Former lead designer claims Dead Cells update termination is a ‘marketing stunt’ to ‘leave room’ for Windblown

Former Dead Cells lead designer Sebastien Benard isn’t exactly thrilled about publisher Motion Twin’s decision to end development on the acclaimed roguelike Metroidvania. A few days ago, Motion Twin announced that his 35th major update of Dead Cells, aptly titled “The End Is Near,” would be his last. Benard feels this is a betrayal of both the game’s community and the current development team of his Evil Empire, the spin-off studio he took over in 2019.

Specifically, asking for time in Dead Cells is a “disgusting act” and a “one-sided strategy that leaves people behind,” and urges players to clear their decks in preparation for Motion Twin’s upcoming Windblown. He thinks it’s by design. Benard first posted about the news when asked for his opinion on Discord. Below is what he wrote via Eurogamer.

“Since you are asking me, I would just like to say that MT made the worst worst move imaginable against Dead Cells and EE. Having seen first hand the real situation behind the scenes, I I can honestly say I’m glad I wasn’t there.’ This is no longer the case. The official statement is complete marketing bullshit. The way this situation happened is on a completely different level. I never imagined that my former co-op studio would turn out to be such greedy people. I wish them all the best for what’s next and I hope the people working there survive this sudden economic cut. ”

Benard apologized for his “frank words” in a blog post and provided a longer explanation. This blog post begins by summarizing how the development of Dead Cells transitioned to Evil Empire after the game’s launch in 2018. “While Motion Twin held his IP, Evil Empire, created by former MT staff, continued to work hard and released 22 new major updates and releases. The DLC lasted about 5 years. ” he said Benard. “They employed 50 people during that period.”

The decision to stop releasing updates for Dead Cells “left the player community completely speechless,” Benard continues. He notes that, as Push Square reported in June 2023, “Evil Empire (EE) had official content plans for at least 2024 and 2025.”

For Benard, the abandonment of Dead Cells (bug fixes and quality of life updates will continue to come) means that Motion Twin has made short work of previous browser and Flash games, such as Eternal Twin, he said. This is consistent with the characterization.

“In short, Evil Empire has done a great job of keeping the game fresh and alive while taking care of its players,” he wrote. “On the other hand, I saw firsthand how we at Motion Twin thought about our player base years before Dead Cells existed. This was around the time I was creating it.

“Our short-term strategy was to release, update a little bit, drop. This is not confidential information. It’s basically what our old player base from the pre-Dead Cells era knows. .I was obviously on board with it, but as an individual and a subcontractor, decisions were made together, but I was pretty disillusioned about that topic as well.

“Obviously, when Dead Cells, as we all know it, became a success, MT decided to ignore all of the player base from the past web era. Fun fact, our once loyal players , we waited over 4 years and made hundreds of requests to get the source code.” Mainly because MT didn’t really care, but thanks to their incredible love and dedication. , some of our older works have been revived (see “Eternal Twin”).

Benard speculates that there may be similar thinking behind the decision to end Dead Cells. He further added that because “most of the true original team members are no longer with us,” “the true Dead Cells team was basically the one that kept the flame alive for so long with a true love for the franchise.” It’s now just Evil Empire,” he added. Bernard credits most of Dead Cells’ sales to date to his Evil Empire.

As for why Motion Twin in particular is calling it quits now, Benard says it’s all to make room for Windblown, and that Evil Empire is recognized as the “true architects” of the Dead. I think it has something to do with Motion Twin’s “panic”. Cells (incidentally, it will be made into an animated series at some point this year).

“The obvious reason for this disruption is definitely to make room for Windblown, the upcoming dash-dash-dash rogue from MT,” he claims. “It’s easy to see how panic broke out in MT as the press slowly began to realize that the real architects of Dead Cells were EE. Check out recent articles about Dead Cells and you’ll see that EE was the real architect. They started getting mentioned as authors more and more, which was honestly very fair given their supportive pedigree, but I like the fact that MT is starting to notice. I can imagine it wasn’t there.

“The MT strategy makes some sense. It’s a pretty logical marketing strategy. Let’s get rid of Dead Cells and make room for Windblown,” concludes Bernard. “But, as Motion Twin has always done, this is a one-sided strategy that leaves people behind – both EE’s loyal players and employees. Unfortunately, there is nothing really new.”

We have reached out to Motion Twin for comment. I don’t mean to say anything more insightful, but this whole thing makes me pretty sad. I like Dead Cells, am enthusiastic about what I saw in Windblown, and have great respect for Motion Twin, one of the gaming industry’s most famous worker co-ops. I hope the disputing parties find a way to reconcile.