Sunset

I HATE to only comment with criticism (even if I think it's constructive), still I need to voice this. The episode on Sunset is good, instead of the usually very good. There are reasons for it. I reject the notion that sunset was a failure. Not being a commercial success does not mean anything for a work of art. In this light, Sunset failing to recoup it's cost via a traditional market ... I don't think it should have been included in your video. However of course, due to the media attention around Tale of Tales last blogpost, you did include meta-criticism about stuff around the game. 2 instances of this bothered me the most. 1) The edited video from some streamer making fun of the game and then requesting the a refund via Steam 2) "other indie developers telling ToT to git gud". The first is troublesome because it leads to believe that anyone needs to be respectful with art. The don't! Art is not above beeing ridiculed! Someone wandering through the museum and mocking Pollock paintings for having no substance and being pretentious is still entitled to his opinion. An art critic, which I think you are, scoffing at that in a published review certainly loses some of the respect I had for him. Same here. The 2nd is actually a bit more severe. It's about context. Think about it: most, even contemporary, art only appreciates in public value after a significant amount of time. Sometimes only after the original artist dies, as morbid as this is. Before this, it usually has a hard time in traditional market places. Steam, especially, is such a traditional market place. Art should not strive to be accepted there or even fund itself there. It should be funded by public institutions (which it is often done here in Europe). This way the artist don't need to make compromises to "market" their art. They can focus on actually creating the artwork. In this light, other indie developers, I assume you mean the blog post of the Astronauts regarding the ToT closure, are in the right to tell ToT to "git gud" if they expect to be successful in a traditional market place. This in no ways does invalidate the artwork, just the way it was presented to the mass audience. Still: good episode again! Keep it up! And I hope you don't take this short text the wrong way :)

Stephan Wimmer