As we all sat with bated breath, watching the countdown clock tick down for the Portal 2 ARG, the general consensus was that Portal 2 would be releasing early. It turns out, we were only half right.
By playing the 13 indie games that make up the Potato Sack, players will be working towards unlocking Portal 2 early, by using their CPUs to initiate GLaDOS’s reboot process.
Almost instantly, a vast number of negative comments flooded the Steam forums with complaints focused on the requirement of owning the Potato Sack games to contribute. Forum user dazza159 said: ‘I’d rather wait till the 19th after this now, I’ve got the games I want, I don’t want the Potato Sack pack, I don’t give a damn about the indy games, looks like I’m going to play other games until the 19th because even if everyone plays we are not going to do it.
User Nerfed echoes his sentiments, taking a cynical approach to the ARG: ‘No matter how much you play, the progress bars will not peak. Randomly, Valve will have a few of the bars increase, to make it seem like it’s close, but it’s all just fake. Welcome to marketing. Deal with it.’ Steam user Jake250 is so disappointed, he’s taking drastic action: ‘Time to cancel pre-order. I’m a bit sick of Valve’s stupid games around release.’
On the other hand, some Portal fans were more positive and praised Valve’s attempt to draw attention to indie games: ‘People need to relax. The games release date is the same as it always was – all they’re doing is encouraging people to support indie developers, and in doing so may allow us to play earlier,’ said Butr0sButr0s. Another forum member, DaneO’Roo, thought that, ‘Valve are trying to stimulate money for smaller devs using the hype of their own. I find that admirable.’ It’s certainly a mentality I can agree with, there are some fantastic games in the Potato Sack bundle.
In amongst all the arguments, insults and toy-throwing, some users are trying to co-ordinate the community’s game playing. They want to focus on one specific game at a time to fill the CPU requirement, checking each one off as they succeed. If you’d like to help out and follow their progress, you can find the post here.
What do you think of the stunt: valiant promotion of indie games or a money-grabbing rip-off? Sound off below!
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Without looking at the entirety of what happened, it sounds like it’s another way to promote games. It happens to be from a specific set with indie developers but in all honesty, it’s really no different then any chain using certain things to promote pre-sales and hype for their own store.
It would be different if Steam said you can’t play this game unless you have bought this other pack.
It’s interesting marketing for sure.
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Tren (April 15th, 2011)
Pretty brilliant marketing, just like the treasure hunt. Hopefully people will enjoy the games as well, rather than buying it just for the ARG.
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Faulty Wiring (April 16th, 2011)