John Bedford (Modojo): Everyone has an opinion about Curiosity: What's Inside the Cube, the first release from Peter Molyneux's new studio 22Cans. Yesterday we took a look at the types of tapper you can find working away at the app, but what do game developers make of this strange concept?
We polled some of the biggest names in mobile games development to ask them what they thought of the Curiosity phenomenon, and what might lie at the center of this enigmatic cube.
Reactions were mixed to say the least.
From Xfire: "Remember when you'd buy a game and... that was it? You got the full experience by purchasing the full product one time. "
Damn, Train Simulator is costing the big bucks. That game is kinda fun but not if you purchase all the DLC.
"All the DLC - Train Simulator 2020, $10,145"
No wonder we're witnessing an increasing number of ports from PC to consoles, you can't nickel and dime PC owners with all their mods over there, lol
"Legatus Pack - Star Citizen $27,000"
Ouch!
Planet Calypso - Entropia Universe, $6,000,000
WTF...?!
The Peter Molyneux Godus saga has been advancing at a rapid rate this week, as an industry veteran is raked over the coals.
With recent fudge-ups by Molynuex, I can't believe people still gave this loser any money. Is he on drugs? Why can't this GROWN man do anything right?
The man's ego is so over-inflated that his hairline had to make room for his "big headedness".
I feel bad for the investors, but it isn't as if he hasn't done this kind of thing before.
During the early afternoon of 26th May 2013, 18-year-old Scot Bryan Henderson tapped on Peter Molyneux's Curiosity cube for the last time. He had won the game. A tiny message appeared on the screen of his smartphone. It contained an email address for someone at 22Cans, the Guildford studio Molyneux had founded after leaving Microsoft and traditional game development behind.
Bryan, confused but intrigued, followed the instructions. Have I really won, he asked? An email appeared with a link to a video. In it Molyneux, dressed all in black and set against a virtual cube, delivers a message of congratulations.
The prize? In the months before Curiosity's release, Molyneux had hyped it up, promising it would be "life-changing" for whoever discovered it. "Life-changing." Quite the claim, and Molyneux's video message repeats the words. But how? You will become a digital god, Molyneux proclaims in the video, of 22Cans' next game, Godus. And, you will receive a cut of the money made by Godus from the start of your reign to its end.
"That, by any definition of the word, is life-changing," Molyneux says.
18 months later, as Bryan approaches his 21st birthday, he has yet to become God of Gods, he has yet to receive the "riches" Molyneux promised him, and it's looking increasingly likely he never will.
