At least in this case the dev seems to be responsive. Publishers impose deadlines that don’t necessarily align with the reality of development, and then it’s on the devs to support it post-launch with far less support from the publisher. I think a prime example of that dynamic is No Man’s Sky. I’m betting that if Hello Games hadn’t taken that sweet sweet Sony money, the game would have released much later and in a better state (assuming they had enough cash to keep going without Sony).
The reality is, problematic ports don’t directly correlate to poor sales. If the port is bad but still profitable, the publisher won’t have incentive to give a shit (see: Horizon Zero Dawn), and if it isn’t profitable, the publisher just won’t do ports anymore.
At least in this case the dev seems to be responsive. Publishers impose deadlines that don’t necessarily align with the reality of development, and then it’s on the devs to support it post-launch with far less support from the publisher. I think a prime example of that dynamic is No Man’s Sky. I’m betting that if Hello Games hadn’t taken that sweet sweet Sony money, the game would have released much later and in a better state (assuming they had enough cash to keep going without Sony).
The reality is, problematic ports don’t directly correlate to poor sales. If the port is bad but still profitable, the publisher won’t have incentive to give a shit (see: Horizon Zero Dawn), and if it isn’t profitable, the publisher just won’t do ports anymore.