[quote][b]Warning: Third Party Account[/b]
This game requires you to create a third party "Microsoft Playfab" account... there's no valid reason for this in a PC game when SteamWorks is available. This is often done to harvest private data and profile you, with potential sale and transmission of your private data to third parties. The developers will probably argue that you can trust them, but if they were trustworthy they wouldn't demand you create a third party account.
This represents a considerable risk to gamers due to the privacy and security implications of developers that wish to bypass Steam and harvest user data. Remember, sometimes if the product is free, YOU are the product.[/quote]
[quote][b]Note: Dead PvP game[/b]
This game contains no meaningful single player content. There are no available servers and no player population. This game cannot be played as intended.[/quote]
This Nintendo Switch game is an unabashed ripoff of Rock n Roll Racing (copyright Interplay, 1993) only worse in every respect. It was ported to PC, presumably as a last ditch effort to get someone to play it because nobody on the Switch wanted it.
So, OverShoot Battle Race is a dead PvP game. Why did it fail? It's video game autopsy time!
[i]Almost every PvP exclusive game on Steam fails.[/i] Only a tiny proportion of them "go viral". This game failed for many of the same reasons those others fail. The chief of which is the developer thinking that their game will "go viral" without actually creating any reason for it do so.
Competition amongst PvP centric games is extreme, and there's only a finite player base to appeal to. This game failed to reach any kind of critical mass and died as a result. Let's go into some of the reasons this particular game failed to appeal to gamers, despite the zero up front cost.
First and foremost, there's no meaningful single player content. The developer gambled that other players would be an acceptable substitute for adding storytelling, level design etc to the Game. They lost that bet.
Without a huge community of players or single player content to add a lasting value to the game, the game dies.
Developers must learn that other players are not an acceptable substitute for adding content to a game.
The graphics in this game are passable, but could be better. And while it's vital for any game to have impressive visuals (gaming is a visual medium, after all), there's more to a game than just the graphics. To be worth a gamers time, the game must match top tier visuals with top tier gameplay, and that's not happening here.
It's free... now, but it wasn't before. The developer was charging $10 USD for this. Price barriers, especially on low quality products, can be a direct cause of failure. It's a nice gesture for the game to be given away for free, but it also tells us that the game wasn't good enough to succeed as a paid product. It's also a bit of a slap in the face to anyone who paid money for this... nobody got refunded.
Despite having no up-front cost, this failed to appeal to the 120 million+ gamers on Steam. SteamDB showed the game peaked at only 12 concurrent players... this is a dismal public reception. This was so bad they couldn't even give it away.
Bearing in mind that free games don't add +1 to your game collector count, should you bother adding this to your library and downloading it?
Nope, it's dead, it's a Nintendo Switch game, and the developer's third party account requirement is a deal breaker. Don't be evil.
[quote][url=https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/store/reviews]Developer Response![/url][/quote]The developer has weighed in to inform everyone they didn't read the [url=https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/store/reviews]Developer Usage Rules[/url] for Steam "partners", or they deliberately ignored the part where Valve says:
[quote]Though it may be tempting, not every review needs to be responded to. A developer response will frequently draw more attention than the original statement, potentially turning a small issue into a much larger community discussion. It's also not a good idea to use this feature to refute customer opinions. Your direct attention can be seen as validation or a defensive attempt to silence your customers.[/quote]
The developer attacks this reviewer and tells outright lies, and has engaged in a creepy pattern of stalking me as he feverishly reads through all of my reviews for other products, which have no bearing on his own failure as a developer.
The "developer" argues that I review a lot of games, therefore this game review isn't valid or truthful. Huh. If I changed all my other reviews to positive, would the graphics and gameplay of this crap game suddenly improve? Would it get players and stop being a dead game? No. Would the developer have refunded the people he scammed into paying for this? No.
The developer seeks any possible angle to throw shade at me personally to discredit my review. You can see what they are trying to do. If this was the only review I have ever written, would that change any of the properties of this game or alter the facts contained in my review? Of course not. [b]My reviews for other games have no bearing on the dismal quality of this failed product[/b].
The developer deliberately and falsely claims I only write negative reviews. This is a lie. The developer claims I only review "free" games. This is another lie.
The developer desperately tries to suggest racing against other players isn't PvP. What bizarre mental contortions from a failed Nintendo Switch developer.
The developer DEMANDS that before anyone can tell that a carton of milk is rancid and sour, you have to drink the whole thing. What uttter, arrogant rubbish. [b]It does not take long for the defects in this failed game to become apparent. Playing a bad game for longer will not change those defects.[/b]
I've written literally hundreds of positive reviews for exceptionally high quality games on Steam, some free, some paid products, which I thoroughly recommend to gamers. Why the developer chose to lie about this, the civil tort of libel, is clear; He cannot cope with his own dismal failure as a developer. Attacking this reviewer and telling outright lies is a mental coping mechanism.
I am not the cause of this game failing, but the points I raise in my very valid review tell us a clear tale about why it did fail... because the developer is not capable of making decent games. They attack this reviewer and tell lies to try somehow shift the blame onto me. Perhaps if the developer spent more time learning how to make games instead of poring over thousands of my reviews, stalking me and telling outright, libellous falsehoods, they might have done better.
The Steam Store page clearly indicates the requirement for a Playfab account. It is nigh on impossible to verify if this is happening behind the scenes or not... we just have to take the developers word for it. And given the developers disgusting, appalling response, attacking reviewers, committing libel, and telling outright lies, they demonstrate clearly their character is of such low quality they simply should not be trusted.
Nothing in the developers pointless breach of Valve guidelines changes any of the objective facts of my review. My review stands unaltered. I cannot recommend this game to anyone.
