Blood Bowl 3's reception among players is a bit of a bloodbath
Launch issues, monetisation concerns, and more
Blood Bowl 3 released this past week to a reception from players as brutal as one of its matches. As its Steam reviews sit at the 'mostly negative' mark, developers Cyanide have posted a response aimed at "addressing the main topics of discussion".
First up, the less than stellar launch. Blood Bowl 3 had server issues and some crash and "infinite loading" errors that meant some people couldn't play. All of these are reportedly fixed in a patch on Thursday, and some players have reported a marked improvement.
More unsual at release was a "mistake" that led many players who bought Blood Bowl 3 on Steam to receive the incorrect version. The Brutal Edition, which bundles the core game together with extra cosmetics and bonus in-game currency called Warpstone, was given to all players regardless of which version they bought. Cyanide say that they're letting players keep the incorrectly granted currency, removing the cosmetics they didn't pay for, and granting those who legitimately purchased the Brutal Edition even more in-game currency so they still have the intended boost.
Monetisation seems like the overwhelming concern among players. Cyanide say they "truly believe that our system is fair, rewarding and optional" and that they "intend to implement features allowing players to be rewarded either with cosmetic items or Warpstone [currency] through play as well as purchase." Players, for their part, seem concerned that those features aren't in the game as it stands, and allege that other faction's teams are already complete and discoverable among the game's files but are being withheld to be sold as DLC.
Cyanide address this, too, saying that future factions "are still under development each at varying degrees of completion." They say that one team is at a more advanced stage of development but still with "a lot of testing and validation to make."
In short, Blood Bowl 3 is in a bit of a mess, at least in some of its players' eyes. I don't have a crystal ball, but I suspect these issues will all be ironed out in time. The developers certainly have plans to work on it for a long time.
