"The middle class of game developers is going away. Soon, it's going to get to the point you're either AAA or Indie." Quite the assumption that it hasn't already.
Is the reason why people are still believing that gaming is under a depressing state: You either have a slop AAA game with annoying monetization, or a indie game that has to limit itself due to budget constraints. You either have an over-budget game or an under-budget game. Nothing in between.
@@lumirairazbyte9697 Even then, indie games have a lot more effort put into them, largely because many of them are passion projects. Budget means nothing save for how much money you throw at the game, what matters is the quality of the finished product.
I feel like if I wrote a fictional story about a monopolistic cyberpunk-style video game megacorporation that continually assimilated other companies and I called it "Embracer Group" my editor would tell me to be a little less on-the-nose.
THQ eventually becoming Embracer Group is the most heartbreaking corruption arc of all time. The guys who made the spongebob movie game are now spending BILLIONS of dollars to own a monopoly of 5/10 studios just to sit on their hands and bleed money.
it's important to remember the company does not make the people; the people who made spongebob are the developers and the people who own embracer are not the same individuals at all
THQ died (probably rightfully, look at how they managed their company) and Nordic just took their name and some of the stuff they owned, they did not become Embracer Group.
On the topic of developers getting absorbed, I will never forgive Activision for seeing how much the Internet praised those Tony Hawke remasters for finally being something that’s not another call of duty and then being like "That's a weird way to spell "we want more Call Of Duty," but we got you," before casually and callously absorbing vicarious visions to work on the COD machine.
Vicarious Visions, Toys for Bob, Neversoft, Raven, Nerve, etc Incredibly talented developers that worked on so many games I loved, all folded into the CoD mines. I have no opinion on the CoD games as games because I've never played them. But I forever resent all the talent fed into the machine that used to and still could be offering new, fresh games
@@Medi4243Yep. It's sad. Call of Duty really needs to take a break. OK, this comment will be long winded but here's a truthful opinion on Call of Duty instead of just going with the crowd and saying "CoD bad !" I feel it gets a lot of hate, and some of it is undeserved. I mean people always critique the game as being "The same game every year." I mean the original MW and MW2 got rave reviews, so if it's the "same" then the games are good, right ? It feels good to play, always has. The campaigns are on a scale of really good to "decent." As someone that has gotten older I don't have as much time to game so the 6-8 hour campaigns are perfect. They are not that 'deep' but are on par with a blockbuster action or spy movie. My problems with the game IMO is how much Activision has pimped it out. Yearly titles, filled with microtransactions and a heavy use of FOMO to try to keep people hooked until they release a new one in a year and then they just drop all support for the last title. There's a bit more to it (like matchmaking is optimized for 'engagement' and it has totally killed the multiplayer aspect for me. However I would highly recommend you check some of them out if you want fun bite sized action game. The original Modern Warfare 1 & 2 are great. Black Ops 1, 2 and Cold War had really fun campaigns. Fun fact, Raven made the campaign to Cold War and it was great, I tend to think what I like about the newer games is Raven's contributions. I would definitely suggest at least checking out Black Ops 1 and if you enjoy it to then play Cold War and 2. I like the more spy and brainwashing themes they go into. Though the games are a bit overpriced if you are only playing them for the campaign. Like $40 for a 14 year old game !? I don't know if MS have reduced the price after buying Activision. They are free If you have game Pass or if you can find a cheap physical copy then I definitely recommend.
Actually, they weren't thrown into the COD mines... they became a division of Blizzard and renamed Blizzard Albany, where they helped make Diablo II Resurrected and Diablo IV. Still not a great fate for them, but probably still better than the mines.
The last part about embracer group was insane I didnt think my jaw could drop amymore than it did. Would love to see an individual video on them some day
You didn't mention this, but the funny thing about THQ's founding was that the same guy had also founded LJN, thus you can trace an almost direct throughline from LJN to Embracer Group
A little fun fact about Mortal Kombat vs DC comics, my brother used to boot up the practice mode, play as Sonya and set the opponent as Wonder Woman. He would beat her up using specific move combos that would do the most battle damage so that she would be more... "revealing," then launch her towards the screen. Over, and over, and over again.
Starting the video: Hm, interesting! I always wondered about the swan songs of certain developers. Ending the video: You are absolutely correct it is now my life's mission to kill Embracer Group.
Can definitely see why it would be fascinating a subject to look back on, somber as it might be for all those developers that went out with less-than-stellar results. I always dig these informative overviews that Bumbles does every so often.
My dearest bumbling fumble, It has come to my attention that you have made a giant yugioh iceberg and that you saw it covered on this very website. As someone whose favorite video is your original iceberg one, disregarding you saying it's bad which is simply untrue; I insist you go on with making your own video on said iceberg chart as a celebration to when that genre of video was still good and for embracing your roots in both those and yugioh. Sincerely, A viewer whose favorites by you are that and bumbles mcrumbles
I think it's worth saying, but... Bumbles? If the algorithm leaves this one at the wayside? Please don't think the video of poor quality or poorly chosen or whatever. This was quality, top to bottom. The exact kind of well-defined storytelling and research that feels like an old friend describing their fandom that I, and many like me, enjoy greatly. This one felt like a labour of love, or... at the very least, the kind of passion that is much needed in a dire time.
Which fate is worse? Balan eventually falling to darkness and becoming the new Lance, trapped forever in an endless cycle of purity and corruption? Or, Being owned by Embracer Group?
i can see this topic becoming a really interesting series for the channel if you're worried about running out of topics, don't worry, just wait a few months and you'll have another couple dozen studio swan songs
Me going into the video: Oh, neat, a Hoyle games mention! I loved Hoyle Card Games 2005 as a kid! Me exiting the video: *WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS INDUSTRY*
I didn't expect this video to turn into a screed against Embracer Group, but really, they deserve far worse than Bumbles flinging mean words at them. As a Big Think Dimension listener, I've long been aware of their terrible crimes and inept attitude leading to multiple people's houses being lit on fire, metaphorically.
I thought I recognised the name “Turok,” from somewhere, I bet you having done all the hard work on the “Worst Video Game Advertisements Ever” made researching the information for that slot a LOT easier. Anyways, this was a really great video! It was really interesting to see all the game dev team’s last hurrahs, but also very sad at the same time, keep up the good work, man!
@@youtubeuniversity3638 Other than Mario & Luigi series (also they did some Hamtaro as well) they apparently had a couple of unique games. So they probably would've thrived in making weird little games that would've done great on PC or switch.
Part of the reason I love this channel is ideas like these. A really relatively simple concept that I have never seen covered before. Combine it with the depth gone into and the fun personality. And boom S tier channel.
The story of midway was a tragedy, a true industry titan cut down due to horrendous mismanagement and a lack of finding a new audience. They were about as big at their peak as sega or Xbox was
Love this topic, plus any video that involves you talking wrestling is a win. Btw, any updates you can share on PokéPets: Hoenn or is it still a ways off?
A lot of people underestimate the global value of board games. It is also worth noting that in addition to Ticket to Ride the studio had a little property in its wheelhouse called the English rights to (Settlers of) Catan.
Dang. Just this week, I was walking through a local mall isle with a row of dead stores, wondering what was the last product or service that left their shelves! Neat!
52:02 Ok, the mythology nerd in me (okay, religion nerd, but Revelation is the most mythology-ish part of the Bible) feels the need to make a point: the horsemen besides death are never actually named in the original text. All we really know is that one rides a white horse, wears a crown, and conquers; one rides a red horse, carries a sword, and destroys peace; and one rides a black horse, carries scales, and its unclear exactly what he does, but it's something to do with increasing the price of grain. (Note that the white horseman being pestilence is a fairly modern interpretation of unclear origin.) Now, I could see the white horseman being war and the red horseman being strife, but the black horseman being fury is a bit of a stretch. Edit: I should clarify, I mean no disrespect to Mr. McFumbles. I just enjoy sharing knowledge.
War is the Red Horseman, he's like a Red Riding Hood wielding a metal sharpened surfboard. In Darksiders, the Horses are named after things that follow or are associated with their Riders. War's horse is named Ruin for example (and actually appears black, but with red accents) and Death's horse is named Despair. Fury's horse is named Rampage (if i remember correctly) and Strife's i don't remember. Funnily enough, "Ruin" is also the Dutch word for a male horse.
THQ made a game where you get to punch Tails Miles Prowler as sonic the hedgehog, so hard he rebounds against the wall, and you get to follow it up with a midair spike that smashes his body into the ground. So you have to love them. (The game is sonic battle for the GBA, the sonic advance spin off that gets referenced in sonic advance 3)
Saint's Row (2022) stung really hard, as it was clear that Volition didn't know what they wanted to make. A more grounded approach like the first two games, or a more wackier approach like Saints Row The Third and IV. This can really be seen in the final product, where they tried to combine both to make an unappealing game. And the fact that Embracer was expecting Saints Row to make at least $100 million in profit due to a very lucrative investment from a Saudi group falling apart at the last minute... It was never going to happen. And now Saints Row, and by extension, Red Faction, are left in legal limbo. Really sucks.
38:34 Funnily enough, I can name at least on Mohawk fan, as a speedrunner was requesting it for GDQ for ages and genuinely loves the game, it got lumped into the Awful block but he still loves the game
As a Darksiders fan it is my civic duty to recommend everyone play these games. The fourth game just got a teaser trailer earlier this year so now would be a good time to jump into the series, assuming Embracer doesn't kill the game before it reaches the finish line.
The fourth Mainline(?)game, the prequel Darksiders Genesis was a good one too. I'm hoping here with you, that Darksiders will be able to find itself proper continuation and eventual conclusion. The ending may be different from the beginning, but i still hold out faith that the soul and core of Darksiders will be kept.
Im going to be honest, i think im going to need a map for that last part, i have never been so confused, and yet somehow, without understanding anything, i can still feel the dread the entire segment implies. Terrifying.
7:15 Have you seen “both” Olsens in the same room at the same time? HBO couldn’t even get them to both show up as a gag back when they had Game of Thrones money.
Darksiders is a genuinely great series tbh. I personally loved the story of the Horseman’s red headed problem child, the entire series I do not own, and had to listen to someone else tell the story and all. And man does it fucking slap, all of em for the most part
Would Limbus Company technically count under this category? It's not that the developers, ProjectMoon, are struggling financially because of this game or anything (in fact its whole purpose is to literally financially back the company for future projects), hell it's probably their most famous and lucrative game in the trilogy, which is somehow simultaneously the most beneficial and restrictive aspect of the game towards the company. For a little bit of backstory, Limbus Company was constructed from the husk of the currently presumably in development purgatory Distortion Detective game, which was supposed to be the true successor to Library of Ruina/ProjectMoon's third foray into the worldbuilding of The City. It was supposed to be some sort of dungeon crawler, akin to something like Darkest Dungeon or the Mystery Dungeon games. The problem isn't that Library of Ruina wasn't received well or at least the PC/non-Nintendo ports, in fact it received critical acclaim from both newcomers and long-standing denizens of The City, the game is what I'd like to call "quite the spectacular experience." And that's probably the problem. Don't misunderstand me, PMoon bros, I'm not saying the game is too flashy for its own good or anything in fact it's one of my favorite games of all time, I even replay it from time to time to check out the mod fights, trust me, you will find me dead in the ground, bones eaten (or claimed, lol) by rats before you get me to downplay the sheer magnificence that is this game's presentation. But did you know that -in terms of male human and abnormality breeding- in terms of careers pursuable by the global adult population that provide at least some degree of financial stability, game development is one of the financially stable careers to have ever financed? This is just a theory from a friend and I'm relatively new to the PMoon cult so I can't say for certain if this is the truth but while LoR is what can probably be considered peak fiction, the production costs undertaken to get there can probably be best described as "kinda Samjover". There's the development of the game itself, and then there's also the voice acting fees, artist fees, the musician fees (especially when it comes to the Mili songs since they're in charge for producing most of the atmospherically heavy tracks in the game), probably some IT support fees because of le iconic janky ass spaghetti coding that's become part of the studio's game catalogue at this point (for a channel-appropriate comparison it's on a similar wavelength to M Dickie games but usually hidden so well that you'll rarely even notice the jank unless you try to break it yourself, or if your PC just so happens to be too underpowered to hide the jank), and yeah you can put two and two together and see where I'm going with this. By what I can presume to be sometime around Distortion Detective's production, because of the financial woes that LoR's production alone managed to rack up, it could be hypothetically deduced that at their current climate, the budget was too unstable for them to keep going ALONE (pay attention, this will be on the test) but they didn't wanna completely scrap what they've already done for the game, so they decided to (for now) scrap all that they've made for the game and focus on remaking the pre-existing assets of Distortion Detective into a new game instead, one meant to serve as their means of fundraising for their future projects, the f2p gacha some of us know and probably love, hate, or never heard of until you somehow find this maybe obscured ass comment ; Limbus Company. I'm not gonna talk about the gameplay because this mention is long enough as is, but while the game succeeded at what it set out to do, where the game failed is at giving the studio any hope at being able to make a new game within a reasonable time gap, because the game has become so lucrative, that Kim Ji-hoon, the studio's CEO and god responsible for this hyperfixation had revealed in the stream building up to future content before and after Canto 7 (peak canto btw) that they're currently in the midst of a 10 year plan developed for Limbus, and don't seem to be pulling the game's plug anytime soon until those plans are all exhausted. Which, whether you like it or not, as of right now, Limbus Company is technically kind of a de facto "final game" that ProjectMoon has made. Surprise plot twist! Distortion Detective isn't actually dead! Kinda. Remember when I said that they wouldn't be able to develop a full fledged Distortion Detective game alone? You don't? Barely C Minus. Pay more attention in class. But for those who remembered, basically on the same stream where Kim revealed his future plans for Limbus service, and also content leading up to canto 7, he's revealed that Distortion Detective the game isn't completely dead, and in the current state of the company, financial problems won't be as much of a dealbreaker as it was during the initial development of the game, it's just that they've kinda hit an idea block for the game and because of that, we probably won't be able to see the game truly realized without the backing of a structurally stronger collaborator. So the game isn't necessarily scrapped, but under what can be described as development purgatory. Hell, everything surrounding Distortion Detective is basically Schrodinger's video game, since the game exists but also doesn't. Remnants of the passion left behind mid-development of Distortion Detective can be traced in the fictional literary novel of the same name, and hell, one of the game's main cast, Ezra, even made her first cameo appearance in Limbus' Blade Lineage Intervallo, and even Moses, the main character of Distortion Detective, was even mentioned as a cameo by Don Quixote in a mini-episode not long after the events of the Blade Lineage intervallo before spoiler alert, getting a full fledged cameo appearance during the events of Canto 7 in the same vein as Ezra did during the Blade Lineage subplot (it's also here that Ezra makes another cameo appearance, sorry couldn't fit that in with the main script so have this subplot bracket instead), acting as a supporting character that informs the sinners of the various typings and/or categories of bloodfiends they may or may not face in their crusade within Lamancha Land. But aside from cameo appearances and an entire dedicated novel, that's kind of it for Distortion Detective. As mentioned before, the game is in development purgatory until officially stated otherwise, so for now, again, it's safe to assume that Limbus Company is currently the last of ProjectMoon's works that we'll be diving deep into anytime soon. TL;DR local Korean indie company underestimate just how lucrative their little fundraising project turned out
I absolutely love the Darksiders franchise and I had no idea of the history behind them, I remember my mom buying me the game when I, Threw my back out and helped unload The moving truck, So this game holds a special place in my heart, I am very excited for the fourth game if we ever get it
I'm slowly falling down the gamedev history rabbit hole, thanks a bunch UFO 50! ...and Bumbles! (Covering Cyber Owls in this as a bonus feature in the kayfabe you covered Shipwrecked 64 in would've been pretty funny, even if that would've kinda went against the video's purpose)
I always wondered what happened to THQ. I remember paying their Tonka racing game for the PC. I mean a physical CD disc that you would put into the disc tray in the PC tower. This was around 05-07 or somewhere around there. This was an old game. It was good. Really good. It even had a track creator that I would spend hours on making as awesome of a track that I could. Not surprising that they ended with a whimper.
That last minute twist is crazy. And i thought Activision was bad in it's ability to buy promising developpers and run them into the ground! Great video overall, ending's crazy and i loved hearing the various company histories
I wanna add a company to this list. Ensemble Studios was founded in 1994, and it's first game was Age of Empires. Age of Empires went on to become one of the biggest RTS of all time. Picking an ancient empire, you'd build up your empire, collect resources, and deceat your opponents. Not only was Age of Empires a hit, but Age of Empires 2 is often considered one of the greatest RTS of all time. AoE2 Definitive has the highest player count of all Age games. AoE2 heads into the medieval era. Then Ensemble got bought by Microsoft, while they were working on Age of Mythology, a game that went in mythological route instead of a historical one. Originally with just Greeks, Egyptians, and Norse, Age of Mythology revolved around picking gods. While it got overshadowed by a little known game called Warcraft 3, it was popular enough to get an expansion and a remake this year. After Age of Empires 3, Microsoft decided to give them another task, Halo. So Halo is Microsoft's biggest IP for the Xbox, and ehile the hype for Halo 3 was through the roof, Ensemble was put in charge of an RTS for Halo. Bungie hated this. While Halo started out as an RTS for Mac of all things, Bungie didn't want anyone else working on a Halo game at the time, feeling it was whoring out the series. Bungie gave Ensemble as little to work with as they could, and even refused to tell them how Halo 3 ended. So Ensemble put the story before even Halo 1. Then they came into work to be told that Microsoft was closing them down. All nonessential personnel were laid off, with the rest given incentives to stay till the completion of the game. This meant possible projects like Sorcerer, a fantasy adventure RPG, Wrench, a platformer, and Titan, a Halo MMO, were all canceled. How's the game? Pretty good actually. Better than it should be. RTS has a hard time working on comsole, given the lack of a mouse and hotkeys, but Ensemble managed to make a good RTS with solid story and characters. It wiuld absolutely be better on PC, but this game is really good. You have two factions, UNSC and Covenant, but they have their own leaders rhat you pick. These leaders having their own advantages and weaknesses, as well as unique units. Resource gathering was simplified, but the maps are nice. All in all, a great game and a good swan song for one of the kings of RTS. The Age series was sent to the basement for many years after this, but the fans kept the series alive. Eventually, the games were moved to Steam and the less we talk about the AoM Extended Edition, the better. And finally, Age of Empires 2 got DLC. Yes, DLC. And with those profits, we fot Age of Empires 1 Definitive Edition. It wasn't great. But then Fallen Empires and World's Edge got to work on AoE2 DE, and it was great. So they made AoE3 DE, and it was great! But Age of Mythology never seemed to be a priority. Then it was announced a remake was in the works! And then nothing for two years. But then we saw some news in an AoE stream! They spent less time on it than they did on the mobile game. But then we got an actual trailer, and it looked great. So after the trailer was revealed, you had the chance to pre-order on Steam for....$30? And the Premium Edition was $50? And the Premium Edition not only has a bonus god, but the first two expansions and all the old god portraits for free? As well as early access? And you get it discounted if you have the Extended Edition? But the big question was the beta. And....yeah it was good. AI portraits and Arkantos voice acting aside, but they actually changed those in the game's release. By early access release, in fact. And yeah. Age of Mythology Retold is great. Halo Wars got its own sequel in Halo Wars 2, made by the guys who made Total War, and that was also good. Ensemble may be gone, but at least Halo Wars, Age of Empires, and Age of Mythology seem to be in good hands.
Honorable mention Fire emblem awekening was originaly was supuse to be the final entry in the series a last Swan song (thats why it was base in the same country as marth's) but thank to its popularity the introduction of casual mode and many other things it save the series
"Awakening birthed some of fire emblem's modern problems" my brother in christ it birthed modern fire emblem in general, we almost got third trimestered
What a fun little romp through the past of some unfortunate developers, I sure hope the terror of capitalism doesn’t rear its ugly head and why is there boss music
52:09 *Technically*, there’s no “correct” interpretation (outside of Death). Yes, strife and fury are kind of lower than war, but… so is conquest, AND YET in other words, it’s not wrong, just different
Could also be fun to see the flipside: studios with an amazing swansong to cap things off. In fact this could be a really interesting series in general.
57:49 no wonder Bl3’s story was so lackluster. Here’s to hoping they don’t fail so badly with borderlands 4 next year. That would suck because I love the borderlands games. They’re my favorite ever
![Games You Can't Buy Anymore 3: Battleborn To Die [Bumbles McFumbles]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/7BLO2U6Dk6Y/mqdefault.jpg)
![Games You Can't Buy Anymore 3: Battleborn To Die [Bumbles McFumbles]](/img/tr.png)
![Unwinnable Video Games [Bumbles McFumbles]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/9-qA8ixz4rM/mqdefault.jpg)
![Silent Hill Ascension Is The Worst Silent Hill Thing [Bumbles McFumbles]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/kB6ieSUZojU/mqdefault.jpg)
![The Burger King Xbox Games [Bumbles McFumbles]](/img/n.gif)
"The middle class of game developers is going away. Soon, it's going to get to the point you're either AAA or Indie."
Quite the assumption that it hasn't already.
Is the reason why people are still believing that gaming is under a depressing state: You either have a slop AAA game with annoying monetization, or a indie game that has to limit itself due to budget constraints.
You either have an over-budget game or an under-budget game. Nothing in between.
@@lumirairazbyte9697 Even then, indie games have a lot more effort put into them, largely because many of them are passion projects. Budget means nothing save for how much money you throw at the game, what matters is the quality of the finished product.
I think that we reached that around the 7th generation of consoles
@@kmdgaming6039 indie games are proof that you don’t need a colossal budget to make a gorgeous looking game
in my mind there’s AAA, indie, and sega . sega has its own thing going on, good for them.
I feel like if I wrote a fictional story about a monopolistic cyberpunk-style video game megacorporation that continually assimilated other companies and I called it "Embracer Group" my editor would tell me to be a little less on-the-nose.
THQ eventually becoming Embracer Group is the most heartbreaking corruption arc of all time. The guys who made the spongebob movie game are now spending BILLIONS of dollars to own a monopoly of 5/10 studios just to sit on their hands and bleed money.
it's important to remember the company does not make the people; the people who made spongebob are the developers and the people who own embracer are not the same individuals at all
THQ died (probably rightfully, look at how they managed their company) and Nordic just took their name and some of the stuff they owned, they did not become Embracer Group.
@@evilredflame
Good to know one of my childhood devs didn't become the Video Game Industry's equivalent to The Thing.
And instead they're shutting those studios down because their latest major investor pulled out hard
On the topic of developers getting absorbed, I will never forgive Activision for seeing how much the Internet praised those Tony Hawke remasters for finally being something that’s not another call of duty and then being like "That's a weird way to spell "we want more Call Of Duty," but we got you," before casually and callously absorbing vicarious visions to work on the COD machine.
Vicarious Visions, Toys for Bob, Neversoft, Raven, Nerve, etc
Incredibly talented developers that worked on so many games I loved, all folded into the CoD mines. I have no opinion on the CoD games as games because I've never played them. But I forever resent all the talent fed into the machine that used to and still could be offering new, fresh games
@@Medi4243Yep. It's sad. Call of Duty really needs to take a break. OK, this comment will be long winded but here's a truthful opinion on Call of Duty instead of just going with the crowd and saying "CoD bad !" I feel it gets a lot of hate, and some of it is undeserved.
I mean people always critique the game as being "The same game every year." I mean the original MW and MW2 got rave reviews, so if it's the "same" then the games are good, right ?
It feels good to play, always has. The campaigns are on a scale of really good to "decent." As someone that has gotten older I don't have as much time to game so the 6-8 hour campaigns are perfect. They are not that 'deep' but are on par with a blockbuster action or spy movie.
My problems with the game IMO is how much Activision has pimped it out. Yearly titles, filled with microtransactions and a heavy use of FOMO to try to keep people hooked until they release a new one in a year and then they just drop all support for the last title.
There's a bit more to it (like matchmaking is optimized for 'engagement' and it has totally killed the multiplayer aspect for me. However I would highly recommend you check some of them out if you want fun bite sized action game.
The original Modern Warfare 1 & 2 are great. Black Ops 1, 2 and Cold War had really fun campaigns. Fun fact, Raven made the campaign to Cold War and it was great, I tend to think what I like about the newer games is Raven's contributions. I would definitely suggest at least checking out Black Ops 1 and if you enjoy it to then play Cold War and 2. I like the more spy and brainwashing themes they go into.
Though the games are a bit overpriced if you are only playing them for the campaign. Like $40 for a 14 year old game !? I don't know if MS have reduced the price after buying Activision. They are free If you have game Pass or if you can find a cheap physical copy then I definitely recommend.
Actually, they weren't thrown into the COD mines... they became a division of Blizzard and renamed Blizzard Albany, where they helped make Diablo II Resurrected and Diablo IV.
Still not a great fate for them, but probably still better than the mines.
I miss neversoft 😭🤢😭😭😭🤢🤮🤮😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭@@Medi4243
The last part about embracer group was insane I didnt think my jaw could drop amymore than it did. Would love to see an individual video on them some day
As someone in the board game business the Asmodee acquisition surprised me the most. They have more reach than the video let on.
I'd never heard of them. I was _stunned_
Felt like an Hbomberguy bit where he dedicates half of the video to outing one person/company
You didn't mention this, but the funny thing about THQ's founding was that the same guy had also founded LJN, thus you can trace an almost direct throughline from LJN to Embracer Group
Same quality and standards I see.
The Curse of the Ghosts of the Laughing, Joking Numbskulls is still with us today
@@joefrew1614Yup. Laughing, Joking, Numbnuts.
taughing hoking qumbnuts
A little fun fact about Mortal Kombat vs DC comics, my brother used to boot up the practice mode, play as Sonya and set the opponent as Wonder Woman. He would beat her up using specific move combos that would do the most battle damage so that she would be more... "revealing," then launch her towards the screen. Over, and over, and over again.
why you gotta out your brother like that before god and the jury?
He'd do the same, given the opportunity
@@bumblesmcfumbles Do you think you could play Anton Blast
he cant blast himself what makes you think he can blast anton@@joeferri3491
Starting the video: Hm, interesting! I always wondered about the swan songs of certain developers.
Ending the video: You are absolutely correct it is now my life's mission to kill Embracer Group.
Now we need to get Tommy Tallarico involved with them. Two birds with one stone.
oooo Neat choice for a topic. Always interesting to see a Dev's last gasp for survival.
Can definitely see why it would be fascinating a subject to look back on, somber as it might be for all those developers that went out with less-than-stellar results. I always dig these informative overviews that Bumbles does every so often.
My dearest bumbling fumble,
It has come to my attention that you have made a giant yugioh iceberg and that you saw it covered on this very website. As someone whose favorite video is your original iceberg one, disregarding you saying it's bad which is simply untrue; I insist you go on with making your own video on said iceberg chart as a celebration to when that genre of video was still good and for embracing your roots in both those and yugioh.
Sincerely, A viewer whose favorites by you are that and bumbles mcrumbles
I will. Soon
Goomd.
@@WilfredCthuluG o o m d
@@bumblesmcfumbles Finally, we'll finally get the context of Yugi having diabetes.
@@bumblesmcfumbles Good, I kinda miss the Yugioh content.
I think it's worth saying, but... Bumbles? If the algorithm leaves this one at the wayside?
Please don't think the video of poor quality or poorly chosen or whatever. This was quality, top to bottom. The exact kind of well-defined storytelling and research that feels like an old friend describing their fandom that I, and many like me, enjoy greatly.
This one felt like a labour of love, or... at the very least, the kind of passion that is much needed in a dire time.
I greatly second this.
30:46 I love how Deathstroke collapses like he's a cartoon character whose grave is going to spontaneously appear under him
Start of the video: Oh cool, Hoyle Games
End of the video: It is now my life mission to destroy Embracer group
Balan appears at 58:04.
You're welcome.
Which fate is worse?
Balan eventually falling to darkness and becoming the new Lance, trapped forever in an endless cycle of purity and corruption?
Or,
Being owned by Embracer Group?
@@Blackheartzero The Latter of course!
i can see this topic becoming a really interesting series for the channel
if you're worried about running out of topics, don't worry, just wait a few months and you'll have another couple dozen studio swan songs
I heard you mention Turok and IMMEDIATELY knew you'd bring up the baby name and tombstone marketing moments again lmao
I'm so glad Mario and Luigi managed to have a good ending
And brought back from the dead 9 years later!
Gotta respect Nintendo for making the fans of all Mario rpgs happy
That last part...made me wish it was Halloween again with how much is scared the crap out of me.
Me going into the video: Oh, neat, a Hoyle games mention! I loved Hoyle Card Games 2005 as a kid!
Me exiting the video: *WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS INDUSTRY*
Bumblesmcfumbles inadvertently continuing my tradition of watching his videos while eating mall pizza by uploading this today
I didn't expect this video to turn into a screed against Embracer Group, but really, they deserve far worse than Bumbles flinging mean words at them. As a Big Think Dimension listener, I've long been aware of their terrible crimes and inept attitude leading to multiple people's houses being lit on fire, metaphorically.
Dang. What an ending! You did some great research here!
I thought I recognised the name “Turok,” from somewhere, I bet you having done all the hard work on the “Worst Video Game Advertisements Ever” made researching the information for that slot a LOT easier.
Anyways, this was a really great video! It was really interesting to see all the game dev team’s last hurrahs, but also very sad at the same time, keep up the good work, man!
A moment of silence for these dead companies that with these games we can remember them by...
Bumbles McRumbles 7 when?
Huh, what an interesting deep dive into different game comp-I must now kill Embracer Group.
Hey, just here to remind you, it's shown the squirrel gave consent
That Embracer part got really scary the longer it went on XD
Miss Alphadream...
I really wish they didn't do the remake. It was an obvious miss with the ds version still playable on the same system.
@@FubukiTheIcyKingWhatcha think they'd be making today if they were still here?
@@youtubeuniversity3638 Other than Mario & Luigi series (also they did some Hamtaro as well) they apparently had a couple of unique games. So they probably would've thrived in making weird little games that would've done great on PC or switch.
@FubukiTheIcyKing Alphadream Good
oh shit theyre a girl?
Part of the reason I love this channel is ideas like these. A really relatively simple concept that I have never seen covered before. Combine it with the depth gone into and the fun personality. And boom S tier channel.
The story of midway was a tragedy, a true industry titan cut down due to horrendous mismanagement and a lack of finding a new audience. They were about as big at their peak as sega or Xbox was
I have lots of fond memories of playing Smash TV on an old Xbox collection of their arcade titles with my brother.
episode idea:
A Developer's Final Game 2: The Cold Embracer of Death
"Oh, that's kinda cool they included an obit-GRAND WIZARD???"
@@adriantillman8203 I swear to God he wasn't a klansman he was an actual wizard and gay
I dunno what it is about Acclaim being Acclaim, but Bumbles got 4 all-timers out of their failures alone. That 0verflow gag hit me like a train.
Started playing YGO so now I finally get the little jokes Bumbles puts into the transitions, it's like I unlocked a bonus extra joke in every video
Love this topic, plus any video that involves you talking wrestling is a win.
Btw, any updates you can share on PokéPets: Hoenn or is it still a ways off?
58:50 Going by the pattern... billion dollars?
58:54 Oh, I just got a third of it.
A lot of people underestimate the global value of board games. It is also worth noting that in addition to Ticket to Ride the studio had a little property in its wheelhouse called the English rights to (Settlers of) Catan.
@@IPFreelyYT To be fair though, realizing that a billion dollars is an UNDERestimate is insane no matter how big the real number is.
My 2012 high school self seriously appreciated the random Demetori background track like 15 minutes in. God tier taste, Mr. Fumbles.
Dang.
Just this week, I was walking through a local mall isle with a row of dead stores, wondering what was the last product or service that left their shelves!
Neat!
57:33 the amount of primal fear I felt when you showed this was palpable
52:02 Ok, the mythology nerd in me (okay, religion nerd, but Revelation is the most mythology-ish part of the Bible) feels the need to make a point: the horsemen besides death are never actually named in the original text. All we really know is that one rides a white horse, wears a crown, and conquers; one rides a red horse, carries a sword, and destroys peace; and one rides a black horse, carries scales, and its unclear exactly what he does, but it's something to do with increasing the price of grain. (Note that the white horseman being pestilence is a fairly modern interpretation of unclear origin.) Now, I could see the white horseman being war and the red horseman being strife, but the black horseman being fury is a bit of a stretch.
Edit: I should clarify, I mean no disrespect to Mr. McFumbles. I just enjoy sharing knowledge.
wait, you only mentioned 3, wasn't there a 4th?
what about bojack
@@ehhorve857 Yes. The Pale Horseman is specifically named as Death, while the other three go unnamed.
War is the Red Horseman, he's like a Red Riding Hood wielding a metal sharpened surfboard.
In Darksiders, the Horses are named after things that follow or are associated with their Riders. War's horse is named Ruin for example (and actually appears black, but with red accents) and Death's horse is named Despair. Fury's horse is named Rampage (if i remember correctly) and Strife's i don't remember.
Funnily enough, "Ruin" is also the Dutch word for a male horse.
I did NOT see that ending coming.
18:04 Guess this game spelled disaster for Acclaim (they forgot to add Kurt Angle into the mix)
Indeed, their chances of this game breaking even drastic went down
THQ made a game where you get to punch Tails Miles Prowler as sonic the hedgehog, so hard he rebounds against the wall, and you get to follow it up with a midair spike that smashes his body into the ground. So you have to love them. (The game is sonic battle for the GBA, the sonic advance spin off that gets referenced in sonic advance 3)
Saint's Row (2022) stung really hard, as it was clear that Volition didn't know what they wanted to make. A more grounded approach like the first two games, or a more wackier approach like Saints Row The Third and IV. This can really be seen in the final product, where they tried to combine both to make an unappealing game.
And the fact that Embracer was expecting Saints Row to make at least $100 million in profit due to a very lucrative investment from a Saudi group falling apart at the last minute... It was never going to happen. And now Saints Row, and by extension, Red Faction, are left in legal limbo. Really sucks.
Fun fact: THQ released the Drawn to Life duology on DS.
Man i miss those games
Wait, I was named Turok for a dead publisher? Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
You’re the creator I most look forward to seeing in my notification feed. Thank you, Jack
Very nice to see that this video was the first notification I got when I woke up :)
I cant believe a fake sting got into an akklaim game.
*the in-game sting would proceed to take off his mask* OH MY GOD ITS STING!
Anyone else see MKvDC and thought the title of the vid was "A Developer's Fighting Game"
I thought that was the title when I saw Hulk Hogan.
Honestly thats what I thought too.
@@cillbipher2613 Wait a minute! The thumbnail that’s shown in the comments tab DOES say fighting game!
I don’t know how you could sit there and say that Showdown: Legends of Wrestling didn’t have any polish.
I mean, Ivan Putski is RIGHT THERE!
Good joke. A+
Mr.Mc fumbles, I cannot beleve you thought you could change the text on the thumbnail and we wouldnt notice.
Thanks for the Sierra shout-out 💛
i think bret put more oomph into his spoken word masterpiece "Never Been a Right Time to Say Goodbye" than into those tutorials
38:34 Funnily enough, I can name at least on Mohawk fan, as a speedrunner was requesting it for GDQ for ages and genuinely loves the game, it got lumped into the Awful block but he still loves the game
Yeah, PJ. He tried for like seven years! Plus the tech in the game was super impressive, watching it at GDQ I didn't think it was that bad.
After the tease, I demand to hear Mr McFumbles recite Steiner Math.
You awoke a repressed memory of playing legends of wrestling at a game stop, thank you for that.
As a Darksiders fan it is my civic duty to recommend everyone play these games. The fourth game just got a teaser trailer earlier this year so now would be a good time to jump into the series, assuming Embracer doesn't kill the game before it reaches the finish line.
The fourth Mainline(?)game, the prequel Darksiders Genesis was a good one too.
I'm hoping here with you, that Darksiders will be able to find itself proper continuation and eventual conclusion. The ending may be different from the beginning, but i still hold out faith that the soul and core of Darksiders will be kept.
Honestly, an entire video dedicated to video game adaptations of horror movies would be cool
The amount of wrestling in this video pleases me greatly.
Duuude this was a sick video, great work
Im going to be honest, i think im going to need a map for that last part, i have never been so confused, and yet somehow, without understanding anything, i can still feel the dread the entire segment implies.
Terrifying.
7:15 Have you seen “both” Olsens in the same room at the same time? HBO couldn’t even get them to both show up as a gag back when they had Game of Thrones money.
"Noah's Ark" was one of the best bits I've heard in a while
This is such a cool video! Great work!
This made me sad, but you did a helluva good job on this, BmF
"There are so many ball rolling puzzles in this game..."
Aeon Flux: Finally, a worthy opponent...
40:16 Which reminds me, we all need to get back to watching the spongebob movie game video on repeat! I'm getting that essay out of you eventually!
My ears pricked when i heard jack start quoting steiner math
Great video topic, really interesting choices. I always appreciate the amount of history and context that you bring to the discussion
the last 10 minutes absolutely destroyed me emotionally. what the fuck.
This intro is horrifying for someone in their first year of trying for a game dev major
Good thing we know no one like that haha, right?
....right?
@ haha... hah... heh...
We're so close to 100 episodes.
Didn't expect th is to turn into "Embracer Group Is Everywhere"
Darksiders is a genuinely great series tbh. I personally loved the story of the Horseman’s red headed problem child, the entire series I do not own, and had to listen to someone else tell the story and all. And man does it fucking slap, all of em for the most part
Would Limbus Company technically count under this category? It's not that the developers, ProjectMoon, are struggling financially because of this game or anything (in fact its whole purpose is to literally financially back the company for future projects), hell it's probably their most famous and lucrative game in the trilogy, which is somehow simultaneously the most beneficial and restrictive aspect of the game towards the company.
For a little bit of backstory, Limbus Company was constructed from the husk of the currently presumably in development purgatory Distortion Detective game, which was supposed to be the true successor to Library of Ruina/ProjectMoon's third foray into the worldbuilding of The City. It was supposed to be some sort of dungeon crawler, akin to something like Darkest Dungeon or the Mystery Dungeon games. The problem isn't that Library of Ruina wasn't received well or at least the PC/non-Nintendo ports, in fact it received critical acclaim from both newcomers and long-standing denizens of The City, the game is what I'd like to call "quite the spectacular experience."
And that's probably the problem.
Don't misunderstand me, PMoon bros, I'm not saying the game is too flashy for its own good or anything in fact it's one of my favorite games of all time, I even replay it from time to time to check out the mod fights, trust me, you will find me dead in the ground, bones eaten (or claimed, lol) by rats before you get me to downplay the sheer magnificence that is this game's presentation.
But did you know that -in terms of male human and abnormality breeding- in terms of careers pursuable by the global adult population that provide at least some degree of financial stability, game development is one of the financially stable careers to have ever financed?
This is just a theory from a friend and I'm relatively new to the PMoon cult so I can't say for certain if this is the truth but while LoR is what can probably be considered peak fiction, the production costs undertaken to get there can probably be best described as "kinda Samjover". There's the development of the game itself, and then there's also the voice acting fees, artist fees, the musician fees (especially when it comes to the Mili songs since they're in charge for producing most of the atmospherically heavy tracks in the game), probably some IT support fees because of le iconic janky ass spaghetti coding that's become part of the studio's game catalogue at this point (for a channel-appropriate comparison it's on a similar wavelength to M Dickie games but usually hidden so well that you'll rarely even notice the jank unless you try to break it yourself, or if your PC just so happens to be too underpowered to hide the jank), and yeah you can put two and two together and see where I'm going with this.
By what I can presume to be sometime around Distortion Detective's production, because of the financial woes that LoR's production alone managed to rack up, it could be hypothetically deduced that at their current climate, the budget was too unstable for them to keep going ALONE (pay attention, this will be on the test) but they didn't wanna completely scrap what they've already done for the game, so they decided to (for now) scrap all that they've made for the game and focus on remaking the pre-existing assets of Distortion Detective into a new game instead, one meant to serve as their means of fundraising for their future projects, the f2p gacha some of us know and probably love, hate, or never heard of until you somehow find this maybe obscured ass comment ; Limbus Company.
I'm not gonna talk about the gameplay because this mention is long enough as is, but while the game succeeded at what it set out to do, where the game failed is at giving the studio any hope at being able to make a new game within a reasonable time gap, because the game has become so lucrative, that Kim Ji-hoon, the studio's CEO and god responsible for this hyperfixation had revealed in the stream building up to future content before and after Canto 7 (peak canto btw) that they're currently in the midst of a 10 year plan developed for Limbus, and don't seem to be pulling the game's plug anytime soon until those plans are all exhausted. Which, whether you like it or not, as of right now, Limbus Company is technically kind of a de facto "final game" that ProjectMoon has made.
Surprise plot twist! Distortion Detective isn't actually dead! Kinda. Remember when I said that they wouldn't be able to develop a full fledged Distortion Detective game alone? You don't? Barely C Minus. Pay more attention in class. But for those who remembered, basically on the same stream where Kim revealed his future plans for Limbus service, and also content leading up to canto 7, he's revealed that Distortion Detective the game isn't completely dead, and in the current state of the company, financial problems won't be as much of a dealbreaker as it was during the initial development of the game, it's just that they've kinda hit an idea block for the game and because of that, we probably won't be able to see the game truly realized without the backing of a structurally stronger collaborator. So the game isn't necessarily scrapped, but under what can be described as development purgatory. Hell, everything surrounding Distortion Detective is basically Schrodinger's video game, since the game exists but also doesn't. Remnants of the passion left behind mid-development of Distortion Detective can be traced in the fictional literary novel of the same name, and hell, one of the game's main cast, Ezra, even made her first cameo appearance in Limbus' Blade Lineage Intervallo, and even Moses, the main character of Distortion Detective, was even mentioned as a cameo by Don Quixote in a mini-episode not long after the events of the Blade Lineage intervallo before spoiler alert, getting a full fledged cameo appearance during the events of Canto 7 in the same vein as Ezra did during the Blade Lineage subplot (it's also here that Ezra makes another cameo appearance, sorry couldn't fit that in with the main script so have this subplot bracket instead), acting as a supporting character that informs the sinners of the various typings and/or categories of bloodfiends they may or may not face in their crusade within Lamancha Land. But aside from cameo appearances and an entire dedicated novel, that's kind of it for Distortion Detective. As mentioned before, the game is in development purgatory until officially stated otherwise, so for now, again, it's safe to assume that Limbus Company is currently the last of ProjectMoon's works that we'll be diving deep into anytime soon.
TL;DR local Korean indie company underestimate just how lucrative their little fundraising project turned out
I absolutely love the Darksiders franchise and I had no idea of the history behind them, I remember my mom buying me the game when I, Threw my back out and helped unload The moving truck, So this game holds a special place in my heart, I am very excited for the fourth game if we ever get it
I'm slowly falling down the gamedev history rabbit hole, thanks a bunch UFO 50! ...and Bumbles! (Covering Cyber Owls in this as a bonus feature in the kayfabe you covered Shipwrecked 64 in would've been pretty funny, even if that would've kinda went against the video's purpose)
Ok, I HAVE to know why you picked Ursarctics for this one
I always wondered what happened to THQ. I remember paying their Tonka racing game for the PC. I mean a physical CD disc that you would put into the disc tray in the PC tower. This was around 05-07 or somewhere around there. This was an old game. It was good. Really good. It even had a track creator that I would spend hours on making as awesome of a track that I could. Not surprising that they ended with a whimper.
That last minute twist is crazy. And i thought Activision was bad in it's ability to buy promising developpers and run them into the ground!
Great video overall, ending's crazy and i loved hearing the various company histories
I wanna add a company to this list.
Ensemble Studios was founded in 1994, and it's first game was Age of Empires. Age of Empires went on to become one of the biggest RTS of all time. Picking an ancient empire, you'd build up your empire, collect resources, and deceat your opponents. Not only was Age of Empires a hit, but Age of Empires 2 is often considered one of the greatest RTS of all time. AoE2 Definitive has the highest player count of all Age games. AoE2 heads into the medieval era. Then Ensemble got bought by Microsoft, while they were working on Age of Mythology, a game that went in mythological route instead of a historical one. Originally with just Greeks, Egyptians, and Norse, Age of Mythology revolved around picking gods. While it got overshadowed by a little known game called Warcraft 3, it was popular enough to get an expansion and a remake this year. After Age of Empires 3, Microsoft decided to give them another task, Halo.
So Halo is Microsoft's biggest IP for the Xbox, and ehile the hype for Halo 3 was through the roof, Ensemble was put in charge of an RTS for Halo. Bungie hated this. While Halo started out as an RTS for Mac of all things, Bungie didn't want anyone else working on a Halo game at the time, feeling it was whoring out the series. Bungie gave Ensemble as little to work with as they could, and even refused to tell them how Halo 3 ended. So Ensemble put the story before even Halo 1. Then they came into work to be told that Microsoft was closing them down. All nonessential personnel were laid off, with the rest given incentives to stay till the completion of the game. This meant possible projects like Sorcerer, a fantasy adventure RPG, Wrench, a platformer, and Titan, a Halo MMO, were all canceled.
How's the game? Pretty good actually. Better than it should be. RTS has a hard time working on comsole, given the lack of a mouse and hotkeys, but Ensemble managed to make a good RTS with solid story and characters. It wiuld absolutely be better on PC, but this game is really good. You have two factions, UNSC and Covenant, but they have their own leaders rhat you pick. These leaders having their own advantages and weaknesses, as well as unique units. Resource gathering was simplified, but the maps are nice. All in all, a great game and a good swan song for one of the kings of RTS.
The Age series was sent to the basement for many years after this, but the fans kept the series alive. Eventually, the games were moved to Steam and the less we talk about the AoM Extended Edition, the better. And finally, Age of Empires 2 got DLC. Yes, DLC. And with those profits, we fot Age of Empires 1 Definitive Edition. It wasn't great. But then Fallen Empires and World's Edge got to work on AoE2 DE, and it was great. So they made AoE3 DE, and it was great! But Age of Mythology never seemed to be a priority. Then it was announced a remake was in the works! And then nothing for two years. But then we saw some news in an AoE stream! They spent less time on it than they did on the mobile game. But then we got an actual trailer, and it looked great.
So after the trailer was revealed, you had the chance to pre-order on Steam for....$30? And the Premium Edition was $50? And the Premium Edition not only has a bonus god, but the first two expansions and all the old god portraits for free? As well as early access? And you get it discounted if you have the Extended Edition?
But the big question was the beta. And....yeah it was good. AI portraits and Arkantos voice acting aside, but they actually changed those in the game's release. By early access release, in fact. And yeah. Age of Mythology Retold is great.
Halo Wars got its own sequel in Halo Wars 2, made by the guys who made Total War, and that was also good. Ensemble may be gone, but at least Halo Wars, Age of Empires, and Age of Mythology seem to be in good hands.
The last games from game studios are fascinating to me, mainly on what occurred for that to happen 😊
Some games go out as a great last showing....some are just sad.
18:03 hey look he referenced the funny clip
Noah's Ark in Bumbles McRumbles pls. Hopefully in a team with Baron BluBlu and Diggity Dog.
I love the Darksiders series. All four games are masterpieces to me. I'd love a BmF deepdive into them, there is much to talk about
that final segment was actually terrifying
Honorable mention Fire emblem awekening was originaly was supuse to be the final entry in the series a last Swan song (thats why it was base in the same country as marth's) but thank to its popularity the introduction of casual mode and many other things it save the series
"Awakening birthed some of fire emblem's modern problems" my brother in christ it birthed modern fire emblem in general, we almost got third trimestered
Casual mode was in the FE1 remake on the ds before Awakening ever existed.
What a fun little romp through the past of some unfortunate developers, I sure hope the terror of capitalism doesn’t rear its ugly head and why is there boss music
That ending bit scared me I didn’t realize Halloween videos were still happening
embracer group is like standard oil if standard oil was stupid
"Tried to make a grittier version of Mortal Kombat." You mean they eat puppies in addition to the gratuitous violence?
Dear Mr. McFumbles
If you by any Chance make Games you can't buy anymore 4, could You Talk about the Shutdown and Delisting of LittleBig Planet 3.
52:09
*Technically*, there’s no “correct” interpretation (outside of Death). Yes, strife and fury are kind of lower than war, but… so is conquest, AND YET
in other words, it’s not wrong, just different
Could also be fun to see the flipside: studios with an amazing swansong to cap things off. In fact this could be a really interesting series in general.
I see Darksiders 2 in the thumbnail. I'm here for it.
I remember that commercial from the early 2000’s. Still don’t know why the two dudes are dressed like they’re from the late 70’s and early 80’s?
57:49 no wonder Bl3’s story was so lackluster. Here’s to hoping they don’t fail so badly with borderlands 4 next year. That would suck because I love the borderlands games. They’re my favorite ever
Dark Horse Comics huh so the company behind my Deluxe Berserk Books has Embracer behind them.