![]() (As a side note, there was one big post-launch mental difference for us at Panic: when you make a game, you’re telling a story, and there’s no “patch” in the world that will make a story perfect for everyone. And we’re still working on ways to improve performance all across the board, including on PlayStation 4 and the Mac. There’s more to come. For example, a lot of people weren’t happy with the game’s performance on PlayStation 4, so the team cranked and quickly pushed out a PS4 patch that dramatically improved the PS4 experience.Īnd the great thing: we’re not quite done. We read countless forum posts for bugs. And everybody at Campo Santo worked like crazy to make things even better. A lot felt very familiar: no matter how much testing you do on software (we all played through the game so many times on all platforms!) things are either going to be broken for some people or you’re going to think something isn’t a huge deal that other people will feel very much is a huge deal.Īnd again, like an app, the best thing you can do is be on the ball after launch, read tweets, read forums, work overtime, and fix the majority of the friction points as quickly as possible. In many ways, shipping a game was like shipping an app. In short: people’s response to Firewatch was overwhelming and amazing. (I also loved stumbling across the everyday streamers like EpicSoren, just people playing our game, and in this case, being really affected by it.) Then there were the incredible streamers - folks like Markiplier (who had a thoughtful and hilarious - poor Bernie! - experience), iHasCupquake (my niece’s favorite!), and Jacksepticeye who gave Firewatch their time. By my rough ‘n’ crummy math, there’s well over 15 million views (!) of Firewatch on YouTube, which is so hard to comprehend. Video Games Where Hearts, Not Guns, Drive the Action – Chris Suellentrop, The New York Times ‘Firewatch’ creators mix heartbreak and the creeps – Todd Martens, Los Angeles Times There were also some cool write-ups about our genre and interviews with our team:įirewatch and the Addictiveness of Lonely Video Games – David Sims, The Atlantic Henry and Delilah’s exchanges are full of the familiar tug and tarry of people getting to know each other, of playing and of flirting, and of reaching out to feel less alone.” ★★★★☆ “The writing is not just believable, it is likeable and funny. All of this is wrapped in a fun game that, once completed, I played over again.” It does all this in a clever and engaging way that will have you emotionally connected to both Henry and Delilah. “ Firewatch deals with love, loss, and how you put yourself together again after trauma. This is your next must-play story, another voyage to a place games don’t often take us.” “It’s an emotional gut-punch all the way through, for many reasons, and largely a pleasure to explore and find yourself lost in-mentally, if not geographically. “In the end, it feels like it’s about the emotions and cares of real people, not the animations of puppets.” 8.5 It’s delicate, lovely, melancholy and wistful. “Firewatch is a rare and beautiful creation, that expands the possibilities for how a narrative game can be presented, without bombast or gimmick. ![]() It’s a game I can see coming back to every year or two just to revisit its beautiful sights and memorable characters – just like a good book.” 9.3 “It is among the very best of the first-person narrative genre, and it reminds us what video game storytelling is capable of in the right hands. But once Firewatch reviews started to appear, the world stopped spinning a little bit. Here were some of my favorite reviews: Butterflies to the extreme, the kind of butterflies that keep you in bed a little too long, the kind I’m well familiar with whenever I tackle the unknown. ![]() I can’t lie - my stomach was a wreck as launch day approached. If not just for posterity, I wanted to take a moment to record some of what’s happened since. Here we are, a little more than a month after Firewatch shipped. ![]() How Panic got into video games with Campo Santo – Dave Tach, Polygon The story of Campo Santo and Panic - and how we ended up being a part of a first-person adventure video game for Mac / PC / and PlayStation 4 - starts in 2013, and makes for interesting reading in retrospect:
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