Operation Caucasus developer Dream Games has given out tons of early access keys for their shooter. But when this player asked for one, sporting a colorful avatar signaling support for LGBT rights, the developer responded with a simple message: “We’re not support lgbt. Please, just f**k you.”
This exchange was posted as part of a negative review for Operation Caucasus on Steam yesterday. (You need to own the game to post a review, but since the game hasn’t officially launched, the player nabbed a key from a friend who managed to get one from the developer, through a Facebook giveaway. That friend didn’t have a rainbow-themed avatar, obviously.)
“If you also think that the developer[’s] homophobia must be clear to all,” wrote ||B.r.|| niveadc, “please check this review as helpful, to stay on top. thanks.”
Dream Games did not respond to my request for comment, but the player received a bunch of support in the comments of their review.
“Games are for all,” they said. “The pleasure of playing a game should not be restricted to people who are not gay, black, women, or any other group that suffers prejudice. And it is important that developers know this and respect the differences.”
Instead of walking their comment back, knowing something like this could easily spread much further than a comment thread, they doubled down.
Update (8:36pm): The company has since apologized via Facebook. Full statement at the end of this article.
“We’ll never support ‘lgbt,” said a developer writing under and official Dream Games account. “We’re not a toy. This is our freewill.”
“We don’t need their and your money if you’re/they’re from ‘lgbt,’” the developer continued. “You don’t liked our this decide? You can flag this game. This is your freewill. And this decide [sic], our freewill.”
The developer kept writing, but it’s not worth sharing. It’s all garbage.
A bigger problem for Dream Games may be that Operation Caucasus doesn’t seem like a good game. Take a look:
This is actually the second time Dream Games has launched Operation Caucasus on Steam. The first time, it appeared as a full-priced game in late March for $9, despite the game proclaiming it was actually a “demo.”
A few days after launch, according to Steam DB, the price dropped to $1. The game was mysteriously removed from Steam; selling a demo as a full game is not exactly truth in advertising, whether it’s for $9 or $1.
In a post on Steam, the developers claimed this was all an accident.
“There was a button in Steam page,” the post reads. “It was ‘Share full project’. And our editor’ve [sic] pressed it. He said, ‘i tried to cancel, but it shared on Steam.(9.99$). After a few days we’ve set the demo price 0.99$ because, we couldn’t hide it. And, you know, it was our first experience. We were newly acquainting with Steam, and we saw there is a group for developers on Steam. We’ve wrote a message to them. And they helped us.”
Dream Games then announced the project had been postponed because “development is a lot of hard work.” It was now coming in early May. The official launch came a little later, on May 26, with the game adopting a seasonal model. That’s when Dream Games started giving away keys.
None of this explains why a developer would tell a player to “f**k off,” let alone for the crime of supporting LGBT rights through a Facebook picture.
2016! What a year for video games.
UPDATE: The company has since apologized via Facebook:
“At Dream Games we feel very sorry about current situation,” the company said in a statement. “We have fired both editor and managing director from team. We will make sure situations like this will never happen in the future.”