The Callisto Protocol’s review embargo

[Frindis]

Not gonna lie, I'm a little hyped for the game. That is also why the review embargo makes me question WTF is going on and WHY publishers do this stupid thing in the first place. Are there good examples of doing this strategy or just damage control for preventing criticism because of something that is unpolished or worse? The only reason I was even thinking about preordering, was to be able to preload the game before launch on Steam, but now that I read about this review embargo happening, I don't really feel like it at all. Thoughts?

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

If I remember right one of the publishers to do it was Bethesda with Doom 2016 and that turned out ok

I think its not great though all in all. Does make it seem they have something to hide

 

[Frindis]

From what I understand, a lot of love went into making this game so I really hope they are not hiding anything and that this game will be able to make a gory and rememberable footprint in the horror genre as Dead Space did in its time. Transparency is always the best option in my eyes, even if it could have meant they had to postpone the game.

 

[mainer]

I hadn't heard of a review embargo for Callistro Protocol, and I'm not exactly sure what that means. Does this mean that major gaming sites, like PC Gamer, will not be able to publish reviews before the actual release of the game, or is it more involved than that?

Early reviews are helpful to me for games that I'm interested in, yet have uncertainties about the actual gameplay (like check point saves). A review embargo like that would only increase my uncertainty and suspicion about a game, and delay any purchase I might make. I don't understand how an embargo would actually benefit anyone: developer, publisher or player.

I have an interest (and wish-listed) Callisto Protocol as well as the Dead Space Remake, but I wouldn't purchase either without reading some gameplay reviews first.

 

[Johnway]

Never a good sign when publishers embargo reviews. All that makes me do is just hold back preordering even more. Here's hoping its not a bad game but its a tell tale sign if someone doesn't want reviews early or before release chances are they're trying to sucker a lot of people into buying it. Pointless when in most cases you can refund the game in the first few hours. Also a common tactic of hiding something they didn't want us to know

Hopefully its the opposite and the game is brilliant. But only time will tell...

 

[Frindis]

I hadn't heard of a review embargo for Callistro Protocol, and I'm not exactly sure what that means. Does this mean that major gaming sites, like PC Gamer, will not be able to publish reviews before the actual release of the game, or is it more involved than that?

I believe that is a correct assumption. I reckon there are ways to go about it, but most of the time you won't see any reviews until the release of the game.

Pointless when in most cases you can refund the game in the first few hours

I can see some consumers getting punished for this, especially those who preorder and starts playing it without reading any reviews. Maybe there is a bug in the game that makes it impossible to play and people not knowing about it would be playing past the refund time before they experience the problem. It is not always retailers will compensate for something like that, if we are not talking about something in the scope of the issues at launch with Cyberpunk 2077.

 

[McStabStab]

It's a bummer for sure cause I ain't hitting buy @ full price until I see some feedback on the game (this from a guy who preordered Cyberpunk 2077 and BF 2042 so I'm done with preordering).

That being said, I've been super pumped for this title and it looks great, but the price ain't gonna change between now and the time I purchase it so what's there to lose besides delaying my playthrough? In the end I think it only hurts the publisher to embargo - I've bought many games on Day 1 that got reviewed before release.

 

[Zimbaly]

I know with movies they usually do it with stinkers, but I can see why even if it's good some people may want to do that. Usually cause they're stinkers though = P

 

[Sarafan]

The truth is that when the developers don't have anything to hide, they usually don't employ embargo. I don't thing that it's a major problem though. I'm patient enough to wait a few days before buying a game. TBH I rarely buy them on release date, so the problem is of minor importance for me.

When it comes to Calisto Protocol, one of the main reasons of embargo could be the fact that they made a poor console port. We'll verify this soon enough.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Reviews are up, middling and not too much talk of technical issues in the PCG review, but RPS had a bad time on PC it seems.

I wish theyd always state the specs of the review systems. Helps when trying to figure out where the issues might be.

I'm still interested, on rails for a horror game suits me just fine. As long as I can find time to play it in the day time soon, to scary to play at night.

 

[Frindis]

@Kaamos_Llama I liked that review. Seems to be one of the few mentioning the problems for PC.

Been reading through some of the reviews and seems the score is pretty much in the middle. I think I understand the review embargo now, so the question will be if the more concerning issues are something that can be easily fixed. There is a lot of other stuff like: too much crawling, little enemy variety, and repetitive jump scares that would be more up to who is playing it, but having bad controls or poor optimization, is something that most people will experience as a major problem. I'm going to wait for some more PC reviews about those issues and then make my decision about buying now or waiting a little longer.

 

[Ryzengang]

Yea, this game is getting absolutely walloped on Steam right now. I don't know how significant the issues actually are, but I know Digital Foundry will have an analysis video in the near future so we can actually get performance information from a reliable source.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Yea, this game is getting absolutely walloped on Steam right now. I don't know how significant the issues actually are, but I know Digital Foundry will have an analysis video in the near future so we can actually get performance information from a reliable source.

Ouch, yea thats bad.

sample Steam user review as summary

The Callisto Protocol™ is an FPS horror game, the real horror is in the FPS.

 

[Brian Boru]

what else is there to understand

Seems to me our adult experienced members above are teasing that out quite nicely.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Yep Steam reviews are telling the story this time. Wait for patches and/or DF analysis. Someone in a Steam review suggested disabling Motion Blur and Vsync worked for them.

 

[mainer]

It's my personal feeling that Striking Distance Studios, or whoever was responsible for releasing Callisto Protocol, was aware of the PC performance issues before release but released anyway (a sad, but reoccurring, theme in many of todays AAA games), and the most likely reason for the review embargo, at least in my opinion. Maybe even a bit of intentional deception regarding the PC specs.

Take for example the Steam Minimum and Recommended PC specs:

I've always felt that if I met or exceeded the minimum specs, I should at least be able to run that game in low to medium settings. If my PC was equal to, or greater than, the recommended specs, I've always felt that I could max out most or all of the graphical settings. Maybe I'm being a bit naive in this assessment, but this method has always worked for me. Take a look at the "recommended" videos cards: GTX 1070 or RX 5700, them compare them to the specs from this PC Gamer article:
Callisto Protocol's system requirements will terrify your PC | PC Gamer

There's a fairly large margin from Steam's recommended specs and the max & ultra-specs. I'm not knocking the game itself, but more the marketing of the game.

 

[Zloth]

Minimum specs: it's pretty likely that you'll be able to play the whole game at the lowest settings. If you haven't got this level of hardware, they don't even want you to try to play the game. Let me emphasize: a company does not want your money! Let that sink in before you buy. Sure, some people will be able to squeak through with even lower stats, but when the people who stand to make a profit off of that are telling you that you shouldn't try, maybe you should go play something else.

Everything else is bull. If you've got the minimum, you can (barely) play the game. If you've got better, the game will do better. If you want to know how various hardware advances help various systems within the game, you'll need to look elsewhere for a detailed analysis.

 

[Frindis]

@mainer Krafton holding company & Bluehole Inc are the publishers. Perhaps not a shocker there that greed might have been a tiny, tiny culprit in the whole ordeal. At least from my own experience with the publishers through PUBG (there are also other publishers in the honey jar) the focus is more on money through predatory monetization than on really making the game shine. I honestly don't quite understand the whole PUBG lore with this game also. Far as I understand it Striking Distance started as a studio within the PUBG universe, then it branched off, but still uses the publishers. I guess it makes sense, but that also means that Krafton/Bluehold Inc got more power when it comes to the development cycle and release, not to mention that their shareholders are also the ones who also published PUBG.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Steam User reviews now mixed, people reporting day one patch fixed the stutter.

 

[Zloth]

Now that's interesting! I wonder what went on there? Did their QA not see the stuttering? (Maybe because of a very late change in code?) Did they see it but only rarely? Did everyone know it was coming but thought that it wouldn't hurt reviews all that much? Maybe they knew there was a problem but couldn't figure out how to fix it until they got a lot more examples in? Maybe an engineer at NVIDIA or AMD bought the game, had the issue, and figured out how the devs could fix it? Was the review embargo even related to this issue at all?

So MANY possibilities!

One thing seems certain, though - unless they removed Denuvo with the patch, that wasn't the cause.

P.S. Looks like there are still numerous reports of stuttering. No idea if they are from people that still legitimately have the issue or people who don't meet the game specs.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Now that's interesting! I wonder what went on there? Did their QA not see the stuttering? (Maybe because of a very late change in code?) Did they see it but only rarely? Did everyone know it was coming but thought that it wouldn't hurt reviews all that much? Maybe they knew there was a problem but couldn't figure out how to fix it until they got a lot more examples in? Maybe an engineer at NVIDIA or AMD bought the game, had the issue, and figured out how the devs could fix it? Was the review embargo even related to this issue at all?

So MANY possibilities!

One thing seems certain, though - unless they removed Denuvo with the patch, that wasn't the cause.

P.S. Looks like there are still numerous reports of stuttering. No idea if they are from people that still legitimately have the issue or people who don't meet the game specs.

https://www.pcgamer.com/patch-fixes-the-callisto-protocols-stuttering-which-glen-schofield-blames-on-a-freakin-error/

So, pre release builds didn't have as much stutter, which explains the lack of comment in most of the PC reviews.

Glen Schofield, CEO of developer Striking Distance Studios, explained what happened to cause the problem on Twitter (opens in new tab). "A wrong file was patched", he said. "Just freakin error by someone rushing." He also referred to it as "a clerical error", and said that, "It's launch day, this happens unfortunately. This is Krafton's 1st sp, console game so we're basically doing everything ourselves like a startup. I apologize".

 

[Zloth]

Yep, happens plenty - which is why you're supposed to run a battery of tests on the release version before releasing it. They've (re-)learned that the hard way.

 

[Brian Boru]

BBC article—canceled in Japan, huh:

Callisto Protocol: Gory new game pushes horror to new limits

The Callisto Protocol has been cancelled in Japan for being too gruesome but its makers are unapologetic.

www.bbc.com

 

[Sarafan]

BBC article—canceled in Japan, huh:

Callisto Protocol: Gory new game pushes horror to new limits

The Callisto Protocol has been cancelled in Japan for being too gruesome but its makers are unapologetic.

www.bbc.com

I wonder what's the status of games such as Agony and Succubus there. Callisto Protocol seems suitable for everyone if you compare it to these two.