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Mewgenics devs make their budget back in 3 hours, celebrate with cat-shaped cake; The new game from The Binding of Isaac developers is already a success (www.polygon.com)

submitted 4 days ago by thelastaxolotl@hexbear.net to c/games@hexbear.net

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Mewgenics, the new release from Edmund McMillen and Tyler Glaiel, the indie devs behind hit roguelike The Binding of Isaac and all its subsequent expansions, smashed through 250,000 copies sold in just 12 hours.

In a tweet posted by Glaiel, he screenshotted a post from 2023 where he explained it would need to sell that much for him to "consider Mewgenics a success." Shortly before, IGN reported the game sold over 150,000 copies in six hours, and that McMillen's previous sales record came with The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth, at 40,000 in one day.

This came just a few hours after he revealed the team "made back their development budget after three hours," which given the game was first announced in 2012, is a huge accomplishment. That's a whopping 14 years, although it was put on hold in 2014, canceled in 2016, then picked back up again two years later

To celebrate, Glaiel posted a picture of both him and McMillen with a cat-shaped cake, while they each hold replica awards and wear gold medals. At the time of writing, Mewgenics peaked with a player count just a few shy of 66,000 on Steam, and it was the top-selling game on the platform yesterday.

It's also been received to critical acclaim, with a Metacritic score of 89 from 38 reviews. Polygon's Mewgenics review describes it as "a charmingly churlish game" that "players could likely get years of entertainment from," along with considering it "the first GOTY contender" for 2026.

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[–] purpleworm@hexbear.net 21 points 3 days ago (1 children)

It's very plainly not pro-eugenics, that's like saying "Capital" is a pro-capitalist text because it is named after capital. It's about the morbid instrumentalization of living creatures via selective breeding and such. The intro is very heavy-handed that the "Mewgenicist" is a sicko and a fool (albeit apparently pretty good at bio-engineering).

I agree that the neighbor comes across as distasteful, but also the guy explicitly has a wife, so I think the idea is that he's a straight sub who is just really into being pegged (or he might be bi).

[–] AntiOutsideAktion@hexbear.net 4 points 3 days ago (2 children)

It's very plainly not pro-eugenics, that's like saying "Capital" is a pro-capitalist text because it is named after capital.

Considering the newgrounds southpark style it's still possible it's more like saying "Monopoly" isn't pro-monopoly except despite that being true it's still how it's marketed, played, and understood. It may be a parody of eugenics but in the game world it works.

[–] ProgAimerGirl@hexbear.net 13 points 3 days ago

you reading 'newgrounds southpark style' as a sign of chuddery is the same faux pas as when chuds read 'calarts steven universe style' as a sign of wokeness.

i know this is a bit snipey, i'll apologize in advance. i've played edmund mcmillen's games for a long time, i understand the hesitation.

[–] purpleworm@hexbear.net 6 points 3 days ago (1 children)

The ideology of "Monopoly" is not conveyed by the title, only the subject matter, much like "Capital" and "Mewgenics." What I am saying is that the presented inference about the title is not even correctly judging the cover of the book, let alone use that judgement to understand the book itself.

Perhaps the point of juxtaposing a cutesy pun with an ideology that is widely regarded as deeply monstrous is a tip that the tone of the game is showing you a seriously awful setting in order to convey that the instrumentalization of domesticated animal populations, not just humans, is monstrous.

But also, we have much more textual evidence to work with than just the fact that that's the title of the game and the game is centered on a selective breeding mechanic. We don't need to just sit here and make guesses about the movie from looking at the poster.

It may be a parody of eugenics but in the game world it works.

Would you like to elaborate? Because you can breed cats in the real world too, but also in the game there are cleric cats who can do faith healing that actually works (and mage cats and necromancer cats). Is the game going to have the social impact of promoting faith healing (etc.)?

Also, do you notice how the claim drifted from if the author is a chud to some point about social impact?

[–] AntiOutsideAktion@hexbear.net 3 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I'm sorry to be all reddit but I'm just not going to read all that

I'm feeling a little like a lolcow right now so I'm just gonna say my immediate and vibes based reaction was probably wrong and I'm okay with that