Djaron: also to whoever was claiming backers/pissed off customers were not entitled anything from snapshot, that they had no legal liability or responsability towards customers and such...
i may add one piece of info that got underlooked:
after the crowdfunding/crowdinvesting campaign on Fig was over and was locked down/secured (along with the money they got from backers and investors) there had been another problematic event, afaic, from Snapshot, prior to them going to seek out distribution deal with Epic Games:
snapshot set up an online store of their own on their website, where they SOLD the game (as preorder) in three different tiers... That's right: they pre-sold steam and gog copies of the game through their own website.
now please, enlighten the stupid peasant i am, and tell me that when a store get paid by a customer for a product, said store has no damn legal liability or obligation toward the paying customer, and that any feature or product's characteristic advertized in order to get the purchase made by the customer worths nothing and is totally (and above all, perfectly legally) ok ?
i'm very interested in seeing any other store or product pulling same string and get away easily with it without some serious consumer-law backlash...
That's interesting. I did not know about the pre-order purchases through their own website.
What we will all find out over the next year is:
How many people do apply for a refund.
How sales for the game go on Epic.
How big is the faction of pc gamers who actually care enough about client/platform to change their spending behavior.
And that last one is the one I wonder most about. There's no question that a very vocal group of gamers is stirring the pot against Epic and against Phoenix Point. But how many people will avoid buying the game as a result? Even how many people spewing outrage on the forums will refrain from purchasing for a year?
During the Metro Exodus flair-up, I followed a thread by an outraged poster who later on conceded that he was going to buy the game on his console instead. As if that was some kind of worthwhile protest. As angry as he was, he was not going to wait a whole year to play the game.
I don't really care about having multiple clients. And so, I don't really consider the change in platform a big betrayal by Pheonix Point devs. I understand the GOG people balking, because now they won't get a DRM-free copy, and that matters a lot to them. And I hope they get full refunds and a GOG availability down the road. But people who are just angry about it being on Epic instead of Steam... Well, I suspect that those people will just crumble in the next few months and buy all their favorite games on Epic. They may grumble, but they will get used to having the Epic client. And that will be that. A moment's outrage will fade.