Crafting Memes

You know a game is doomed when it hits the buzzword bingo jackpot. "Early Access" means "we'll finish it eventually, maybe." "Open World" translates to "90% of the map is empty filler." "Survival" guarantees you'll spend 6 hours punching trees. And "Craft"? Brother, you're about to memorize 47 recipes for slightly different wooden sticks. Combine all four and you've got yourself a $30 tech demo where you'll starve to death while collecting rocks in an unfinished wasteland. The developers will promise updates for 2 years before abandoning it for their next "revolutionary" project. Steam is a graveyard of these things. It's the gamedev equivalent of a startup claiming they're "disrupting the space with AI-powered blockchain solutions." Run.

Ah, indie game developers and their groundbreaking ideas! First, they'll make a "top-down RPG" (revolutionary, never been done before). Then they'll make it "Earthbound inspired" (because apparently that's a personality trait now). And finally, they'll add "crafting" (because every game needs to let you combine sticks and rocks for some reason). Meanwhile, Squidward is all of us experienced devs dying inside as we watch the 500th pitch that's basically just "Stardew Valley but with guns" being presented as the next gaming revolution. How daring indeed.