Seed Sparkle Lab questions the avalanche of excessive praise that Starsand Island has got
, by Thibaut
While review bombing is unfortunately a common practice in the small world of video games, it is rarer to see studios pointing the finger at feedback from players that is considered almost too positive.
Yet this is what has happened to Seed Sparkle Lab, the developer behind Starsand Island. This life sim, which was released in early access on February 11, has "very positive" reviews on Steam, with 87% of the nearly 2,400 reviews published being favorable. However, this enthusiasm has raised real questions within the Chinese studio.
The company says it has noticed that the glowing reviews were posted after "very short playtime, were released at nearly the same time". Seed Sparkle Lab believes that these reviews may have been generated by AI.
"This made us realize that something might not be right.Is this some kind of overpraise as an attack? We have no concrete evidence, but it does feel as though someone may be doing this intentionally.
What makes it even more puzzling is that this approach is not cheap, since leaving a review requires purchasing the game. (We later discovered that some of these accounts refunded the game after posting their reviews.)"
As a result of this discovery, the developers are openly asking those responsible for these actions to stop posting these reviews so that the team can focus on improving Starsand Island.
"We would like to say this clearly: making a indie game is not easy. We simply want to focus on building a good product and giving the players who truly like our game a better experience.
So, to whoever may be behind this, please stop. Please let us focus on making our game in peace. We pose no threat to anyone."
In the coming months, the studio has several new features planned for its game, such as more voice dialogue for NPCs in April and mod support via a creation tool in May.
Source: store.steampowered.com