“It’s hard to put into words just how much of a positive influence Game Pass will have on our game,” Lesiakowski explains. "It opens up a door for a multitude of different players playing Benedict and, fingers crossed, falling in love with it and its genre. It’s a huge deal for a small studio like ours.
Saw this at the show. Look like a very good game and hope many people not only play it but buy the game to support the devs. Game do not need a triple A budget to be good. In fact, many Tripple A games are not very good.
I will absolutely play it but any game on gamepass outside of yakuza I never buy as I normally fully complete games on gamepass 
For the games that I completed and really liked I usually buy them. I kinda think of it as showing some extra appreciation to the devs. Like a “I really enjoyed your game and would like to see more” kinda thing.
I definitely want to hear more about Benedict Fox though. From the little they’ve said im very interested.
I will do this also. Instead of forking over money first based on previews or reviews and then maybe thinking I got my money’s worth, I have no problems playing a game, enjoying it, and buying after as to say thank you. Heck I should probably do this more because I have a ton of games in my backlog. I’d save a ton of money if I only paid for the games I finished.
Fwiw, I believe devs are compensated based on how many people play their games in GP.
They get paid beforehand (afaik some/most games recoup devs costs from that already) and receive bonuses based on how they perform long-term (player number, engagement, co-op and bringing new subscriber effect)
This game looks so awesome. One of the highlights of the Xbox showcase.
Does look fun, I’m very excited to play it!
So these vary based on each deal, some games are paid one lump sum some are paid a bit upfront then an amount based on hours played longer strategy games usually jump in these deals such as empires of sin. Each deal is pretty unique actually as somei have heard is one upfront lump sum and help with marketing ala being on the Xbox e3 show or the smaller gamepass showcases they do.
I can’t wait to play this game, it looks amazing
Yup. Here’s a direct quote from Phil for anyone that’s interested:
How do you pay out developers? I’m a developer, I make a game, I say I’m going to put it in Game Pass, a customer pays [you] $14.99 a month. How do you decide how much to pay me, the developer?
Our deals are, I’ll say, all over the place. That sounds unmanaged, but it’s really based on the developer’s need. One of the things that’s been cool to see is a developer, usually a smaller to mid-sized developer, might be starting a game and say, “hey, we’re willing to put this in Game Pass on our launch day if you guys will give us X dollars now.” What we can go do is, we’ll create a floor for them in terms of the success of their game. They know they’re going to get this return.
[In] certain cases, we’ll pay for the full production cost of the game. Then they get all the retail opportunity on top of Game Pass. They can go sell it on PlayStation, on Steam, and on Xbox, and on Switch. For them, they’ve protected themselves from any downside risk. The game is going to get made. Then they have all the retail upside, we have the opportunity for day and date. That would be a flat fee payment to a developer. Sometimes the developer’s more done with the game and it’s more just a transaction of, “Hey, we’ll put it in Game Pass if you’ll pay us this amount of money.”
Others want [agreements] more based on usage and monetization in whether it’s a store monetization that gets created through transactions, or usage. We’re open [to] experimenting with many different partners, because we don’t think we have it figured out. When we started, we had a model that was all based on usage. Most of the partners said, “Yeah, yeah, we understand that, but we don’t believe it, so just give us the money upfront.”
I thought I would update since the interview is out. They interviewed the creative director and lead game designer of Plot Twist, Bartek Lesiakowski, and asked him a few questions. Questions like What’s the game about? What’s the gameplay like? and, What’s the world like? They went over their inspirations, how much the game changed as they developed it, as well as the design process for making the achievements.
Here’s a part of their answer when asked about the world in their game.
One of the twists of The Last Case of Benedict Fox is that we won’t just be exploring the “real” world of the mansion, but, thanks to our demon’s powers, will also venture into the minds of the dead and into worlds where “memories, emotions, and traumas take on a physical form.” Lesiakowski elaborated on this for us, adding, “The mansion that you will explore in the real world is a hub, a safe haven to which you and Benedict can come back to at any time, meet NPCs, spend that well-earned coin, and find clues and other places to explore in the world of limbo. Once you enter limbo though, you are in a place that’s full of danger from enemies that are in it and from the environment itself. It’s not a place you want to spend your free time in, that’s for sure. From a visual point of view,” he continues, “it’s one heck of a challenge as it is a constant balance between that which is known and real and that which is supernatural and out of this world.”
Lesiakowski gave us a few hints on what these different worlds will be like to explore. “One of our main goals is to give players constant reasons to explore,” he begins. “We try to achieve that in a few different ways. One is to give you variety in your “typical” Metroidvania explorations. The other is to give you reasons to explore through the narrative itself by giving you more clues and glimpses into the story. We want the story to accompany you throughout your whole experience, such as through the dialogue between Benedict and his demon companion. And lastly, we want to have a high quality and level of detail in our environments, so that the environment in itself makes the player want to explore it further.”
