A Community Strategist for Daedalic Entertainment, the publisher of Spitfire Interactive’s Capes, revealed the company will no longer work with Sweet Baby Inc. in the future. However, he also accused gamers of trying to harm Spitfire Interactive by opposing the agenda of Sweet Baby Inc.
A screenshot from Capes (2024), Spitfire Interactive
It was brought to public attention that Spitfire Interactive and Daedalic Entertainment worked with Sweet Baby Inc. for Capes in the game’s end credits. The credits were showcased in a gameplay walkthrough video on ChristopherOdd’s channel. It revealed that Sweet Baby Inc. co-founded David Bedard and Chris Kindred along with 10 others from Sweet Baby Inc. worked on the game.
Credits for Capes (2024), Spitfire Interactive
Given Sweet Baby Inc. was listed in the game’s credits, Sweet Baby Inc. detected Steam curator list founder KabrutusRambo added the game to the Steam curator list as well as his DEI Detected website.
He wrote on X, “Sup guys, I bring a new Sweet Baby Inc. game for y’all.”
— Kabrutus (@kabrutusrambo) August 1, 2024
Penta, the Community Strategist for Daedelic Entertainment, initially reacted to the game being added to the curator lists writing on the game’s Steam forums, “We already had 3 months and 14 pages of constructive discussion about “DEI” in the forum and delivered a gameplay update focussing on exactly what the playerbase wanted – leading to ~80% positive recent reviews.”
He continued, “You don’t have to take my word for it, you can actually read up on it yourselves (https://steamcommunity.com/app/2081080/discussions/0/4328601129273437389/) , but we were already able to explain that SBI only worked briefly, mainly to bring the 4-5 people strong Indie-Dev team in contact with fitting Voice Actors, together with the Devs (2+ years ago) and many first sceptical players were able to find out that there is no hidden agenda or somethig else we “force down your throats” or other concerns they had – besides a well-rounded, diverse cast, obviously.”
Penta then concluded, “So why don’t we just focus on the most important question, that the OP was mentioning already? Is Capes fun? And this is exactly why I brought up the positive reactions towards our most recent update – we think you would enjoy it, if you gave it a chance.”
Daedalic Entertainment Community Strategist Penta on Steam
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However, this explanation did not seem to hold water as a number of recent reviews and the most recommended ones were negative, and nowhere near 80% positive. In fact, only 56% of the 32 reviews posted in the last 30 days are positive. The voice acting was also heavily criticized.
A screenshot of Capes’ Steam storefront page
Now, in a post titled “Conclusive Statement about SBI,” Penta explained why there are 12 Sweet Baby Inc. employees listed in the credits if all Sweet Baby Inc. did was act as an intermediary to find voice talent.
He said, “It is an industry norm, that if you contract a company, you credit the whole company, or at least, that they tell you who they want listed in your credits. If we really would have wanted to ‘hide’ something, we wouldnt have put SBI into the credits at all nor would we have been already talking in the steam forums about it during the last 3 months after release.”
He then indicated that Daedalic will no longer work with Sweet Baby Inc. moving forward, “The Devs collaborated with SBI in early 2022. We are aware of the statements being done by individuals connected to SBI in the years to come – but in 2022 there was no sign of that – it is likely that the decision would have been a different one in 2024.”
A screenshot from Capes (2024), Spitfire Interactive
Finally, he admitted that regardless of Sweet Baby Inc.’s involvement the company is committed to inclusivity and equality. He wrote, “As a company bringing games to an international audience, we take the term inclusivity and equality literal. We don’t condone hate towards any type of group. This includes – among POC, LGBTQ+ and others – white male gamers, aswell.”
“It is sad that we have to actually word it out – it should be a given – we are ALL gamers, no matter who we are. If a diverse cast of heroes makes you not want to play Capes, thats your decision – but we are surely not ‘the enemy’ – at least we don’t see ‘you’ as one for making this decision.”
“But at the moment some – not all – of you are actively trying to harm a small indie Dev Studio – to teach them a lesson, that they never really needed to learn,” he concluded.
Daedalic Entertainment Community Strategist Penta on Steam
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Steam user Hellsmoke77 puts it succinctly, “Nobody is actively trying to harm anyone, we are voicing our opinions as potential customers. We’re the ones they are trying to sell a product to and we have to watch one product after another being ruined for the sake of ‘diversity and inclusion’. We have to listen to people like SBI and all types of ‘game journalists’ insult us and gaslight us” for “rejecting their political slop and they openly brag about it being just that. I’m not going to link to Larry Fink or Kim Belair saying it outright, we’ve all seen it.”
He continued, “We are past the point of feigning ignorance, it’s clearly malice now. You don’t get to insult your customer base time and time again, and expect them to continue buying and playing your products. And it’s not this small team of developers that are at fault, we know this. It’s the higher ups that are making the decisions who are to blame and they do indeed need to be taught a lesson and that lesson is that the customer is king.”
A screenshot from Capes (2024), Spitfire Interactive
“There is no ‘modern audience’ looking for the ‘well rounded diverse cast’ that you see in every movie, every show and increasingly in every game these days,” he added. “It’s boring, it’s played out, it’s not natural and we all know it’s political.”
“The time has come for the industry to decide whether it wants to make good games or push their politics,” Hellsmoke77 asserted. “They’re free to do either of course but if they want to earn money, politics is clearly not the way to go. That’s not what people are here for, at least not the vast majority. I’m sorry these devs have to suffer in order for us to get this message across but it is what it is. That said, none of what I said should come as a surprise, we’ve been shouting it from the rooftops for years now and instead of reading the room, we get ‘mocked and alienated’ by this tiny group of loud mouthed activists that don’t buy your games in the end anyways. This is your ‘modern audience’ in a nutshell.
“Good luck to whatever you do in the future, I’m done in this forum. If anything, I hope this was at least a learning experience for all parties involved,” he concluded.
Hellsmoke77 on the Capes Steam forum
What do you make of Penta’s statement regarding Sweet Baby Inc.?
