The people behind the panned XIII remake apologise, blame pandemic
Unlucky.
The people behind the panned XIII remake have apologised for the state of the game.
The remake of XIII, a cult-classic 2003 cel-shaded first-person shooter, came out this week and it wasn't long before it saw an "overwhelmingly negative" user review rating on Steam.
Character designs are noticeably different, and there's been criticism of how the game's iconic cel-shading has been changed. Footage from the game shows various bugs in the launch version, such as missing animations that see you go to garrotte an enemy and then simply fall to the floor, or projectiles clipping through models while still seemingly striking them.
In a joint statement, developer PlayMagic and publisher Microids admitted the heavily criticised remake did not live up to expectations, blaming the coronavirus pandemic for development troubles.
"Unfortunately, players' expectations have not been met by the launch version and we hear loud and clear the legitimate criticism and disappointment," they said.
"First and foremost, we would like to offer our most sincere apologies for the game's technical issues. In its present state, XIII does not meet our quality standards and we fully understand players' frustrations. The pandemic has impacted the game's production on many levels. Pivoting to home working for the teams has added unexpected delays in the development schedule and the QA process. We hoped we would be able to provide a Day One patch fixing all the issues but the development of this update is taking more time than expected."
PlayMagic is working to turn things around now, although the damage may already be done.
"We want to assure you that PlayMagic is working hard to solve all the game's issues," the statement continues.
"With live monitoring and multiple patches in the upcoming days and weeks, we hope to reach the quality level we all expect for the optimum gaming experience."
The first update goes out soon and aims to fix urgent issues regarding the controls, framerate, collisions, rendering and sound. A roadmap is being worked on that will reveal free content due out at some point, including new levels, weapons, skins and modes for the local multiplayer.
"We are aiming to please all the XIII fans and we'll work relentlessly to achieve our goal," the statement concludes.