Just days after the game was released by Squid Shock Studios Bō: The Path of the Turquoise Lotus On July 17, publisher Humble Games announced on July 23 that it was laying off 36 employees, effectively delaying the game’s critical launch period. Humble Games, which has also released acclaimed indie games such as Coral Island, Destroy the SpireAND Unpackingdescribed the changes as a restructuring in official statements, but the laid-off employees said on social media and LinkedIn that there were no more employees. The name Humble Games was transferred to external consulting firm The Powell GroupAftermath reports. The shockwaves have left some developers questioning the impact on their games — and specifically, the game update process on consoles.
Developer Stairway Games posted the following to its X account on July 25, two days after the announcement of Humble Games’ restructuring: that it offers Nintendo Switch players the option to upgrade to the Steam version popular life simulation, Coral Islandwithout having to pay for the game again. Stairway Games wrote in its post that it is concerned about the possibility of porting its game to Nintendo Switch, something that was promised to his Kickstarter backerswithout the support of Humble Games. However, Humble Games representative Michael Brown told Polygon that “nothing has changed and no developers have had to change their porting plans; every project is moving forward.”
Image: Squid Shock/Humble Games
When asked to explain why studios are publicly saying they are unable to update console ports, Brown said, “Some studios are still in the process of syncing with their new touchpoints and all of their concerns are currently being addressed and any issues are being resolved as quickly as time allows.”
For developers, that process can’t happen rapid enough. “For example, we have an upcoming patch for Update 1.1 that’s getting close to being released on Steam,” Stairway’s post reads. “We have no idea how to make that update available to other platform players, as we don’t have backend permissions on console platforms to push updates. We only have access to the Steam backend.”
Four studios confirmed to Polygon that they are still unsure about the process of updating their games on consoles more than a week after Humble Games’ announcement. Some studios are taking immediate, independent action: Stairway Games said it is in contact with a lawyer, while Squid Shock Studios has set up a Patreon account. Amidst the confusion, other developers publishing on Humble Games stand in solidarity. TheThe Crema wrote about the difficulties Squid Shock is facing: “This has caused a lot of uncertainty for creators who work with their brand. Of all these creators, there is one for whom the blow has been greater: @SquidShock, who lost marketing and related visibility in the week of launch, overshadowing a moment that should have been cause for celebration. If you like what you see, support them, they deserve it. We send them our warmest hugs and send our best wishes to the rest of the games affected by this sudden event.”
Brent Kobayashi, co-founder of Meowza Games (Mineko Night Market), told Polygon that plans to port the game are “on hold” because Meowza Games doesn’t have console rights. “We also released a version shortly before the layoffs that reintroduced a few old bugs,” he said. “Humble has been acting as a middleman and facilitating deals with porters, so we have no contact with the porting team or publisher to address this at this time. We’re waiting to hear from a representative, but we haven’t heard anything from them yet. Until we understand what kind of plan/relationship we expect from them going forward, we can’t say for sure what the state of ports will be in the near future.”
Another person close to Humble Games, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation due to a non-disclosure agreement, said Squid Shock Studios felt “abandoned and abandoned” by Humble management after it reached out for clarification via internal Slack and only received farewells from the fired employees in response. Overnight, they said, communication about console ports disappeared. Console players are now many patches behind Windows PC players using Steam — and console users are indeed experiencing bugs. Communication is starting to improve, according to the anonymous source — it has begun introducing up-to-date contacts at Powell Group — but the console port pipeline was still an issue at the time of writing, they said.
“The only explanation I’ve been given is that The Powell Group was brought in to find a buyer for Humble Games,” another developer whose game was published by Humble Bundle, who also asked not to be named, told Polygon. “When that didn’t work out, they were left to manage the catalog enough to fulfill their contractual obligations and maintain other revenue streams. Given that, it’s hard to be optimistic that even the most well-disposed team members will have the resources necessary to do their jobs effectively.”
Polygon has reached out to Humble Games to clarify details of the attempted sale and The Powell Group’s involvement in the Humble Games catalog.
