Recently, a story surfaced regarding Moon Studios, the developer behind the Ori series, and, more recently, of No Rest For The Wicked, an ARPG. It was revealed that the studio’s CEO had taken to Discord to plead for positive reviews for the team’s latest game, stressing that negative reviews and review bombing could lead to a studio shutdown.
The CEO, Thomas Mahler, then appeared on X following a few articles covering his statements, altering and defending what he said very sketchily. In his rant, he suggested that ‘crazies’ hating on him for not including ‘five trans characters’ or ‘political bullshit’ in his games are to blame for negative reviews.
Bad to Worse
A recent article from Windows Central revealed Thomas Mahler’s Discord comments, in which he said:
If you’re writing here and are enjoying Wicked and are excited for future updates, but haven’t left a positive review, it’s entirely possible that we won’t be around in a couple of months to do anything anymore simply because we got review bombed which leads to people not buying the game. Which means we’re not making any money and will have to shut down.
Mahler caught wind of the article and responded to it on social media, going on a rant against ‘the press’ and those who hate against him and his brand on social media because of past events and opinions.
He slipped a bit, making some inflammatory comments:
I’ve been hated on Twitter by a few crazies for years now, and I also saw the calls for review bombing because, according to those folks, I’m a ‘Nazi.’
These days, apparently anyone who doesn’t include five trans characters in their game and doesn’t let their products be influenced by political bullshit is a Nazi. What a world we live in.
When the Russia/Ukraine war broke out and I replied on Twitter saying that Moon Studios wouldn’t be taking a public stance—because we’re a video game company, not a journalistic outlet—the next day a threat letter with a picture of Putin was taped to my office door, full of insults from top to bottom.
He explained his earlier comments, suggesting that he was asking players who enjoyed No Rest For The Wicked to leave a positive review and nothing further. He also mentioned that Moon Studios isn’t in ‘immediate financial danger’ and that the studio’s 90-person team is still trying to create masterpieces.
For the record, No Rest For The Wicked was rated ‘Mostly Positive’ from 34,300 reviews at the time of publishing, so it’s not as though the game is in a dire spot.
Do you think Mahler is right to plead for users to leave positive reviews to battle back against review bombers? Let me know on the Insider Gaming forum.
For more Insider Gaming coverage, check out the throwback to my interview with Dying Light’s Roger Craig Smith
Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
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