We had a good time with Ascendant Studios' EA-published Immortals of Aveum when it launched in August of last year, but sadly it seems like it hasn't sold very well at all, especially considering how ambitious it ended up being.
Interestingly, an-ex employee on the project told IGN this week that it was a "truly awful idea" to make the game in today's market, calling it "massively overscoped" and criticising its "bloated, repetitive campaign that was far too long".
Here's more of the quote from the former Ascendant Studios employee:
"At a high level, Immortals was massively overscoped for a studio’s debut project. The development cost was around $85 million, and I think EA kicked in $40 million for marketing and distribution."
"Sure, there was some serious talent on the development team, but trying to make a AAA single-player shooter in today’s market was a truly awful idea, especially since it was a new IP that was also trying to leverage Unreal Engine 5. What ended up launching was a bloated, repetitive campaign that was far too long."
IGN also spoke to another anonymous employee who's actually still working for Ascendant Studios, and they pointed out that the game reviewed fairly well, had no microtransactions or "pointless grinding", and yet still nobody bought it.
It appears that the sales for Immortals of Aveum were only a "tiny fraction" of what was expected, which led to a fairly large number of layoffs shortly after launch. Just a few months later, the game was being sold at a 90% discount on the Xbox Store, and there have been suggestions it'll be heading to Xbox Game Pass sooner rather than later.
It's been a sad end for this one all around - but we still think it's worth playing if you get the chance!
Why do you think Immortals of Aveum struggled? Let us know down in the comments down below.
[source ign.com]
Comments 15
I'm not going to pretend that I know how much a game should cost to make, but I WILL say that anytime you see a game set in a version of the past, or a fantasy realm and the dialog is lazily modern English, you're in trouble lol. It also doesn't help when despite the trappings at the end of the day, the game is just a shooter. It had a few good ideas, but this was a prime example of a half-baked game.
Sounds about right.
Coming to Gamepass at some point if any of the rumours are accurate…
Ah, I ‘love’ how “bloated” is a shopworn criticism now, you can’t escape that one these days, everything’s too big now apparently. 🙄
This game’s problem for me—and why I never wanted to try it—was it looked incredibly generic and unimaginative, like it was playing it too safe. I would love to see a fantasy game taking cues from 80s fantasy movies/games. That never happens. And with the way games are rendered now it’s all beginning to look so samey. I dunno why I went on this ramble here of all places, I’m sorry.
But yeah. It’s sad that we live in a world now where a game like this is a bad idea. And it’s even sadder that I don’t really disagree, but I think it could have done marginally better with a different aesthetic and a different release window… Plus the price, this is all getting so expensive now.
I think they are taking the wrong lessons from this. I would argue the game didn't review fairly well. I haven't played it, but everything I read sounds like it lacked some basic quality of life stuff and just flat out wasn't well done.
A single player story driven shooter isn't an awful idea, but doing it poorly is.
I don't think making a single-player shooter "in today's market" is a bad idea, as can be shown from numerous successes in that space. But making one that is boring is never a good idea.
@AlwaysPlaying it's an EA game so they all do eventually
@InheritNegative
Although I agree with everything you said, I do think that the “bloated” is a huge problem in the industry. Game developers seem to only want to make large online services that have 10 year lifecycles and require a gazillion hour commitment.
I think there is a large market for people that like engaging and original stories that allows you to play in half hour to one and a half hour sessions and takes less than a few weeks of those sessions to complete. Oh and yes there is a clear completion.
There seems to be either mega monster sized games or lower production value indie games. Gone is the happy medium between the two. I am really hoping Hellblade 2 sits in the category and does well.
If it hits GP I’ll check it out.
@NeoRatt Alan wake 2 is worth a mention also
I actually bought this a few months ago in a sale and found it ti be initially fun but then became repetitive with some frustrating parts so gave up on it… with little wish to return
@MarkD01
I also bought it on sale but wish I had given that money to the needy instead. My main problem with it is the creepy demonic magic stuff and the BLURRY AS graphics from bad programming of their UE5 build to run on Xbox Series S. I played about 1 hour.
I'm currently playing it, it started off kind of slow but it seems to be getting interesting now. The frame rate is all over the place and that's on Series X. You can see for yourself as I've been live streaming it on YouTube. I'm only a few hours in so far. I save the live streams. You can see them at: www.youtube.com/zydio1103
They forgot to make the game good.
Their marketing of the game was pretty poor. I saw this game regularly on gaming sites and stuff and not until I read this article did I realize it was a single player shooter. Nobody talked about it. I always thought it was a magic-based pvp arena shooter for some reason.
I never saw anything based on story (that I remember) or the setting. Nothing other than just a bunch of lights and electricity flying around on the screen.
Hell, even now I don't really know what the game is. Is it like a wave-based horde mode shooter like Serious Sam? Or is it slower like a Bioshock?
I literally know nothing about this game, and I follow games daily.
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