Illuvium: The World's First 'AAA' Crypto Video Game

I've reviewed Illuvium once before, over a year ago. At the time, the game was in a closed invite-only "beta", which was really more like an alpha. The game was a flashy but unsubstantial tech demo that seemed to be a thoughtless attempt to cash in on the "auto chess" hype, two years past the genre's prime. Their biggest selling point was the promised "interoperability" between the company's 3 games, but at the time, only one and a half were playable.

We're approaching year 4 of Illuvium, and all 3 of the games are now playable in an open beta state. I'd typically give them a bit of leeway with that label, but due to their extreme monetization, I feel that leniency is unwarranted.

A budget nearing $60 million, a team of nearly 200 employees, and a whole lot of disappointed fans; this isn't the Illuvium we were promised, but it's the one we got.
#illuvium #crypto #gaming

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Chapters:

0:00 Introduction
1:21 What is Illuvium?
3:47 Illuvium: Overworld
20:13 Illuvium: Arena
23:31 Illuvium: Zero
24:33 The Final Boss of Crypto Games
26:20 A Second Opinion
30:28 Who's paying for this?
42:17 Special Thanks

All views and opinions expressed in this video are solely my own and do not reflect the views or opinions of anyone else. All game footage and information is used for the purpose of review and commentary, and falls under the fair use doctrine. Video game reviews are subjective, and what I don't like, you might love. These videos are not intended to defame or harass anyone, nor are they made with any malicious intent. They are simply intended to provide entertainment. All information presented is based on my own research and understanding, and as such, there is always a chance I got something wrong. Always make sure to form an opinion of your own based on your own experience and research.

Do what you want with your money, and if you enjoy the games, feel free to support the creators!

[RavioliGuacamoli]

I worked on Illuvium, here's some info that can help understand the absolute state of this... thing.
(I obviously created a new account lol)
To understand this (bad) game you need to understand that the 3 Warwick brothers have a massively inflated ego. Like massively massively. I think they genuinely believe that they can pull it off, and make the first game(s) in history, even if they have no prior knowledge on how to do a very simple game. Grant was posing as a mystery developer who invented a groundbreaking shader on the dev workspace. Kieran often talked about the inevitable Netflix documentary that would be produced about Illuvium. Aaron really think he has written the next Star Wars but like, better. They really really see themselves as geniuses, busy inventing the future of video-games.
This leads to obvious problems, like Grant leaving the game because his massive ego conflicted with Kieran's. Apparently, the two brothers hate each other's guts. It seems that having spicy unsolved family issues doesn't help making a bazillion dollars project. Who could have guessed ?
Other consequences range from firing a whole part of the team on a whim, changing core gameplay elements after Palworld released (lol that was something to witness), a lack of vision, etc. More importantly, this led them to overlook the ideas of the people they hire. IMHO this is the main reason the game is in this state. Why would they listen to anyone ? They are geniuses !
On one side, the devs do not have any incentive to criticize the bosses' shitty ideas. They are well compensated, and for a lot of them, Illuvium has been a shelter from the many layoffs that happened in the game industry over the recent years. Getting into an argument with one of the brothers could lead to a layoff so the devs shut up, and implement whatever stupid idea comes out of the brain of these millionaire manchilds. The paradox is that a lot of devs are actually very good at what they do.
That's why the game is neon-purple (Grant's idea), that's why there is three games instead of just one (iirc, Kieran wanted a NFT thing first, Aaron wanted to make his own TFT, and Grant wanted an openworld RPG), that's why it drains that crazy amount of money : no vision, no experience, every competent dev is too busy playing the Emperor new clothes make-believe. (To be honest, some of them do believe the Warwick's bullshit. )
I really really think that the brothers are the main consequence of this disaster. With that crazy amount of money, you really need to be amazingly bad, amazingly unqualified to make that poor excuse of a game.
But the devs have their salaries and the Warwick brothers will end up richer than they were in the first place. Everybody wins... except, of course, the poor people who genuinely believed that it would be a sound investment.

And you know what ? It probably won't stop there. They are very very good at getting funds from investors. The company is in Dubai now, and there's probably a few corporate suckers who will fall for it. They might pour a few more millions into the development of this glorified slot machine. But one thing is sure : it will never be a good game.

[chair]

Anybody who says this game is fire is referring to the fire it starts as it mines bitcoin on their setup.

[Boomer]

I like how the grass renders about 3 feet around your character, it almost looks like a game mechanic or something that should have a lore reason for it. "Everywhere you walk, as your feet touch the ground it inspires blades of grass to spontaneously emerge from the otherwise flat green texture of ground".

Edit: Apprently, some people don't realize this comment was made sarcstically. I don't in fact like that the engine is incapable of rendering grass further than 3 feet away.

[QuintusCunctator]

The last point about the Illuvium player base trying to find ways to convince other players joining in the "fun" to recoup some of their losses should be eye-opening. It's multi-level marketing with a new coat of paint: the founders are the only ones netting a gain, all the others are left scrambling for breadcrumbs. It's a dog-eats-dog proposition, and as you've well explained, a zero-sum game.
Of course, thanks for the video, Jauwn! As always, much appreciated.

[PijanTheDrunk]

Dailys are usually a thing to extend the replayability of game you've finished. Having them be the main thing to do after finishing a tutorial is pretty funny.

[RealHarveyStardew]

Free to Play games MUST be enjoyable for a non paying audience. That's not just an ethical statement, it's good business. You simply cannot build a sustainable business in the free to play market if you expect the median player to pay $30 a month in order to get the "full experience" of your main product.
That, coupled with the fact that 99% of gamers can't even run the game because of overdone graphics and poor optimization tells me that these guys have no business getting millions in funding. They don't know the basics of operating a business in the games industry

[pikmin_]

"This cost $60, 000, 000 to make" more like they spent $50 to make the game then pocketed the rest

[Cuestrupaster]

"I've never played a crypto game before, but if they're all like this I don't want ever play them anymore..."
~No no no, you don't understand... they aren't all like this one... this is the best one of them all...

[philbecker]

My favourite marketing tactic so far has to be "hey we are the first game in this category... that we invented... and put ourselves in."

[littleroott]

“finally! a game for people without glasses!” had me cackling. loved the brother feature

[TewgyTaylor]

Quite frankly the second opinion section was a stroke of genius. Seeing someone's first exposure to crypto games is not only funny, but also shows the fundamental flaw of these types of games; they just don't actually appeal to anyone who isn't a bag holder.

[Rynobii]

The genre change is like picking up the revolver at the beginning of ultrakill and instantly starting a chess match

[spookysugar]

The fact that both of them, completely unprompted and without previous communication, came up with thicc oompa loompa absolute units

[neutralnarwhal]

Why would I try any of these "play-to-earn" "games" when TF2's hat-based economy is right there?

[punishedbung]

60 million dollars is an obscene amount of money. That’s 1, 563 Hollow Knights. That’s 131 Nine Sols. That’s 3, 638 Lisa the Painfuls. That’s 1, 173 Undertales. That’s 150 Omoris. That’s 192 Shovel Knights. I can go on.

[lasennui]

Please rope your brother into more of these in the future. His "wtf is happening" laughter was so infectious XD

[CheesyX]

The fact that they use the Unreal Engine default font on some signs (which takes seconds to change) and that they use the cheapest "Advanced Locomotion System" from Epics Store to move their characters in a game that "supposedly" cost 60.000.000 bucks to make, says everything about the game. Thats not even considering that this looks like an old unity engine school project while running in Unreal Engine 5.

Also i dare to say it but most of the ground clutter in the overworld and the cliff meshes look like they are straight ripped out from Fortnite. The grass, the flowers, the water, the cliffs, waaay too much stuff looks exactly like Fortnite and these are coincidentially the only parts of the game that look somewhat presentable. This would also explain the bad optimization in this game because it's assets are most likely just thrown together randomly. Even the fact that the grass grows mere meters in front of you is just laughable. UE5 can render grass for miles and with millions of foliage instances with little performance loss (if done correctly of course). Someone should really nvestigate if this is not a massive asset flip of a bunch of stolen/ripped assets.

I develop in UE4 and UE5 for many years now and i can pretty much tell from even a still image what goes on behind the scenes and this looks all like stolen and hastily thrown together artwork from other places. Nothing is coherent and nothing looks like it belongs in this game or in it's world.
The character skeletons don't even line up with the animations from the cheap Advanced Locomotion System as they have just been retargeted to a different skeleton without any care in the world (this is the reason why the animations look so goofy, because they were meant for the default UE5 mannequin skeleton). The lip-syncs are off because they are pre-canned animations for sure. I can almost certainly assure you that they don't have the technical knowledge to setup their face rigs correctly to use UE5's face animation systems.

The only thing in that game that really cost any kind of money is the CG cutscenes and the server infrastructure. Considering the quality of whats on display here, the rest of the game cost probably more around like 500k-1m if even that (because given what trash heap this game is in its beta state, this is a very generous assumption).

[caseyhurlburt]

You are one of those creators you come along and binge their entire catalog in 3 days and then just hate yourself for not making it last longer.. I wish you had like 200 more videos.. I would watch them all.

[DGladiator]

The plan was probably never to release a real game. The “founders” and investors made a big profit 3 years ago, cashed out and are now are now trying to avoid legal problems by somehow developing the thing further. The poor artists and developers working on the game are certainly spread all over the globe, from India to Venezuela, trying to coordinate in weekly meetings, always with the fear of not getting paid at the end of the month. I can imagine that some of the monthly expenses go straight into the pockets of the management team. We all know that filling up your Aston Martin is not cheap.

[yaboye]

Here before the cryptobros and thier incessent insistence that thier preffered scam is actually a legit investment opportunity