The 2024 Game Awards crowned Astro Bot as GOTY instead of Black Myth: Wukong. Now, the loyal Chinese players have decided to jump on Steam and review bomb Baldur’s Gate 3. The move is likely caused by the head of Larian Studios Sven Vincke’s pre-award speech, which some view as a criticism toward Game Science. During the event, the man denounced the popular trend of companies focusing on creating games just for profit and not for fun and passion, and some Chinese fans have taken offense to that.
If you visit Baldur’s Gate 3‘s Steam page and look through the recent negative reviews, you will see review bombs left by Chinese players. Besides being disappointed that Black Myth: Wukong failed to become GOTY, some fans claimed that Vincke’s speech was hypocritical. After all, the game that beat Black Myth: Wukong was Astro Bot, which was made by Sony, a company many believe to be quite greedy.
One player commented that since Vincke didn’t care about sales, he shouldn’t mind receiving negative reviews. Another said that the company should stop promoting their games if they didn’t care about sales. A handful even proclaimed that they would no longer support Larian Studio after hearing the speech. These came from players who claimed to have purchased the Early Access of Baldur’s Gate 3.
Besides the lengthy reviews, there are also common spam messages in which review bombers claim that Baldur’s Gate 3 isn’t as good as Astro Bot. Many review bombs also merely mention that sales don’t matter. There are even those who directly criticize Vincke’s speech, calling his words arrogant and offensive.
It’s unclear why Chinese players feel Vincke’s words directly criticize Black Myth: Wukong and Game Science. Perhaps they believe that since the Chinese game didn’t win, the man indirectly said it was not made with passion. Some may also feel like the man doesn’t have the right to say those words since Baldur’s Gate 3 is extremely successful and has a high sale. Ultimately, the review bombs are an emotional backlash from Chinese fans who are angry or disappointed that Black Myth: Wukong failed to win.
Thankfully, despite the review bombs, the overall ratings of Baldur’s Gate 3 remain overwhelmingly positive. It should also be noted that the Chinese players who left these reviews have amassed decent playtime on this game. They seem to range between 50 hours to several hundred hours. So, the people who expressed their disappointment seemed to quite enjoy the game before they took offense to Vincke’s speech.
