CEO and Lead Dev of Superhot speaks about recent update and future of the game on Discord.

This is about the recent update to Superhot VR, I forgot to specify that in the title. The recent update removed a few scenes involving "self harm". This is not intended to be an argument for or against anything. There seems to be a lot of misinformation and confusion about what is happening going around, and this clears some of it up, not all, but more than some might be expecting. This is not every line spoken, but just the major points, and is one side of several arguments that were mostly rebutted by people in the chat. I did my best to not cherry pick anything and am not trying to make piotr sound good or bad. It is simply his words. Not all in complete context, but enough to get the point of what his intentions are across I think. He's Polish, so English is a second language, which is also a small issue with getting across what he means. It sounds like this update was a poorly thought out foundational update for something else actually. They weren't expecting the backlash and intended this to be a two step process without realizing how people would react to step one. The content that is cut is being replaced somehow, and it's not clear by exactly what. This is actually a bit more information than I was expecting, even if it doesn't actually do a very good job of explaining. I think some of that is trying to avoid a Sean Murray situation where he over promises by running his mouth too much about something that is still in development. Again, the intent of this post is not to pick a side, just to put what the CEO and lead dev of Superhot said about what is going on out there in his own words. ​ piotr here, designer and ceo of superhot. I just saw steam reviews for superhot vr moderated, which feels weird. Crushing game's reviews like that was a valid message. It's not the most pleasant, but I get it: something was taken from a game, as if stolen remotely. This didn't feel right and you reacted. SUPERHOT VR is now a scarred experience, as its' 'story' hinges on the offending scenes removed. If you played before the update: you played a classic. This version is now history and we are not erasing it - we're simply living on, responsibly. I don't want us to sell this version any more. It does not feel right. We're still commited to removing these scenes on all VR platforms. Place where time freezes until you move is far more interesting on its own, without the edgy narrative that forces you through a set of levels and until you get a "you win" message. Further updates will sharpen focus on gameplay and presence. When I wrote "you deserve better", I really really meant it. We first developed superhot for a 7 Day FPS Jam in 2013 and it was a massive success ever since. This was a taxing experience for everyone involved, myself included. Almost 8 years have passed and we're still stuck making games about self-destructive loops: this is a fingerprint of this pressure. You deserve better than the product of stress and depression that we feel obliged to preserve because of the possible outrage of content removal. superhot is a place where time stops until you move. You cannot possibly experience that without virtual reality. This place is made of hard concrete and brittle crystal exacly because this physics of shattering can be so mesmerising in slow motion. This place is safe in a weird way: even if it's crumbling around you, the danger will not reach you until you move. If you ever froze still, scared of an object fast approaching - we deliver what your instincts wanted in that moment. This is the core of superhot virtual reality. Scenes alluding to self-harm will not be part of this place. Neither will I allow for manipulative design and illusion of achievement. In Poland we call this 'dzidzi-bobo design'. We're past that. Time freezing for you means you are in control and let this be foundation for all things superhot from now on. I hope this clears up our intentions behind this important update. It was not easy to do and is not easy to communicate. I kept the original message minimal, but that only spawned confusion and in the end you deserve to know what is happening. I'm open to suggestions on how to preserve the old version, but maybe it's better off as a folk tale rather than a working software. Peace. ...I realised that we cannot proceed further without addressing the toxic issues at heart of this work. It took me a while. If this game is to grow, it is through rethinking of fundamentals instead of just adding more and more... ...Violence is part of gameplay of superhot. You shoot virtual enemies, you feel whatever you want doing it. It's fantasy. Shooting others is not okay, but shooting virtual enemies I consider acceptable. Game gatekeeping you from further levels and requiring to shoot yourself is manipulative. That's wrong.... ...I feel that this crept into our work. The core is time frozen that waits for you. That may be a gimmick in a PC game, but in VR it's magic that we didn't really deliver on yet... ...virtual reality is different somehow. currently platforms are focused on 'apps' or 'games', but the atomic (smallest) piece of VR content is more like 'an object' or 'a place'. If you think of superhot as a virtual place it's only natural that this place changes over time... ..."updates that add content make people happy, updates that remove content make people unhappy" - lol. it became impossible for us to work without addressing the scenes in question... ...it's not like the manipulative power of this game is so strong. It's just not the message we're want to send out. It's not important to the game's core... ...I long thought that this kind of update - removing self-harm - cannot be done without adding something great to the game. When recently I played this game again I realized that removing some parts is enough to hugely improve the game. I've made a new cut of a game. It's really different and already feels more complete. Taking anything away is not my intent, but as superhot grows it also changes? thay means confronting the past... ...Further iterating on those scenes would be a waste of time. That's why we take them out completely... ...making another branch and maintaing it is work, that requires time. I don't see value in those scenes and would see this time as wasted... ...From the inside view of development I see a lot of time put into things not significant (auto-destructive narrative), while the core of the game - physics, shattering in slow motion, sound - get skipped over. We focused on wrong things, because important stuff is difficult technically. That's the negative message from my point of view... ...Good point. There will be no changes to those games... [The non VR games.] ...I removed those features because I didn't want them there anymore... ...I'm done pretending that this scenes are major feature. If they really are - we failed... ...I started with pure gameplay and added shuffling levels: you start the game immediately in the zwishenplatz void with a pyramid in front of you. grabbing it starts random level with level phases shuffled. effectively it a surprise any time you grab a pyramid, you land in different part of the original game... Adding new content to that would require a VR editor which can be simple enough: maybe just select a place on an existing level, put items, put enemies, maybe give items to enemies? i don't know. simple stuff... ...I consider superhot still an unfinished game, but most of superhot team is doing other vr games, on their own... ...yeah, that's what i'm excited about. without the story the game can be more interesting, that's what i'm thinking. you don't play those really long sessions - it's still a bit cumbersome to wear a headset for so long. just drop in anytime you put on a headset? i'm still working on it, but it's good stuff... ...I don't think toggle was a good idea. It wasn't a visible toggle, the scenes still came as a surprise, which is careless design. we could have worked on it more and try fixing it: opt-in vs. opt-out, but that poses a question should we really enable this option. what good does it do for the game? i couldn't find a reason to keep those scenes in the game... ..The deleted scenes are not coming back.. ...there will be at least one more update. The point of this update is to set the stage for something else. No idea exactly what, but it sounds fairly extensive. Not sure what to say beyond that. I'm not approving of anything, just reporting on the state of the situation and what the lead dev said about it. It sounds like they intend to add more than was lost, but decided to remove what was in the way earlier than they maybe should have for some reason. Again, not complaining or approving in this case, just putting what piotr had to say about it out there. submitted by /u/contrabardus [link] [comments]
http://dlvr.it/S4JpS7