The ongoing boycott of video games that have been developed by consultancy group Sweet Baby Inc. appears to have crushed the sales of Surgent Studios’ Tales of Kenzera: ZAU.
Screenshot from Tales of Kenzera: ZAU (2024), Surgent Studios
The game released on Steam earlier this week and according to SteamDB peaked with 287 concurrent players on the day of release. In the two days since, the peak concurrent has already declined to 211.
SteamDB data for Tales of Kenzera: ZAU (2024), Surgent Studios
Not only has the game only achieved a peak concurrent of 287, but SteamDB also notes that game has only sold between 930 and 4,700 copies albeit it notes the “Game released recently, estimations [for sales data] take days to accumulate.”
SteamDB data for Tales of Kenzera: ZAU (2024), Surgent Studios
Not only does the game appear to have poor sales, but social media analyst MastersoftheTDS alleges that the game is using bots “potentially to run damage control for the game.”
He adds, “Many of the accounts mention Surgent Studios, which was founded by Abubakar Salim, who has significant ties to Sweet Baby Inc. directly.”
With the release of Tales of Kenzera: ZAU on April 23rd, 2024, a game known to have been worked on by SBI, it’s not surprising that discussion of the game was met with controversy online.
What also isn’t surprising is that a combination of blue checkmark and non-blue checkmark… pic.twitter.com/HRub2psC8d
— MasteroftheTDS (@MasteroftheTDS) April 25, 2024
As noted above, the game is part of the Sweet Baby Inc. boycott. It was added by Brazilian gamer KabrutusRambo’s Sweet Baby Inc. detected Steam Curator list given the consultancy company announced it worked on the game in its January newsletter.
The company wrote, “Our friends at Surgent Studios dropped the trailer for their upcoming action-adventure platformer, Tales of Kenzera: ZAU. We had the utmost pleasure of working with Abubakar Salim and the Surgent team on this poignant story, which has been heavily inspired and influenced by Bantu mythology. We know you’re gonna love it as much as we do.”
“In Tales of Kenzera: ZAU, join Zau as he journeys through the world of Kenzera to get his Baba back, joined by an unlikely companion: the God of Death,” the company added.
Screenshot from Tales of Kenzera: ZAU (2024), Surgent Studios
On top of Sweet Baby Inc. confirming it worked on the game, former World of Warcraft team lead Mark Kern revealed that the game’s main creator Abubakar Salim previously worked with Sweet Baby Inc. cofounders Kim Belair and David Bedard as well as Sweet Baby Inc. employee and Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League Script Coordinator Amy-Leigh Shaw for a “ready-made interactive leisure and entertainment software development” company called Bebe Sucre LTD.
Kern shared on X, “ZAU creator, Abubakar Salim, is actually an SBI INSIDER! The REAL reason that ZAU worked with Sweet Baby Inc, is because Abubakar Salim co-directed a company “BEBE Sucre” (Secret Baby) with the FOUNDERS of SBI, Kim Belair and David Bedard, and SBI writer Amy-Leigh Shaw.”
“Tales of Kenzera: ZAU isn’t just a detected game, it might as well be a direct Sweet Baby Inc. game,” he declared.
The Narrative fix is IN. @MightyKeef puts @kabrutusrambo on blast for Sweet Baby Inc. game ZAU.
Claims he and critics are just RACISTS. And that ZAU was made by a Kenyan man who just wanted to promote his culture.
But ZAU creator, Abubakar Salim, is actually an SBI INSIDER!… pic.twitter.com/VK93CXQmuC
— Grummz (@Grummz) April 25, 2024
Interestingly, after Sweet Baby Inc. employees Chris Kindred and Maya Kramer attempted to cancel KabrutusRambo and shut down the Steam curator list, Abubakar was terminated as a director of Bebe Sucre LTD. A UK filing history of the company shows Abubakar was terminated as a director of the company on March 12, 2024 at the height of the backlash against Sweet Baby Inc.
It’s quite possible he was attempting to distance himself from Sweet Baby Inc. in order to prevent his game from being boycotted.
A screenshot of Bebe Sucre LTD’s filing history
What do you make of the concurrent players and lack of sales for Sweet Baby Inc. influenced Tales of Kenzera: ZAU?
I was cool with this game up until finding out that the developer did not merely hire SBI, but he ran a company with them. Unacceptable.
And they tried to be sneaky about it, too! Ridiculous.
Sucre means “sweet”, not “secret”. Bebe Sucre is just “Sweet Baby” in Spanish.
Good to see you over on this site now Chief.
What’s most unfortunate about this is that I watched someone do a playthrough and review of the game, and to be honest, the game itself looked pretty decent. And from what narrative stuff that was displayed initially, nothing seemed to raise any red flags. It looks like a decently executed metroidvania title.
But even if it’s an original story, filling the gap that has been decried for so long about there being a lack of black creators in the gaming space – I don’t care if you’re if you’re the second coming of Martin Luther King Jr. – if you decide to involve Sweet Baby Inc, or the growing number of other DEI-motivated consultancy firms that are being identified, then you’ve immediately put a stop to me even considering buying your game.
That’s the thing. We mostly wanted our hobbies left alone. You want to make a game that appeals to certain demographics or features characters that look a specific way? That’s fine. But don’t try to tear down what has already been built up already. When you do, you start forcing people to pick sides and there are consequences for that. Never mind that you need to deal with the fact that nobody owes you a purchase of your game, no matter how good or well intentioned it is.
I have always been 100% supportive of stories centred on different mythos or with different demos BUT not anymore. As Western Male culture is cancelled on purpose, I am not supporting anything (games, movies etc.) with a whiff of woke… yes, only past games/movies/series for me or even better going out. Believe me it works. Try it – Sopranos, Breaking Bad, etc.. you see the difference with current garbage! PS: I made only one exception because the product was very good and it was an original story (Arcane) and even then not giving money to Netshit ;-)