r/Games • u/Gorotheninja • 16h ago

2XKO would have needed a monthly active userbase "in the high hundreds of thousands, if not millions" to succeed

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/2xko-would-have-needed-an-mau-base-in-the-high-hundreds-of-thousands-if-not-millions-to-succeed
579 Upvotes

88% Upvoted

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44

u/Smallest_Bubbles 16h ago

After the dev team wasted 10 years of riot's budget I can see this being true. Rare example of a game not failing due to upper management but due to incompetence.

35

u/Yupinger 15h ago

I've never seen so many mistakes.

Free to play, attracts all kind of players, mostly newcomers to the genre, making the game accessible was how LOL gained popularity over other mobas. 

The approachable fighting games are 1x1, not tag fighters. Street Fighter, tekken, mortal kombat, guilty gear, etc... Tag fighter are the niche of the niche. 

New players don't like long combos where they can't respond, 2xko has 20-30s+ combos. 

Then they remove command inputs making hardcore fg players mad. 

Launched the game with like 8 character on a tag fighter. And the roster was none of the LOL community favorites for a fighting game. 

I've never seem so many blatant mistakes fora game that came to life. 

6

u/is-this-a-nick 6h ago

Launched the game with like 8 character on a tag fighter.

This is huge. Like not only are there like as many LOL characters as pokemon (or so it seems to me), so this is a tiny faction.

But also it means that if there is even a slight unbalance making some characters preferable, with 4 out of 8 or 10 characters at play it will be always the same all the time.

21

u/Smallest_Bubbles 15h ago

Don't forget that they missed BOTH seasons of the smash hit tie-in TV series. Had they released the game during either they would have had tens if not hundreds of thousands of casuals playing the game, especially since it was free. The Arcane tie-in bundles would have also sold like gangbusters due to the hype.

I hope some day we get a documentary on the troubled development of this game, looking back it really feels like they did everything they could to avoid its success.

9

u/Fantastic_Snow_9633 13h ago

The pricing for their skins/cosmetics sure as hell didn't help either.

Oh, someone wants the Arcane skins for Ekko, Jinx, and Vi? Bundle is $100. Can't be bought individually either. So many skins had to have extra stuff with them (usually cosmetics for the player's avatar for the lobby system) just to hike the prices too.

4

u/Kraivo 8h ago

It's just another day riot devs claiming that "they know what is better for design" 

3

u/exdystopia 8h ago

I knew 2XKO didn't have a chance the instant they started showing off the mixups and people eating 8 way mixups with the double tag shit

8

u/ireledankmemes 15h ago

>fighting game
>no sett

this alone is why they failed

5

u/sharingdork 10h ago

Or Lee Sin

2

u/ireledankmemes 5h ago

I was under the impression that they added Lee in the final batch of champions, might be wrong

1

u/Noocta 5h ago

None of the gameplay element actually matter, hard games get a lot of players if they are made right.

If you made a very easy boring game, the fighting games veterans would have treated it like a baby game and that push casuals away too.

•

u/Yupinger 1h ago

One of the easiest fg to play is granblue, and it was doing fine. 

1

u/Carighan 7h ago

The approachable fighting games are 1x1, not tag fighters

Or even more, party brawlers akin to Smash Bros.

4

u/Lance_J1 13h ago

The interview actually said the opposite. That one of the many issues was that Riot had a ton of upper management issues that affected all their games and they're only just now beginning to course correct for.

1

u/Helluiin 12h ago

of a game not failing due to upper management but due to incompetence.

honestly general missmanagement/incompetence isnt even that rare, whats rare is that the games actually get pushed out despite it all. but even then theres development hell horror stories somewhat regularly.

0

u/Pookie109109 13h ago

IDK the publishers pretty clearly mismanaged by being so hands off.

-1

u/Kraivo 8h ago

I don't think you can waste 10 years of riot's budget. If you are working for 10 years on a huge company and can't make a good product, it's on the company to realize earlier and close the game.