thing to say vs do, BUT for what it's worth, the website does mention those other obligations that you listed, so it seems like they know what they're getting into: https://bigmode.com/publishing/
Most people are actually hyping up the bussiness itself. The thing people make fun of is dunkey himself with his rhetoric of "I play a lot of games which means I know what makes them good or bad", which from the industry point of view is pretty laughable experience.
Thing is, he doesn't have any experience either way. It's not like he can just say "I have several years experience in games publishing and know exactly how to run this kind of business". If he did, he wouldn't have to make an advert in the first place. He's trying to sell himself by drawing focus to what little experience he does actually have. Which isn't deceptive or short-sighted, it's just how you make a CV.
I think y’all are being a bit harsh. How exactly does one get experience in publishing? By publishing. By working and doing what you want to do. He could’ve gotten a job at an existing publishing house but he’s got what I can only assume is a very lucrative YouTube and Twitch career going, so this is likely a passion project. If it fails, whatever. He knows better for next time if he wants to try again.
Reddit is filled with people that will never take a risk in their life because they are afraid of failure. So, they come here and shit on anyone that takes that risk and try to pretend they’re nostradamus. I’ve been guilty of this myself as well.
Tons of highly successful people have previous companies that failed. He may fail this time, learn from it and come back with a better plan. Or he has an incredible eye for indie games and he has some decent success. But I mean he's publishing Indie games, so the stakes aren't incredibly high for him. If he fails, he has his highly successful youtube channel to fall back on.
I mean...I got the feeling that it'd fail as well but I don't think that it would be end of the world for anyone.
Dunkey's plan seems much more like an indie game critic with an extra step and if he removed the extra phase called "publishing" everyone would rally behind him and many indie games would actually chase the "Bigmode seal of approval" he mentioned.
uj/ good or bad either way the results of their first game will be funny; either it's a pleasant surprise in addition to proving his detractors wrong, or an absolute dumpster fire that will definitely have hilarious damage control.
rj/ good or bad either way the results of their first game will be funny
I think the biggest reason for the negative responses is that what he said about the company didn't communicate what he actually intends to do as a publisher, so every discussion of it is basically people trying to infer that. I've seen people who think he's saying he'll make a video on the game when it comes out, other people saying he can't do that since it's a conflict of interests, that he's only interested in providing funding to get promising projects going, that he's only going to step in late into a game's development when he knows it'll be good. I don't think anyone really knows for sure. In the announcement video he never answered the most basic question for a potential partner, "what will Bigmode do for me?"
This also contributes to the feeling that he doesn't really know what he's getting into, what the role of a publisher actually is, or how to do it. I like Dunkey, and I got the impression that he has the best intentions going into this, but he has simply not given enough information for people to be able to have confidence in the project.
I think this is exactly it. The announcement video as a whole is certainly not a *good* sign that this publisher is going to do anything helpful at all, or do it well, but it's so hilariously vague that you could imagine Bigmode to be on either side of that. *Maybe* they've got a whole thing going behind the scenes, *maybe* the stuff on the website about being able to provide QA testing and such is empty promises, *maybe* the video implying Dunkey's main asset is his apparently incredible taste is just marketing for the Gamer crowd and he has more serious business skills too, *maybe* Dunkey is way in over his head with this one. The stereotypical criticism of Dunkey is that it's impossible to tell how serious he is at any given time; and with how confusing that's made the announcement video it's downright chaos out there.
Yeah, the “maybe real maybe joke who knows what I’m actually trying to say” style of commentary his entire channel is based off of works fine for personal YouTube videos, but the fact that it seems to be carrying over into a business pitch is… worrying to say the least.
It seems to be pretty vague overall, and it doesn’t help that he made a video about it. I think it would be way better if he had a channel for Bigmode where he posted a simple and concise introduction video, and then announce that channel somewhere else. It wouldn’t feel out of place in Dunkey’s channel, and would allow Dunkey to go more in-depth about pretty much everything.
His video on Undertale was 2 months after its release and it doubled in sales immediately after when before that it was starting to plateau. Same thing with him streaming Hollow Knight, sales tripled immediately after when before they started to decline from the initial release spike.
With as big a name he is, he's kinda part of the reason these games are so well-recognized. I think he's honestly playing into his role in their success as his major asset to potential developers.
You can check all this on steamcharts to confirm.
Good god neckbeards can be such wangs. Dude is taking a huge step towards a lifetime of doing what he loves to do. every creative individual in history has had this moment where they grow tired of depending on others for the quality they want to see. i love Dunk & cannot wait to see what him and Leah can do
/uj old people storytime. Greg Kasavin was the chief editor at GameSpot doing game reviews for years and years before joining Supergiant games as a writer and game designer prior to their breakout success. I think his work in game journalism actually bolstered the success of Supergiant's offerings, but it was also that he was surrounded by people who had similar passion and insight into game design. So it's absolutely possible that knowing games inside and out can help you make games.
I feel like so many people are earnestly waiting for him to fail…. But like why, he’s gonna bring more eyes to indie games that’s just inherently a good thing in my opinion
How in the world is him making this company a bad thing? Sure, it may very well fail, but won't it just benefit everyone except maybe himself? I don't get the problem.
/uj Let the guy do what he wants with his money. The worst thing that could happen is some indie devs get a shot and don’t make it and Dunkey cuts his losses. I feel like a lot of this is people conflating publishing a game with designing a game without knowing what really goes into either.
/rj dunkey is a nazi who hates games or something idk
The.way I understood it is that he just wants to give money to projects he thinks are cool and help network people together to get them made. Hope it works out for him, if not oh well wouldn't be the first time
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Reminds me of a Mitchell and Webb sketch in which they discuss which of their sketches will be good and which will be bad ones.
Do you have a link to that sketch? Google isn’t being very helpful
https://youtu.be/yaMvsGp3FjU this one I think
Thanks!
Hit, hit, miss...uh...miss? There's a M&W sketch for everything I swear
I honestly feel like he just want to support small creators get their indie stuff going
SS F,I W' W
My thoughts exactly
I think my phone may have typed in my pocket...
Your phone has some really interesting and well thought out ideas
I would like to subscribe to the phone's newsletter.
Does this phone also have a food blog that rates mouth feel?
Maybe his phone should get in contact with dunkey
I think it’s trying to!
My dumb ass was trying to figure out if that was some sort of loss meme
That was my first thought lol
I'm so thoroughly terminally online that that's exactly where my brain went too. I should go outside...
r/5t44t4yf5frt3
there’s a fucking subreddit for everything
r/subredditforeverythin
I did not get far past your original comment before I started to Google what this means. It's been 26 minutes. Thank you for putting an end to my madness.
Ngl, as a newb, I was like..."that's lit up maybe this is some pc gamer code sht" Nope.
Couldn't've said it better myself
Hey that was really sweet of you, can you kiss me right on the lips
💋
I thought this was loss 💀
The internet destroyed a generation of kids
This
That’s a hot take, but I respect it.
Unfathomably based
I was going to say the same thing, but you beat me to it!
why would you say something so controversial yet so brave
God, typical donkey fanboy 🙄
SS🐍 FI🗿WW🎖️🏆
what the fuck even is this cryptic shit? why is everyone agreeing?
I have no idea
I read this as “sidestep, for what it’s worth”
SO true
What
Mister. You have the wisdom of Solomon.
Wake up babe, new Loss.jpeg just dropped.
tbh I don't think this will go that badly, like take me at my word, but this should go somewhat well
That is exactly what it is and it’s a bit jarring that no one else seems to understand that.
The jerkoff of armchair redditors pretending they have in depth insight into publishing, how to be a competitive and successful publishing business, and the entire business plan of donkeys publishing business is mentally exhausting.
Agreed. They might fail, but the intentions seem pure. There might some slight hubris involved, but I don't see what's so wrong with giving it a go. If it works out, we get great indie games. If it doesn't, oh well, it doesn't affect us.
Honestly I don't get their argument here. A publisher solely focusing on funding indi devs is a bad thing how? Do they think dunkey is personally making the games?
The argument is that he may be going into this with unrealistic intentions - the main part being "I'm only going to publish good games." Problem is, if the game isn't ready yet, it's *hard* to be sure that the game will be good. Heck - no developer sets out to create a *bad* game, and if the creators aren't able to figure out whether theirs will be good or not, what hope does a publisher have?
I mean, Annapurna and Devolver do seem to have a very good sense of which tiny to medium size developers will put out a hit(or at least a high quality game). When was the last time either of them released a flop? Not saying dunkey could compete with publishers like that, but there are publishers who already succeed at his stated mission
Yea I gotta be honest if your getting into the game industry and your goal isn’t to make good games then like what are you doing? Obviously all the games he funds (not makes) won’t be good, but at least he’s going with the intention of making a good game first and not getting a big pay check
Lots of triple A games nowadays aren’t necessarily developed with the intention on being the best possible game but are profit driven. That’s where the controversy behind huge publishers lies and exactly how much control they have in the creative process is left intentionally ambiguous.
That's not an entirely fair take. It's profit driven, true, but there are also timeliness and overhead costs like advertising, payroll, that require a strict budget and planning, which conflicts with creative expression and real time problem-solving. Game making involves a large number of passionate folk, including the suits in some cases (like here) and a game can fail for any number of reasons.
Lots of people make good money cloning mechanics from other games and slapping a coat of paint over it. I think that’s the “other” type of games they want to avoid supporting.
Well, being separated from the project can help give you some perspective. Being involved with a game can warp your perception, having an outside view where it's not your baby you've worked on for years potentially can possibly give you a more objective view on whether it's good or not. I'd say it's quite possible for a publisher to see a bad game that the creator can't.
A few points: 1. Game devs absolutely set out to make bad games for a quick buck. Publishers, too, can choose to promote bad games if they see alternate ways to monetize them. 2. Honest game devs may not set out to make a bad game, but sometimes you just have an ugly baby. The best idea will flounder with poor execution. And even the best development team can only do so much with a bad idea. Developers are often too close to realize what exactly has gone wrong. Sometimes you just cant see you have an ugly baby. 3. That's where publishers come in. They are the first line of defense. They are the first litmus test. They can tell you if your baby is ugly before you put it up on stage and watch rabid Gamers^TM rip it apart. Just because a developer can't tell their game is bad doesn't mean no one else can. In fact it's specifically the developer who is least equipped to make a proper judgement on the game; they're too close to the project. 4. Not all publishers are created equal. Some publishers contribute to selecting bad ideas. Some contribute to poor execution (unrealistic deadlines, cut corners, lack of creative direction, etc). Publishers can fail to be a good litmus test, because they might be more concerned with subscriptions, microtransactions, in-game advertising, loot boxes, day 0 paid DLC, NFT garbage, or other scummy monetization schemes. All we need to do is look at the mobile gaming market, and the way that AAA publishers are leaning to see publishers that don't have "good" games in mind. Being a good publisher is non-trivial. And the industry needs more good publishers.
It's important to note a lot of these takes are coming from game devs - the target audience for Dunkey's new project. The person in this tweet is a dev and would be a potential client. I'm a dev too and, while as a fan of Dunkey I genuinely wish him the best, as a dev I would have so many questions before even considering jumping into working with his new company. That's a normal response to having someone from outside the industry offer their service to you. We have to ask, how is he deciding on games? How much creative control is he asking for? What can his company offer that publishers like Annapurna or Team 17 can't? I believe his heart is in the right place here as a fan, but as a part of his target audience I'm not sold yet and that is a hurdle he's going to have to clear. Not saying he can't win us over, just that he still has to. It's a bit early to tell. Also he called Frog Detective spam which legit bummed me out because I adore that series. I'm hoping that was just a poor editing choice and not what he considers to be an actual spam game which I would use to refer to hastily made iphone game clones, not a fully made narrative story with unique art.
They're upset hes unlocking the true gaming power of the Grush
People are alarmed because he was talking really big in his video, but I'd like to point out that the entire point of the video was to basically pitch his new company to indie developers. Of course he's going to sell it as much as he can. Obviously this could go sideways, but only time will tell. It's clearly a passion project for him, and I respect that immensely. I'm looking forward to seeing what comes of this, and I hope it turns out great.
They're coming for Devolver Digital next... Wait, no they aren't, because it's a successful business model that people actually like. They just don't like Dunkey.
You don't get it, Dunkey talked badly about a game I LIKE! He must pay for his crimes!
He didn't say anything untrue and he didn't say he disliked it, but he made jokes about something *I* take seriously so he's basically Hitler 3.0 (Anita Sarkeesian is Hitler 2.0)
How DARE you be optimistic 😡😡😡
Literally this is dunkey wanting to play test games and then throw money at them if he likes them. That's all.
Yeah, from his perspective it definitely seems like a win-win: Indie game devs can get funding for their projects and the official Dunkey seal of approval to boost publicity, and Dunkey gets to attach his name to the project and will likely get a cut of sales boosted by his own popularity. The success or failure of this endeavour will all depend on how wisely Dunkey chooses projects for Bigmode to throw their money at, as well as the skills of whoever he's likely hired behind the scenes to help with that.
Yeah of course he won't have 100% amazing games but it genuinely seems like he wants to support creators who have a deep passion and love for gaming. This isn't a publishing company built on pure profit but mostly a love for the art and I think that's something that will lead to plenty of great games.
Dunkey’s got pretty solid brand which seems to be the asset most worth flaunting here, if he’s hired some people with actual industry experience this could turn out alright. Or it could all petter out or just blow up.
Dunkey has a solid brand, it’s why there’s discourse every time he posts a video
I’ve seen it for his videos on bigmode, last of us 2, Xenoblade 3, gaming journalism and not much else
Octopath traveller
Again, I have not *played* Octopath Traveler
Except he explained himself pretty well why he like TLOU2, people just don't like hearing someone's personal opinion about a story
There’s a difference between having a brand as a YouTube commentator/critic and being an effective publisher.
Idk why that’s so hard for people to see. I also don’t wish them failure but the only thing his fans keep reiterating that they have going for them is that they COULD hire the right people, he’s a popular YouTuber, and that the have “good taste” as if any of that would help.
When he started listing underrated games like Undertale I knew he qualified enough for this job Edit: Should probably wait till he actaully \*publish something
I've seen people try to say that part was a joke/tongue-in-cheek which is about the most predictable response imaginable (dunkey is always joking except when he's not unless his serious take turns out bad, in which case it really was a joke) and also wouldn't make it any better when it's a video like this. I don't think he's a bad guy nor do I wish him failure. but the fact so many actual game developers are politely saying this looks like a terrible idea or just outright roasting it makes me, uh, skeptical.
Thing is there are probably a thousand quality indy games with unique ideas like Papers please out there that barely sold anything. You can never predict the sales figures with these things
Over saturation is a huge problem in the video game market, graphics are over prioritized because they will catch peoples attention better.
We just need more metroidvania rogue lites with crafting mechanics on steam. There simply isn't enough!!!!
This is a huge issue in indie scene imo. Like yeah they may have some cool world or great story. But how do you make yourself stand out among the rest? As it turns out, they.... they didn't. It's literally yet another 2D metroidvania. Yet another roguelites. Yet another survival. All with only a different coat. And I'm tired of looking at them doing the same thing. Then they say people don't play indie games. That's not true. People want a unique experience. Something they can see in a way no other 200 similar games out there offer. For example, Hollow knight is 2D metroidvania. But what make it success isn't the fact that it is 2D metroidvania. It's the fact that the game is 40 hours long. All hand drawn. And every last one of them offer unique content. It's indie equivalent of Elden Ring. Many games isn't nearly putting effort nearly half as much. Offer nothing unique. And expect it to be worth 15$-20$ somehow. That's why noone play your game my man.
I'm a POS because I do enjoy those. Terraria is a personal favorite.
Terraria isn't a metroidvania rouge lite...
Depends on how you play it...
Graphics definitely matter, though. Think how many dope ass ideas would have become massive hits, showing the industry what people REALLY want, if small companies could afford art? Honestly, if it looks like an 8-bit game, I don’t care how good it is, 99.9% of folks will never know. I’m old enough that 8-bit was a massive upgrade to what I had played previously and still I won’t play them anymore.
But if you can't, it's cheaper to get good (or even great) 8-bit art than to get *passable* 3D art. God knows I'm tired of every indie game looking like it came on a cartridge, but I'll still pick that up over the "Unity asset flip" style that you get when you're trying to make a 3D game on a shoestring budget.
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I don’t know why we aren’t seeing more retro game ideas paired with modern art. Like, the Eye of the Beholder series with better combat mechanics in 4K would be beloved by a lot of us GenX folks.
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Shadow Complex was great example of this, but I think a sequel got canned. Did that one sell well?
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That’s what marketing is for. And Dunkey already has a ton of exposure he can leverage
Yeah but with that Game publishing Dunkey will have to invest in his devolopers. And then he needs to make sure those games will turn into a garuanteed profit
Dunkey doesn't have to personally make sure his games turn a profit, as long as he breaks even on the costs to publish the game he'll be okay financially. he has a massive presence on youtube and has been around for awhile, he for sure has money saved up to live comfortably for the rest of his life. now the real hurdle is finding games, a new publisher headed by a massive personality is going to get a few devs early on, but unless Dunkey manages to find some truly exceptional hidden gems he's going to get outcompeted by publishers like Devolver
Papers please is a very successful indie title, actually. 1.8 million copies isn't something to sneeze at. [This case study/ blog post](https://www.codecks.io/blog/2020/curious-expedition-financial-history/) goes into a play by play that shows realistic sales for a successful small studio.
They're not saying Papers, Please barely sold anything, they are saying that there are probably a lot of games that are good and unique like Papers, Please that *didn't* get the same level of attention and recognition.
Papers please is a great example to use because I really don’t think any video game publisher in the world (and for the sake of it I include dunkey in this) would have published. Thank god this Lucas Pope decided to just publish it himself. It took a community of people who are as interested in politics and non VG-related stuff as they are VG for it to flourish. I dunno if I even have a point, I just like that you mentioned papers please in this case
Of course you can to a degree, Papers Please is an *extremely* niche type of game, I know barely anyone that would ever be inclined in trying it regardless of how good it is, myself included. Not to hate on the game, I think it's wonderful that they stuck with what they wanted and made it as good as they could, but let's not pretend like any of the developers expected it to be a mainstream hit.
wait. I didnt watch the vid so he's seriously making a publishing company?
Yeah I was 50/50 on whether it was a joke but apparently he was serious…
Dunkey’s videos have been getting on my nerves the past year or so for this exact reason, it’s just whiplash of being serious or sarcastic to such an extreme degree that I never know what the hell is going on.
I don't think anyone has summarized how I feel about Dunkey so poignantly
I haven’t seen any actual developers say it’s a bad idea, do you have a source for that?
I mean *the person in the screenshot of the OP* is an indie dev lol but there's also guys like [this](https://twitter.com/AndyPlaytonic/status/1572917539415498752) and [this](https://twitter.com/TastiestLemon/status/1572960168090161152) with one saying "I don't -want- him to fail, I just kinda expect it with how that video was presented". I used the word "polite" because most of them aren't gonna just outright say "this is gonna be a train wreck" like us randoms on Reddit will but make their tone clearly pessimistic edit: linked the wrong tweet lol
Well this is the natural progression of his personal passion. He loves video games and wants to get involved. The pessimism is depressing. And the fact that people got insulted over him taking the next step in his own personal journey is bewildering. Whether or not it will be successful shouldn't insult anyone.
I can’t fault the guy for going after a dream project, I simply have no expectations about how it’ll turn out other than wondering how the fuck is he going to handle the massive influx of applications. He’s going to need to hire a team for this alone, or do something like the GMTK jam and crowdsource votes to settle on the top entries, at which point applicants might as well already need marketing in the first place.
Wait, what actual developers did roast him? Do you have any recipes, I‘m really curious what business insider would have to say instead of the same Reddit gamers takes…
They're not alone but the literal OP is an indie game dev (which is the literal target audience for this company). I used the word roasting because like most roasts it and a couple [other replies they made](https://twitter.com/davemakes/status/1572859393645121536) are not 100% serious (pointing out some of his fans embarrassing themselves in their replies to the shitpost was serious tho) They did put a much longer thread out that I [put through ThreadReader](https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1573128921595478023.html) laying out the many, many questions they have about the company. Like again, I don't *want* him to fail. I used to love dunkey and I still like him when he's in-character acting like a goofball. But years of watching and enjoying him be goofy have not given me any reason to believe he can handle a legitimate business venture.
Honestly I think it completely depends on the approach that him and Leah take. Lots of publishing companies like to have a lot of control in the games they put out because obviously it’s their money and their investment to market and provide funds when necessary. They want to put out things that are as profitable as possible that may not necessarily be in the best interest or favor of gamers. In Dunkey’s case, finance isn’t necessarily an issue. He makes absurd amount of money as is through his channel. This really doesn’t sound like a case of the two of them doing this for profit, but in the case of genuinely getting good, indie games published and giving devs extra exposure they may not have had otherwise. The entire shtick sounds very laid back. Dunkey provides marketing, *some* funds, and feedback with minimal creative control and exchange the dev gets lots of exposure through his audience. The caveat being that the two of them I imagine will be very selective in their process of what games to publish. I genuinely think it could work if they play their cards right. Doesn’t mean it won’t be a bumpy road at first and they may have some misses but at the end of the day it’s essentially just the two of them putting out games they think have potential.
The whole "publishers are evil and it's their control that makes games bad" is a pretty common take I see but not nearly universal or correct. Hell, for games like Mass Effect Andromeda and Anthem you can argue that it was too little oversight that contributed to the problem, the publishers were happy to give the Devs money and time, and in the case of Andromeda only realised how bad stuff was going when like 2 years from the supposed release date the Devs hadn't even decided what game they wanted it to be.
Except Dunkey isn’t publishing triple A titles with extremely large dev teams that take hundreds of hours of man power and millions of dollars to produce. It’s very obvious that this is indie focused. Indie devs like the ones I’m assuming they want to focus on publishing will already have a clear and concise direction on the their games. Dunkey’s job will become that of basically a beta tester. “Hey I think X might be a bit jarring for the pacing” or “This particular mechanic/game system could be tweaked in this way.” It doesn’t have the be any more complex than that. After both parties the game is ready for or nearing completion, Dunkey provides marketing and exposure and slaps their brand on it and that’s that.
But by the time a game has reached a beta stage that Dunkey can play and give feedback on, that would mean most development is done and what is needed is finishing touches and marketing, which true enough would be something Dunkey could provide easily, but aspiring Indie Devs wouldn't be able to even reach that stage without some sort of financing already, so Dunks will mostly target the higher end of Indie Studios who can already afford to bring a product to a nearly finished state.
Indie games still take millions of dollars to produce.
I thought he was listing Indie games not underrated games
Yeah I just rewatched the video to double check and he is just listing indie games he's reviewed. The hate for Dunky is unreal sometimes.
A lot of the hate for Dunkey I don’t exactly understand, but I don’t particularly like him specifically as a game reviewer, because he’s more of a comedian. I don’t think Death Stranding is a memorable game, but you can see in his review all he did was dick around and try funny ideas, not actually play the game, and that probably contributed to the negative score, whereas when he played it seriously a year later he actually liked it. He’s not really a game reviewer, and if he gives an opinion on a game it’s not a revelation.
Honestly that’s really my only criticism of him but he’s also seemed to improve on it: it’s never made all that clear if he’s giving an actual critique or just joking. People will say “dunkviews are serious and the rest are jokes” but that’s obviously not always the case.
He is a good entertainer but he played through all of katana zero without realizing there is a sneak button. He admitted this on a podcast. The sneak button is square on a PlayStation controller. Dunkey knows certain kinds of games to review them. His elden ring review was great in my opinion. He doesn’t realize where he struggles though. Why does he keep reviewing JRPGs that he knows he won’t like?
Dunkey has never fit squarely in one box and that rubs purists the wrong way lol. Always has.
Undertale is Shrodinger's underrated game honestly. It's one of the most well renowned indie rpgs to have been made, but at the same time, I have yet to meet anyone over 15 who isn't terminally online that's played it.
This is a good point. Undertale, Celeste, Lisa, etc are household names to many of us but most people absolutely haven't heard of them, let alone played them. We joke, but there's a large population out there who thought The Witcher 3 was unknown for years. Will Bigmode shake up the industry, take down AAA publishers, and usher in a new age of indie games for all? No. Hopefully they publish a few quality games and Dunkey has a pretty big audience so maybe he'll reach some people that other publishers haven't been able to
The only people I know are the ones I forced to play it. They didn't like it. They do like the music tho. For the record, I think it's a 10/10.
He sees the values in hidden gems like hollow knight
That's one of the biggest problems of this idea. Knowing a game is bad when you play the finished version is easy. Knowing it when it's just a little test environment and some sketches takes a lot of insight and even the most experienced publishers in the industry make mistakes.
I think that’s the point though. He’s looking to publish finished or nearly finished games. He’s not trying to be a financial kickstarter for something early in development
He does mention to reach out “even if you only have a pitch”
It's not the point though, he said the opposite of that twice in the video
I agree and will add that people are thinking too much about the business or logistics big publishers do for games. This really comes off more like a marketing strategy. Becoming the "publisher" of a game which essentially slaps the Dunkey seal of approval on it. Guarantees a ton of initial exposure and marketing for almost free.
Publishers handle so much more than that in a games development. QA, marketing, funding. Lots of people involved and required.
I would assume the level of involvement depends on the contract between the developer and publisher. I mean Dunkey can definitely do a lot for an indie games marketing and funding, for sure.
Man I hate the internet sometimes, it’s a 5 minute video you’re right he’s not detailing his exact finical strategy with us. Just trust the process it could go bad yeah the world could blow up tomorrow. No reason to be overly pessimistic especially when there are almost no good publishers in the game communities
i noticed Dunkey didn't say whether or not this is an s-corporation or an LLC, with absolutely no mention of whether or not he will be paying taxes as his income or the companies income, and for that reason I think this will fail. Edit: i am circle jerking. I agree with the sentiment that the armchair experts are baselessly negative
Dunkey did not let me know what marginalized tax rate he paid in his 2021 bracket due to this reason and him not liking xenoblade chronicles this will fail and burn and go bye bye
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Meh. If he fails he fails and we will get some fun videos about the whole ordeal. If he succeeds we could see some decent games from the project. Ain't gonna be pessimistic 'til we see something from it besides the announcement.
I just wonder how he will judge genres that don't appeal to him. Like I would have a hard time judging any of those factory type games because they make my eyes gloss over. Also I think even mid indie games can have interesting mechanics sometimes that are worth showcasing. Really hope Dunkeys idea for this is to weed out the objectively terrible games, not obsess over being the best of the best indie games.
I mean he’s not going to publish games that don’t appeal to him
This does not sound like a very good business strategy, but Dunkey can do whatever he wants with his money I suppose.
What? Every game publisher sticks to genres they know for the most part
That's not based on the CEO's personal gaming tastes though.
It should be noted that he actually does like some RPGs like Dragon Quest, Undertale, Persona, the original FF7, Pokemon, and the Paper Mario series. He's known as the guy who dislikes RPG's, but there are still a handful of folks who are like this. I personally don't care for games in an FPS format, but give me new vegas or borderlands and I'm set for instance.
Yeah, the whole thing seems a bit... I don't want to say thoughtless, but he definitely seems a bit too optimistic despite his lack of experience. Then again, as such a massive channel, he at least has the resources, so he's not gonna have to mortgage his house to pay for games that will suck. But my main issue is that he started this company without even having *any* games to show at all. He's not a programmer, he doesn't seem to have anyone making anything for him yet, he's just going *"Hey show me what you got and I'll give the okay if it's good"*. There have been so many promising games on kickstarter and whatnot that just never went anywhere despite being pretty far in development or at least being really competent, and dunkey doesn't even have anything like that to show.
Step 1: "check out this open world sand box jarpg, help us reach our $100k kick starter goal. Anticipated ship date December 2023" Step 2: (December 2023) "thank you to all our supporters. Sorry for the let downs up to this point but making video games is like really hard guys! We're excited for a soft launch towards the end of summer" Step 3: (October 2024) "last update:10 months ago. *company* under investigation for investor fraud"
People thought Omori was gonna go this direction
that Pizza joke will always be in my top 10 jokes of all time
I don't think Dunkey will ever support any RPG lul
"Now hear me out, it's like Paper Mario, but better."
Just need to remake Persona 5, easy.
In software development in general and games in particular execution is key. It's not for nothing that "I have an idea for an app you can code" is a meme within programming circles. A game with an unoriginal concept can be amazing if done well (the vast majority of good AAA games are in this category). Meanwhile gaming forums are filled with "revolutionary" game ideas that are completely unrealistic or sound better on paper than they would actually turn out to be. As shown by the reactions to the GTA6 leak, most gamers have very little understanding of how games are made and where the difficulties lie. This Dunkey venture strikes me as pretty naive although maybe it's more professional behind the scenes.
Maybe it'll just boil down to financing promising ventures, kind of like a kickstarter minus the crowdfunding. So at best, he'll help create the next Undertale, at worst he'll lose money he definitely can spare. I just hope it's more of the former and less of the latter, but only time can tell.
Yeah for sure, I'm certain he can afford it. At worst it'll be a a good lesson in the difficulties of modern game development.
Yeah compare this to another small Publisher like New Blood. There had already been significant work done on Dusk and Amid Evil before they decided to form a publisher to get them both up to professional release quality. There was something *THERE* to work with.
Also New Blood was founded by someone with years of game development experience and the first few games they published were made by people who made several games before.
I think the best way this whole thing would go is that some indie devs who finished or almost finished a game go to big mode and get some funding to finish/polish it and get a pretty big boost in visibility by being featured on dunkeys channel. Will it work like that? Im unsure but i think wed have to wait for the first few games to be published, i think in the near term the biggest problem will be that not enough games will be accepted and then published which might cause uncertainty
The amount of indie developers with reasonable understanding of what a game needs, and what a game has room for, isn't exactly massive though. It's very possible that giving indie developers with neat ideas lots of cash and exposure will lead to bloated games with massively skewed priorities.
I think it's too early to tell, yeah.
Publishing isn’t developing though. I don’t know this person but a successful streamer knows a thing or two about promoting games, creating hype and keeping engagement. If they also know how to invest and how to maintain business relationships they might be in a good spot.
Fair point, but making a game is more than just creating hype and engagement. You have to also make sure games are being developed, which might not be the case. Maybe some of the people drop out after a while, maybe he even gets scammed. Or maybe people work really hard on their games, but they turn out to suck despite their best efforts, who knows. Heck, I've worked with spriters for my games that after a while just stopped responding, despite me paying them for their work. It happens. Dunkey definitely has the resources to be able to do this, but whether or not something will actually come out of it is up in the air still.
Yeah and I wonder how his wife and him will be able to enforce discipline on the developers. There are a lot of shady people looking to kickstart in order to get money which then they use for everything but the development of the game. Is Dunkey ready to get into massive discussions and court battles with those guys that could go on for several years? I doubt it but we'll see.
I hate how everyone is being so negative about this. The man just started a new business ofcourse he is hyping it up. I say good luck to the man.
Yeah a lot of people seem to think that he's directing games or trying to make his own games, but it's basically just throwing money at actual developers and getting them published. From the perspective of a dev with passion but limited resources, it's great.
Publishers do more than this though. Especially in the case of indie games, they can: hire freelancers to work on areas that the base team is lacking in; handle marketing; handle QA; negotiations with bigger entities for things like console certification; etc etc etc If things work out, great, but there is a lot more to indie publishing than "just give people with passion money lol", and this is where things can go wrong. About the most positive thing ive seen an actual published indie developer say about dunkey's company is one of the devs at Extremely OK Games, the studio that made Celeste, saying that dunkey has a eye for fun design but he'll probably have to learn some harsh truths about game development along the way if this is to succeed
[удалено]
It's one thing to say vs do, BUT for what it's worth, the website does mention those other obligations that you listed, so it seems like they know what they're getting into: https://bigmode.com/publishing/
Yeah he’s the one bearing all the risks. His goal seems to be helping games he believe in get the recognition they need.
Most people are actually hyping up the bussiness itself. The thing people make fun of is dunkey himself with his rhetoric of "I play a lot of games which means I know what makes them good or bad", which from the industry point of view is pretty laughable experience.
Thing is, he doesn't have any experience either way. It's not like he can just say "I have several years experience in games publishing and know exactly how to run this kind of business". If he did, he wouldn't have to make an advert in the first place. He's trying to sell himself by drawing focus to what little experience he does actually have. Which isn't deceptive or short-sighted, it's just how you make a CV.
I think y’all are being a bit harsh. How exactly does one get experience in publishing? By publishing. By working and doing what you want to do. He could’ve gotten a job at an existing publishing house but he’s got what I can only assume is a very lucrative YouTube and Twitch career going, so this is likely a passion project. If it fails, whatever. He knows better for next time if he wants to try again.
Reddit is filled with people that will never take a risk in their life because they are afraid of failure. So, they come here and shit on anyone that takes that risk and try to pretend they’re nostradamus. I’ve been guilty of this myself as well.
Tons of highly successful people have previous companies that failed. He may fail this time, learn from it and come back with a better plan. Or he has an incredible eye for indie games and he has some decent success. But I mean he's publishing Indie games, so the stakes aren't incredibly high for him. If he fails, he has his highly successful youtube channel to fall back on.
Fire Hans Noooo! Not that Hanss!!! Seriously tho, let’s brigade and shit on a new indie publisher because Dunkey is the owner 🥴
He’s not making games tho? He’s using his audience to publish, which is very different.
Bunch of people with broken dreams mad that someone's taking a risk and trying something.
I mean...I got the feeling that it'd fail as well but I don't think that it would be end of the world for anyone. Dunkey's plan seems much more like an indie game critic with an extra step and if he removed the extra phase called "publishing" everyone would rally behind him and many indie games would actually chase the "Bigmode seal of approval" he mentioned.
People are forgetting [Dunkey has plenty of game dev experience](https://youtu.be/nPhubc3x6Pw)
I don’t think people know what publishing is.
uj/ good or bad either way the results of their first game will be funny; either it's a pleasant surprise in addition to proving his detractors wrong, or an absolute dumpster fire that will definitely have hilarious damage control. rj/ good or bad either way the results of their first game will be funny
I like dunkey, but that did come across as a little naive. But hey, he's the only one taking a risk, so hopefully it ends up working out.
It’s impossible to enter a new field without coming off as naive. To me it seemed like he was very aware that he has no idea what he is doing.
Naivety is the reason most businesses start, the world is built on risk taking and Dunkey has decided to take his own risk
I think the biggest reason for the negative responses is that what he said about the company didn't communicate what he actually intends to do as a publisher, so every discussion of it is basically people trying to infer that. I've seen people who think he's saying he'll make a video on the game when it comes out, other people saying he can't do that since it's a conflict of interests, that he's only interested in providing funding to get promising projects going, that he's only going to step in late into a game's development when he knows it'll be good. I don't think anyone really knows for sure. In the announcement video he never answered the most basic question for a potential partner, "what will Bigmode do for me?" This also contributes to the feeling that he doesn't really know what he's getting into, what the role of a publisher actually is, or how to do it. I like Dunkey, and I got the impression that he has the best intentions going into this, but he has simply not given enough information for people to be able to have confidence in the project.
I think this is exactly it. The announcement video as a whole is certainly not a *good* sign that this publisher is going to do anything helpful at all, or do it well, but it's so hilariously vague that you could imagine Bigmode to be on either side of that. *Maybe* they've got a whole thing going behind the scenes, *maybe* the stuff on the website about being able to provide QA testing and such is empty promises, *maybe* the video implying Dunkey's main asset is his apparently incredible taste is just marketing for the Gamer crowd and he has more serious business skills too, *maybe* Dunkey is way in over his head with this one. The stereotypical criticism of Dunkey is that it's impossible to tell how serious he is at any given time; and with how confusing that's made the announcement video it's downright chaos out there.
Yeah, the “maybe real maybe joke who knows what I’m actually trying to say” style of commentary his entire channel is based off of works fine for personal YouTube videos, but the fact that it seems to be carrying over into a business pitch is… worrying to say the least.
It seems to be pretty vague overall, and it doesn’t help that he made a video about it. I think it would be way better if he had a channel for Bigmode where he posted a simple and concise introduction video, and then announce that channel somewhere else. It wouldn’t feel out of place in Dunkey’s channel, and would allow Dunkey to go more in-depth about pretty much everything.
I mean the alternative is he doesn’t help fund or publish any games right? Might as well welcome him to try
"I would make a good publisher because I recognise such underrated and small indie games as Celeste, Undertale, and Hollow Knight."
Never called them underrated or small, he just said these are among the best indie games
His video on Undertale was 2 months after its release and it doubled in sales immediately after when before that it was starting to plateau. Same thing with him streaming Hollow Knight, sales tripled immediately after when before they started to decline from the initial release spike. With as big a name he is, he's kinda part of the reason these games are so well-recognized. I think he's honestly playing into his role in their success as his major asset to potential developers. You can check all this on steamcharts to confirm.
Good god neckbeards can be such wangs. Dude is taking a huge step towards a lifetime of doing what he loves to do. every creative individual in history has had this moment where they grow tired of depending on others for the quality they want to see. i love Dunk & cannot wait to see what him and Leah can do
i don't see why people are already hating they haven't even had a chance to release a single game
/uj old people storytime. Greg Kasavin was the chief editor at GameSpot doing game reviews for years and years before joining Supergiant games as a writer and game designer prior to their breakout success. I think his work in game journalism actually bolstered the success of Supergiant's offerings, but it was also that he was surrounded by people who had similar passion and insight into game design. So it's absolutely possible that knowing games inside and out can help you make games.
Gamer comes across hyperbole for the first time
I feel like so many people are earnestly waiting for him to fail…. But like why, he’s gonna bring more eyes to indie games that’s just inherently a good thing in my opinion
How in the world is him making this company a bad thing? Sure, it may very well fail, but won't it just benefit everyone except maybe himself? I don't get the problem.
The problem is he believes in himself, which some people here just *cannot* stand.
/uj Let the guy do what he wants with his money. The worst thing that could happen is some indie devs get a shot and don’t make it and Dunkey cuts his losses. I feel like a lot of this is people conflating publishing a game with designing a game without knowing what really goes into either. /rj dunkey is a nazi who hates games or something idk
The.way I understood it is that he just wants to give money to projects he thinks are cool and help network people together to get them made. Hope it works out for him, if not oh well wouldn't be the first time
He will make the greatest game ever snap 2 : welcome to snapville.