News Shadowrun: Hong Kong smashes Kickstarter goal

Blows past $100K target in two hours.
http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2015/01/14/shadowrun-hong-kong-hits-goal/1

 

'Cos I don't review games?

If you're asking why bit-tech hasn't reviewed it, I have no idea. I've played the Android version, if that helps. I enjoyed it, but it seemed a bit buggy. Don't know if that's improved since launch.

 

Then you obviously don't pay much attention. I write the news articles. (Well, the news articles that have my by-line, obviously. I don't write anyone else's.) I chose to write about this because it interested me, and I figured it would interest others. Any suggestion to the contrary is extremely insulting.

As for "it really isn't [a mainstream game]," says who? Sure, it's digital-only: but it's available for Windows, OS X, Linux, Android and iOS, and its two releases so far have generated several million dollars in revenue. That is, as far as I'm aware, more than The Talos Principle, which was reviewed late last year. Sure, it was crowd-funded - but so was Wasteland 2 which was reviewed back in October, albeit with approximately twice the backers and twice the cash.

If you want to know how games are selected for review, you'd have to ask Rick. As an outside observer, I know there's an obvious bent towards triple-A titles - but indies certainly get a look-in. Is Shadowrun less mainstream than Five Nights in the Forest, or Mind: Path to Thalamus, or Gang Beasts, or Ether One, or - hell - Goat Simulator? Hmm? What if I told you - in case you weren't aware - that the much-loved Shadowrun table-top RPG on which the franchise is based dates back to 1989 and had its fifth edition published in 2013, having sold millions upon millions of copies in the interim?

EDIT:
Couldn't help but add this in, just in case you decide not to click on the Wikipedia link up there. How mainstream is mainstream again?

What I can tell you is that when you have one person working part-time reviewing games, you won't get a review for every single game that is ever released. It's simply impossible.

 

Wait, you think bit-tech is mainstream? Yeah, that could be the root of your problems.

As a quick bit of 'market research' for you: the PC version of Shadowrun Returns was reviewed by 54 review sites registered with Metacritic; the PC version of Goat Simulator was reviewed by 39 review sites registered with Metacritic. Thus, I can safely say, if we're using the presence or absence of reviews as a yardstick Shadowrun Returns is significantly more mainstream than Goat Simulator. The fact that Rick reviewed one and not the other is something you'd want to discuss with Rick, there.