Top 10 Times Game Developers Got Confrontational

It can be hard to accept criticism when your name is synonymous with an incredibly popular franchise. However, it can make you look a tad egotistical when mishandled, which is what happened with Patrice Désilets, the director of “Assassin’s Creed”, “Assassin’s Creed II”, and “Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood.” When his game, “Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey” launched in 2019, it wasn’t met with the most positive reception, to put it gently. It wasn’t long before a frustrated Désilets accused critics of giving the game a negative review score without having even played it. In his words, “It can’t be my fault the game was poorly received, so it must be the critics who’re wrong.”

Communication is key when selling your game, especially when it’s a AAA game like the “Borderlands” series. We get that using the correct terminology can be tricky, but it doesn’t justify a tantrum quite like Randy Pitchford’s. During the gameplay reveal event for “Borderlands 3,” Pitchford stated the new game wouldn’t have microtransactions. Once word got around that players would buy cosmetic items, people started calling Pitchford a liar, and the several headlines from gaming sites did not help the situation. The CEO of Gearbox Software went to town on Twitter, blaming outlets like Game Informer for supposedly misconstruing his remarks.

With a number of controversies taking place, from the change in visuals to the launch of another Kickstarter for a different game before “Mighty No. 9” was even finished, tension had brewed between backers and project lead Keiji Inafune. During a stream in which Inafune was showing off the game, a viewer asked about plans for DLC, to which Inafune would say, “this is what you see and what you get,” before his translator added, “it’s better than nothing”. This remark felt like a slap in the face to many fans and was proceeded to be used as a means for mocking the game. Well, it couldn’t have gotten any worse, right? [“make the bad guys cry like an anime fan on prom night!”]

Phil Fish has been a controversial game developer on account of his typically brash nature and confrontational attitude towards people. We wouldn’t expect he’d take a feud so far as to flat out cancel a game. After some heated exchanges with a journalist from GameTrailers, Fish announced the cancellation of “Fez 2,” the sequel to his 2012 hit. This wouldn’t be the last time he would take his frustration out on others either. In 2014 - a year after the feud, Fish lashed out on Twitter towards those asking for “Fez 2” to resume development, potentially killing his career.

In addition to his work on the “Fable” and “Black & White” franchises, Peter Molyneux has earned a notorious reputation for overhyping games only to under-deliver at launch. Although, his relationship with the press came crashing down after his game, “Godus,” received scathing backlash for its heavy monetization. In interviews with The Guardian and Rock, Paper, Shotgun, Molyneux stated that he would not speak to the press again. Most developers, as we’ve seen so far, would lash out or try to spin the blame onto the media. This form of the cold shoulder, on the other hand, was just as loud and ferocious.

It’s not a secret that “Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly” was an absolute trainwreck, so much so that it’s one of the worst “Spyro” games you can play. Its disastrous condition could have been partially caused by its two developer studios, Check Six Studios and Equinoxe Digital Entertainment. According to interviews conducted by French journalist WumpaGem, both studios were excited to work with each other before conflicts arose due to missed deadlines, mismanagement, creative differences, and some petty behavior. By the time “Enter the Dragonfly” had launched, both studios grew resentful towards each other (at least the executives did). Equinoxe would shut its doors shortly after the game’s release, and Check Six followed suit in 2003 after a project was canceled.

It’s perhaps one of the biggest stories of 2020, and one of the more absurd. When Apple denied Epic Games the ability to let customers purchase microtransactions directly through them, Epic went ahead and put the feature into “Fortnite’s” mobile versions anyways, violating Apple’s (& Google’s) terms and conditions. Apple (& Google) proceeded to remove “Fortnite” from their App Store, prompting Epic to file a lawsuit against both mega-conglomerates. Both companies would proceed to call each other out, claiming one was performing shady business practices, pulling marketing stunts, having a monopoly… It’s just one big corporate drama bomb.

The gaming industry was shaken up quite a bit in 2015, and it was all because of this. Towards the end of development for “Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain,” tension grew between Konami and acclaimed developer Hideo Kojima on account of the publisher seemingly wanting Kojima out of the company. Kojima and his team were given tight deadlines and restrictions so that Konami could get the work done before his contract was up. What made this ordeal seem more spiteful was that Konami expunged Kojima’s name from all marketing material associated with the “Metal Gear” franchise and even went so far as to threaten him with a lawsuit if he attended the 2015 Game Awards. “Metal Gear Survive” certainly hasn’t helped mend anything.

One would not expect issues within a community centered around such an adorable game. Alas, Glumberland found themselves under fire by toxic “fans” after they announced their game, “Ooblets,” would be an Epic Games Store exclusive. Glumberland co-founders Ben Wasser and Rebecca Cordingley became victims of harassment, which prompted Wasser to make a few statements defending their decision to walk away from their original Steam release. These did not sit well with the community, and Wasser would apologize shortly after before making a statement about toxicity - “What happened to us is the result of people forgetting their humanity for the sake of participating in video game drama.”

This was the event that has arguably tarnished Blizzard’s reputation. During a “Hearthstone” tournament in October 2019, Hong Kong player Blitzchung took time in his interview to show support for the Hong Kong protests. Blizzard would proceed to ban the “Hearthstone” pro from the remainder of the tournament, place a one-year ban on him from future tournaments, and demand he forfeit his prize money. The community was furious! The hashtag “Boycott Blizzard” was trending for a while, protests took place both at BlizzCon AND Blizzard’s own office, and one of “Overwatch’s” characters, a Chinese scientist named Mei (may), would become a symbol of the movement. Blizzard would soon withdraw the penalties, but to this day, the company is still feeling the sting.