The first dev in the collab has been identified, thanks to some keen-eyed viewers: www.youtube.com/@DaFluffyPotato I was happy to learn that the art assets he made for the project are actually being reused in this upcoming Steam release, so the situation isn't a total write-off: store.steampowered.com/app/2824730/Yawnoc/ Update: @ezthedev has come forward as a later dev (likely 4th) in the pass-the-game project. You can see his devlog segment in this timestamped VOD: ru-vid.comKdgRUvvy19o?&t=2339
They really did though! Nobody has any idea what anyone else on the team is doing, deadlines are somehow both rapidly approaching and nonexistent at the same time, people will literally be doing nothing to improve the progress of the assignment, unilateral decisions are made that will only make the project worse to work on and present and there's some guy who did absolutely nothing but drag the rest of the group down but still somehow managed to get top marks because they put their name on the title page.
Organizing other people to do stuff is not easy, especially when they do it for free. That doesn't excuse their unprofessionalism and lack of communication of course, but you're naïve if the rest of it is easy.
@ITR It’s a half-dozen teams made up of at most a few individuals per video. That "6 devs make a game without communicating" is just a pipeline, and all you have to do is make it go smoothly
@@ITR Except that usually the problem is getting your collaborators to communicate and complete necessary work. When you're the one failing to communicate and complete work, plus introducing additional complications out of nowhere, you're the problem.
@@ITR i have organized tournaments and agree about prganizing people, I'll just add that people will take your project as serious as you are willing to take it, so being goofy about deadlines is a really good way to set a bad example
As a project lead who can be a little disorganized and sleeps in sometimes, my 2 hours late "appologies for the late relply" is NOTHING compared to this guy's wow.
@@randomlittleidot I'm actually also an Indy dev as well! We're making a murder mystery. It's still in early stages at the moment but it's getting along.
@@craniumsnumb Yeah when I miss deadlines by 1 day I feel like the scum of the earth and that I disonored my family's bloodline... Blackthornprod is built different.
The responses they give that constantly talk about "viewer retention" and such make me think they've fallen into the corporate void and no longer care about the art
That's kind of just editing a video to make it interesting to watch though. RU-vid algorithm can be pretty brutal if a video doesn't pick up "enough" views. A lot of youtubers edit their videos to be more interesting, doesn't mean they "no longer care about the art".
@@ITRLook, making your video interesting to watch is one thing, but cancelling an entire project, which was done mostly by other people, because it wouldn't be "inspiring" enough, is a different thing entirely.
@@festivite Yeah that's a bit more out there, I know some larger youtubers like Mr. Beast does it, but I personally find it distasteful. I'm just saying thinking about viewer retention in itself isn't necessarily a sign of them "not caring about art", I'd rather criticize them for how they handled the situation
Things I learned: 1. BlackThorn is somehow even less competent than I thought 2. My ADHD/OCD that makes me compulsively cover things in projectiles whenever possible is more common than I thought 3. You should play Random Access Mayhem
@@randomlittleidot the second point is probably about the archer game later in the video, and how both Andrew and Tobey were completely obsessed with the idea of covering the wall with arrows.
This is what "getting paid in publicity" means: doing freebies and getting treated like shit. Hope you guys will find more success in other marketing efforts.
I think if you have a game to advertise it can make a genuine difference... But I think financial compensation is called for when they do the work and you just change your mind and decide they don't want to any more.
@@christophernoneya4635 At the VERY least they should have OFFERED to give the clips for them to upload, not waited and ghosted them until they asked if they could do it.
@@rompevuevitos222 oh that's a given, the devs had the clips already it's just that blackthorn didn't even bother to let them know the show ended. They always had the ability to upload it, just weren't even given the courtesy of "hey guys we have to cancel the project"
I mean wouldn’t it make more sense for it to be you make some content for us to advertise your game However that didn’t happen so they shoulda of done something else
I was the other dev who Blackthornprod accidentally also passed the first game to, I animated a whole 1 minute mini devlog, and passed it over and they told me they where going to pass it over to the third dev. (they never mentioned anything about it branching or anything.) 9 months passed and the video never came out there was pretty much 0 communication between me and them so I just assumed the video didn't turn out to be good. In case my experience helps lol Edit: I'm pretty sure I was working on a video too at the time so I had to drop everything to work on the game AND the devlog. (Ik I was the one that accepted it at the time but it kinda sucks the video didn't come out and all that effort was for nothing)
Wowzers. Thanks for making contact! I don't suppose your segment is available to view anywhere? I've been trying to link everyone who comes forward as collab participants in the pinned comment.
@@andrew_cunningham I sent it over to blackthorn prod but since it was taking a lot of space on my drive and I assumed he had already downloaded it my dumbass deleted it like 4 or 5 months ago 😭😭😭😭 I think I still have the game though. That's the only thing that remains lmao
I remember watching “6 DEVS make a HORROR GAME without COMMUNICATING!” And how everyone was slowly making this cool and unique horror game up until noa came and literally threw out all of the work out to make some boring centipede boss battle game… it made me so disappointed, that instead of trying to understand the other 5’s visions, he just threw it all away, leaving basically nothing behind of the original game ideas…
This happened a few times. There was the first person shooter one where someone just straight up removed all the pixel art and replaced it with bad 3d models
Do they even make games anymore, or do they just grift? Is it all just about their RU-vid and their gamedev rocket platform now? Every time I see content from them now, it just leaves such a bad taste in my mouth.
I was a dev on one of the pass the game jams about a year ago (the Pokémon-style one). The lack of communication and inability to hold to a deadline seems to be a common theme. Also, they told me I had to make a 1-2 minute video section, but then they cut out half my section for no reason, which makes me look really bad because most of the stuff they kept was me talking about the *difficulties* of the problems I was solving. Then of course the next three devs after me were a team, who just completely built a new game from scratch, after Blackthornprod had told me that there were only a couple devs after me so I had spent all my time polishing and fixing bugs. I posted my segment on my own channel, but the whole experience was just plain awful.
Oh damn, I actually saw that video today, it got a bit confusing towards the middle but it was fine. I think the last team of 3 devs did help make the game more complete, but it is unfair cuz they get to have so much more impact than the others who cannot communicate. I always thought it was weird to put dev teams in the middle of solo devs. But I actually think people who clean up the game a bit for others deserve higher praise, the worst videos are the ones where people just keep adding their own things and ideas into the game and in the end it becomes a complete mess. I sometimes see comments praising a dev who bugfixed or cleaned up the game a bit to keep it steady and coherent for the rest of the devs, so I'm sure your work was appreciated by some :)
What has made me raise an eyebrow for months is seeing how they overexploited this format while asking people to edit their parts (and simply inserting ads for their courses in between lol) without even participating themselves. But seeing all this now... Oof.
Don’t they usually participate and edit their own parts as well? Though that would still only be fair if there was something like an even revenue split between the creators. (P.S. still haven’t finished watching this video so this could have been addressed)
@@quackncheeseThey used, but ever since a certain incident involving a centipede, it seems blackthorn himself doesn't participate anymore. So yeah, all they do is send games from person to person, make them do the work, slap in some premade ads for their courses and collect the money at the end.
guys i think andrew and toby are team Xylem and they're currently working on their debut project: Random Acesss Mayhem, which is a top-down shooter with no player character
He was very up-front that this video was his attempt to salvage anything from his extensive efforts to work with blackthornprod, the only benefit of which would have been exposure for him as a small indie developer for his game. I am impressed and surprised by how forcefully he DIDN’T push his game.
ikr. Even the games they publish are terrible (I've actually played them and they were so bad lol), and when I saw the course, I was like "dont you actually have to make good games first before teaching people?" they're such scammers
I instantly recognized the thumbnail. I am very honored to have been the dev right after you guys! I made a few changes to Arrowdactyl, adding biomes and tiles that affected movement. Based on Ezra's video, there was another dev or two after me since his version was significantly different than mine. I think this is the order: 1. DaFluffyPotato 2. Xylem Studios 3. tumblewed 4. Unknown (Pino?) 5. DeveloperEzra 6. Unknown Anyways, I'll try to upload my development video this week. Thank you for making this video. PS. Excited for RAM!
all the devs assembling together and being able to meet echother despite the guys at blackthornprod refused to give out echothers contact information is super wholsome and cool it seems that in the end all this has turned out well
Absolutely wild to watch this clusterfuck. In awe by that "i hope it's not too late" THE NIGHT BEFORE THE DEADLINE. Flabbergasted at the audacity and at the fact that they've somehow not crashed and burned yet if this is how they run their challenges. Wow.
Wait what I remember when blackthornprod was just one dude (or at least it appeared that way?) Haven't watched the channel in ages so it's kinda crazy to hear that it went from one indie dev to a whole wacky business held together with elmer's glue and fishsticks Crazy
@@colecube8251 it's still crazy to me because when I used to watch them it appeared that he was doing it because it was fun But either that was a lie or the money took hold because this is definitely not passion anymore lmao
wait the devs are only "payed in exposure"? jesus no wonder BTP is rich, they just farm their subscribers and use them as bargaining chips for creators lacking eyes on their project, it seems like a mutually beneficial trade but its truly not, you do unpaid work for them, EVEN making the video yourself and are not paid whatsoever to just be featured on an account with a bunch of subs, its really manipulative i thought it was suspicious that they were always dressed in suits in some videos where they're judging, it seemed incredibly tonally off and im glad ive found out why lol its truly despicable that a channel that definitely has a substantial income leeches off of other genuine devs and only offers "exposure" as payment. sometimes i think my games are shit but i guess id rather make shit games and still be a good person than make decent games and then turn around and treat other devs like a vampire treats a corpse
I don't see how this is a problem, since money was never on the table in the first place. It's not like they have an obligation to platform anyone on their RU-vid channel. If a dev fells like it's too much work for too little reward, they can just, you know, not do it.
@@Karmonit Uncompensated work is always a problem. But the unfortunate thing is you cant have a yt series such as the 6 devs thing be sustainable if you had to pay every single dev everytime. the only solution here is to do it occassinaly so that they can pay devs without losing money. That's ny opinion
@@Karmonit Solus Astorias, one of the more popular comic dubbing channels, shares their revenue with the original comic authors and they add more to the experience than BTP does. While I think it's ""fair"" not to pay them up front, the least they could do is split video revenue with the devs, especially given how little they actually contribute themselves.
@@NahuPyropewhere did you find this information. you composed music for RAM so you probably know what you’re talking about but could you atleast provide a link to some sort of statement?
Well at least they know none of these games will fall prey to Blackthorn's giant centipede obsession. Still mad about that one horror pass-the-game where the guy basically deleted everything the penultimate dev did just so he could have a giant centipede boss fight.
Really? Is that the take away from this video? You should be more considerate of the content you consume, and hold creators accountable when they perform unprofessional, awful actions like the ones depicted in the video. Do you just not care?
@@tipx2master788 ??? i don't see how this comment would suggest that about them. i agree with you, but it feels like what you said doesn't apply to this comment at all
i got into Blackthorn's stuff when he was just a guy making little games and devlogs with that distinctive "we have Isaac at home" wiggly art style but then he started collabing with a bunch of people to make games together and that snowballed into an indie game dev content mill where the process of making a video game isn't the point, it's about it being Entertaining™, Engaging™, it's about the Viewer Retention™ he had an opportunity to platform smaller devs just for the love of the craft and bc he's one of the ones that "made it", with countless subscribers and multiple games on Steam, but money spoke louder. the fact that it was all made for videos on his channel instead of him setting up a public game jam like how Mark Brown or Brackey did it should've been a red flag about the direction he was headed. its not about the art or "love of the craft", its about his Content™
Arrowdactyl had some really cool mechanic ideas just with the sticky interacting arrows. The loop for fighting slimes was brilliant. That game looked like it could go a lot of cool directions.
Shady bit of business here, gotta admit. At an earlier point I was wondering if this is just having too many pots on the boil and not knowing how to speak up early from the blackthorn side but realized that I was being very very considerate. It simply got to absurd levels of willful neglect. I've never seen one of the channels videos, personally, so good on y'all for doing something with what you've made.
This seems less like miscommunication and more like having your labor used for views, only thrown in the garbage if it isn't suitable for "the algorithm"™️
@@randomlittleidotI think they’re referring to the two projects Xylem studios offered to work on mentioned in the video, the second being after they got screwed over the first time.
Did someone already make a video similar to this? I haven't heard about it, but I'm not super tuned-in to the Blackthornverse outside of this one project.
@@andrew_cunningham FYI, the only videos I’ve found of blackthornprod controversy are ones detailing how the development of a game was mishandled between developers, for example a change in direction by one developer which the initial developer was frustrated by. As well as: ‘A video about Blackthornprod and Capitalism’, which as far as I can tell is irrelevant in regard to the issues you experienced. So as far as I can tell you’re the only studio to have publicly voiced your mistreatment when working with btp.
@@calcorps5016yeah I saw a few of the no communication videos and I feel like some of the devs never heard the “Yes, and” rule of improv completely changing established game elements by previous devs
If that project were never cancelled, we would never have this amazing video! For real though, sucks to hear about how it panned out. But well done savouring it and making the most of a sour situation.
This really just adds to the building disdain that I have for Blackthornprod. I already got weird vibes from them long before it, and then this series really sealed the deal for me. Don't like 'em.
The arrow slicing was really nice. I think if the arrows are wood they could be used for fire trails, and if metal then maybe chain lightning or magnetic storms.
The idea that you all managed to make a game so coherently without communicating that they thought it was “too boring” really just implies that you’re all devs who actually know how to work on projects with others.
This video was a wild ride. Seeing your thought processes for what direction to take the game in, and how it pretty much spontaneaously came out of just pelting arrows at the wall was really interesting. You two are really creative, and I'm excited for what comes next even after RAM. Hope the next collab you do is a bit more... organized.
sucks to hear you went through all that, the way that blackthornprod treats his channel like a business is gross, especially since it seems he doesn't have the capacity to manage it well, he's literally just compiling other people's work and he can't even do that
Is it gross to manage your channel like a business when it's literally how you make your money? If anything it would seem careless not to run the channel like a business at that point.
@@Karmonit The phrasing could've been better, but some businesses are run with care and sincere love for the work you do, for the art itself and for its quality, and some are soulless cashgrabs that engage in dubious practices, are quick to discard people, not keep their word, and latch onto every trend in hopes to emulate something that lures in tons of blindly obedient fans. Blackthorn is definitely looking more like the latter business with those messages.
@@Karmonitthe problem is that he's not taking care of the people he is profiting off of. There are plenty of businesses that carry the respect and responsibility towards their employees/contractors/volunteers while also being successful. However, btp did not show this kind of respect due to the flippant mishandling of multiple projects and repeated miscommunication issues.
@@Karmonit you're right, he should still be able to profit off of his videos, it's just that the way he goes about it, with no respect for the people who make 90% of his videos is gross. it feels like he's making videos purely to make money, not out of love for game making
wait. what im getting from this is, they make the ideas for the videos, recruit (free) developers, and then compile those developers' work? where do *they* do any work? what were they so busy with that they couldnt reply to the people who make their content for free?
Both the arrow game and the cabin one looks pretty good, and had a nice foundation for a full game (or at least a flash game IMO). You truly are creatives in your process. Also it was pretty funny as you said. Overall, while your work might not be as much exposed, I don't feel like it has gone to waste. Great video, miscommunication/10
Dang, that's a lot of work you guys did. Glad to see you salvaged some of it here while entertaining us. I took part in 2 past BTP jams, and turned down 3 or so others. It's easy to underestimate the total work that's required to take part in these - editing alone often takes longer than the game dev part. Good luck with RAM, looks great.
If this is how they normally operate when collaborating with other gamedevs then that's genuinely insane, I'm surprised nobody else has mentioned it before considering the number of these videos they've done. If I was in this situation I'd probably be a lot more upset than you're coming off in this video, kudos to you for keeping a level head about the situation. I have no idea how they could have accidentally sending the game to two separate devs. How does that even happen. Not replying to a message from anyone for weeks on end is already pretty bad, but it's REALLY bad when it's someone who's effectively doing free labor that's directly going to earn you money. 2:52 "I hope it's not too late 😬👀" on literally the night before the deadline. Extraordinary. I like how he ignores you till you effectively send him a formal warning that you're going to publicly blast him for how he's acting, THEN you're suddenly worth replying to. Also really weird to me that they wouldn't just... finish the videos and put them out? Even if they didn't expect them to perform well, if they were using other people's free labor then they should make sure that labor doesn't go to waste.
always had a poopy feeling when watching the couple of blackthorn videos i watched cool to see its justified . the ickiest thing is the youtubemaxx mindset
Andrew it is no unprofessional to talk about issues with employers or people you collaborate with. In fact for things to change in a positive manner, and for this situation to be fair to you, you ought to talk about the issues you experienced. I'm refering to the bit at 5:45 where you start calling this unprofessional. I disagree, it's professional to handle the issue as you have done here, in fact it shows that your team care about these projects and other creators with the evidence shown. You wanted to credit creators and waited months before making a video that exposed this bad experience. That is professional, you respected that they had a lot on their hands and gave them the benefit of the doubt, you were generous with how long you waited. The fact that you don't even put BTP's name in the title for views shows that you are making this video, not for views but to show off what you have created, and you wanted to give full context. You have been cheated by a bigger creator and had your work be exploited, to talk about that is good. I can't wait to play RAM. Cheers mate, may your future collabs be better
All the videos you two prepared were excelent. I am surprised by how fun all of those games seem. Loved the blunt arrow mechanic, the slimes turned out kinda like a zelda boss. (I'm gonna completly ignore btp)
this is 1000% exactly how I imagined it would be to work with blackthorn. There's nothing more infuriating than slow & corporate responses that aren't leading to any solution. They should've just talked to you guys openly, explain what happened, voice their concerns, then work out a solution together that everyone is happy with. If you're the boss and you mess up, it helps to put yourself in a vulnerable position.
I thought the revenues of the video was split among the developers this whole time but wow this is so much worse, all the work is done for you how do you mess it up 😭
I’m sorry I’m probably just retreading what others have said but was the necessary communication between developers really that difficult to accomplish? Months of no communication and an inability to announce the cancellation of the (several) video projects over ‘viewer retention’ gives off such a careless (not to mention corporate) attitude towards indie devs and their time it’s frankly shocking, especially from a RU-vid channel who you’d expect would know to show some respect to smaller studios. But anyway, never attribute to malice what you can attribute to incompetence. Hopefully you get a real apology from them at some point going forward.
Man, I'm sorry to hear that you went through that. I signed up for the course and at first things were going well. We were even given the opportunity to do a pass the game challenge as well, with the possibility of it ending up on RU-vid. I was the 2nd dev, and yeah, the challenge (and several parts of the course) were cancelled. Now the brothers don't really interact on the course's private Discord server. It's been disappointing, to say the least.
i love how you can really tell that some of this was edited during the Rain World Playthrough Era. in all seriousness the snowplow game looks fun as hell i'd play that for 3 hours during a college lecture
They really dropped the ball, I wish I could see the finished version of Arrowdactyl and the engine battle videos were hugely entertaining too. Definitely makes me think less of a channel that already felt like it had a shaky reputation regarding work ethic. Sorry you guys had to deal with that, hope the other devs get in contact.
You've got a hell of a lot more patience than me, I absolutely would've been cussing them out the moment they tried to make me overhaul my project to InCrEaSe ViEwEr ReTeNtIoN
the shade you’re putting out it well deserved. them dealing with a lot of dev teams is no excuse to cold shoulder smaller ones. hopefully they expand their team so something like this doesn’t happen again
I'm don't know this blackthornprod, so unfortunately I can't speak about him, but I'm glad at least this videos made it out! The Arrowdactyl game looked fun to play!
I've been doing 3D modeling as a hobby for like 8 years and Godot for like 3 and I'm still overhauling my passion game once a year. 3D game creation is a torturous process.
i clicked on this video expecting that it was just a funny gimmick game, like seeing a bunch of people (i didnt process the 1 in the title) struggle to make a game while there is purposefully bad communication methods somehow, but then i looked at the comments and saw the text at the start and i can tell this mustve been very snusk for everyone involved so hopefully they all got Something positive out of it
I remember I used to watch old Blackthornprod videos 5 years ago. Always thought it was just a guy passionately sharing his gamedev and art experiences. He even responded to my very much "I'm a 14yo child on youtube" comments, which was nice. I then recently re-discovered their channel once the pass the game thing started, and was met with what I can only describe as "business faces" telling me about their cool program that will make you successful and fulfill your dreams (limited time offer of course). I couldn't help but be reminded of those pseudo self-improvement coaches on twitter. Something about the facial expressions, business attitude and the ways in which they shill their products. Shame really. Always loved the art style, but something about them just feels... corporate (despite the lack of organizing skills)? Hate to use that buzzword but it kept popping into my mind while watching them.
Jesus christ. I checked blackthornprod's channel. Between October 11th and the day this video released, they have published 15 videos with *122* devs. There are probably people who worked in multiple videos, so the number of unique devs is probably lower, but still. This isnt in their defence, its an indictment. They have too many irons in the fire, and overextended themselves trying to produce more Content. There's no way the way they treated you was unique, or even uncommon.
I legit could always tell that there was something off about BlackThorn videos. The way they present themselves was always weird and it always felt super unprofessional and random. They probably always wear suits out of insecurity for how unprofessional they actually are lol. Glad to see people standing up to them. They're just using people for free labor and shilling out on their own "gamedev" course and sponsors. I doubt the course is any good, even their published games are terrible.
I cant believe this happened, I used to binge watch BTP videos and always wondered how much the devs were paid for their efforts. Exposure?? And not even THAT sometimes?? I'm out lmao great vid keep it up
I used to follow blackthornprod years ago but since the no-communication collaborations started I've seen maaany people arguing how they're not what you'd call good people. At last, a video that confirms this and makes me feel perfectly fine with unfollowing them.
HEY YOU'RE THE GUY WITH THE ENEMY SWAPPING GAME I got your first vid on the subject ages back and never saw you in my feed again. AND WHOA IT LOOKS GREAT
The sprites realy look like it been done by theflufypotato i think it him becuse he worked with blackthornprod before he works with godot and the art just look so much like his
I watched this video when it released and I was too shocked to comment. Coming back to it again after 12 hours, I still think BlackThornProd’s behaviour was unacceptable. Hopefully the news gets out there and people with larger audiences start addressing it. Nonetheless, it’s good to get another Andrew Cunningham upload, keep up the good work!
The devlogs in this video are a remaster after blackthorn told them to remove the unity joke about their falling stock prices because it would "upset their unity contacts"
Ok wow! I barely ever upload, but i did manage to get a spot in one of the challenges. I sent them the files and the devlog. Everything sounded great. Then radio-silence. Nothing ever got uploaded. I reached out once but never heard back. That was back in May of last year. I assumed that maybe it was an exception because it seemed like it was an experiment of letting people enter that aren't necessarily youtubers with established viewership. But nope.. Seems like they just toy with people
Imagine you are Directing a high budget film, you spend 3 whole years getting the sets and actors necessary, your team puts their sweat and tears on the script, making sure to make it stand out and overcome the rest, and when you reach the month of the release... The marketing guy comes up to you and says "Yeah no, horror isn't doing well this season, can you change the genre to Comedy/Fantasy? Thank you" THAT'S how this situation feels
Awn man, it sucks that that you and Toby got bamboozled like that. In two weeks a player character in Stardew could already be married, or in other, a big amount of time just for exposure that didn't happened. I agree that it was funny at the very least. It's interesting to see the creativity on both of you come through in a game log like this, at the very least. Especially liked spinning the slime, seeing it gives comparable levels of dopamine that those Tiktok's making actual slimes give, but without reducing my attention span in the process (I also never watched those Tiktok's of slime). Good luck on RAM!
Just saw my avatar pop up at the beginning and panicked this was about the video I took part in 😅 I was quite lucky in that the video got released but in terms of exposure I saw no gains for my channel from it!
Ngl, I'm starting to suspect that disorganization and poor communication is a rather universal theme amongst RU-vidrs. I've done some animation work for a large RU-vid channel and it was pretty clear that their "organization" was chaos and changing plans constantly. But at least I was paid for what they published.
Here's some fun stats on the pass the game/multiple developer style videos after adding everything up: Total views: 22.231 million Total content length: 9hrs 28 mins Total visible payout to developers payout: $13,000 Obviously they take part in some of the videos themselves but its still crazy that the majority of the work other devs were doing was for free...
