The Lord of the Rings: Gollum reviews made the stealth game the worst-received of 2023, but some game devs want you to look beyond numbers. Sony Santa Monica environment artist Dannie Carlone, who worked on God of War Ragnarok, said on Twitter that making games is hard work and he proudly displays his lowest-scoring game alongside all the hits.
“Games are hard to make,” Carlone said. “Regardless of the score, every project has positives/lessons learned. I display my “lowest score” game because I’m proud of the time I had working with some of my favorite people in this industry. Some things are out of your hands. Be kind to each other.”
Games are hard to make. Regardless of the score, every project has positives/lessons learned.
I display my "lowest score" game because I'm proud of the time I had working with some of my favorite people in this industry.Some things are out of your hands. Be kind to each other. https://t.co/PNM0dlhqiR pic.twitter.com/G30l6wtRTf
— Dannie Carlone (@Corgiboltz) May 25, 2023
Several developers responded either directly or with their own posts and shared stories of their low-scoring games.
“Agreed 100%,” Meta engineer Dusten Sobotta said. “Some of the most elegant and performant systems I developed are part of the worst game I’ve worked on. We all knew the final product would be bad for reasons outside of our control as ICs. But that didn’t stop us from following our passion and doing great work.”
“Sometimes you Really can’t do anything about it when you’re in a certain position,” Rocksteady senior environment artist Jeryce Dianingana said..”As an environment artist you not gonna change the game design you know?”
You know what ? I'm sending a lot of support to some Devs there because sometimes you Really can't do anything about it when you're in a certain position.
As an environment artist you not gonna change the game design you know ?
Good luck people, I'm with you https://t.co/CfSCSHwEA5
— Jeryce Dianingana (@JeryceDia) May 25, 2023
Wizards of the Coast brand manager Marcel Hatam said that sometimes, projects are just a bad fit for a team’s experience and talents. ExpressionLTD animator Jack Tondeur pointed out that, even if a game fails, the team usually gains valuable experience from working on it.
Let's make this into a thing. This was the first game I worked on from start to finish. A bunch of talented people tried to do something very ambitious and for various reasons it didn't land but working on this basically taught me how to be a gameplay animator. https://t.co/HvvDAVVXWs pic.twitter.com/TTyDlN4cyk
— Jack Tondeur (@JackTondeur) May 25, 2023
Meanwhile, Daedalic Entertainment, the makers of Gollum, posted an apology on Twitter for disappointing fans and promised to address the game’s many bugs. A grant filing in Germany also suggests the team is currently working on a second Lord of the Rings game, reportedly with a new character in unexplored parts of Middle Earth.
Written by Josh Broadwell on behalf of GLHF
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