Massive Monster, the studio behind indie hit Cult of the Lamb, has announced that it will be deleting the game on Steam despite its success. The reason for this is planned changes to Unity’s pricing policy.
What game is it about? In Cult of the Lamb you play a possessed lamb who rebels against the old gods and builds his own cult. The game combines elements of a roguelite with base building: you fight your way through various dungeons, continue to expand your sect with the resources you receive and take care of the needs of your cute followers.
Cult of the Lamb was released on August 11, 2022 and became a real cult hit. On Steam, it peaked at nearly 62,000 concurrent players and achieved 94% positive reviews overall – rising to 96% in the last 30 days (via SteamDB).
It was only in April that Cult of the Lamb received tons of new content with the free update “Relics of the Old Faith” (via GameStar). In August, a collaboration with indie darling Don’t Starve added a new game mode.
But if you still have the Steam hit on your wish list, you should hurry up: As the developers announced via X/Twitter, they want to delete their game on January 1, 2024.
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Developers urge people to buy their game quickly
Why do the developers want to delete their game? The announcement follows planned changes to Enginge Unity’s payment system. This is used by many developers to build their games. Starting in 2024, Unity plans to charge a fee for every installation of their games.
This represents a major challenge for indie developers like Massive Monster. Another post says:
Our team specializes in Unity games. So what are the implications for us? Well, we have future projects in the pipeline that were originally intended to be developed in Unity. This change would result in significant delays as our team would have to learn an entirely new skill set.
Massive Monster goes on to say that their mission is to support and promote new and emerging indie games. For aspiring developers, the introduction of these fees could be a huge obstacle.
It is unclear whether the developers actually want to implement their plan or just want to express their dissatisfaction. They are calling on players to buy their game quickly and are also making a demand to Unity: “Stop being stinky.”
For others, the decision to take a game off the market comes from completely different reasons: the developer takes its viral hit off Steam to find peace of mind